Me To We - I am Silent

The "I Am Silent" Campaign, created by FREE THE CHILDREN kicks off in t-minus six days. On March 5th, 2009, all those who have vowed, will be silent for twenty-four hours. This means no talk. No text. No E-mail. No Fax... ect. (Unless at work or school.)

As the news passes through the halls, more and more people are curious about this campaign. I myself didn't really understand the proposal -why not speak UP for those who don't have a voice, why are WE being quiet about this?

Well it all makes perfect sence.

We, as Canadians, have incredible opporotunities that we fail to appreciate -on a daily basis. We can go to school for free, have free transportation to school (SAFE transportation), we have jobs, our own money -own lives. I could go on and on about the security, advantages and privledges of Canadian life...

In developing countries, children are born into a life that they alone cannot change. Many children don't have healthcare, let a lone education -let alone free education. Many children don't have rights, or a 'voice'. In Canada's democracy (Capitalism), many of us abuse this privledge. We choose not to look outside of our own bubbles.

This being said, people in the hallways at school will notice if you are silent for two days straight.

"why aren't you texting me back?" "Why aren't you answering me?" "Why are you acting so weird?" "How come you weren't online last night?" Ect, ect.

It's a very interesting campaign that I look forward to participating in. I hope you do as well.
For more information check out:

www.Metowe.com

Women's history conference

On January tenth I spoke at a women's history conference. The objective of the conference was to give school teachers, and student teachers, information on how to create a more inclusive lesson plans.

In the morning, an archaeologist, was explaining how local history ties with national history. She had a mass dig in Toronto a local elementary school where she uncovered two graves, which, after 20 years of research, lead to the discovery of a tale of the underground railroad.

The afternoon there was a choice between a women speaker on black history settlements or a women speaker of indigenous and aboriginal history, pre contant and present day. I decided to go with the indigenous presentation. The history that I learned that day was quite basic, but it hit home and I enjoyed it.

At the end of the day, Brandon, Moon and I, all high school students, had to talk about our history experiences in school. They also wanted us to speak about the secondary school curriculum and how it has affected us. We had to explain how we learned it -what were beneficial strategies, and what could improve, ect.

This was a great opportunity for me. After being in my IDC course (gifted course) I was able to discuss the benefits of self-learning. The IDC course (interdisiplinary course) gives students a space where they can research subjects that they want to learn. They can research topics that are important to them, specific to their values, learning styles, and personal and acedemic goals.

When it came to speaking about history... I talked about inclusive history being more beneficial.

Of course for documents to be considered 'history' they must be 50 years old or older, but in our history texts books we learn one bias. There is information out there, there are documents and history books out there from other peoples perspectives.

An example is female history. In your history books I bet there are 5 pages that mention women in them. They probably mention that women were nurses during the war, or that women just started to get factory jobs.

Women are not well known in history courses- and they should be. Females need people to remember in history to feel a sence of belonging. Who were the women that gave up everything they had to fight for women's rights? We stand everyday to Oh Canada to remember the soldiers who faught for our freedom .. well we don't learn about the women who faught for MY freedom.

Another thing I touched upon at this conference was innovative learning. We're slowly developing different learning techniques - i.e smart boards, but other methods should be more normalized. For example DISCUSSION. Open discussion in the classrooms allows students to speak their mind freely, and to learn a variety of perspectives from different people. It is when we learn from other people, that we learn more about ourselves.

Another thing was how we actually sit in the classroom - row on row like soldiers. Robots. Machines. In my media literacy course, almost once a week we'd break routine and everyone would move their desks into a circle. This way we presented our info to a 'community' rather than, well, robots...

Racism in the classroom

So the other day, my friend tells me that in her English class, one of the students who sits near her is racist.

Apparently the teacher was asking how the students felt about Barack Obama becoming the President of the U.S, which was then commented at with a racist remark by this person.

The other students in the class -did nothing, said nothing. Maybe they felt it wasn't there place to say anything. Maybe they didn't know what to say.
Maybe they didn't realize that Mr. Obama not only now has the power, but the intelligence, the passion, and the values to change the way American
politics have been run.

Barack Obama is the face of change -socially, environmentally, economically and politically. It is obvious that Mr. Obama is a turning point in history -the first coloured man to hold the highest political seat -the coloured black man to become the President of the most powerful country in the world. He highly values family, health care and education. Rather than coming up with antidotes and treatments, he strives for prevention, education, and awareness.

He is the leader of the most powerful country in the world -and he got there by democracy. He was elected in by the people. So I ask you - the students in the classroom... When you hear somebody speak so ignorantly about someone so important to so many people, how do you react?

When you choose to hold your tongue on such topics - this is what I call unintentional carelessness.

A Turning Point In History

January 20th, 2009...

A date that will mark history for decades to come. As of 12 o'clock on this day, as we all know, Barack Obama became inaugurated -he officially became the President of the United States of America.

What does this mean for us? Tell me what you think!

Inspiration

If this doesn't inspire you, I don't know what will.

Life Without 

Limbs

Nick Vujici

The Girl Conference- The White Tiger

**********************************************************

A few weeks ago I went to London with a few girls from my school as we attended The Girl Conference held by The White Tiger Company. The conference was filled with several main topics that included:

• A Girl's Right to Stay Safe



• Drug Induced Sexual Assault



• Sexual Assault Awareness Skills



• Preventing Date Rape



• Growing up with Domestic Violence
  and



• Healthy Dating Relationships

The White Tiger Company teaches women's self-defence. They started to have 'girl' conferences around Ontario to raise awareness about violence against women, and empower women with education on healthy relationships, saftey, and effective ways to protect theirselves against violence.

This girl conference was made as a commemoration for the 14 women tragically killed on Dec. 6th of 1989 at Ecole Polytechnique. On that day, those 14 women were shot to death by one man, who hated women. He actually yelled "you're all a bunch of feminist! And I hate feminists!" After these murders he then decided to end his own life as well.

This tragedy sparked a campaign called the White Ribbon Campaign, which is reflective of the violence against women that takes place in our communities.

At the girl conference there were a couple speakers who bravely shared their personal experiences of violence and abuse. These stories were unbelievable and hit the audience hard in the heart. One women shared her experience about being kidnapped, raped and stabbed - a traumatic event that has effected the rest of her life; and the other speaker shared her history of domestic violence and having to witness it growing up.

Since the White Tiger group is a self-defence group, one of the other presentations was a woman senior instructor, who taught us a few handy self defense moves. She showed us how to get out of a choke hold, areas to aim for during an attack , and stances to take while being confronted with violence. Although this teaching is very important and serious, the instructor made it fun and exciting. I myself would love to enroll in some classes; and in fact soon enough I will.

Finally, the day closed with two singer-songwriters who played keyboard and sang. Not only were their performances beautiful, but they were very original and inspiring. They gave a strong message to the women who participated in the conference, so that we could leave with a sense of power and understanding, rather than pain and hurt that was felt at other times during the conference.

Overall this was another great experience for me, and my fellow school mates. I know that I felt like a stronger woman when I left the room; and a luckier one at that, and I'm sure all the women felt a little better, too. So to The White Tiger Group, and The Girl Conference, thank you -for educating young women, to empowering them.

Toujours de RebELLES 2008

On October 11, 12, and 13 history was in the making! Montreal held Canada's first pan-Canadian feminist conference -where women from every province and territory gathered to learn, share, experience, and stand up for social change! As you can see by the banner, this gathering was called "Toujours RebELLES - Waves of Resistance".

Through various workshops, activities, debates and discussions, over 500 women who participated shared experiences, struggles and ideas. We networked amoungst eachother and made links of solidarity that have strengthened and revitalized the young feminst movement in Canada.

Jessica Yee, who brought me there, presented a speech about Indigenous women and their history of 'feminsim'. She talked about recognizing how the mainstream media has introduced feminism as an exclusive movement, and that we need to erase mainstream media and search for a plurality of backgrounds. We also had three international speekers make speeches about the state of their country and how feminism needs to be international. We had a women from Brazil, a women from the The Philippines, and one from Africa, who shared their personal experiences suffering.

The whole gathering was very organized. The organizers accomodated breakfast and lunch everyday. The only thing participants needed was to buy a dinner each night! All the meals were very filling vegetarian dishes, and the organizing committee went out of their way to ensure vegans got a proper meals as well. Everyone was given paper documents outlining some history of the feminist movement, resources, and workshops about feminism.

I'm very glad that I volunteered to be apart of the Manifesto Comittee. Our job was to create a document that could be used as a political tool for women to bring back into their communities. We joined different workshops and recorded the concerns and opinions of our groups, and met during lunches, after preliminaries to put our information together. Through numerous backgrounds, beliefs, locations, philosophies and ideas -we had to search for one voice.

The Manifesto was writtten in different 'chunks' -explaining who 'we' are as feminist, what our perseptions and ideas are, what and who have left us oppressed, and steps of action to take for social change. It was so hard to be inclusive of the various types of struggles in different geographical locations, but the team worked very hard to sum up the activity that took place that weekend.

We presented our Manifesto in the prelimary on the last day, and here everyone had a chance to discuss any changes that needed to be made, or anything that needed to be added, ect. After someone made a statement, we would have a vote to change that part of the Manifesto, or keep it the same. It was a long process, but after a few hours it was finally done.

Here's a photo at the preliminary, where the women at Toujours RebELLES got together for a BIG HUG!

A copy of the Manifesto can be found on the Toujours RebELLES website: www.rebelles2008.org

Feel free to check it out, change it up for different audiences, and use it! Send it to your best friend, your classmates, even your MP!

Make a difference in your community. Ask lots of questions, and take action in your everyday life! Revolution starts in you.