Women's Views on News |
- Singer calls music industry ‘juvenile’
- Four Birds to row across the Pacific Ocean
- Looking at phobia and hate crime figures
| Singer calls music industry ‘juvenile’ Posted: 25 Oct 2013 07:04 AM PDT
Giving the annual John Peel lecture on BBC Radio 6Music, the 27 year-old singer discussed the theme of women and their representation in the music industry. Church spoke about her own experiences of growing up in the public eye and being “pressured” to wear “revealing outfits” by record label executives who “often reminded” her “just whose money was being spent”. Church also cited statistics revealing just how few women are behind the scenes. “Out of 295 acts and artists in the The Rock & Roll hall of fame, 259 are entirely male, meaning that Tina Weymouth’s part in Talking Heads make them one of the 36 female acts. “The Association of Independent Music’s 2012 membership survey revealed that only 15 per cent of label members are majority-owned by women. PRS claims only 13 per cent of writers registered are female. The music producers guild: less than 4 per cent,” she said. The speech ended, Music Week reported, with a call for age-ratings on ‘unacceptable’ videos and for radio stations to take into consideration the image of an artist when deciding whether to play and promote their music. Music Week has printed her speech. To read it, click here. Church also said that radio stations should consider dropping singles by artists whose images were too risque. She said: “As Tony Hall, the BBC’s director general, announces the new iPlayer channel for Radio 1, the question must be asked – should programmers take into consideration the image of an artist when deciding whether to play and promote their music? “There are countless examples from the last few years of songs that have been in high rotation, that have little to no artistic worth, but are just plain rude.” Radio Exe has suspended all airtime play of Robin Thicke's big summer hit Blurred Lines while the station consults with listeners about the future for the song after Charlotte Church branded the song derogatory to women at this week's Radio Festival. Radio Exe's chief executive Paul Nero and award-winning presenter Ashely Jeary were in the audience of her John Peel Lecture, delivered at the Radio Festival at The Lowry in Salford, in Manchester earlier this month, when Church appealed for sanctions against songs that use "soft porn" in its accompanying music videos and promotion online. Church said: [Porn] “drives up online views and subsequently encourages more radio play… The Blurred Lines video had the biggest role to play in jettisoning a song by a mediocre artist into the biggest hit of the year. “The indefensible Robin Thicke stated in an interview with GQ that his intention was to do everything that is completely derogatory towards women because he respects them so much….I'm like “What a pleasure it is to degrade a woman!” “It is,” Church continued, “highly disappointing to note that the director of this crass and misogynistic video is a woman, Diane Martel, who also captured Miley Cyrus’s twerking for the first time in the video for “We Can’t Stop” and is responsible for an objectionable little number by Leah LaBelle called of all things “LOLITA”.” Blurred Lines has also been banned from at least five university campuses in the UK.  |
| Four Birds to row across the Pacific Ocean Posted: 25 Oct 2013 04:02 AM PDT
Forget Three Men in a Boat pottering on the Thames for laughs. ‘Four Birds a Boating’ are going to row across the Pacific Ocean from California to Australia for education and research. Four Birds a Boating is the brainchild of teacher Sarah Weldon, who developed the plan while teaching in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia in 2010. She recruited Kate Gibbs to join the team and Lizzie Williams, daughter of Great Britain rowing coach Robin Williams. The mammoth journey will take eight months of gruelling conditions requiring both physical and emotional stamina. None of the women have any previous rowing experience. With no more than 2 hours' sleep at a time the women will face storms, up to 50 foot waves, the deepest oceans in the world, and isolation as they will be alone at sea for months at a time. They will face a routine of rowing, boat maintenance, including scraping barnacles off the bottom of the boat, and teaching students around the world from their computers. Sarah said, "We want to bring the oceans alive using pioneering 'live from boat' technology" and to promote the value and role of women in society through online interaction, interviews, video footage with both males and females from around the globe, and in particular the four very ordinary female rowers." The women are also raising money for the Thai Children's Trust and their own charity, Four Birds a Boating. The boat, Mr Toad, will be 6 feet wide and 23 feet long and is currently being built, to be ready in time for Christmas. The team are raising £200,000 for the expedition and they need two additional crew members. They have just held trials for one full member and a substitute at their Henley on Thames headquarters. Among the candidates was fitness instructor Tracy Benham, who flew over from Florida to take part. Despite 80 hours of traveling from and to the US she said the experience was "100 per cent worth it". The chosen crew will be announced on the website at the end of the month. Four Birds a Boating is supported by patrons Debbie Flood, Olympic medal-winning rower and Roz Savage, the first woman to row solo across the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. To donate to Four Birds a Boating and for updates on the project, click here .  |
| Looking at phobia and hate crime figures Posted: 25 Oct 2013 01:09 AM PDT
The report, entitled Europe: Because of who I am: homophobia, transphobia and hate crimes in Europe, was released by Amnesty International (AI) last month. It found that although the situation of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and intersex people has improved in recent years in some European countries, prejudice, discrimination and hate-motivated violence persist, even in countries where same-sex relationships are relatively accepted. It seems that about 80 per cent of homophobic and transphobic violence is not reported to the police, often because of a fear of institutionalised homophobia and transphobia. In other cases, gay people do not report attacks against them because they are not openly gay and are afraid that their peers and families will find out. And the AI report concluded that the European Union (EU) and its member-states are failing to tackle homophobic and transphobic hate crimes and to protect all individuals from discrimination, harassment and violence. In order to do so effectively, authorities need to make improvements in several areas, and Amnesty International has put together a briefing identifying such areas with illustrative case studies and providing information on homophobic and transphobic hate crimes in these countries. The Guardian looked at the homophobic and transphobic hate crime figures for England and Wales last year, and they showed that hate crime was rare – equivalent to 11 out of every 1,000 crimes in 2011-12. That is clearly no compensation if you’ve been a victim, however. The data gives a detailed breakdown of hate crimes throughout the two countries for the latest financial year – and it was the first time the Home Office had published this data. According to The Guardian 43,748 hate crimes were recorded by the police in the 2011-2012 period. This is how they broke down: 35,816 (82 per cent) were race hate crimes; 1,621 (4 per cent) were religion hate crimes; 4,252 (10 per cent) were sexual orientation hate crimes; 1,744 (4 per cent) were disability hate crimes and 315 (1 per cent) were transgender hate crimes. The majority of all hate crimes (83 per cent) involved violence – and the worst proportion for that was race hate crimes – 85 per cent were violent offences. And if you look at each type of crime as percentage of the total, it also showed a lot of variation around the country. In East Anglia, for instance, over 20 per cent of all hate crimes were against disabled people. And attacks against people because of their sexual orientation were much higher as a proportion of all hate crimes in South Wales and the south coast of England. In Scotland a series of reports on hate crime, religiously aggravated offending and the first annual statistics on the Offensive Behaviour Act were published in June. The Crown Office's most recent publication, 'Hate Crime in Scotland 2012-13', showed that: Racial crime remained the most commonly reported hate crime, although the number of charges has fallen by 12 per cent. The number of charges reported against disabled people was more than double the previous year, at 138. And the number of charges related to sexual orientation was 12 per cent higher than the previous year. This is likely to reflect the introduction of the Offences (Aggravation by Prejudice) (Scotland) Act in March 2010, which specifically addresses prejudice relating to disability, sexual orientation and transgender identity and may have led to increased reporting of such offences. The Lord Advocate, Frank Mulholland QC, said at the time: "I welcome the reduction in the majority of hate crimes committed in Scotland in the last 12 months. "What I do find concerning is the rise in offences committed against individuals because of their sexual orientation. "I hope that this is the result of the increased confidence in reporting which has encouraged more people to report this type of offending, but it is something we will closely monitor and explore ways we can look to reducing such offending, as we have done with other forms of hate crime. "Prosecution may be seen as a blunt tool which can only be used after an offence has been committed. "COPFS [The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service] and the Scottish Government are engaging with schools and local communities to change attitudes. "Working with such groups, and members of the public, we believe that in time such offences will reduce as Scotland becomes a fairer and more tolerant society to live in." In Northern Ireland a survey involving over 1000 face-to-face interviews with members of the public throughout Northern Ireland was conducted during September 2011. Negative attitudes existed towards: Travellers (30 per cent), transgender persons (22 per cent), and Eastern European migrant workers (21 per cent). Only 7 per cent perceived those from a different religion in an unfavourable light. Analysis of the results concluded that negative attitudes towards the different groups were broadly similar to those in 2008. The only group to see a decline in negative attitudes towards them was lesbian, gay or bisexual persons, from 21 per cent in 2008 to 15 per cent in 2011. There was not a corresponding increase in positive views though – rather the proportion of those holding 'neutral' views increased. Social distance – that is the extent to which respondents feel comfortable with varying degrees of closeness to a member of a 'different' group – was explored in the context of situations of work, community and family life. Negative attitudes were also displayed towards transgender people in each of the three social situations: 35 per cent of respondents would mind (a little or a lot) having a transgender person as a work colleague, while 40 per cent would mind having a transgender person as a neighbour and 53 per cent would mind having a transgender person as an in-law (53 per cent). And when asked which groups were treated unfairly, the most common answers were: people over 70; lesbian, gay or bisexual people and disabled people (all 24 per cent). A majority of respondents (54 per cent) disagreed with the statement that 'sometimes there is good reason to be prejudiced against certain groups', however, close to one-third (30 per cent) agreed with the statement – a proportion similar to that noted in the 2010 Scottish Attitudes Survey, from which this question was developed.  |
| You are subscribed to email updates from Women's Views on News To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |