Reclaim the Night returns to Wellington

Wellington Reclaim the Night 2009

Reclaim the Night is an international event putting the issue of women’s safety from male violence on the agenda for this night and every day.
We march to demand our right to be free from the fear or reality of rape, of sexual harassment, of domestic violence, of stalking.

In Aotearoa/New Zealand
􀁹1 in 3 women will experience physical or sexual violence from a partner in their life
􀁹99% of sexual violence incidents reported to the Police are perpetrated by men
􀁹95% of them on women
􀁹A woman is killed in a domestic violence incident every 3 ½weeks
􀁹92% of protection orders are taken out by women
􀁹1 in 3 women report sexual harassment in the workplace

This year the Wellington Reclaim the Night march addresses:
“The culture of violence towards women”
and is focused around being safe in our city;
in our homes,
at work,
while out exercising or walking,
going clubbing or out for a drink with our friends

When: Friday the 27th of November, 6.00pm

Where:
Assemble at the front of the Wellington Railway Station for speakers including Labour’s Lynn Pillay on the changes to ACC for sexual violence survivors
Performance by the Real Hot Bitches (tbc)

Who: All self-defined women and their children

After party:
Ivy, Dixon Street from 8pm with performances from…
Edwardene Tanaki, Tyree Robertson
Mahinarangi Maika, Rachael Wright
Freya Eng, Palace This!
And others…

Let’s celebrate being safe in our city
Questions, comments?
www.reclaimthenight.blogspot.com
vuwsa.womens.group@gmail…com

 

Neo-pagan Winter Solstice

I had the pleasure of attending two distinctly different Solstice celebrations this weekend, both involving food, fire and friends, one private & incorporating birthdays as well, and one very public.

I’ll review the public one, as it covers a few aspects of life dear to my heart.

There’s a fantastic group of people called the Phoenix Astronomical Society, who grew out of staff of the now-defunct Carter Observatory, where I was priviledged to work part-time a few years ago. They decided to set up a stone circle in the southern hemisphere, for the purposes of teaching star-lore to the inhabitants of Aotearoa/New Zealand, as well as visitors.

This is the now well-travelled locus of Solstice and Equinox festivals in New Zealand, and is a locus for Pagan groups (Druidic and Wiccan) from all over the North Island.
I’ve been invited many times, (including the historic Autumn Equinox of 2007, with the High Druid of Britain, Phillip Carr-Gomm, in attendance) but for one reason or another not made the trek – so this time, I thought I’d have a go.
There was a bus from Wellington, a dinner afterwards in Carterton, how hard could it be?

Having been advised to ‘rug up warm’, I layered on as much merino clothing as I could find, under my woolen dress, and got off the bus to find a damp afternoon in the Wairarapa, clouds threatening more rain; and a lot of people in cloaks of many colours under umbrellas, being watched by an even bigger crowd of sensibly dressed locals who’d come to observe the pagans. This was going to be interesting!

I joined with my hosts, members of the Grove of the Summer Stars of Wellington, and was duly offered a citronella torch to bear for the procession. Suitably equipped, I followed our leader and processed to the Henge, circling widdershins once before we entered the Henge to ‘hold’ the Southern placement during the ritual. There was an ‘order of service’, celebrants had parts scripted to play, and a flow of serious proclamations of our commitment to peace and care of the earth followed. I didn’t take as many photo’s as I thought I would, as I became caught up in the meaning of the ceremony.
(For a better explanation than I’m fit to give, see the Woolshed, home of the Grove.)

Grove of the Summer Stars banner

The ceremony began around 4.30pm, and continued through the dusk to true solstice about 6pm, when despite the overcast sky and inability to actually see the sun set directly over the sunstone, there was a very eery sense of power having been raised and then released in the course of the ritual.

Closing ritual - Druids Pamela and Tom

As this photo shows, it was quite dark and cold at the end!

Afterwards, we all piled back into the bus & various cars, and headed back to Carterton, where a dinner for about 200 pagans and sympathisers was held at the RSA. After-dinner entertainment came from Richard Hall, one of the Henge creators, who gave a sound presentation about the origins of modern pagan practice, assisted by Pamela from Wellington and Chris from Auckland.
This has to be the best midwinter feast I’ve ever attended, and I’ll certainly sign up for the next one.

Happy Solstice, everyone, and let’s look forward to longer days now that the longest night has passed. Maybe we’ll even see more sunshine than the fitful streaks going past my window today!
More info (and better pictures) about the Henge here.

 

J-day, 2009

After a week of rainy, blustery weather, J-day 2009 dawned fair, and the members of NORML who have been organising the event for a coupla months breathed a huge sigh of relief. Tents were raised, PA’s set in series, and the music and good times began to flow at around high noon on the 2nd May at Frank Kitts’ Park, Wellington, as well as at other venues around the country.

Banner with slightly out-of-date details ...

DJ’s Thief and Funkdamunk entertained the relaxed and cheerful crowd, who also created some of their own entertainment with juggling, poi twirlers and hacky sack being in evidence. The amphitheatre of the park was well filled by mid-afternoon, and despite the sky clouding over and the wind increasing slightly, there was a good crowd for the 4.20 smoke up.

Norml are making an attempt to get some more action on changing the legislation around marijuana possession, specifically in terms of the Misuse of Drugs Act, with the support of MP’s Tim Barnett, Meteria Turei, and former MP Nandor Tancos.

For more information about the campaign, see their website here.

 

Supersizemypay 2.0

On Friday, I went to a cheery Campaign launch in Wellington for the latest Unite! minimum wage increase call – to raise the minimum to $15/hour.

We gathered at the Southern Cross in Abel Smith St, to be welcomed by Don Franks MC-ing, and a warm-up performance by the Union Choir, who sang stirringly and melodically.

Union Choir at Unite! Campaign launch

There were a few more speeches after the intro, then a time of social chitchat and networking was enjoyed by all.

Details of the new campaign can be found at Unite! website.

 

Students as workers Week Panel with Unionists at VUW

Despite the rainy night and the presence of a significant crowd in the Bar on campus, a good turnout showed to the panel discussion organised by Vuwsa and NZUSA on the topic of “The importance of students being collectively organised when the global economy carks it”.

Sue B, Peter Conway, Andrew Little speaking, Jordan King, MC.

The panel comprised Jordan King of NZUSA, MC-ing, with Sue Bradford MP, Green party spokesperson on employment and union issues; Andrew Little, President of the Labour Party and National Secretary of the EPMU; and Peter Conway, Secretary of the CTU.

Each speaker in turn gave some insights into their years as students – Sue in the 60’s & early 70’s at Auckland Uni, then again in the 80’s doing her MA, was involved in some of the great student activism efforts, against Vietnam War, Springbok Tours, and Anti-nuclear demos; Andrew and Peter were both at VUW, Andrew as President of Vuwsa for some of his time, Peter admitting to involvement in campus Folk Music and Communist clubs (…a heady combination!)

All three stressed the changes they’d seen, for the worse, in the amount of time students have to engage in clubs and politics on campus, due to the onerous requirements of work necessary to keep fed and housed, since the removal of universal student bursaries when the student loan scheme came into force in the early 90’s.

There was a lot of general discussion about the impact of the recession – which Sue B likened to a ‘phony war’ over the last 18 months to two years – which may this year begin to be felt by students, as job retrenchment begins to hit families who have been supporting their children at university, and as part-time positions dry up in the workplaces traditionally supplying casualised jobs to students.

Whereas factories and industrial sites have been gradually laying off workers as demand for consumption has eased over the past year, which has seen many unions negotiating better terms for staff, student jobs haven’t been as much affected yet; although the VC’s committees and TEC have been bracing for a roll-on effect as redundant employees register for tertiary education, to make the best of a shrinking job market by taking the opportunity to upskill during the downturn – a pattern of behaviour that is repeating the experiences of workers made redundant around the time of the ‘87 crash; to which there are many parallels in the current recessionary period.

All of the speakers stressed that the Government needs to be made accountable for the quality of the decisions that are being made around where ‘recession relief’ spending is to be done, and questioning whether big ticket projects such as roading or buildings should be balanced by investment in upskilling workers via tertiary institution funding, with suggestions that 2009 may be our “Winter of Discontent”.

A short but lively discussion concluded the evening, which carried on for about half an hour longer than the event had been advertised, resulting in some time-pressed individuals leaving during the question time.

 

Trouble in Paradise

Ethnically diverse groups of Fijian residents are a concern for social justice activists, following reports of foreign journalists being expelled and censorship of local news in the Fiji Times, after the latest round of crackdowns by coup leader Voreqe Bainimarama. Social networking website sotiacentral.com was taken off the net, and while Fiji residents are still able to use MSN to contact relatives outside Fiji, communication is difficult.

Property and business owners in the main islands, who are not ethnically Melanesian Fijians, may be the next target for Bainimarama’s high-handed tactics. Questions should be asked about how New Zealand will support non-melanesian Fijian citizens, and ex-patriate residents, should the worst possible outcome happen. This is not even counting the possibilities of harm to any foreign tourists currently holidaying in the ‘Pacific Island paradise’.

Today’s Dominion Post editorial says what many have thought, but not voiced in the past four months since the coup – that Bainimarama has styled himself on Robert Mugabe, the arch-totalitarian of Zimbabwe, known now as a genocidal megalomaniac. Our New Zealand Defense Forces, who trained the Fiji Army leaders at Burnham Military Camp, must now take stock of what their protégée’s have done with the skills and tactics so learned.

 

Global Recession lecture by Dr Robert Costanza

Friday saw me whipping back into town to catch a conference-opening lecture by Dr Robert Costanza, from the Gund Institute of Ecological Economics at The University of Vermont, who is here in NZ on a secondment to the New Zealand Centre for Ecological Economics (NZCEE), based at Massey University’s home campus in Palmerston North.

After the requisite time spent on the pre-lecture refreshments and Green membership gossip, I found myself a seat in the auditorium of Rutherford House LT1, and waited for the rest of the SPC attendees to catch on and copy. Twiddle, twiddle, watching the crew setting up tech gear & checking the powerpoints were working; then finally, all 300 pre-allocated seats were filled, and the talks got underway.

First up, our Green Co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons greeted the assembled members, and thanked Dr Costanza and members of the NZCEE for coming to Wellington to make presentations on Ecological Economics. Then Dr Costanza made his presentation, which was stimulating and challenging; to the point where my notes became a list of publications to look up, and websites to browse later.

Links: the presentation is here,
which also gives the handy list of Dr Costanza’s published works, in far tidier format than my hasty notes.
The panel was then constructed of Jeanette, Bob, and members of the academic and research staff of NZCEE; Vicky Forgie, Marjan van der Belt, and Ida Kubiszewski. A quick overview of the work done by NZCEE was given, which can be viewed in greater depth here:
along with publications by the Centre here:
I’ll admit right now that some serious reading is going to happen in my home study time, to get myself up-to-date on this area – my last efforts at understanding economics were for a feminist-perspective paper, which looked at green economies as part of a holistic, sustainable economic policy development paradigm. What I heard certainly stimulated me to see the upside to the Global Recession, and to take heart from the Green New Deal economics that is being developed and applied in the USA, and many other administrations around the world at present.

Having made a decision some weeks ago not to attend the SPC held at Silverstream over the weekend, I wistfully set off home on another bus, as many old friends and fellow campaigners headed out for the conference opening dinner, charged up with enthusiasm for Green economic policies after this stimulating and enriching lecture and presentations.

Associated links:
The Encyclopedia of Earth
Friends of the commons See Capitalism 3.0, by Peter Barnes, available as a free download from this site – a guide to reclaiming the commons.

 

An open dig at the “intelligence services”

The Sunday Papers have had a field day, following up on the stories about Maire Leadbetter and Keith Locke’s SIS files, which have dribbled on in the DomPost at a relatively slow pace for the past couple of months, and the exposure of Rob Gilchrist which came out about six weeks ago.

Anthony Hubbard at the SST has made some good points here, and the story has been mirrored, with slight variations over at the Herald on Sunday.

In a comment on the post at Indymedia a week ago, I jokingly suggested that every activist in NZ should request their file, to clog up the SIS admin systems.
The folk at Oct15th Solidarity have followed up on that in their latest newsletter, which is downloadable from the website, providing the addresses for anyone to write in and demand, as is their right under NZ citizenship, to have any information kept on them released. Invoke the Official Information Act, if you so desire.

Given that so far, they are known to have targeted politicians, eco-activists, animal rights groups, peace activists, and I dare say, those whose names have been attatched to policy discussion documents or website fora; if everyone who thinks they might have been a subject of investigation writes in, they could be tied up answering the mail for some months.
Finally, a use of public money that is transparent and accountable …

 

Sustainable business, fashionably!

Yesterday’s Weekend DomPost had, in it’s glossy ‘your weekend’ section, a rather good article by Sharon Stephenson, about Laurie Foon of Starfish, a designer I’ve long been a fan of.
[My attempt to post the link has failed, as the stuff website seems to jealously guard the contents of the weekend magazine!]

During the last election campaign, her staff were unfailingly helpful if I was doing the rounds with posters or fliers to put in shop windows; and we often took a while, having a chat about new products they had in stock using recycled or sustainable produced materials, such as their sneaker lines and some of the new textiles that were coming in for summer.

I was a ‘Jive Junkies’ regular back at the turn of the millenium, and frequently had Sarah, the manager of the Cuba St store, send items back to the Starfish workroom to be altered to fit me perfectly. Never a quibble, just an attitude of ‘make it work’.
One time, I brought in a vintage ‘little black dress’, and asked Sarah if we could swing it through the workroom, before I wore it to a showing of ‘Les Miserables’ at the St James. Not only did she set that up, she also whipped out her pintin, heaved me into a dressing-room, and made sure that we had the dress pinned to the exact fit. Those were the days!

I was a fan for life, until the redoubtable Sarah was finally beaten into submission by the Left Bank body corporate, shutting her shop and heading back to hometown, Auckland.
However, my love of Laurie Foon’s designs has stayed with me, and I am frequently a ’swing through’ at the beginning of the season to check out what’s new in fabrics and styles.

This year, as the article says, Starfish have a winter collection inspired by the Rita Angus Exhibition at Te Papa, curated by Jill Trelawney, who I interviewed about her biography of Angus. I can’t wait for this lot to hit the racks, and I imagine I’m going to seriously compromise my budget somewhere, because from the pix shown in the paper, this will be a lovely collection to own a piece or two from.

More about Starfish’s sustainable ethics here, from the Wellingtonian, and here, from the DomPost again, when Foon first began promoting her sustainability credentials.

I’m probably the fashion industry’s worst nightmare, in spending terms – I rarely buy on a whim, I prefer to buy directly from NZ designers, (most preferably local to Wellington) and I have made some spectacular wins in the Auckland sales in times past. And, god forbid, I occasionally sew my own designs up for special occasions, like the dress I finished at lunchtime on my graduation day, last year!

I’m a fan of vintage clothing, a trick I picked up from a few great set-dressers I worked with at one time. ‘Recycled Clothing’ has gained a cachet that old-school opp-shopping never had – and I both buy from, and donate clothes to, my favourite second-hand charity shop. (Opportunity for Animals, if you’re asking – branches in Newtown and Kilbirnie, all proceeds go to animal welfare projects in Aotearoa/New Zealand)

So, file this story under ‘fangirl’, ‘buy local campaigns’, and ‘Welli fashion celeb’s’, however you like; but do go and have a look at a designer who has put her ethics and her profits into the same (beautifully stitched) pocket, and manages to find a sustainable win-win even in the current recessional business climate.

 

Ellipsis magazine launch

I’m having a social day, and thought it was time to do another post about something fresh and creative happening in the comics/graphic novel scene here in Wellington.

This is what an Ellipsis looks like...

Kieran Clarkin is the inventive genius behind this little mag, a graphic novel of sorts starring a Gecko Detective, named Arthur Deco. (yeah, it’s gonna be Art Deco for shure, sometime along, ain’t it?) He’s got Daniel Scudder and David Randall Peters doing the inks and colours, which sets him apart from the usual run of zinesters and comix producers in Wellington, as most of them are DIY compulsives who don’t let anyone else touch their babies. And it’s all done under a creative commons license.

The other thing that sets Clarkin apart is his plan to issue one a month, so Issue One’s launch at Red Tomatoes, just a hop & a skip from VUW Kelburn Campus, started this ambitious program off in the style to which it obviously intends to become accustomed. A who’s who of the ‘young artsy-writing crowd’ people were there, heavy on the ex-Salient, VBC, and music/theatre & film school networks. There was talk of the next issue release being combined with a performance by the band Clarkin has been playing in at Happy Bar, as a way of keeping interest up. Multi-talented, then.

The project has taken two years to get to fruition, during which time Clarkin worked on the writing, and realised he “can’t draw a bath”; nonetheless, he has produced issue one, has drawing talent lined up for issue two, and is on the scout for more artists. He aims to publish six issues in the current run.

As is usual these days, the magazine has it’s own Facebook page, fans, and events notices, so if you want to see where it’s going, have a look here Ellipsis on FB
Physical copies of the magazine are being stocked at Graphic in Cuba Mall, and Space Thing in Newtown, as well as comic shops in other centres.