“While Australia was the first country to give women the right to stand as well as to vote for the national parliament, Finland was the second. And Finland immediately elected nineteen women to its parliament (in 1907) while Australia had essentially given women the right to stand but not to sit. It was not until 1943 that the first women took their seats in Australia’s national parliament.”
“When Janine Haines was elected Leader of the Democrats in 1986, she became the first woman to lead a national political party. The Democrats have had 5 female leaders. When Janine Haines, became the first Australian Democrat to enter the Senate in 1977, she joined seven other women. At that time, of the 177 Members of the House of Representatives, there was not one female member. A higher proportion of women has consistently been elected to the Upper House compared to the Lower house, which begs the question, “Which House is more representative? It is also worth noting that in 101 years there have only been two Indigenous members of the federal parliament and both were elected to the Senate: Senators Neville Bonner and Aden Ridgeway.”
“Self-respect cannot be hunted. It cannot be purchased. It is never for sale. It cannot be fabricated out of public relations. It comes to us when we are alone, in quiet moments, in quiet places, when we suddenly realize that, knowing the good, we have done it; knowing the beautiful, we have served it; knowing the truth, we have spoken it.”
“Dreams are extremely important. You can’t do it unless you can imagine it.”
“Caring about someone as much as you care about yourself, and the critical eye that comes with it, are two strands that cannot be separated. Both engender a passion that makes the mother-daughter relationship perilous—and precious.”
“There is no such thing as being non-political. Just by making a decision to stay out of politics you are making the decision to allow others to shape politics and exert power over you. And if you are alienated from the current political system, then just by staying out of it you do nothing to change it, you simply entrench it.”
“To positively discriminate in favour of groups that have been negatively discriminated against in the past.”
“Because women’s liberation is a movement of the powerless for the powerless, its attraction is not immediately clear to the powerless, who feel they need alliance with the powerful to survive.”
“Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.”
“There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul, then the way it treats its children.”