MTR’s (unpublished) letter to the editor Dear Editor Two months ago, you ran a profoundly affecting extract from a new book by former MP Craig Emerson (‘Out of the Darkness’, Weekend Australian Magazine, Feb 24). Emerson wrote candidly of the trauma and violence he suffered as a child, revealing a man in touch with his […]
Porn’s distortions need addressing in schools say educators The ABC filmed me addressing students at Healthdale Christian College in Melbourne last Wednesday. Some of the students were interviewed – hear how well they articulate the issues! (click on image below for link to video) MELINDA TANKARD REIST, AUTHOR, ADVOCATE FOR WOMEN AND GIRLS: Our boys […]
How sexualised behaviour has become the new normal While the content was disturbing, it was encouraging to wake up to the front page of The Australian on the weekend and see the issues myself and my colleagues write and speak about most days, reflected on the front page. A news piece titled ‘Click bait: kids […]
Two of my favourite women writers were published in ABC Religion and Ethics on the same day this week. Dr Helen Pringle (long time collaborator and contributor to Big Porn Inc) and talented emerging young writer Laura McNally, who I’ve published here a number of times before. Both are contributors to the new Connor Court […]
Topless women in newspapers are not ‘tough, rough, challenging’ ideas’ In a piece titled ‘Politician-Led Attack on Media Freedom is a Sentence on the public’, in The Australian last Thursday, Spiked Online editor Brendan O’Neill wrote an impassioned defence of free speech. O’Neill argued that attacks on press freedom were not only attacks on those […]
Just the latest example of the mainstreaming of pornography ‘The “Telstra Babes” content is just a few clicks away from the “Women at Telstra” recruitment website, which describes the company’s “inclusive working environment” for women and its culture that “celebrates the success of women at every level”’. This piece by James Frost in The Australian last […]
Cold term cannot disappear central experience of pregnancy and birth Gestational carrier is an ugly term THE objectification of women’s bodies and commodification of childbirth came together yesterday in a single antiseptic phrase contained in the announcement of a second child for actress Nicole Kidman and her musician husband Keith Urban. The baby’s birth three […]
Pornography will always be exploitative I recall a few years ago being interviewed (read ‘debated’) by two young men on an Adelaide radio station, on the issue of prostitution and trafficking. After cataloguing a litany of harm caused as a result of the global trade in the bodies of women and girls, the boys came […]
