Following on from her kick ass speech at the Keep Sydney Open rally recently, The Preatures‘ frontperson Isabella Manfredi has taken to her personal Facebook page to share a message of her distress about Australia’s Minister For Women Michaelia Cash.
Linking to this Brisbane Times article written by Tanya Plibersek in 2014 on why she’s a feminist, Manfredi wrote, “I was distressed to hear our national minister for women say ‘I don’t consider myself a feminist’ on Q&A Monday night.
“Not because she isn’t ‘entitled’ to her own opinion, but because in her squirming cringing rejection of it I saw a lifetime’s worth of conditioning, a party line that discourages its use, and above all I saw ignorance and disrespect for the history of women’s liberation.
“There will come a day when feminism is simply called for it is – humanism – but until the feminine and the female are valued in society, the word stays very much alive and relevant.”
Manfredi wasn’t the only one calling out Cash for her refusal to call herself a feminist, with fellow Q&A panel member and media personality Mia Freedman saying: “it troubles me that Alan Jones is willing to label himself a feminist but our minister for women isn’t.”
Echoing the sentiment expressed by Manfredi, Freedman accused Cash of “running from the perception of it [feminism], and I think it’s a really outdated perception that feminism is about angry women or it will alienate men somehow or that it will offend men.”
“I don’t label myself as a feminist because I don’t believe in labels,” countered Cash on Q&A. “That does not mean that I don’t get up every single day and fight for gender equality.”
You can watch the exchange on Q&A, and read Manfredi’s full post, below.
“I don’t label myself” @SenatorCash. @MiaFreedman thinks she’s scared. Alan Jones identifies as a feminist #QandA https://t.co/6QmM02QI1W
— ABC Q&A (@QandA) March 7, 2016
