Yanis Varoufakis: 'The money market is not equilibrating savings and investments', Fund Forum International, State of Europe - 2017

12 June 2017, Fund Forum International, Berlin, Germany

No transcript available

Susan Rennie: 'Woolworths the pokies people. It doesn't quite have the same ring', Woolworths AGM - 2017

23 November 2017, Sydney, Australia

Susan Rennie is a Councillor in Darebin, Melbourne.

Thank you Mr Chairman. I'd like to start by acknowledging that we're meeting today on the lands of the [Wurundjeri] people of the [Kulin] nation and pay my respects to elders of the past, present and emerging and any Aboriginal and Torres-Strait Islander people here today.

Woolworths, the pokies people. It doesn't quite have the same ring as Woolworths the fresh food people does it? But Woolworths is Australia's largest operator of pokie machines and if you judge the money that they manage to extract from vulnerable people as a measure of their success then they're extremely successful in that business. But pokie machines are doing extraordinary harm in our community. Harm from gambling in fact is almost on a par in terms of the health impact with harm from alcohol or harm from depression and most of that harm is related to pokie machines.

Did you know that postcodes with 7.5 pokie machines per thousand adults have 20% more family violence that postcodes with no pokie machines. It raises a question about how much family violence is an acceptable outcome to Woolworths for the operation of their pokie machines. A question I put to every director who is elected today, how much family violence do you think is an acceptable trade-off for the operation of your pokie machines? Woolworths, the family violence people doesn't have a good ring either does it? There were 400 gambling related suicides in Australia every year. Woolworths, the suicide people, not really what you want to be known for.

But you can actually have your cake and eat it too. You can have your pokie machines and operate them more safely and despite what the Chairman has said, Woolworths has done nothing to achieve this outcome. It is as a Company the most aggressive and predatory pokie machine operator in this country, actively lobbying against changes that might make machines safer.

I spoke earlier of being able to withdraw cash from gaming venues. Imagine 10 years of cash withdrawals from a vulnerable person in a state of chronic ill health who was gambling with money that really wasn't hers to gamble with. She was getting it off her elderly mother who had early stage dementia. Woolworths in receipt of money that really didn't belong to the person who was gambling and any level of due diligence across the four venues that Sarah lost money at would have found that she was not in a position to lose with a lower job. Not in a position to lose well over $1 million.

As I said, you can have your cake and eat it too. You could actually as a company support a limit on the amount of cash that people can get out in a gaming venue every day. You don't need further research to do this. The evidence is already there and in fact I have shared some of that evidence with the Chairman and with Richard Dammery yesterday. Solid research that's been undertaken rigorously and academically. You could decide that it wasn't appropriate for these venues to be open 20 hours a day because nothing good comes from being on a pokie machine at four in the morning. Most Woolworths venues are only closed between 5:00am and 9:00am. It kind of puts a different meaning on nine to five doesn't it?

You could do what Coles has done and support $1 bets because at the moment every time you push the button and you can do that every three seconds, at the moment you can lose $5 every time you push a button and that can be well over $1000 an hour. You could relieve a huge amount of harm and suffering. You could be part of the solution to family violence in this country instead of part of the problem.

There are a number of other evidence based measures that could actually make the pokie machine industry safer. What we know from research is that for those people who gamble on a pokie machine every week, one third to a half of them are experiencing very significant harm. Don't believe it when they say this is a small problem in a small number of people.

Weekly gambling on a pokie machine is harmful in a very significant proportion of cases. So I think we all know that with recommendations to vote against me it's highly unlikely I'll be elected today. I would ask you then to use your vote as a powerful statement to this Company and to all of the directors that they each, each and every one of them, has a personal responsibility to get involved in the ALH business, to step up to the Board of that business and to make sure that they are taking action to reduce harm from gambling. Because that action is possible and it doesn't need to wait for further research or information or international experts to come from overseas. You have that action in your hands with your vote today and I hope that you will demonstrate that to the Company and save the lives of people like Sarah who died tragically at the age of 54.

Just finally, I would ask that it might be possible to see the results from today's vote, not just mixed in with the previous results. Thank you.

Peter MacDonald: 'Without Navajo, Marines would never have taken the island of Iwo Jima' Oval Office reception for Navajo Code Talkers - 2017

27 November 2017, White House Oval Office, Washington DC, USA

Today, we have with us three of the thirteen surviving Navajo Code Talkers of World War II. First, we have Fleming Begaye. Fleming Begaye is 97 years old, the oldest veteran of World War II. He survived the Battle of Tarawa. His landing craft was blown up and he literally had to swim to the beach to survive. Also, on Saipan, he also landed on Tinian where he got shot up real badly, survived one year in naval hospital.

We have Thomas Begay, also one of the Code Talkers who were on Iwo Jima, a tough battle, where Three Marine Division landed on Iwo; 5th Marine Division -- he was part of the Code Talkers within the 5th Marine Division.

Also, as if Marine Corps was not enough, he enlisted to be United States Army, and served in the Korean War. Survived that awful battle at Chosin.

My name is Peter MacDonald. I'm the president of the 13 surviving Navajo Code Talkers. I went in -- I'm 90 years old -- I went in when I was 15 years old in 1944. I was with the 1st Marine Brigade on Guam, and then went on to North China with 6th Marine Division to get those Japanese in Northern China to surrender. They didn’t want to surrender, but it took 1st Marine Division, 6th Marine Division to get them to surrender eventually. We had a separate treaty ceremony in Tsingtao, China, October 25th, 1945

Navajo Code Talkers, in the early part of World War II, the enemy was breaking every military code that was being used in the Pacific. This created a huge problem for strategizing against the enemy. Eventually, a suggestion was made in early 1942 -- February '42, essentially -- to use Navajo language as a code.

The Marine Corps recruited 29 young Navajos, not telling them what they are being recruited for, because this was a top-secret operation. They were just asked, "Do you want to join the Marines? You want to fight the enemy? Come join the Marines." So they volunteered.

Twenty-nine young Navajos joined the Marines in 1942, after going through boot camp, passed boot camp with flying colors; combat training -- the same thing. Then entered the Marine Corps Communication School -- passed that. Then they were separated from all the rest of the Marines, took them to a top-secret location just east of San Diego -- Camp Elliott. That's where they created a military code to be used in the Pacific.

After creating 260 code words, the 29 young Marines -- half of them were sent overseas to join the 1st Marine Division. The 1st Marine Division was getting ready to go on to the first offensive movement in the Pacific, Guadalcanal.

On August 7, 1942 -- 75 years ago -- 1st Marine Division hit the beaches of Guadalcanal with 15 Navajo Code Talkers. This was the first battle where the Navajo code was to be tested in actual battle to test to see how our memory would be under heavy enemy fire. Well, three weeks after the landing, General Van De Griff, Commander of the 1st Marine Division, sent word back to United States saying, this Navajo code is terrific. The enemy never understood it; he said, we don't understand it either, but it works. Send us some more Navajos.

So that opened up the gate for United States Marine Corps, San Diego to start recruiting more and more Navajos, using the same tactics: "You want to fight? You want to join the Marines? You want to wear this beautiful blue uniform? Come join the Marines." So we all volunteered. That's how he went in, that's how he went in, that's how I went in.

Boot camp, combat training, communication schools. Then we all get separated, go to that special top-secret Navajo code school to learn to code. Initially, 260 code words, all subject to memory only. Eventually, by the time the war ended, 1945, there were 400 of us that went to war. And also, our code words grew to 600 code words, subject to memory only. In every battle two communication networks were established: Navajo communication network for all top-secret, confidential messages; the second network, English network, for all other messages.

In every battle -- from the frontline, beach command post, command ship, all other ships -- Code Talkers were used. On the island of Iwo, Major Connor said, the first 48 hours of battle, over 800 messages were sent by the 5th Marine Division, only. The first 48 hours, over 800 messages. Major Connor also said: Without Navajo, Marines would never have taken the island of Iwo Jima. (Applause.)

So thank you very much. The 13 of us, we still have one mission -- that mission is to build national Navajo Code Talker Museum. We want to preserve this unique World War II history for our children, grandchildren, your children, your grandchildren to go through that museum.

Why? Because what we did truly represents who we are as Americans. America, we know, is composed of diverse community. We have different languages, different skills, different talents, and different religion. But when our way of life is threatened, like the freedom and liberty that we all cherish, we come together as one. And when we come together as one, we are invincible. We cannot be defeated. That's why we need this national Navajo Code Talker Museum so that our children, the future generation, can go through that museum and learn why America is so strong.

Thank you very much for listening. (Applause.)

President Trump responded and earned criticism for his condescending tone , and Pocahontas jibe at rival Elizabeth Warren.

That's fantastic, thank you. That's fantastic. Thank you very much. Beautiful.

That was so incredible, and now I don't have to make my speech. I had the most beautiful speech written out. I was so proud of it. Look. And I thought you would leave out Iwo Jima, but you got that in the end, too. (Laughter.)

And I want to tell you -- you said you're 90 years old? That's great, because you have good genes. That means the press has got me to kick around for a long time. (Laughter.)

That was beautiful. I loved that and I loved your delivery. And the Code Talkers are amazing. And seriously, it is what I said. So what I'm going to do is give you my speech, and I want you to hold that. And I know you like me, so you'll save it. But that was so well delivered, from the heart. That was from the heart.

So I want to give you this speech because I don't want to bore them with saying the same thing you just said. And you said it better, believe me, because you said it from here. And I mean it from there too.

And you have a lot of great friends. Tom Cole is here, and you know Tom. And you know Jeff. So I want to thank you both, Jeff Denham. I want to thank you both for being here, and you too for being here.

Also, General Dunford, head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and General Kelly. And I have to say, I said to General Kelly --- I said, General, how good -- here he is right there, the Chief; he's the General and the Chief. I said, how good were these Code Talkers? What was it? He said, sir, you have no idea. You have no idea how great they were -- what they've done for this country, and the strength and the bravery and the love that they had for the country and that you have for the country.

So that was the ultimate statement from General Kelly, the importance. And I just want to thank you because you're very, very special people. You were here long before any of us were here, although we have a representative in Congress who, they say, was here a long time ago. They call her "Pocahontas."

But you know what, I like you because you are special. You are special people. You are really incredible people. And from the heart, from the absolute heart, we appreciate what you've done, how you've done it, the bravery that you displayed, and the love that you have for your country.

Tom, I would say that's as good as it gets, wouldn't you say? That's as good as you get.

General Kelly, just come up for one second. I want to just have you say what you told me, a little bit about the Code Talkers. Because it really has been -- learning about you and learning about what you've done has been something that I'd like General Kelly to say to the press.

Go ahead, General.

Reese Witherspoon: 'Ambition is not a dirty word', Glamour Magazine, Woman of the Year

9 November 2015, Hollywood, Los Angeles, USA

I can't thank Glamour magazine enough and Conde Nast and Cindi for asking me to be here. You just made this night so amazing. These incredible, inspiring women are doing so many things to change how we perceive women, and I hope Amy Schumer and all the other nominees that when you consider making your biopic, you'll give me the rights first, which would be great. Although Amy, I'll have to play your grandmother in the movie (by Hollywood standards), and you'll probably have to play your own mother.

I'm so excited that so many young women are here tonight.This all started for me when I was a little girl. I was 14 years old when I learned that I love acting, and I still do. Acting allows me to slip into the skin of all kinds of different women, and not in a creepy Silence of the Lambs way…but in a way that lets me explore the full spectrum of humanity. Every woman I've ever played is passionate and strong and flawed, except for Tracy Flick. She's 100% perfect, but she made me say that. But I also learned at 14 years old that I was ambitious. Really ambitious. Did I say that out loud? Let's talk about ambition.

I want everybody to close their eyes and think of a dirty word, like a really dirty word. Now open your eyes. Was any of your words ambition? I didn't think so. See, I just kind of started wondering lately why female ambition is a trait that people are so afraid of. Why do people have prejudiced opinions about women who accomplish things? Why is that perceived as a negative? In a study by Georgetown University in 2005, a group of professors asked candidates to evaluate male efficient versus female efficient in politicians. Respondents
were less likely to vote for power-seeking women than power-seeking men. They also perceived ambitious women as looking out for themselves. They even reported ambitious women as provoking feelings of disgust.

Now, in my life I have always found more comfort in being the underdog. Whether people thought I couldn't do something or they said it was impossible, I always rose to the challenge. I enjoyed reaching for the impossible. I remember when I was 18 years old and applying to
colleges, I had this male college counselor, and he said, "Don't even bother applying to Stanford, sweetie. Your SAT scores aren't good enough." But I did it anyway, and I got in. (But it wasn't because of my SAT scores!

When I got into the film business, I was doing dramas, and casting directors didn't know if I could be funny. So I did a comedy, Legally Blonde, and then my entire career I was pigeonholed. I did comedies, they didn't think I was serious. I did dramas, they didn't think I was funny. And I got older and they didn't think I could still be viable. So about three years ago, I found myself very curious about the state of the movie business. I really wondered how the digital evolution was affecting the landscape of filmmaking and specifically why studios were making fewer and fewer movies. So I started asking questions, and I decided to meet with the heads of each of the different movie studios that I had been friends with for years and I had made many movies with them. Each of the meetings started with something very casual like, "How are your kids?" and "Wow, has it really been that long since Walk the Line?" At the end of the meeting, I sort of casually brought up, "So, how many movies are in development with a female lead?" And by lead, I don't mean wife of the lead or the girlfriend of the lead. The lead, the hero of the story. I was met with nothing, blank stares, excessive blinking, uncomfortable shifting. No one wanted to answer the question because the fact was the studios weren't developing anything starring a woman. The only studio that was was turning a man's role into a woman's role. And the studio heads didn't apologize. They don't have to apologize. They are interested in profits—and after all, they run subsidiary companies of giant corporations.

But I was flabbergasted. This was 2012, and it made no sense to me. Where was our Sally Field in Norma Rae or Sigourney Weaver in Alien or Goldie Hawn in, you name it, any Goldie Hawn movie: Overboard, Wildcats, Private Benjamin? These women shaped my idea of what it meant to be a woman of strength and character and humor in this world. And my beautiful, intelligent daughter, who is 16 years old now, would not grow up idolizing that same group of women.
Instead, she'd be forced to watch a chorus of talented, accomplished women Saran wrapped into tight leather pants, tottering along on very cute, but completely impractical, shoes turn to a male lead and ask breathlessly, "What do we do now?!" Seriously, I'm not kidding. Go
back and watch any movie, and you'll see this line over and over. I love to ask questions, but it's my most hated question.

I dread reading scripts that have no women involved in their creation because inevitably I get to that part where the girl turns to the guy, and she says, "What do we do now?!" Do you know any woman in any crisis situation who has absolutely no idea what to do? I mean, don't they tell people in crisis, even children, "If you're in trouble, talk to a woman." It's ridiculous that a woman wouldn't know what to do.

So, anyway, after going to these studios and telling people about how there's barely any female leads in films and the industry's in crisis, people were aghast. "That's horrible," they said. And then they changed the subject and moved on with their dinner and moved on with
their lives. But I could not change the subject. I couldn't turn to some man and say, "What do we do now?" This is my life.

I've made movies all my life, for 25 years, since I was 14 years old. It was time to turn to myself and say, "OK, Reese, what are we going to do now?" The answer was very clear. My mother, who is here tonight, a very strong, smart Southern woman, said to me, "If you want something done, honey, do it yourself."

So, I started my own production company, Pacific Standard Films, with the mission to tell stories about women. And I was nervous, y'all. I was spending my own money, which everyone in the movie business always tells you, "Don't spend your own money on anything." I was warned that on the crazy chance Pacific Standard would acquire any good scripts we would never make it past our first few years in business because there just wasn't a market for buying female-driven material. But like Elle Woods, I do not like to be underestimated.

I'm a very avid reader. In fact, I'm a complete book nerd. So is my producing partner, so we tore through tons of manuscripts and read so many things before they were published, but we could only find two pieces of material that we thought were right. We optioned them with our own money, and we prayed that they would work. Both had strong, complicated, fascinating women at the center and both were written by women. And lo and behold, both books hit number one on the New York Times bestsellers list. One is called Gone Girl, and the second is called Wild. So we made those two films last year, and those two films rose to over half a billion dollars world wide and we got three Academy Award nominations for women in acting performances. So that is year one. Against the odds, Pacific Standard has had a year two and year three. We bought five more bestselling books.

I think we are in a culture crisis in every field. In every industry, women are underrepresented and underpaid in leadership positions. Under 5 percent of CEOs of fortune 500 companies are women. Only 19 percent of Congress is women. No wonder we don't have the health care we deserve or paid family leave or public access to early childhood education. That really worries me. How can we expect legislation or our needs to be served if we don't have equal representation? So here's my hope: If you're in politics, media, the tech industry, or working as an entrepreneur or a teacher or a construction worker or a caregiver, you know the problems we are all facing.

I urge each one of you to ask yourselves: What do we do now? That's a big question. What is it in life that you think you can't accomplish? Or what is it that people have said that you cannot do? Wouldn't it feel really good to prove them all wrong? Because I believe ambition is not a dirty word. It's just believing in yourself and your abilities. Imagine this: What would happen if we were all brave enough to be a little bit more ambitious? I think the world would change.

Magda Szubanski: 'None of us can live in a bubble where we pretend that other people don't exist' Results Day Marriage Equality - 2017

 speech can also be viewed here. This video courtesy of Kathryn Bird facebook

15 November 2017, Canberra, Australia

One of my great hopes is that this does not become a case where there are the acceptable gays, who are the married ones, and the other ones, who are the non acceptable gays.

This is for all of us, no matter what way we want to live our lives.

It is that we must live as equal people within this country,

And the great thing is ... I’m always very moved ... thank you for the welcome to country, every time I’m at an event, I’m always struck by the warmth and generosity that our indigenous brothers and sisters give us, to this land.

Because apart from them, all of us have come from somewhere else seeking a safe, civilised society.

White Australia began, literally, as a prison. A place for the dregs of society to be dumped and to rot in isolation. A mere 239 years later, it has become one of the most stable, peaceful democracies in the world. 

Now we have voted through one of the last remaining pieces of inequality that exists in the legislation. 

That shows that a belief in this country for a second chance for people, to not judge people, by their looks, by whatever sexual identity or cultural or ethnic or religious identity, is core to our beliefs, this is not something that’s added on it comes from our history. That welcome extended to us by indigenous people, the reciprocity of that is so important to the way this society is formed, and the way we see ourselves as Australians.

And I hope that we are all mindful in this moment, of other people who don’t have the advantages that we have, and are still struggling with lack of opportunity and inequality, and that we reach out our hands to all of them, but also, as we said, to people who voted ‘no’.

Now in the legislation that is coming ahead, we’ve all heard the rumours ... we’ve all seen the legislation actually that they’re proposing.

And it would actually create a form of segregation, for LGBTQI people who wish to marry. Well I’m saying, as an LGBTQI person, no matter what the result would have been, I would never have treated anyone who voted no with anything less than respect. I would never not serve them. I would never not ‘be funny’ for them.  

None of us can live in a bubble where we try to pretend that other people don't exist. We must find ways to reach out our hands across the divide that's been created by this unfortunate survey, and go forward with a deep and good faith understanding of one another, as a nation.

I also think it's a moment for pure humble gratitude.

WE are so lucky to live in this country. When we think about the other countries, where just for being who we are, we could be killed, bashed pushed off a tower.

And this sends a message that this country does not stand for that sort of behaviour, that this is civilised country, that this is a secular country, that this is a country that allows religious freedom. And this is a country that believes in equality and justice, and we've had virtually no leadership in this, we have led ourselves.

And so we can rely on the Australian people to do the bloody right thing.

Go us!

Oh, I did promise I'd do an Irish dance if we won.

Edwin Cameron: 'HIV is a virus, not a crime', AIDS Conference - 2008

8 August 2008, Mexico City, Mexico

Justice Edwin Cameron is a Judge of the Constitutional Court of South Africa. He has lived with AIDS since the 1990s and is a passionate advocate for decriminalisation and destigmatisation of the disease.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.   It is an honour to be able to share an important issue with you in this plenary today.

Let me tell you what I want to do in the next twenty minutes.  

I want engage your minds, your feelings and your reactions, and I want to do so in three ways – through information, response and commitment:
·    First, I want to offer you information about one of the most serious issues in the epidemic at the moment – the use of criminal statutes and criminal prosecutions in the epidemic.
·    Then I will invite you to feel disquiet about what you know.
·    Lastly, I want us to consider resolving here, in this morning’s session, to engage in positive action about the issue.
Let me start by taking you to three very different places – to Texas, to Zimbabwe and to Sierra Leone.

In Texas, just three months ago, a homeless man was sent to jail.  He was convicted of a committing serious offence while being arrested for drunk and disorderly conduct – namely, harassing a public servant with a deadly weapon.  Because of his past encounters with the law, the system ratcheted up the gravity of what he did, and he ended up being sentenced to 35 years in jail – of which he must serve at least half before he can apply for parole.

Well, that’s very sad, you might say, but what is our concern with the case?  It is this.  The man had HIV.  The ‘deadly weapon’ he used against the public servant was his saliva.  He was jailed because he spat at the officers who were arresting him.

After sentencing, Officer Waller is reported to have said he was elated with the jury’s decision: ‘I know it sounds cliché[d], but this is why you lock someone up … Without him out there, our streets are a safer place.’

Let’s note some quick points about the case:

First, according to the most assured scientific knowledge we have, after nearly three decades studying the virus, saliva ‘has never been shown to result in transmission of HIV’.  

So the ‘deadly weapon’ the man was accused of wielding was no more than a toy pistol – and it wasn’t even loaded.  Ratcheting up the criminal law because the man had HIV was thus inappropriate, unscientific and plain wrong.

Second, we must note the length of the sentence.  Whatever his past conduct, it stuns the mind that someone who has not actually harmed anyone or damaged any property (or otherwise spoiled the world) could be locked away for 35 years. 

The inference that his HIV status played a significant, probably pivotal, part in sending him away for so long is unavoidable.  In short: the man was punished not for what he did, but for the virus he carried.

Let me take you now to violence-wracked Zimbabwe.  There, a 26 year old woman from a township near Bulawayo was arrested last year for having unprotected sex with her lover.  Like the homeless Texan, she was living with HIV.  The crime of which she was convicted was ‘deliberately infecting another person’.  

The strange thing is, her lover tested HIV negative.  The woman was receiving ARV therapy, so that is not surprising.  Before sentencing her, the court tried to get a further HIV test from the lover – even though reportedly he didn’t want to proceed with the charges at all.  She was eventually sentenced to a suspended term of five years’ imprisonment.  The threat of imprisonment, and the shame and ordeal of her conviction, will continue to hang over her.

Let me tell you about the statute under which she was convicted, s 79 of the Zimbabwe Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act 23 of 2004.  It is an extraordinary piece of legislation.  It doesn’t make it a crime merely for a person who knows that she has HIV to infect another.  It makes it a crime for anyone who realises ‘that there is a real risk or possibility’ that she might have HIV, to do ‘anything’ that she ‘realises involves a real risk or possibility of infecting another person with HIV’.  

In other words, though the crime is called ‘deliberate transmission of HIV’, this is a misnomer.  For you can commit this crime even if you do not transmit HIV.  In fact, you can commit the crime even if you do not have HIV.  You merely have to realise ‘that there is a real risk or possibility’ that you have HIV – and then do something – ‘anything’ – that involves ‘a real risk or possibility of infecting another person’.

Stranger upon strange, this statute offers a defence when a person really does has HIV.  In such a case, if the other person knew this, and consented, then the accused is exempt.  But, the way the statute is drafted, this defence can not apply where the accused does not in fact have HIV, or does not know that she has HIV – by definition, in that case she cannot engage the informed consent defence by telling her partner she has HIV!

In short, this law creates a crime not of effect and consequence, but of fear and possibility.

What is more, the wording of Zimbabwe law stretches wide enough to cover a pregnant woman who knows she has, or fears she may, have HIV.  For if she does ‘anything’ that involves a possibility of infecting another person – like, giving birth, or breast-feeding her newborn baby – the law could make her guilty of ‘deliberate transmission – even if her baby is not infected.

In all cases, the law prescribes punishment of up to twenty years in prison.

In Sierra Leone, lawmakers have gone even further.  They have avoided subtle lawyers’ arguments about whether their law applies to pregnant women.  So they have enacted a statute that removes all doubt.  Their law also creates an offence of ‘HIV transmission’, though it too criminalises exposure to HIV, even without transmission.  

The Sierra Leone law requires a person with HIV who is aware of the fact to ‘take all reasonable measures and precautions to prevent the transmission of HIV to others’ – and it expressly covers a pregnant woman.  It requires her to take reasonable measures to prevent transmitting HIV to her foetus.  No one doubts a mother’s will and duty to take reasonable steps to protect her baby, but the law will make it more difficult for her to do so.

In addition, a person with HIV who is aware of this fact must not knowingly or recklessly place another at risk of becoming infected with HIV, unless that person knew of the fact and voluntarily accepted the risk.  This, too, applies to pregnant mothers.

The provision criminalises not merely actual transmission of HIV from mother to child – but makes a criminal of any pregnant woman who knows she has HIV but does not take reasonable measures to prevent transmission to her baby.

I can carry on giving examples.  
·    In Egypt, Human Rights Watch reports that men are being arrested merely for having HIV under article 9(c) of Law 10/1961, which criminalizes the ‘habitual practice of debauchery [fujur]’ – a term used to penalize consensual homosexual conduct in Egyptian law.
·    In Singapore, a man with HIV has been sentenced to a year in prison for exposing a sexual partner to the virus – even though the risk to the partner (whom he fellated) was minimal, if not non-existent.  
·    In Bermuda, a man with HIV who had unprotected sex with his girlfriend has been sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment, even though he did not infect her.
·    In June 2008, the highest court in Switzerland held a man liable for negligently transmitting HIV to a sexual partner when he knew that a past partner had HIV, even though he believed, because he experienced no seroconversion symptoms, that he himself did not have HIV.

These laws are stunningly wide in their application, and fearsome in their effects.  They attack rational efforts to lessen the impact and spread of the epidemic with a sledge-hammer.  They represent a rash phenomenon that is taking place world-wide:
Ø    law-makers are putting on the statute books new laws that create special crimes of HIV transmission or exposure – in Africa, the continent that carries the heaviest burden of the epidemic, at least a dozen countries have already adopted laws similar to the Sierra Leone law (though not all of them expressly include pregnant women) – many countries have done so with the proud help of an American-funded organisation;
Ø    courts and prosecutors are targeting men and women with HIV for special prosecution.

These laws and prosecutions are creating a crisis in HIV management and prevention efforts – and they constitute one of the biggest issues in the epidemic right now.

Let us try to understand what lies behind criminalisation.  

HIV is a fearsome virus, and its effects are potentially deadly.  Public officials should be able to invoke any available and effective means to counter its spread.  This includes criminal statutes and criminal prosecutions.  Moreover, in the abstract and from a distance from social reality, there seems a certain justice that criminal penalties should be applied against those who negligently, recklessly or deliberately pass on the virus – even against those whose actions create only the risk of doing so.  

African lawmakers and policy-makers, in particular, have reason to look for strong remedies.  Many African countries face a massive epidemic with agonising social and economic costs:  all effective means, including the mechanisms of the criminal law and criminal prosecutions, must be in-spanned.

In addition, many lawmakers are spurred especially by the plight of woman.  Many (including very young women) are infected by unwary or unscrupulous men – they need especial protection, and a criminal statute may give best voice to their entitlement to protection.

But these reasons are bad.  Bad.  And they need to be countered, rationally, powerfully and systematically.

Let us start right here, this morning, by setting out the ten plainest reasons why criminal laws and criminal prosecutions make bad policy in the AIDS epidemic.

FIRST, criminalisation is ineffective.  These laws and prosecutions don’t prevent the spread of HIV.  In the majority of cases, the virus spreads when two people have consensual sex, neither of them knowing that one has HIV.  That will continue to happen, no matter what criminal laws are enacted, and what criminal remedies are enforced.  Criminalisation will not stand in the way of the vast majority of HIV transmissions.  

SECOND, criminal laws and criminal prosecutions are a shoddy and misguided substitute for measures that really protect those at risk of contracting HIV.  We know what we need in this epidemic.  After more than a quarter-century, we know very well.  We need effective prevention, protection against discrimination, reduced stigma, strong leadership and role models, greater access to testing, and, most importantly, treatment for those who, today, this morning, are unnecessarily dying of AIDS.  

AIDS is now a medically manageable condition.  It is a virus, not a crime, and we must reject interventions that suggest otherwise.

I speak with passion about this, since nearly eleven years ago, in November 1997, my life was given back to me by anti-retroviral therapy.  Since then I have been blessed to live a vigorous and productive life, and continue to enjoy excellent health with no few if any side-effects.

But I also speak without complacency and with a sense of fragile humility, since too many unnecessary deaths – especially in Africa – continue to occur.  

We must focus on ending deaths, on ending stigma, on ending discrimination, on ending suffering.  And on ending irrational, unhelpful and resource-reducing measures – like criminalisation.  

For the uninfected, we need greater protection for women, more secure social and economic status, enhancing their capacity to negotiate safer sex and to protect themselves from predatory sexual partners.  Criminal laws and prosecutions will not do that.  What they do, instead, is to distract us from reaching that goal.

THIRD, far from protecting women, criminalisation victimises and oppresses and endangers them.  In Africa most people who know their HIV status are female.  This is because most testing occurs at ante-natal healthcare sites.  The result, inevitably, is that most of those who will be prosecuted because they know – or ought to know – their HIV status will be women – like the Zimbabwe woman who now has a five-year prison sentence hanging over her.  

As the International Community of Women living with HIV and AIDS has pointed out in a powerful consultation process, many woman cannot disclose their status to their partners because they fear violent assault or exclusion from the home.  If a woman in this position continues a sexual relationship (whether consensually or not), she risks prosecution under the African model statutes for exposing her partners to HIV (even when she does not pass HIV on to him).  

The material circumstances in which many women find themselves – especially in Africa – make it difficult and all too often impossible for them to negotiate safer sex, or to discuss HIV at all.  These circumstances include social subordination, economic dependence and traditional systems of property and inheritance which make them dependent on men.  

These provisions will hit women hardest, and will expose them to assault, ostracism and further stigma.  They will become more vulnerable to HIV, not less.

FOURTH, criminalisation is often unfairly and selectively enforced.  Prosecutions and laws single out already vulnerable groups – like sex workers, men who have sex with men and, in European countries, black males.  

Women who are already marginalized, such as sex workers and drug users, are placed at risk of further targeting by government officials and agencies.  This targeting is made more acute by the fact that, thus far, these laws have been relatively rarely applied.  Such prosecutions as there have been, have resulted from individual and sometimes idiosyncratic decisions by particular police officers and prosecutors.  The fact is that, if we leave aside cases of deliberate transmission of HIV, the behaviour that is prosecuted – namely, sex between two consenting adults – is common.  The prosecutions there have been have therefore been necessarily arbitrary.

FIFTH, criminalisation places blame on one person instead of responsibility on two.  This is a hard but important thing to say.  HIV has been around for nearly three decades.  For nearly three decades the universal public information message has been that no one is exempt from it.  So the risk of getting HIV (or any sexually transmitted infection) must now be seen as an inescapable facet of having sex.  We cannot pretend that the risk is introduced into an otherwise safe encounter by the person who knows or should know he has HIV. The risk is part of the environment, and practical responsibility for safer sex practices rests on everyone who is able to exercise autonomy in deciding to have sex with another.

The person who passes on the virus may be ‘more guilty’ than the person who acquires it, but criminalisation unfairly and inappropriately places all the ‘blame’ on the person with HIV.  It is true (as I have pointed out) that the subordinate position of many women makes it impossible for them to negotiate safer sex.  When a woman has no choice about sex, and gets infected, her partner unquestionably deserves blame.  But the fact is that criminalisation does not help women in this position.  It simply places them at greater risk of victimisation.  Criminalisation singles one sexual partner out.  All too often, despite her greater vulnerability, it will be the woman.  Criminalisation compounds the evil, rather than combating it.

SIXTH, these laws are difficult and degrading to apply.  This is because they intrude on the intimacy and privacy of consensual sex.  I am not talking about non-consensual sex.  That is rape, and rape should always be prosecuted.  But where sex is between two consenting adult partners, the apparatus of proof and the necessary methodology of prosecution degrade the parties and debase the law.  The Zimbabwean woman again springs to our attention her: her lover wanted the prosecution withdrawn, but the law vetoed his wishes.  It also countermanded her interests.  The result is a tragedy for all, and a blight on HIV prevention and treatment efforts.

What is more, the legal concepts of negligence and even recklessness are incoherent in the realm of sexual behaviour, and incapable of truly just application.  No one suggests that a person knowing he has HIV, who sets out intending to infect another, and achieves his aim, ought to escape prosecution (such deliberately stabbing someone with an injecting needle containing blood with HIV). He has set out deliberately to harm another and he has achieved his purpose as surely as if he had wounded his victim with a firearm or a knife.  

But in cases where there is no deliberate intention, the categories and distinctions of the criminal law become fuzzy and incapable of offering clear guidance – to those affected by the laws and to prosecutors.  Some laws target ‘reckless’ or ‘negligent’ transmission of or exposure to HIV.  Others advocate criminalising ‘reckless’ transmission of or exposure to HIV.  We know that the ‘reasonable person’ often has unprotected sex with partners of unknown sexual history in spite of the known risks – that’s why we have an HIV epidemic, and that’s why interventions to reduce unsafe sex are so important.  

When it comes to sex, with its potent elements of need, want, trust, passion, shame, fear, risk and heedlessness, normal, reasonable people simply do not always follow public health guidelines.  With the best of intentions, they may make assumptions (suggesting condom use = “I am HIV+”), avoid issues (no need to disclose if we just do oral sex), or just hope for the best. HIV is a risk, but it is balanced in both parties’ minds by the possibility of pleasure, excitement, closeness, material or social gain, and maybe love. That, for better or worse, is customary –  yes, reasonable – behaviour.  

But in court, looking back (especially looking back at an encounter where the worst outcome happened), a different standard is applied.  

As Matthew Weait’s insightful account of British prosecutions has shown, the risk of HIV is treated as inherently unreasonable, and the decision of the putative victim to run the risk is

It is simply unfair to judge people, particularly a more or less arbitrarily selected small segment of the population, by legal standards of sexual behaviour that bear little relation to the standards of behaviour in real life.

SEVENTH, many of these laws are extremely poorly drafted.  Partly because it is difficult to prove an offence that involves consensual sex, and because of the difficulties of applying the categories of the criminal law, many of these laws end up being a hodge-podge of confused legislative intent and bad drafting.  

For instance, under the ‘model law’ that many countries in east and west Africa have adopted, a person who is aware of being infected with HIV must inform ‘any sexual contact in advance’ of this fact.  But the law does not say what ‘any sexual contact’ is.  Is it holding hands?  Kissing?  Or only more intimate forms of exploratory contact?  Or does it apply only to penetrative intercourse?  The law does not say.  

What it also does not say is what ‘in advance’ means.  Must it be before any sexual contact is initiated?  Or is it only before actual intercourse occurs?  Will people be prosecuted for intimate conduct intended to lead up to intercourse?  We do not know.  The laws do not say.  Worse, millions of West and East Africans who must now live their lives under fear of prosecution by this law do not know.  

The ‘model’ law would not pass muster in any constitutional state where the rule of law applies.  The rule of law requires clarity in advance on the meaning of criminal provisions and the boundaries of criminal liability.  

But who will venture to challenge the laws as they have been enacted in eleven countries?  Perhaps there will be challenge in Kenya.  But until someone does, the terrifyingly vague provisions remain on the statute books.

EIGHTH, and perhaps most painfully to those of us living with HIV, criminalisation increases stigma.  From the first diagnosis of AIDS 27 years ago, HIV has carried a mountainous burden of stigma.  This has been for one over-riding reason: the fact that it is sexually transmitted.  No other infectious disease is viewed with as much fear and repugnance as HIV is.  

Because of this, stigma lies at the heart of the experience of every person living with or at risk HIV.

It is stigma that makes those at risk of HIV reluctant to be tested; it is stigma that makes it difficult – and often impossible – for them to speak about their infection; and it is stigma that continues to hinder access to the life-saving ARV therapies that are now increasingly available across Africa.

Legislators bewildered, or baffled, or at a loss as to how to respond effectively to the epidemic may be seduced into taking recourse to criminalisation, because it seems attractive, effective and media-friendly.

But it is not prevention- or treatment-friendly.  It is hostile to both.

This is because, tragically, it is stigma that lies primarily behind the drive to criminalisation.  It is stigma, rooted in the moralism that arises from the sexual transmission of HIV, that too often provides the main impulse behind the enactment of these laws.  

Even more tragically, such laws and prosecutions in turn only add fuel to the fires of stigma.

Prosecutions for HIV transmission and exposure, and the chilling content of the enactments themselves, reinforce the idea of HIV as a shameful, disgraceful, unworthy condition, requiring isolation and ostracism.

But HIV is a virus, not a crime.  That fact is elementary, and all-important.  Law-makers and prosecutors overlook it.  

We must fight this new burden of moralising stigma and persuade them of how wrong their approach is.

NINTH, criminalisation is a blatant dis-inducement to testing.  It is radically incompatible with a public health strategy that seeks to encourage people to come forward to find out their HIV status.  AIDS is now a medically manageable disease.  Across Africa, the life-saving drugs that suppress the virus and restore the body to health are becoming increasingly available.  

But why should any woman in Kenya want to find out her HIV status, when her knowledge can only expose her to risk of prosecution?  The laws put diagnosis, treatment, help and support further out of her reach.

By reinforcing stigma, by using the weapons of fear and blame and recrimination, criminalisation makes it more difficult for those with or at risk of HIV to access testing, to talk about diagnosis with HIV, and to receive treatment and support.

We therefore have a dire but unavoidable calculus: these laws will lead to more deaths, more suffering and greater debilitation from AIDS.

Criminalisation is costing lives.  

The International Community of Women with HIV and AIDS has rightly described laws like this as part of a ‘war on women’.

They are not just a war on women.  They are a war on all people with HIV, and they constitute an assault on good sense and rationality in dealing with the epidemic.

The rush to legislation has resulted in rash, inappropriate and in all too many cases excessive laws.

The laws often constitute an assault not just on civil liberties, but on rational and effective interventions in the epidemic.

And this brings us to the TENTH and last point, which is about belief, and hope – words all too seldom heard in this epidemic.  Criminalisation assumes the worst about people with HIV, and in doing so it punishes vulnerability.  The human rights approach assumes the best about people with HIV and supports empowerment.  

As Justice Michael Kirby – who powerfully lights a pathway of justice and hope and reason in this epidemic – has argued, countries with human rights laws that encourage the undiagnosed to test for HIV do much better at containing the epidemic than those that have ‘adopted punitive, moralistic, denialist strategies, including those relying on the criminal law as a sanction’.

The prevention of HIV is not just a technical challenge for public health. It is a challenge to all humanity to create a world in which behaving safely is truly feasible, is safe for both sexual partners, and genuinely rewarding.  

When condoms are available, when women have the power to use them, when those with HIV or at risk of it can get testing and treatment, when they are not afraid of stigma, ostracism and discrimination, they are far more likely to be able to act consistently for their own safety and that of others.   

The global consensus on human rights and the enabling environment captures this positive vision of HIV prevention.  When compared with the punitive and angry approach embodied in criminalisation, is clearly more important now than ever.

The principal effect of criminalisation is to enhance stigma, fear, isolation, and the dread of persecution and ostracism that drives people away from treatment.

Let us use our plenary meeting this morning to send out a firm and clear message:–
·    Criminalisation is a poor tool for regulating HIV infection and transmission;
·    there is no public health rationale for invoking criminal law sanctions against those who unintentionally transmit HIV or expose others to it;
·    the sole rationale for criminalisation is the criminal law goal of retribution and punishment – but that is a poor and distorted aim for public health law;
·    Criminalisation is in general warranted only in cases where someone sets out, well knowing he has HIV, to infect another person, and achieves this aim.

In other cases, we are left with the sad burdens, but also the hopeful initiatives, that are available to us in this epidemic.  

Let today be the start of a campaign against criminalisation.  

Let one of the conference outcomes be a major international push-back against misguided criminal laws and prosecutions.

Let us return to our countries, determined to persuade law-makers and prosecuting authorities of the folly and distraction of criminalisation.  Let us return strengthened in our resolve to fight AGAINST stigma, against discrimination, and against criminalisation – and to fight FOR justice, good sense, effective prevention measures and for access to treatment.

Edwin Cameron: 'The biggest problem is stigma. Stigma, stigma, stigma, stigma!'21st Annual AIDS Conference - 2016

17 July 2016, Durban, South Africa

I'm really very, very pleased to be here today and I'm very, very pleased that this has taken place. This is an issue which should have a greater prominence in this conference.

We know that the central issue in this epidemic- we know medically and socially, what to do. We know what to do. We know that HIV can be medically managed. I've been on antiretrovirals for almost 19 years. I'm fitter and healthier than I was in 1997. We've got the world's biggest antiretroviral treatment program publicly provided in South Africa. We know that if we can get to enough people, the algorithm showed, if we can get everyone tested and everyone treated, in South Africa, we've committed from September to two important things: Which is to treat everyone with HIV and secondly, as importantly, to give sex workers pre-exposure prophylaxis. Are there any sex workers here?

Audience member: Yes!

Well done, ma'am!

I'm so proud of you. And I'm proud of our country. I'm proud of our country, that we're going to be providing people whose work is one of the most difficult and dangerous, and despised occupations, and one that deserves our support and our respect and our love with pre-exposure prophylaxis.

All of that we know. We even know how we can try to persuade people. Prevention is more difficult. We don't know what to do about prevention, ladies and gentlemen. I always refer to the fact that by 196 1- 10 year after Sir Richard Doll published his ground breaking articles inThe Lancet and the British Journal of Medicine about the link between cancer and cardiopulmonary disease and smoking - by the end of that decade, the governments of North America and Western Europe had accepted that smoking causes cancer. Smoking in the United States - 44%. Where is smoking in the United States now, anyone tell me?

Eighteen percent

So don't tell me ... Don't come to Africa and say, "Why don't those girls in the townships just use condoms? 'Cause we're talking about health seeking behaviour, we're talking about health seeking choices. So, I accept prevention from the broad mind that we know how to manage it, but medically and otherwise, physiologically, virologically, we know exactly what to do.

The biggest problem is stigma. Stigma, stigma, stigma, stigma. Stigma remains a barrier to prevention, it remains a barrier to behaviour change, it remains a barrier to people accessing treatment. Stigma is causing deaths, we know that. Because people are too scared to test. We, in this country, still have between 150,000 and 180,000 deaths from HIV every year, linked often with TB, also an intractably hard disease, much more medically difficult to deal with than HIV. But the cause of the undiagnosed cases of HIV, the cause of the untreated cases of AIDS is stigma.

Beyond Blame has offered today a rare and a crucial opportunity to build the movement that tackles that stigma frontally. Back in 2008, on the final day of the International AIDS Conference in Mexico, I called for a sustained and vocal campaign against HIV criminaliation. Along with many other activists, I hoped that that conference eight years ago would result in a major international resistance movement to misguided criminallaws and prosecution. And I want to credit Edwin J. Bernard, have you got credit today, Edwin? Come and stand in the front. Have you got credit?

Edwin Bernard:

Thank you.

The difference between me and activists like Edwin is that they don't get the judicial salary and the free car. So you take all the credit, Edwin. I really, really honestly mean that. And you working with us, you, ladies and gentlemen, are working with us 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I bring honour and credit to you for doing that in difficult circumstances.

The work of HIV Justice Worldwide, who put together this conference, shows how far we've come. The fact that you had such a successful meeting is itself, a signal of our success.

The movement against these laws and prosecutions, which started a decade ago, is really gaining strength and some heartening outcomes. As you've heard today, laws are being repealed, they've be enmodernised, they've been struck down. From Kenya to Switzerland, from the state of Victoria in Australia, to the state of Colorado in the United States.

I've been living with HIV for over 30 years, ladies and gentlemen. It is especially fitting for me to be able to note that much of the necessary advocacy for this, has been undertaken by civil society. Can I ask, how many government officials are there in the room today? Put up your hands. There, we've outed you, sir!

We're very proud of you. One government official; we pay honour to you. Thank you for coming. And you too, ma'am. Three. Yep, three government officials. The fact is, ladies and gentlemen, you are civil society activists ... every single major breakthrough for treatment, for governmental action against criminal laws, against stigma, has been driven by civil society activists.

Since the beginning of the HIV epidemic 35 long years ago, policy makers and politicians had been under sore temptation to punish us for the fact that we have HIV. Sometimes they have been propelled by public opinion. Sometimes they themselves have not justly propelled public opinion. But they've tried to find, in punitive approaches, a quick solution.

There's no quick solution, ladies and gentlemen. And one way has been this particularly hyper stigmatising way of HIV criminalisation: criminal laws against people living with HIV who don't declare that they have HIV, or to make potential or perceived exposure or transmission that occurs, when it is not deliberate, criminal offences.

Most of these laws are appallingly broad. I've been working this week with Section 79 of the Zimbabwe Criminal Code. Where are our Zimbabwean brothers and sisters?

Is there anyone here who was involved in the case of Pitty Mpofu? I'll come to it in a moment. But appallingly broad. If you do anything that puts anyone at risk of HIV exposure, you are guilty of deliberate transmission of HIV. We've heard today on the panel, I believe, very moving accounts, deeply moving accounts about people who have survived the hyper stigmatsing assault of these laws. We also know a very helpful fact, ladies and gentlemen, that scientific evidence about how HIV is transmitted and how low the risk of transmitting the virus is, is the key way.

People come to South Africa and they speak about President Mbeki, who disregarded evidence, who would not accept the overwhelming scientific proof that HIV caused AIDS, and much more importantly, that if AIDS was virally caused, if its aetiology was viral, that you could treat it. And they look condescendingly at President Mbeki - but Western governments all over, Australia, North America and the rest of Africa, African governments, in equal measure to President Mbeki, are ignoring scientific evidence.

The last 20 years has seen a massive shift in the management of HIV. It is now completely medically manageable, as I've said. I was dying of AIDS 19 years ago in November 1997. I had access to antiretroviral treatment.

Nineteen years later, as I've said, I'm stronger than I was as a younger man then. Despite thisprogress, despite the progress in prevention, treatment, and care, that overwhelming issue remains, which is stigma. And I want to mention a difficult issue and an important issue, which is the internalised form of stigma.

I'm glad that there is going to be quite a lot of attention here. Ladies and gentlemen, internalised stigma is when we as people with HIV or at risk of it, take deeply within,to the recesses of our own consciousness and subconsciousness, the hatred, the ostracism, the fear, the rejection, the prejudice, the discrimination of the external world, and that often is a causative effect when people don't get treatment, when they don't get testing. It's a hard phenomenon to describe. It's hard to act against but its powerful effect on our epidemic must be recognised.

The enactment and enforcement of laws that criminalise HIV, even the threat of their enforcement, fuels the fires of stigma. It fuels the fires of internalised stigma. It reinforces the idea, both externally and internally of those with HIV and at risk of it,that HIV is shameful, that it is a contamination, that it is disgraceful, that thosewho have it are criminals, that they're vectors for passing on the disease. And by reinforcing stigma, HIV criminalisation makes it much more difficult for those at risk of HIV to access testing and prevention. It makes it more difficult for them to talk openly about living with the virus and to be tested and to be treated and to be counselled to behavioural change. I know that I'm preaching to the converted here, but HIV criminalisation is profoundly bad policy. There is no evidence that it works. Instead, it sends out misleading and stigmatising messages. It undermines the remarkable scientific advances and proven public health strategies that we know are effective in dealing with this epidemic.

In 1997, the Chair of the Justice Portfolio Committee in South Africa's Parliament, Mr. Johnny de Lange , called for laws to criminalise HIV. Our epidemic was burgeoning. Treatment was not yet available except to the privileged few like me, who fell severely ill at the end of that year. And of course, you take the easy fix. You pass a law. You pass a law that targets those with HIV. Mr. De Lange was a powerful man. He steered a lot of laws through Parliament at that time, including our version of minimum sentencing laws, which are now being reconsidered in America but not yet reconsidered here. He steered unbailable offences laws through Parliament. He did a lot of legislative steering.

But very fortunately, the matter was referred to a committee of the South African Law Reform Commission, which was chaired at the time by Justice Ismail Mahomed. He asked me to chair the committee, and one of our projects was a project on the criminalisation of HIV. It's worth getting the report, ladies and gentlemen. I don't say this in vanity, because most of the work was done by a superb lawyer and researcher at the Law Reform Commission called Anna-Marie Havenga, so I claim no credit for the report. I claim credit for editing it and for steering it. But that report is worth downloading. It's a 200 - page report that exhaustively looks at all the options. It's 20 years old now, 18 years old, but we decided against criminalisation.

You know what was the pivotal breakthrough? We had a two-day conference where we called all the civil society organisations together in Pretoria to debate this issue. We called especially the organisations dealing with women and with children's rights. We called those who sought protection for women, who sought the prevention of paediatric HIV, and we realised by the end of the second day, we had a unanimous consensus that these laws were bad for women. They were bad for children. That those targeted by these laws are the women themselves, and it's been borne out. Many of the first prosecutions in Africa had been prosecutions of women. The first prosecution under Section 79 of the Zimbabwe Criminal Law Amendment Act, which I've mentioned before, was of a woman, when her partner went and laid a charge against her.

So we decided against it Ladies and gentlemen, I just want to be rude about Canada. Let me summarise. Where's Richard? It's so nice to be rude about Canada. Even though Richard [Elliot, Executive Director of the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network] tried to make Canada sensible,

There's been a decision recently of the Zimbabwe Constitutional Court, a full panel of seven judges where they refused to declare this appalling law .... It's an appallingly broad and vague law. They said they're not going to rule it unconstitutional. And the premise is that everyone with HIV has got to disclose. I want to give you the quote. Paragraph 12 of the judgement:

“Public policy requires of a person with HIV that he make full disclosure to his intended partner, in order to afford that partner the opportunity to make an informed decision." Ladiesand gentleman, I ask why? Why? Why does someone with HIV, either who's on treatment or who's going to take appropriate prevention measures, have to disclose? That's the premise. And that - Richard Elliott, I won't make you stand - is the premise of[the] Mabior [decision].

Obviously it's shameful. Did I say shameful? A bad, bad, bad, bad, bad unanimous decision of the Canadian Supreme Court, which I equate with the judgement andthe reasoning in State vs Pitty Mpofu. Pitty Mpofu's challenge failed. And Mabior ... Mr. Mabior did not transmit HIV. He was on successful antiretroviral therapy. He did not disclose his HIV. He was found, in effect, guilty of rape, because he didn't disclose.

Richard, you argued the case; I honour you and the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network for your valiant attempts. I was in Canada just before the case was argued. Was it 2012? And you were full of hope. You werefull of hope. We now know there's been a study released last week, which shows that 58,000 instances of serodiscordant intercourse have not led to a single transmission of HIV. That was known to the nine justices of the Supreme Court of Canada at the time, but the evidence has been mounting up even more incontrovertibly, since then.

Ladies and gentlemen, let me wrap up. I want to congratulate you for being at this conference today. I want you to feel energised. I want you to feel informed and empowered and energised to take out into this conference today the message of today's meeting. And when Edwin and I were debating what I should say, I wanted to add something to his suggestions for my speech. And what I wanted to add was the fact that we must not let our administrators and officials and politicians arrive at this conference. They arrive, ladies and gentleman, with cars. And they arrive with delegations. And they go back to their countries, 30 of them in Africa, with criminal laws that target us irrationally, unscientifically, stigma enhancingly, stigma magnifyingly.

We must not allow them that peace and comfort. We must challenge them.

We must take the message of this conference out of your meeting today into the halls, into the podiums, and into the individual meetings with those people. Find the ministers and the officials from the African countries that target. We have suffered no harm in this country, because we didn't stigmatise. We did the right thing.

Those countries must do the right thing. They must repeal those laws. And your energy today, your vision, andyour activism, will make sure that that happens. Thank you

Rose McGowan: 'My name is Rose McGowan, and I am brave, and I am you', Women's Convention - 2017

27 October 2017, Detroit, Michigan, USA

This was McGowan's first speech post raising allegations of sexual assault against Harvey Weinstein.

Good morning, women, allies.

Thank you, Tarana Burke. Thank you to all of you fabulous, strong, powerful ‘Me Toos.’ Because we are all ‘Me Toos.’ And thank you, Tarana, for giving us two words and a hashtag that helped free us.

I have been silenced for 20 years. I have been slut-shamed. I have been harassed. I have been maligned, and you know what? I’m just like you — because what happened to me behind the scenes happens to all of us in this society. And that cannot stand, and it will not stand.

We are free. We are strong. We are one massive collective voice. That is what Rose Army is about. It is about all of us being roses in our own life. Not me. The actual flower — because we have thorns, and our thorns carry justice, and our thorns carry consequence. No more will we be shunted to the side. No more will we be hurt. It’s time to be whole. It’s time to rise. It’s time to be brave. In the face of unspeakable actions from one monster, we look away to another, the head monster of all right now. And they are the same, and they must die. It is time. The paradigm must be subverted. It is time. We’ve been waiting a very long time for this happen, but we don’t need to wait anymore because we’ve got this. We’ve got this, I know it.

My sisters, our allies, our brothers — we are no nation. We are no country. We belong to no flag. We are a planet of women, and you will hear us roar. I came to be a voice for all of us who’ve been told we were nothing, for all of us who’ve been looked down on, for all of us who’ve been grabbed by the motherf—ing pussy. No more. Name it. Shame it. Call it out. Join me, join all of us as we amplify each other’s voices and we do what is right for us and for our sisters and for this planet, mother Earth.

There are so many women that inspire me on a daily basis, and if I can be one ounce of that at any moment in time for any of you, I send you all of the strength that I have. Hollywood may seem like it’s an isolated thing, but it is not. It is the messaging system for your mind. It is the mirror that you’re given to look into — this is what you are as a woman, this is what you are as a man, this is what you are as a boy, girl, gay, straight, transgender. But it’s all told through 96% males in the Director’s Guild of America. That statistic has not changed since 1946, so we are given one view, and I know the men behind that view. And they should not be in your mind, and they should not be in mine. It’s time to clean house.

I want to thank you for being here, for giving me wings during this very difficult time. The triggering has been insane. The monster’s face everywhere, my nightmare. But I know I’m not alone because I’m just the same as the girl in the tiny little town who was raped by the football squad, and they have full dominance and control over the little town newspaper. There really is no actual difference. It’s the same situation, and that situation must end because it is not our shame. The scarlet letter is theirs. It is not ours. We are pure, we are strong, we are brave and we will fight. Pussies grab back. Women grab back. We speak, we yell, we march, we are here, we will not go away.

My name is Rose McGowan, and I am brave, and I am you.

Thank you. Right now, there is another mother country hurting that desperately needs our help, that desperately needs our attention, so I am honored to introduce the author, activist and academic Rosa Clemente from Puerto Rico.

Fiona Wood: 'Life is no brief candle' 10 year Bali Bombings Memorial Service - 2012

12 October 2012, Canberra, Australia

Fiona Wood headed the burns unit at Royal Perth hospital. She and her team of sixty treated 28 victims of the Bali Bombings over that terrible week in 2002. She was Australian of the Year in 2005.

Distinguished Australians; all those Australians who 10 years ago distinguished themselves. All Australians, today is the day to look in to your heart, to look into your heart and find in it, the strength, the love and the human energy.

The strength of resilience, to face such horror, and to keep going, knowing there is a bright future ahead when we’ve seen the future of so many beautiful smiles snuffed away.

The love in their heart, that will offer that hand of friendship and forgiveness, and that energy to make sure that we all work, together, to make Australia a place we are proud of, a place we will share our privilege, we will make sure tomorrow is a better day.

As I look down that tunnel of time to that morning ten years ago when we heard the news, I saw many Australians doing many astonishing things.

From the Sari Club to the Sanglah hospital to tarmac at Denpasar into the Northern Territory’s triage centre that’s gone on to excel themselves year in and year out in this last decade.

To all the burns centres across Australia, to all the health facilities across Australia who stepped up to the plate. To all those Australians who helped people they didn’t even know, but what they did know was that they were in need at that time.

And of course it wasn’t just Australians as we have heard. Helping people was what we did. As a health professional it’s my educational training that puts me in that position of privilege, to help people when their life changes in an instant.

Hanabeth Luke assisting Tom Singer, who later died of his injuries

I felt it was a privilege to help those lives on that day, and I tried very hard with all of my colleagues across the country and count not just those who were suffering, and those injuries, but those around them cause we know only too well the horror of burns, and the horror that that entails and the pain.

And that that’s a drop in the ocean, and its like a pebble that keeps going, and those waves effect all those around, all those that care for that person.

So as I look back through that tunnel of time over 10 years I see some amazing things. I think it’s a very appropriate time for us to stand and thank and respect that loss of energy, but also to celebrate, to care, and to celebrate what we go forward with.

I remember one patient a triathlete, a young woman, whose injuries were beyond comprehension and the first thing she said when she came out of her coma was, ‘I’ll never run will I walk again?

I said you will walk, you will run, you will race.

And in 2008 she beat me in an iron man in Busselton. I only rode the bike, and she did the whole thing. And her bike time was faster than mine. And there wasn’t a dry eye in Busselton that day, as we hugged coming over that finish line.

Two weeks ago as I saw Phil Britten, explaining how getting out of the Sari club was so hard, and the pain of his injuries, but the pain of his recovery, was a mountain that was 10 times higher

I think the window to our world has been opened, and our community has seen and as a result they have helped. I think for me this 10 years is a time to say thank you, thank you to all Australians, all those distinguished Australians who facilitated the response.

All those Australians who distinguished themselves. And did extraordinary things. And all those in the communities, and individuals who went on to share that pain. And to support going forward.

So in the words of George Bernard Shaw, life is no brief candle, it’s a sort of flaming torch we have a hold of for a moment and we want to burn as brightly as possible before we hand it on to the next generation.

I see within those hearts, resilience that is inspirational. Love that is selfless. And an energy that as we work in our field to make sure that the quality of the outcome is worth the pain of survival, I see an energy across Australia, in all sorts of areas.

All you have to do is look for it. And to connect with it, and it will grow. So that we can pass on a history that we are proud of.

An Australia that we are proud of, borne on strength, resilience, love and raw human energy.

Doing the best we can for each other.

John Howard: 'You are not forgotten, your loss is not forgotten,' Bali Bombings 10 year service - 2012

http://www.abc.net.au/news/specials/bali-remembered/2012-10-12/live-blog3a-bali-bombing-victims-remembered/4309196

Ten years ago, twenty million Ausralians in a sense extended their arms of comfort to those who had lost so much, on that terrible night, and who in other painful ways, were victims of a foul and evil act of mindless terrorism, that could draw no comfort or support, from any religious or ideological belief.

And today, a decade on, we renew that offer of comfort and compassion, and struggle to understand the continuing pain that so many of you must feel.

That terrible night and the days that followed tested the character of our nation, Australia.

 and it passed that character test with flying colours. We saw in those days, those two great qualities that our nation has; strength but also tenderness.

The gentle efficiency of those who medically evacuated in 37 hours 66 badly injured people.

And those who were responsible for this terrible deed may have hoped a number of things; they may have hoped that they would have driven Indonesia and Australia further apart.

Instead of that, they brought Indonesia and Australia closer together.

Within minutes of the explosions, the commissioner of the Australian Federal Police was in touch with you sir, then in charge of the Indonesian police, and the days and weeks that followed, the cooperation between Australian and Indonesian police meant that those responsible for committing this terrible act were brought to justice.

PART TRANSCRIPT

Gregg Popovich: 'You’ve got that kind of a lead, yes, because you were born white', White privilege press conference - 2017

25 September 2017, San Antonio, Texas, USA

I don’t think about some platform that I have. I’m an individual. I live in this country. I have the right to say and think what I want. It’s got nothing to do with my position. If it helps someone think one way or another about something, great. But the discussion has to take place.

Obviously, race is the elephant in the room and we all understand that. Unless it is talked about constantly, it’s not going to get better. ‘Oh, they’re talking about that again. They pulled the race card again. Why do we have to talk about that?’ Well, because it’s uncomfortable. There has to be an uncomfortable element in the discourse for anything to change, whether it’s the LGBT movement, or women’s suffrage, race, it doesn’t matter. People have to be made to feel uncomfortable, and especially white people, because we’re comfortable. We still have no clue what being born white means. And if you read some of the recent literature, you realize there really is no such thing as whiteness. We kind of made it up. That’s not my original thought, but it’s true.

It’s hard to sit down and decide that, yes, it’s like you’re at the 50-meter mark in a 100-meter dash. You’ve got that kind of a lead, yes, because you were born white. You have advantage that are systemically, culturally, psychologically rare. And they’ve been built up and cemented for hundreds of years. But many people can’t look at it that way, because it’s too difficult. It can’t be something that’s on their plate on a daily basis. People want to hold their position, people want their status quo, people don’t want to give that up. Until its given up, it’s not going to be fixed.

Again, I'm just one dude walking around and that's how I feel.

...

(from start of video)

There’s a lot involved in that when you say culture and politics and sports. People write books about that. I would hesitate to take that on as a whole. It makes more sense to me to be a bit more specific, and I’ll just tell you what we say to our team.

Each one of them has the right and ability to say what they would like to say, and act the way they’d like to act. They have our full support and no matter what they might want to do or not do is important to them, respected by us, and there’s no recrimination no matter what might take place, unless it’s ridiculous egregious. There’s a line for everything. But we do live in a difficult time and it doesn’t do a whole lot of good ...

We all know the situation and it gets beaten up every day by talking heads, it starts to get personal. I think we all know why, we all know who the source where a lot of the division comes from, but to dwell on that is sometimes I think is the wrong way to go, because it’s so obvious now. It’s boring. The childishness, the gratuitous fear mongering and race baiting, has been so consistent that it’s almost expected. The bar has been lowered so far that I think it’s more important to be thinking about what to do in more organic roots based level. Thinking about the efforts to restrict voter registration, comments that demean cultures, ethic groups, races, women. Those sorts of things. What can be done in an organic way to fight that?

We know how everything happens, we know where the power in the country is, we know the racism that exists. But it’s gone beyond that to a point where I’m more worried about, and confused by, the people around our president. These are intelligent people who know exactly what’s going on. They basically were very negative about his actions but now it seems like it’s condoned. We saw it this weekend with his comments about people who should be fired or people who shouldn’t be allowed to do this sort of thing. I wonder what the people think about who voted for him, where their line is, how much they can take, where does the morality and decency kick in?

I understand very well they didn’t like their choice, economically. A lot of people had a problem. And he was the right guy at the right time to tap into that mood. But people overlooked one helluva lot to pull that trigger and vote in that direction, but it was because they wanted change, they felt ignored, they actually thought something would happen that would aid them. But at what price, is the question.

And as we see the actions over and over again, one wonders what is in their head. Have they come to the conclusion that they had the wrong vehicle? They might have had good ideas, good reasons why they wanted to go the way they went. But someone else that had a little bit more decency about how they approach other people and other groups might have served better. That’s what I worry about in the country.

You wonder about if you live where you thought you live. I just heard a comment this morning from a NASCAR owner and Mr. Petty that just blew me away, just blew me away. Where the owner described that he would get the Greyhound bus tickets for anybody to leave, and they’d be fired, and Mr. Petty, who said people who act the way we saw Sunday, they should leave the country. That’s where I live. I had no idea that I lived in a country where people would actually say that sort of thing. I’m not totally naive but I think these people have been enabled by an example that we’ve all been given. You’ve seen it in Charlottesville, and on and on and on. That’s not a surprise. Get over it. What do we do to get it done. To go to the grassroots and not allow this to happen again.

Our country’s an embarrassment to the world. This is an individual who actually thought that when people held arms during the game, that they were doing it to honor the flag. That’s delusional. Absolutely delusional. But it’s what we have to live with.

So we have a choice. We can continue to bounce our heads off the wall with his conduct, or we can decide that the institutions of our country are more important, that people are more important, that the decent America that we all thought we had and want is more important, and get down to business at a grassroots level and do what we have to do.

I guess that’s enough for now.

Simone Clements: 'Mummy, am I going to heaven?' Hayden's story, Redkite charity night - 2017

7 September 2017, Sofitel, Melbourne, Australia

Redkite is a charity that raises money for families who have a child who has received a cancer diagnosis. The corporate quiz is their big fundraiser. Simone is the mother of Hayden. Video of speech embedded above.

Good evening Everyone,

My name is Simone Clements and I have been invited to talk to you tonight because our family has been a recipient of RedKite’s compassion, kindness and financial assistance. 

You may recognise us from TV,  New Idea magazine or advertising material but more recently from the National news and Newspapers as we are the family that had both of our cars stolen out of our driveway on a day we needed to get to the Royal Children’s Hospital for an MRI for our son.

You see we have a little boy Hayden he is 6 years old and he was diagnosed with and inoperable, incurable brain tumour nearly two years ago and this is our story......

A few weeks after the twins 5th birthday Hayden began to complain that he couldn’t use his left hand and arm whilst dressing, immediately we sensed that something neurological was going on but we still had hope that maybe it was an injury.

We didn’t want to panic so we took him the Dr but when they suggested we take him to the Royal Children’s Hospital immediately, we knew it was serious and were overwhelmed with emotion.

As we raced him into the Royal Children’s hospital we began discussing the worst case scenario and preparing ourselves for what was to come. Upon arriving at the hospital he was rushed into a CT scan revealing a 4cm tumour in his brain stem. I remember feeling devastated, sick and barely able to breathe. I tried to be brave and I held it together in front of Hayden but eventually I was overcome with grief and shock and I had to leave the room. My knees went weak and I remember sobbing on the emergency department floor.

Nothing could take away my pain, it hurt so much.  I was grieving for the life that I had envisaged for our son and fearing the unknown.   Eventually, I pulled myself together and realised that all these feelings had to drive me to do whatever it was going to take to get our son through this journey. That became our family mantra, “Whatever it takes...”

I stand here tonight so very proud of our family and the resilience we have shown bravely fighting this beast we call cancer. We took our inspiration from Hayden he is a hero, a little champion. He endured 36 rounds of chemo in 12 months, lost all mobility on his left side, put up with painful procedures, surgeries, MRI’s, x-rays, ultrasounds, examinations, countless blood tests, in and out of hospital for two years, powered through his rehab sessions even when he felt like giving up or it was too hard, he just smiled and got on with it impressing everyone with his attitude and charm.  

If you would like to watch his brave fight you can watch it on youtube called Hayden’s Journey. It’s a 30 minute glimpse into the 2 year struggle for a child diagnosed with a brain tumour.

I don’t know how he did what he did and I don’t know how we have survived the past 2 years but one thing I do know, we couldn’t have done it without our community, the kindness of strangers and the support that RedKite provided our family.

Cancer affects every aspect of your family’s life physically, emotionally, financially and psychologically. RedKite provided our family with much needed resources to manage our grief, counselling for our well being and made sure we didn’t have the extra stress of finding funds to pay bills, petrol, groceries and ongoing medical costs.

Funds raised for RedKite on nights like tonight for families like ours have contributed towards our bills, school fees, medications, rehabilitation equipment,  mobility aids, safety items in our house, Physio, OT , Dr and Therapy costs, psychologists, house cleaning and babysitters for our other children just to name a few. 

The contributions of individuals and companies are greatly appreciated by families like ours. I just can not begin to express our gratitude for all that RedKite have done for our family during such a difficult time.

One night last week Hayden’s twin sister was snuggling a bunny that was given to her she calls it her worry bunny and she told me it wasn’t working. I said to her sometimes you need to tell grown ups your worries and that helps too. She took a breath and said softly, “I need to tell you I have a worry and it’s about Hayden. I braced myself and then she said it, ‘I’m worried that Hayden going to die from his brain tumour.” My heart sank and I responded with, ‘I know sweetheart this is my worry too, but the doctors are doing everything they can to help him and you know what, every day that we have him in our lives we need to tell him we love him and make the most of our time together.’ Young children shouldn’t have such worries weighing heavily on their minds.

Twins Carlee and Hayden

Carlee and Hayden

Another day that nearly broke me was when I was walking with Hayden in the wheelchair to get some fresh air he was so sick this day after chemo and he looked up at me and asked, ‘Mummy am I going to heaven?’ I didn’t know what to say so I just said, “Not today sweetheart hopefully not anytime soon.’

So as you can see dealing with childhood cancer these past two years has been pretty traumatic but knowing we had the support of people like you, companies, businesses and RedKite definitely relieved the pressure and we didn’t feel so alone. The financial aid that you generate goes a long way in helping families like ours and critically ill children.

We will never forget your kindness, generosity, well wishes and support.

From the bottom of our hearts and on behalf of families dealing with Childhood Cancer. 

Thankyou.

You can help Redkite provide essential support for families like Simone's by donating here. You can support Hayden's GoFundMe page here.

Steven Pinker: 'Unfortunately the 'f*cking' in 'f*cking brilliant' is an adverb', The Science of Swearing - 2008

10 September 2008, Warwick's, La Jolia, California, USA

I'm going to switch now from cognition to emotion, and the puzzle of language that I'll start with comes from an event five years ago when NBC broadcast the Golden Globes awards on live television, and accepting an award on behalf of the group U2,  Bono said and I quote: 'this is really really fucking brilliant'.

Now the networks did not bleep out the offending words, and the switchboards lit up and the case went to the Federal Communications Commission, the FCC, which has jurisdiction over the airwaves. In considering the matter they decided not to fine the network, because according to their guidelines, indecency is, quote, 'material that describes or depicts sexual or excretory organs or activities' and the 'fucking in fucking brilliant' is 'an adjective or expletive to emphasize an exclamation'.

Well a number of conservative politicans were enraged, and they filed legislation designed to close this loophole. I downloaded one of these bills from the uS Congressional website, and I'm going to read it to you right now:

House resolution 3687 - The Clean Airwaves Act

The House resolves that section 1464 of Title 18 United States code be amended (1) by inserting (a) before 'Whoever and (2) to the term profane used with respect to language includes the words shit, piss, fuck, cunt, asshole, and the phrases cock sucker, mother fucker and ass hole, compound use, (including hyphenated compounds) , of such words and phrases with each other or with other words or phrases, and other grammatical forms of such words and phrases (including verb, adjective, gerund, participle and infinitive forms).

Unfortunately the fucking in 'fucking brilliant' is an adverb, and that's the one part of speech they forgot to include.

This is a brilliant lecture on what swearing is about. If anyone has a full transcript I'd love to post it.

Joel Creasey: 'We are not going anywhere', marriage equality rally - 2017

26 August 2017, Melbourne, Australia

Joel Creasey is a comedian, speaking at rally for 'yes' campaign in advance of a marriage equality postal survey being conducted in Australia by the conservative government.

My boyfriend he proposed to me.

He proposed that we see other people ....

But in that moment I realised that I truly do want to get married. It is my basic human right, I know I am such a diva these days ...

Like food, shelter, marriage, what’s next, clean drinking water, I am out of control ...

I heard somebody say the other day that gay marriage affects all Australians, it affects ALL Asutralians

Incorrect. It only affects the two people in love wanting to get married.

The only people being affected by gay marriage today is the Fitness First around the corner, because they are empty while every gay man and lesbian is at this rally.

And while I’m at it, can I just say, no. We do not want to marry THE SYDNEY HARBOUR BRIDGE.

I had a one night stand with it once. It was terrible. Very needy, and stayed for breakfast.

Young people, of whom I am one, thank you Anthony, we need to get out to vote. We saw what happened only too recently in America, when people did not turn out to vote.

Jennifer Hudson was voted off seventh on the third season of American Idol.

I know it takes effort and young people and people of my generation and younger, we hate effort! I haven’t cooked a meal in three years. I won’t watch a youtube ad if there’s not a ‘skip ad’ option at the start of it. And I Ubered tothe gym the other day, and it’s in my building.

But this is one of those moments in our young lives that demands that effort.

Insta-story yourself voting if you must, trust me, it’s going to make great content.

But I’d like to speak directly now to those young people who might be struggling right now with their sexuality, made now only worse by this plebiscite, this amazing, non binding, postal plebiscite ... well it’s a survey really, probably done by the same people who do Family Feud.

Survey says - you screwed up Prime Minister.

And I’d particularly like to talk to those young people who are perhaps living in a smaller town, where being gay isn’t particularly common place. Let me assure you, it does get better.

And to please, stick in there, find an ally, find somebody you can talk to.

To the young people let me assure you, the best part of being an adult is youcan make your own decisions.

You don’t have to be friends with the bullies you share maths classes with.

You don’t have to talk to those family members who don’t accept you for who you are.

Christmas can just be you and a couple of hotties sipping Mai Thais in Hawaii if you want.

You don’t have to hang out with Uncle Peter who constantly asks, ‘when you decided to be gay’ .

The gay community is a family, and we are waiting for you, here in Melbourne, and in Sydney and in Adelaide and there’s three in Perth, we are waiting for you all around the world, waiting to embrace you, and tell you that you are loved, and important, and that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with you.

And if I’m perfectly honest, when you get here, I’ll probably try to crack onto you on the dance floor of the Peel.

That said, we’re talking about small towns as well, if a footy club in the regional town of Hamilton Victoria can paint their fifty metre line rainbow, then anything is possible. And do not lose a skerrick of hope.

Now I know Seb said earlier not to speak directly to the No campaign, but I’m a comedian and I can’t help myself, so I’d just quickly like to talk to those people who printed the laughable ‘STOP THE FAGS’ posters. First of all, hello I’m on the television and I’m famous, so isn’t that exciting. Probably never spoken to one of those people before. And yes, I agree, smoking is revolting. And no I’m sorry, we are not going anywhere. That is not going to happen. We are going to fight. We are going to achieve marriage equality, we are going to be allowed to marry the person we love, regardless of gender and sexuality.

We are going to win, in SICKENINGNESSand in health.

And I’m finally going to be able to sell my ten page bridal spread to New Idea, like I’ve dreamt of all my life.

And finally, PS Stop the Fags, your graphic designer sucks, I’ve made more compelling posters on Microsoft Paint.

Thank you ladies and gentlemen,

Love is love.

Clare Wright: 'Discord in voices, female voices, are still seen to belong to wicked witches and evil stepmothers', Breakthrough '16, VWT - 2016

25 November 2015, Melbourne Town Hall, Melbourne, Australia

Thank you so much, Anna. What a great looking stage we’ve got here, hey? And I have to say that the view from the stage looking down is extraordinary as well. Thank you all for coming out, it’s an amazing day. In keeping with the spirit of reconciliation I’d like to start by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land on which we gather today. The Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation, and pay my respects to their elders past, present and emerging. I recognise that this has always been a place of discussion and debate, and I recognise that Aboriginal sovereignty has never been ceded.

I’m going to start today with a confession….my confession is that I have no idea what’s going on on the screen right now. Aha, lets try that again. Thank you, I assume Marie Claire is one of the sponsors of Breakthrough?

-Laughter-

Oh hello, there we go. I want to start today with another confession; I am a surfy chick. Sure I might have cheered along with the rest of my 12 year old friends when Debbie and Sue took their board out into the water at the end of the 1981 version of Puberty Blues, but my feet remained on dry land (third confession; not very good at PowerPoints). My feet stayed firmly planted there, even when I fell in love with a surfer when I was 19. From the safety of many a rocky headland, many a windswept beach, I have watched that man. Now our teenage sons ride those waves, those glorious, exhilarating waves. Our 11 year old daughter has just started to go “out the back” with her brothers. She’s much braver than me, but I’d like to think that I know a thing or two about waves. Here are some of the things that I know.

Waves are mainly a product of wind. The greater the winds force, the bigger the wave. Secondly, the friction created by wind on water forms a travelling circular mass of energy, and this is called swell. When swell reaches the coast, waves break in sets. Then the backwash from waves hitting the land returns the water and energy to the ocean. Force, friction, energy, swell, backwash. No wonder the international feminist movements peak achievements have been described through the metaphor of waves.

First wave feminism is defined by Wikipedia as “a period of feminist activity and thought that occurred within the time period of the early 20th century, throughout the world.” This is the time extending over at least six decades, and many more in some countries, where women fought for their right to be franchised. Their legal entitlement as citizens, under the democratic principal of “no taxation without representation”. This was a political revolution.

Second wave feminism, is Wiki-defined as, “a period of feminist activity and thought that first began in the early 1960’s in The United States, and eventually spread throughout the Western World and beyond. Now this is the time when women, now largely included in the civic body, protested the right to control over their corporal bodies. The personal, was now political. This is the era of women’s lib, the sexual revolution. Personally, I tend to think of these two key historical periods as the two V’s. First wave feminism was all about the vote, and second wave feminism was all about the vagina.

Now this is a crude short hand to be sure, both waves of activism campaigned for gender equality across a range of issues. But there is more to women’s history than these twin peaks of paradigm shifting success. Of course there is. To assume otherwise would be like saying that World War One and World War Two existed in isolation, with modern history devoid of any other instances of armed combat. Clearly, movements for social change, like international conflicts exist along a continuum. But can I ask you this, how much do we know about the history of women’s political activism in Australia? I’ll put this question to you in another way; did you know that there were women behind the rickety fortification of the Eureka Stockade, on that fateful morning of the 3rd of December in 1854? An event we all learned about in school?

Or that British troops opened fire that day on a white civilian population, which unmistakably included women and children. Killing at least one woman. Or that women were central to the community rebelliousness that cumulated in the event that we have come to know as the birthplace of Australian democracy? Did you know that the Women’s Christian Temperance Union actively supported the stalwart men and women who carried out the Pilbara pastor strike of 1946 to 1949? The longest running strike in Australia’s history, sometimes known as the Blackfella’s Eureka. And did you know that one of the most active participants in the Australians civil rights movements was Faith Bandler, an Indigenous woman from Murwillumbah who served in the Australian Women’s Land Army before becoming a full time activist in the 1950’s?

Bandler lead the campaign for reform that cumulated in the successful 1967 referendum to remove racially discriminative clauses from our constitution. Well, probably not, and that’s because there are more ways to silence inconvenient truths. Like the fact that women have historically protested, organised, networked, and advocated for their sex, their families, their communities, and their country. There are more ways to silence truths than by denying women access to the vote, to education, to legal autonomy, or indeed to knowledge of our own history. It is no accident that erasing women from history is one of the mechanisms used to ensure the visibility and viability of patriarchal structures of dominance and control. If knowledge is power, it’s fundamentally disempowering for women if their stories remain secreted in the archives, or confined to academic circles or local knowledge.

How can we know what we are capable of accomplishing, enduring, resisting, overcoming, if we don’t understand how women before us have negotiated their lives? This is another great Australian silence. A silence that perpetuates the myth of exclusive male agency and male potency, and by implication, presumed historical absence from the places and events of nation building, also provides the rationale for male privilege and male entitlement today.

Just because you didn’t learn about it in schools, doesn’t mean that it didn’t happen. I now want to give you some examples of women acting in ways that were adversarial, confrontational and risk taking. That is, acting in ways that if performed by male protagonists, would be considered to show leadership and valour.

The 19th century female factories in New South Wales and Tasmania for example, where an estimated 9,000 convict women worked for no pay, to manufacture commodities like spun wool, cotton and linen. On which the new colonies relied for both domestic use and export. In 1827, the women declared that they’d had enough. A riot at the Parramatta female factory over a cut in rations and poor conditions is considered to be the first industrial action staged by women in Australia. Fun fact: when the Parramatta female factory was closed 21 years later, the building was reassigned as a lunatic asylum.

Then, there are the women of the Cascades factory in Tasmania, who in 1838 staged their own version of the Misogyny Speech. The inmates of this forced labour camp were being lectured on morality by a visiting preacher. A witness recorded what happened next: “Growing weary of his cant, the 300 women turned right around and at one impulse pulled up their clothes, showing their naked posteriors, which they simultaneously smacked with their hands, making a loud and not very musical noise.” I reckon this may have been Australia’s first example of a flash mob, or maybe twerking.

Now another rowdy woman was Fanny Balbuk, a Noongar woman born in 1840. Fanny was prominent in her day for protesting against the occupation of her traditional lands south of Perth. Daisy Bates, who met Fanny in the 1930’s, wrote that “to the end of her life, she raged and stormed at the usurping of her beloved home ground. Through fences and over them, Balbuk took the straight track to the end. When a house was built in the way, she broke its fence palings with her digging stick and charged up the steps and through the rooms.”

Now, at the height of a miners strike in Plunes in 1876, an unnamed woman was also raging and storming. This time, against scab labour employed by the mine. A contemporary later wrote, “nearby was a heap of road metal, and arming herself with a few stones, a sturdy north of Ireland woman without shoes or stockings mounted the barricade as the coaches drew up. As she did, she called to the other women saying, “come on you cousin ginnies! Bring me the stones and I will fire them!” Forth confession, I can’t do an Irish accent. When a policeman raised his gun at the woman, she lifted her shirt, bared her breasts and spat, “shoot away and be damned to ya! Better be shot than starved to death.”

Let me introduce you now, to Ellen Young. An educated English woman who had a different tactic for making herself heard. Ellen was the member of a Ballarat mining community, who witnessed first hand the grievances of the diggers in 1854. She wrote directly to governor Hotham to state the diggers case, as well as penning fiery letters to the editor of the Ballarat times to mobilise grassroots support. In one letter, she provocatively declared, “we, the people, demand cheap land, just magistrates to be represented in the legislative council; in fact, treated as the free subjects of a great nation.” These were fighting words.

In 1917, anti-war campaigner Adela Pankhurst was jailed for her role in inciting riots at the height of the general strike that had crippled wartime Melbourne. Working class women had shouldered a disproportionate amount of the economic burden of war, with food rationing and other austerity measures. The riots that happened just a few blocks away from here involved ten thousand women and their male supporters, rampaging through the CBD smashing shop windows and destroying property. This was not one night of mayhem, but the sustained series of orchestrated attacks on the political and commercial elite.

Now you could write a whole history of women chaining themselves to things.  Take Zelda Fay D’Aprano, an orthodox Jewish woman who left school at 14. Zelda spent most of her life fighting against the injustice she witnessed on the factory floor. When the meat workers union lost a test case for equal pay in 1969, Zelda chained herself across the entrance to the commonwealth building in Melbourne. She was cut free by police, only to lock herself to the arbitration court gates three days later. Then there’s Merle Thornton and Rosalie Bogner, academics of the University of Queensland, who chained themselves to the foot rail of the “male only” public bar at The Regatta Hotel in Brisbane in 1965. Their actions sparked a wave of copycat self-incarcerations in Australian pubs.

Perhaps police could blame Muriel Matters, for the sudden demand for bolt cutters. Muriel was an Adelaide born suffrage campaigner. After South Australia became only the second jurisdiction in the world where women had won the right to vote in 1894, following New Zealand in 1893, Muriel went to England to help spread the gospel of female enfranchisement. In 1908 Muriel chained herself to the grill of the ladies gallery in the House of Commons. The grill was built to obscure the view of women of parliamentary proceedings. The whole grill had to be cut away, with Muriel still attached to it, before a blacksmith could release her. Muriel was latter sentenced to one month in Holloway prison, where British suffragettes famously staged hunger strikes and were force-fed.

Another Muriel, Muriel Henney campaigned for equal pay for Australian women for over 50 years. Muriel was a convent-educated girl from Richmond, who saw wage inequality as the major obstacle to the achievement of equal opportunity status for women. She died in poverty on the 19th of May 1974 (my fifth birthday as it happens) just one week after the wage case granted equal minimum wages to men and women.

My favourite feminist, Vida Goldstein, did not die in poverty but certainly obscurity at the age of 80 in 1949. Vida was born into protestant squattocracy, but went on to spearhead the suffrage campaign that saw Australia become the first nation in the world where white women won equal political rights with men. That is the right to vote and to stand for parliament. She travelled to America to represent Australia and New Zealand at the first international suffrage convention, and there she was greeted with a rock star reception.

Zelda D’Aprano, by the way, is still alive today, she’s 98, and I happened to see that there was a tag for her outside so I hope maybe she’s here. Let’s not forget too the hundreds of women’s organisations that have not been outwardly feminists, but have been instrumental in changing the conditions of daily life of women in this country. I’m thinking here of the Australian Women’s National League, the Country Women’s Association, and the Housewives Association just to name a few. All of these nominally conservative organisations have in one way or another advocated for improvements to the status of women and girls.

So apart from making for a nice slideshow, does knowing anything about these women and their actions make any difference to the price of fish? Well I think it does, and this is the reason why. We have a lost heritage of women’s political activism in Australia, in this country. An activism that had its roots in popular mass movements that included both men and women. Men and women have both historically stood together on common ground. What did Ellen Young say? “We the people, too, loudly profess our mutual commitment to notions of fairness, justice and autonomy.” Women have consistently and courageously defended the right to free speech, to freedom of assembly, and to freedom of the press as well as to women’s rights and human rights more generally. This collective historical memory is important for present and future democratic activism and change. Creating change, real game changing change is hard work, as we’ve certainly seen, as Ann demonstrated in the American election campaign.

If we understand that Australian women, as well as men, have been historically vigilant and hardworking, might not that inspire more of todays women to honour the legacy of those actions? But more than that, to know that women acted in ways that were anti-authoritarian, rebellious, and designed to kick up a stink makes a difference because it reminds us that, as the folk singer Glen Tomasetti sang, “it rarely pays to be too polite, girls”.

The lost heritage of female activism that had its roots in popular mass movements also matters because discord in voices, female voices, are still seen to belong to wicked witches and evil stepmothers. Whiners and wowzers, what was the latest incarnation of that? Fright bats, or nasty women. Not female diggers, mates, and outlaws, our national larrikin icons. We need to understand women’s relationship to citizenship in order to affirm their sense of entitlement to participate in public discourses and occupy key cultural spaces.

I’ll give you one example of how historical consciousness, the female strategies for social change, might work on the ground. Now I can find no evidence to suggest that the women, who marshalled the now famous Monster Petition for women’s suffrage in Victoria in 1891, drew inspiration from the memory of earlier female activism to bolster their cause. In this action, women collected 30 000 names in six weeks, responding to premier James Munro’s promise that if the women of Victoria could demonstrate that they actually wanted the vote, he would introduce a franchise bill. The Monster Petition was the largest yet put before an Australian colonial parliament, although Victorian women didn’t actually win the vote until 1908.

Now the symbolism of the Monster suffrage petition was recently invoked when a group of 12 prominent Australian women organised by Judith Pratt and Mary Crooks, and led by professor Fiona Stanley, started the Monster Climate Petition. The Monster Climate petition called on the Federal Parliament to join in bipartisan action on climate change. Following in the footsteps of the 1891 suffragettes, over 70 000 pen and ink signatures were collected, mainly by women, in just over six weeks. Making the petition the fourth largest to be introduced to the Australian House of Representatives. Now the petition, as we can see here, was presented to parliament on the 3rd of December in 2014. Coincidentally, the 160th anniversary of the Eureka Stockade.

If women were included in our public narratives of mateship, sacrifice, solidarity and service, might not that breed respect and empathy across the gender-divide? And if we wrote some new narratives of reconciliation, healing, and responsibility and care, might not that bode well for our collective spirit? Our environment, and our planet alike? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that women have always done great deeds for virtuous reasons in the past. Women have been colonisers, racists, and enablers of oppressive class structures that limit the lives of other women. But I do believe that gender equality is achieved when we recognise that women to have been agents in the past. That women to have been shapers of their own and others destinies. In other words, that women to have made history. The only way we will understand that we can make history today is when we fully appreciate just how much impact we have made in the past. And as I hope I have demonstrated, we have our own hero’s to guide our path and give strength to our arms. We have Ellen, we have Vida, we have the Muriels, we have Murel, Zelda, and Fanny. We have faith. We are all standing on the sturdy shoulders of those who have come before us. Some giants, some totems. And some of those shoulders don’t just happen to belong to women, there is nothing incidental or accidental about the platforms they’ve provided. Women deliberately, carefully and creatively built the edifice of their political and civic contributions of who we are today.

In 1869, when Vida Goldstein was born, it would seem absurd that any woman would ever be able to vote. By her death in 1949, women in almost 100 countries had been franchised, and Vida herself stood for parliament five times. I was born in 1969, and even a century after Vida, I can hardly dare to imagine what women will achieve for gender equality in my lifetime. I honestly quiver in excitement at the prospect.

The limitation for the wave metaphor, in framing women’s historical impact, is the implication that those two momentous movements, first and second wave feminism, surged, peaked, then pleated out and disappeared. This process would describe tsunami’s, not waves. Waves keep on coming, the inevitable, relentless result of friction and energy. Waves never stop rolling in, because there will never not be force and friction, energy, swell, and backwash that will pull us back into the deep. Waves build, they crest, and they subside. And then they build again. What’s more, you need the wind, the oppositional force to create a wave. As any surfer, or surfy chick knows, if the wind is going with the wave, the energy is dissipated and all you get is slob. In the face of opposition, women like waves will continue to rise, break, and rise again. The cause of gender equality, like the ocean, is bigger than me, or you, or all of use in this room today. It is certainly bigger and more potent than the break walls and sandbags of male privilege. No wonder the institutions, instruments and practitioners of gender discrimination, have been and still are afraid. They should be afraid. There is a wall of living energy hurdling towards them.

It seems to me that we, the people, have three options in the face of such a threat to our sense of mastery and control. We can duck under, hoping that we can dive deep enough to avoid the turbulence before the next wave breaks. We can misjudge the take off, squib at the last minute, and get wiped out by our ignorance and cowardice. Or we can get up, stand up, and enjoy this most wild ride called freedom. Thank you.

The Breakthrough 16 event was organised by the Victorian Women's Trust. This speech was reposted from VWT website with permission. Clare Wright is a documentary maker and award winning author and historian who won the Stella Prize for 'The Forgotten Heroes of Eureka'. She has other speeches on Speakola, including 'Epic Fail' about post natal depression.

Related content: This Breakthrough 16 speech by economist Richard Denniss was delivered at the same event. It's about the mistaken beliefs that hold women back.

Napoleon Beazley: 'No one wins tonight. No one walks away victorious', Last words before execution - 2002

28 May 2002, Texas, USA

In the video, Patrice Turlet recites Napoleon Beazley's last words. Beazley was executed for a capital murder he committed in 1994, aged just 17.

The act I committed to put me here was not just heinous, it was senseless. But the person that committed that act is no longer here – I am. I’m not going to struggle physically against any restraints. I’m not going to shout, use profanity or make idle threats. Understand though that I’m not only upset, but I’m saddened by what is happening here tonight. I’m not only saddened, but disappointed that a system that is supposed to protect and uphold what is just and right can be so much like me when I made the same shameful mistake. If someone tried to dispose of everyone here for participating in this killing, I’d scream a resounding, “No.” I’d tell them to give them all the gift that they would not give me…and that’s to give them all a second chance. I’m sorry that I am here. I’m sorry that you’re all here. I’m sorry that John Luttig died. And I’m sorry that it was something in me that caused all of this to happen to begin with. Tonight we tell the world that there are no second chances in the eyes of justice…Tonight, we tell our children that in some instances, in some cases, killing is right. This conflict hurts us all, there are no SIDES. The people who support this proceeding think this is justice. The people that think that I should live think that is justice. As difficult as it may seem, this is a clash of ideals, with both parties committed to what they feel is right. But who’s wrong if in the end we’re all victims? In my heart, I have to believe that there is a peaceful compromise to our ideals. I don’t mind if there are none for me, as long as there are for those who are yet to come. There are a lot of men like me on death row – good men – who fell to the same misguided emotions, but may not have recovered as I have. Give those men a chance to do what’s right. Give them a chance to undo their wrongs. A lot of them want to fix the mess they started, but don’t know how. The problem is not in that people aren’t willing to help them find out, but in the system telling them it won’t matter anyway. No one wins tonight. No one gets closure. No one walks away victorious.

Osama bin Laden: 'Your securIty is in your own hands', video address to American people - 2004

29 October 2004, videotape release, Pakistan

Praise be to Allah who created the creation for his worship and commanded them to be just and permitted the wronged one to retaliate against the oppressor in kind. To proceed:

Peace be upon he who follows the guidance: People of America this talk of mine is for you and concerns the ideal way to prevent another Manhattan, and deals with the war and its causes and results.

Before I begin, I say to you that security is an indispensable pillar of human life and that free men do not forfeit their security, contrary to Bush's claim that we hate freedom.

If so, then let him explain to us why we don't strike for example - Sweden? And we know that freedom-haters don't possess defiant spirits like those of the 19 - may Allah have mercy on them.

No, we fight because we are free men who don't sleep under oppression. We want to restore freedom to our nation, just as you lay waste to our nation. So shall we lay waste to yours.

No one except a dumb thief plays with the security of others and then makes himself believe he will be secure. Whereas thinking people, when disaster strikes, make it their priority to look for its causes, in order to prevent it happening again.

But I am amazed at you. Even though we are in the fourth year after the events of September 11th, Bush is still engaged in distortion, deception and hiding from you the real causes. And thus, the reasons are still there for a repeat of what occurred.

So I shall talk to you about the story behind those events and shall tell you truthfully about the moments in which the decision was taken, for you to consider.

I say to you, Allah knows that it had never occurred to us to strike the towers. But after it became unbearable and we witnessed the oppression and tyranny of the American/Israeli coalition against our people in Palestine and Lebanon, it came to my mind.

The events that affected my soul in a direct way started in 1982 when America permitted the Israelis to invade Lebanon and the American Sixth Fleet helped them in that. This bombardment began and many were killed and injured and others were terrorised and displaced.

I couldn't forget those moving scenes, blood and severed limbs, women and children sprawled everywhere. Houses destroyed along with their occupants and high rises demolished over their residents, rockets raining down on our home without mercy.

The situation was like a crocodile meeting a helpless child, powerless except for his screams. Does the crocodile understand a conversation that doesn't include a weapon? And the whole world saw and heard but it didn't respond.

In those difficult moments many hard-to-describe ideas bubbled in my soul, but in the end they produced an intense feeling of rejection of tyranny, and gave birth to a strong resolve to punish the oppressors.

And as I looked at those demolished towers in Lebanon, it entered my mind that we should punish the oppressor in kind and that we should destroy towers in America in order that they taste some of what we tasted and so that they be deterred from killing our women and children.

And that day, it was confirmed to me that oppression and the intentional killing of innocent women and children is a deliberate American policy. Destruction is freedom and democracy, while resistance is terrorism and intolerance.

This means the oppressing and embargoing to death of millions as Bush Sr did in Iraq in the greatest mass slaughter of children mankind has ever known, and it means the throwing of millions of pounds of bombs and explosives at millions of children - also in Iraq - as Bush Jr did, in order to remove an old agent and replace him with a new puppet to assist in the pilfering of Iraq's oil and other outrages.

So with these images and their like as their background, the events of September 11th came as a reply to those great wrongs, should a man be blamed for defending his sanctuary?

Is defending oneself and punishing the aggressor in kind, objectionable terrorism? If it is such, then it is unavoidable for us.

This is the message which I sought to communicate to you in word and deed, repeatedly, for years before September 11th.

And you can read this, if you wish, in my interview with Scott in Time Magazine in 1996, or with Peter Arnett on CNN in 1997, or my meeting with John Weiner in 1998.

You can observe it practically, if you wish, in Kenya and Tanzania and in Aden. And you can read it in my interview with Abdul Bari Atwan, as well as my interviews with Robert Fisk.

The latter is one of your compatriots and co-religionists and I consider him to be neutral. So are the pretenders of freedom at the White House and the channels controlled by them able to run an interview with him?  So that he may relay to the American people what he has understood from us to be the reasons for our fight against you?

If you were to avoid these reasons, you will have taken the correct path that will lead America to the security that it was in before September 11th. This concerned the causes of the war.

As for it's results, they have been, by the grace of Allah, positive and enormous, and have, by all standards, exceeded all expectations. This is due to many factors, chief among them, that we have found it difficult to deal with the Bush administration in light of the resemblance it bears to the regimes in our countries, half of which are ruled by the military and the other half which are ruled by the sons of kings and presidents.

Our experience with them is lengthy, and both types are replete with those who are characterised by pride, arrogance, greed and misappropriation of wealth. This resemblance began after the visits of Bush Sr to the region.

At a time when some of our compatriots were dazzled by America and hoping that these visits would have an effect on our countries, all of a sudden he was affected by those monarchies and military regimes, and became envious of their remaining decades in their positions, to embezzle the public wealth of the nation without supervision or accounting.

So he took dictatorship and suppression of freedoms to his son and they named it the Patriot Act, under the pretence of fighting terrorism. In addition, Bush sanctioned the installing of sons as state governors, and didn't forget to import expertise in election fraud from the region's presidents to Florida to be made use of in moments of difficulty.

All that we have mentioned has made it easy for us to provoke and bait this administration. All that we have to do is to send two mujahidin to the furthest point east to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al-Qaida, in order to make the generals race there to cause America to suffer human, economic, and political losses without their achieving for it anything of note other than some benefits for their private companies.

This is in addition to our having experience in using guerrilla warfare and the war of attrition to fight tyrannical superpowers, as we, alongside the mujahidin, bled Russia for 10 years, until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat.

All Praise is due to Allah.

So we are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy. Allah willing, and nothing is too great for Allah.

That being said, those who say that al-Qaida has won against the administration in the White House or that the administration has lost in this war have not been precise, because when one scrutinises the results, one cannot say that al-Qaida is the sole factor in achieving those spectacular gains.

Rather, the policy of the White House that demands the opening of war fronts to keep busy their various corporations - whether they be working in the field of arms or oil or reconstruction - has helped al-Qaida to achieve these enormous results.

And so it has appeared to some analysts and diplomats that the White House and us are playing as one team towards the economic goals of the United States, even if the intentions differ.

And it was to these sorts of notions and their like that the British diplomat and others were referring in their lectures at the Royal Institute of International Affairs. [When they pointed out that] for example, al-Qaida spent $500,000 on the event, while America, in the incident and its aftermath, lost - according to the lowest estimate - more than $500 billion.

Meaning that every dollar of al-Qaida defeated a million dollars by the permission of Allah, besides the loss of a huge number of jobs.

As for the size of the economic deficit, it has reached record astronomical numbers estimated to total more than a trillion dollars.

And even more dangerous and bitter for America is that the mujahidin recently forced Bush to resort to emergency funds to continue the fight in Afghanistan and Iraq, which is evidence of the success of the bleed-until-bankruptcy plan - with Allah's permission.

It is true that this shows that al-Qaida has gained, but on the other hand, it shows that the Bush administration has also gained, something of which anyone who looks at the size of the contracts acquired by the shady Bush administration-linked mega-corporations, like Halliburton and its kind, will be convinced. And it all shows that the real loser is ... you.

It is the American people and their economy. And for the record, we had agreed with the Commander-General Muhammad Ataa, Allah have mercy on him, that all the operations should be carried out within 20 minutes, before Bush and his administration notice.

It never occurred to us that the commander-in-chief of the American armed forces would abandon 50,000 of his citizens in the twin towers to face those great horrors alone, the time when they most needed him.

But because it seemed to him that occupying himself by talking to the little girl about the goat and its butting was more important than occupying himself with the planes and their butting of the skyscrapers, we were given three times the period required to execute the operations - all praise is due to Allah.

And it's no secret to you that the thinkers and perceptive ones from among the Americans warned Bush before the war and told him: "All that you want for securing America and removing the weapons of mass destruction - assuming they exist - is available to you, and the nations of the world are with you in the inspections, and it is in the interest of America that it not be thrust into an unjustified war with an unknown outcome."

But the darkness of the black gold blurred his vision and insight, and he gave priority to private interests over the public interests of America.

So the war went ahead, the death toll rose, the American economy bled, and Bush became embroiled in the swamps of Iraq that threaten his future. He fits the saying "like the naughty she-goat who used her hoof to dig up a knife from under the earth".

So I say to you, over 15,000 of our people have been killed and tens of thousands injured, while more than a thousand of you have been killed and more than 10,000 injured. And Bush's hands are stained with the blood of all those killed from both sides, all for the sake of oil and keeping their private companies in business.

Be aware that it is the nation who punishes the weak man when he causes the killing of one of its citizens for money, while letting the powerful one get off, when he causes the killing of more than 1000 of its sons, also for money.

And the same goes for your allies in Palestine. They terrorise the women and children, and kill and capture the men as they lie sleeping with their families on the mattresses, that you may recall that for every action, there is a reaction.

Finally, it behoves you to reflect on the last wills and testaments of the thousands who left you on the 11th as they gestured in despair. They are important testaments, which should be studied and researched.

Among the most important of what I read in them was some prose in their gestures before the collapse, where they say: "How mistaken we were to have allowed the White House to implement its aggressive foreign policies against the weak without supervision."

It is as if they were telling you, the people of America: "Hold to account those who have caused us to be killed, and happy is he who learns from others' mistakes."

And among that which I read in their gestures is a verse of poetry. "Injustice chases its people, and how unhealthy the bed of tyranny."

As has been said: "An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure."

And know that: "It is better to return to the truth than persist in error." And that the wise man doesn't squander his security, wealth and children for the sake of the liar in the White House.

In conclusion, I tell you in truth, that your security is not in the hands of Kerry, nor Bush, nor al-Qaida. No.

Your security is in your own hands. And every state that doesn't play with our security has automatically guaranteed its own security.

And Allah is our Guardian and Helper, while you have no Guardian or Helper. All peace be upon he who follows the Guidance.

Shelli Whitehurst: 'I live in a place of constant unknowing, and that's what cancer feels like', Tour de Cure Snow Ball - 2015 ',

June 2015, Sydney, Australia

For over 12 months, I've been fighting stage 4 bilateral breast cancer with widespread metastases to the bones. I'm fiercely strong and I'm independent, and I find it hard to ask for help. I smile and I say fine a lot, and I love to win. These are now my greatest weaknesses.

I had the most perfectly crafted speech a week ago that I was going to tell you like a TED speech, you know, the ones that make you laugh and cry, and you're gonna all give me a big standing ovation and it was going to be fantastic ...

That speech is bullshit.

Because on Monday everything changed. My cancer came back, and it's time for me to stop looking like I'm okay with having cancer. I'm not okay with having cancer. It's time for me to talk about what it feels like to have cancer, and tonight I'm calling it my cancer 'coming out'. I was in hospital on Monday, if any of you were following my Facebook you would have known this, recovering, and I was about to leave the hospital as the revolving door of doctors started and I knew something was wrong.

By the way, I love all of my doctors. They are incredible.

I was told that my cancer was no longer stable and that we would have to start new treatments and new drugs in two weeks. On Tuesday I cried. By Wednesday, I was bored with being sad and angry, so I gave myself a deadline by 8:00 a.m. Thursday that I would start pulling myself together and getting on with life.

It's so hard, because I've just spent 12 months fighting to get here, and now I'm back to square one. If the drugs work, we might have years. If they don't work, I might have 12 months. This is what cancer feels like: You constantly have no answers. You always have questions. You are constantly worried that this day is going to come, and it did, and again, and it will come again, and you just constantly want more time.

Thursday night I got on the plane with my brother to come to Sydney. I was so broken. I fell asleep the whole way, and he ate my cheese and biscuits while I was asleep.

Today I haven't even been out of bed. I used all my energy so that I could attend, and as I said to many people tonight, they were like, "Why did you come, you could have not?" Oh, my God, I would have had the worst migraine ever because I love the Tour de Cure family, and it would have killed me worse than the cancer to be at home and not be at this event tonight.

Nothing is ever going to be okay for me. I have stage 4 metastatic cancer. But I'm not feeling sorry for myself. As you all know, that's boring.

I'm not shaming anyone for not knowing any better, but it's now my job to educate. The most asked question I am asked is, "What can I do for you? I want to do more' I usually say, before today, "I don't need anything. I'm fine," 'cause I don't like asking for help. But this answer has changed. This answer is now, please don't forget me. I need hugs. I need my hand held. I need to be allowed to feel vulnerable, and I need to be allowed to cry. I need to be able to tell you this, and I need you to visit me. I need you to Facetime me, and I need you to Facebook me. I need you to pop me a note in the post, and I need you to keep calling me even if I say no. I need you to stalk me, because it's hard keeping myself up when alone, you know, other people not being there as well.

The second biggest thing that cancer does and feels is it consumes you. When it consumes can feel devastating.  What consumes you runs you. When you know me, you'll know I love business, I love ideas, I love making things, I love entrepreneurship. I am very lucky to have very good friends. Dylan, Matt and Chris. They knew that one way to avoid cancer consuming me was to give me a project that consumed me, so we created the project called Kit for Cancer. Some of you may know it. Now, you all know about it. When you're diagnosed with cancer, the worst possible moment happens, and nobody knows what to give you and nobody knows what to say to you. We designed a kit full of beautifully curated items for patients by patients. It is the gift you never want to get, and it is the gift you never want to give, but it is here when you need it. It is something that family and friends can buy for their loved ones when they are told, "You have cancer."

I thank you, guys, for pushing me through and working on this project with me so I could forget, most of the days, that I have cancer. This week, I hate cancer. I hate it. I hate fighting, and I want a day off. I'm tired of being positive and happy and energetic, and I'm sick of being okay and trying to make everyone else feel okay. I'm exhausted. This is what cancer feels like. This is what cancer feels like, and cancer patients will never tell you that it feels like. This is what it feels like every day.

There is no cure for my cancer. There is not much money allocated, either, to researching the kind of cancer that I have. This cancer will kill me. This means that I may not see my niece turn four. I may never go on another Tour to Cure, which would break my heart, 'cause that was awesome. I may never see the legacy of Kit for Cancer succeed. I may never go on another date with a boy again. I may never travel to see my best friends in the USA. I was meant to leave next week, and that's all gone on hold.

But then again, I might. I don't know, because I live in a place of constant unknowing, and that's what cancer feels like. I'm fighting this cancer now on the inside, but there is not a moment that Chantel and the team aren't fighting harder. She surrounded me with the best people in the industry, and they fight hard to make sure that I can stand here today. While we may not be thankful for the cancer, we need to be grateful for the doctors, the researchers, the nurses and the treatments that give me the chance to fight this. If there ever comes a time where the treatments stop working, please know I will always be grateful for having lived a great life with no regrets and now having you all in it.

As we go into the auction right now, and you're all having bubbles, which I wish I could drink but I can't because it tastes awful, and if anyone knows me, champagne is my thing. If I'm given 12 months, I will be going to champagne. I will drink it even if it tastes awful, and drink every single ounce of it. The other thing I will do, of course, is I promised my niece I would take her to Disneyland, and that will happen. We will [inaudible 00:07:26] every single day. As you're thinking about spending money tonight on some of these epically cool items, cross your fingers and know that maybe just one of those dollars or some of those dollars that you're raising for Tour de Cure just might go into a breakthrough drug that might make me stay alive.

Kindness is free. You can sprinkle that shit everywhere, okay? And broken crayons still colour.   

Anita Roddick: 'If you think morality is a luxury business can’t afford, try living in a world without it', International Forum On Globalisation - 1999

27 November 1999, Seattle, Washington, USA

This is sometimes called the 'Trading with Principles' speech. Roddick founded The Body Shop which was an early champion of fair trade. She died on 10 September 2007. 

We can ask the same question of the gleaming towers of Wall Street or the City of London - and the powerful men and women who tinker with the money system which drives world trade. Who is this system for?

Let's look more closely. Every day, the gleaming towers of high finance oversees a global flow of two trillion dollars through their computer screens. And the terrifying thing is that only three per cent of that - that's, three hundredths - has anything to do with trade at all. Let alone free trade between equal communities.

It has everything to do with money. The great global myth being that the current world trade system is for anything but money.

The other 97 per cent of the two trillion is speculation. It is froth - but froth with terrifying power over people's lives. Reducing powerless communities access to basic human rights can make money, but not for them. But then the system isn't designed for them.

It isn't designed for you and me either. We all of us, rich and poor, have to live with the insecurity caused by an out of control global casino with a built-in bias towards instability. Because it is instability that makes money for the money-traders.

"The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie - deliberate, contrived and dishonest," said John F Kennedy, "- but the myth - persistent, persuasive and unrealistic." Asking questions can puncture these powerful myths.

I spend much of every year travelling around the world, talking to people in the front line of globalisation: women, community farmers, children. I know how unrealistic these myths are. Not just in developing countries but right under our noses.

Like the small farmers of the USA, 500 of which go out of business every week.

Half a century ago there were a million black farmers in the US. Now there are 1800. Globalisation means that the subsidies go to the big farms, while the small family farms - the heart of so many American communities - go to the wall.

Or the dark, cramped factories where people work for a pittance for 12 hour days without a day off. "The workers are not allowed to talk to each other and they didn't allow us to go to the bathroom," says one Asian worker in that garment factory. Not in Seoul. Not in Sao Paulo. But in San Francisco.

We have a world trading system that is blind to this kind of injustice. And as the powers of governments shrink this system is, in effect, our new unelected, uncontrollable world government. One that outlaws our attempts to >make things better.

According to the WTO, we don't have the right to discriminate between tuna caught without killing dolphins and tuna caught by those who don't care, don't worry and don't try.

According to the WTO, we have no right to hoard patented seeds from one harvest to plant the following year.

According to the WTO, we have no right to discriminate against beef with growth hormones.

According to the WTO, the livelihoods of the small-scale banana farmers of the Windward Islands are worthless - now facing ruin as the WTO favours the big US exporters

The truth is that the WTO, and the group of unelected trade officials who run it, are now the world's highest court, with the right to overturn local laws and safety regulations wherever they say it 'interferes with trade'.

This is world government by default, but it is a blind government. It looks at the measurements of money, but it can't see anything else. It can recognise profits and losses, but it deliberately turns its face away from human rights, child labour or keeping the environment viable for future generations.

It is government without heart, and without heart you find the creativity of the human spirit starts to dwindle too.

Now there will be commentators and politicians by the truckload over the next week accusing us of wanting to turn the clock back. They will say we are parochial, inward-looking, xenophobic and dangerous.

But we must remind them what free trade really is. The truth is that 'free trade' was originally about the freedom of communities to trade equally with each other. It was never intended to be what it is today. A licence for the big, the powerful and the rich, to ride roughshod over the small, the weak and the poor.

And while we're about it, let's nail another myth.

Nobody could be more in favour of a global outlook than I am. Internationalism means that we can see into the dark corners of the world, and hold those companies to account when they are devastating forests or employing children as bonded labour. Globalisation is the complete opposite, its rules pit country against country and workers against workers in the blinkered pursuit of international competitiveness.

Internationalism means we can link together at local level across the world, and use our power as consumers. Working together, across all sectors, we can turn businesses from private greed to public good.

It means, even more important, that we can start understanding each other in a way that no generation has managed before.

Let's be clear about this. It's not trade we're against, it's exploitation and unchecked power.

I don't pretend for a moment that we're perfect at The Body Shop. Or that every one of our experiments work out - especially when it comes to building trading relationships that actually strengthen poor communities.

We are absolutely committed to increasing our trade with communities around the world, because this is the key - not just for our future, but the planet's. It means that they trade to strengthen their local economy for profit, but not because their very survival depends on it.

Community trade will make us not a multi-national, but a multi-local. I hope we can measure our success in terms of our ability to show just what's possible if a company genuinely opens a dialogue with communities.

Heaven knows, we're not there yet. But this is real life, and all any of us can do is to make sure we are going in the right direction, and never lose our determination to improve.

The trouble is that the current trading system undermines anybody who tries.

Businesses which forego profits to build communities, or keep production local rather than employing semi-slaves in distant sweatshops, risk losing business to cheaper competitors without such commitments, and being targeted for take-over by the slash-and-burn corporate raiders. Reinforced by the weight of the WTO.

It's difficult for all of us. But if we are going to change the world then nobody - not governments, not the media, not individuals - are going to get a free ride. And certainly not business, because business is now faster, more creative and far wealthier than governments ever were.

Business has to be a force for social change. It is not enough to avoid hideous evil - it must, we must, actively do good. If business stays parochial, without moral energy or codes of behaviour, claiming there are no such thing as values, then God help us all. If you think morality is a luxury business can't afford, try living in a world without it.

So what should we do at this critical moment in world history? First, we must make sure this week that we lay the foundations for humanising world trade.

We must learn from our experience of what really works for poor countries, poor communities around the world. The negotiators this week must listen to these communities and allow these countries full participation and contribution to trade negotiations.

The rules have got to change. We need a radical alternative that puts people before profit. And that brings us to my second prescription. We must start measuring our success differently.

If politicians, businesses and analysts only measure the bottom line - the growth in money - then it's not surprising the world is skewed.

It's not surprising that the WTO is half-blind, recognising slash-and-burn corporations but not the people they destroy.

It's not surprising that it values flipping hamburgers or making sweaters at 50 cents an hour as a valuable activity, but takes no account of those other jobs - the caring, educating and loving work that we all know needs doing if we're going to turn the world into a place we want to live.

Let's measure the success of places and corporations against how much they enhance human well-being. Body Shop was one of the first companies to submit itself to a social audit, and many others are now doing so.

Measuring what really matters can give us the revolution in kindness we so desperately need. That's the real bottom line.

And finally, we must remember we already have power as consumers and as organisations forming strategic and increasingly influential alliances for change. They can insist on open markets as much as they like, but if consumers won't buy, nothing on earth can make them. Just look at how European consumers have forced the biotech industry's back up against the wall.

We have to be political consumers, vigilante consumers. With the barrage of propaganda served up to us every day, we have to be. We must be wise enough so that - whatever they may decide at the trade talks - we know where to put our energy and our money. No matter what we're told or cajoled to do, we must work together to get the truth out in co-operation for the best, not competition for the cheapest.

By putting our money where our heart is, refusing to buy the products which exploit, by forming powerful strategic alliances, we will mould the world into a kinder more loving shape. And we will do so no matter what you decide this week.

Human progress is on our side.

Stuart Kelly: 'Australia is an alcoholic; we need to rethink the way we drink', Take Kara gala dinner - 2017

16 September 2015, Sydney, NSW, Australia

Stuart Kelly is the younger brother of Thomas Kelly who was killed by a cowards' punch in Sydney's nightclub district. The NSW Premier was in the room for this speech. This gala raised money for the Thomas Kelly Youth Foundation.

My name is Stuart Kelly, I'm Thomas' younger brother. I was 14 years old when Thomas was brutally attacked without reason; resulting in him losing his life.

Tom was out with his friends, it was his first night out in Sydney. We were at home in Bowral, doing what many families do on a Saturday - watching TV and getting ready for bed.

The phone rang at 10.25pm. Mum answered it but couldn't comprehend what the person was telling her, so she passed it to dad. The voice on the end of the phone told them that they needed to come to St Vincent's Hospital urgently.

Mum and dad told my sister, Madeline and I, that Tom had been in an altercation; they had to drive up to Sydney to be with him but would probably be back later during the night.

We had absolutely no idea about the extent of Tom's injuries. The person from the hospital did not give any further information, except to firmly ask that we come straight to the hospital.

Maddie and I stayed at home. It was really late, so we went to bed. On Sunday morning, mum's sister Carrie called, telling us that she was driving down to Bowral from Sydney to pick us both up. I felt really uneasy, I couldn't understand why Carrie would be coming and not our parents.

Later at home I thought what might have happened to Tom. Never did I think or imagine that we might lose our brother.

I remember walking into the floor at St Vincent's hospital, around midday on that Sunday – the floor was bustling with people. As we made our way to the lifts, I tried to work out what was going on and why we were there. Madelaine had even brought her school books with her to study because she was stressed about her upcoming HSC trial examinations.

We took the lift to the fourth floor, where mum and dad met us. They took us into a small room, closing it … closing the door. I could tell by the look on their faces that something serious had happened. I thought this was really strange as we were not visiting Tom – nothing was making any sense to me.

Finally dad said to us, "Thomas has been badly hurt, the doctors want to explain it to the both of you". I felt uneasy. We waited what seemed to be a very long time, but probably wasn't. Two doctors came in with a social worker. We all sat down. I was feeling scared and anxious, and I was about to find out why.

"Your brother Thomas is in a critical condition and will not survive".

I was being told to prepare for his death. Those few words would change our lives forever. I don't remember too much more of what they said. I was in shock and total disbelief. I heard those terrible words but was feeling that this could not be real, this could not be happening to Tom. I could not process this as a reality.

I look back at that moment: I was 14 years old, I was told by a stranger that my brother, my best friend, was going to die.

I'm now 17 - that was three years ago. However, I carry a deep scar that you cannot see. It's always there, never leaves. It's just below the surface of your skin, and surfaces when you least expect it.

The last time that I had seen Tom alive was at a Wallabies game against Wales on the 23rd of June. We had so much fun, lots of banter between the two of us, laughing at the Welsh accents – trying to imitate them. It was a great afternoon, but now it is a memory caught in time, a memory of my final time with Tom. It is a memory which should continue to be joined by many more, as we grow up and grow old together.

Tom never deserved to die that night, it was not meant to be his time. In fact, I believe now that it could and should have been avoided. Our family lost a son and a brother.

I ask all of you to look at me, I am but one person who has been affected by violence. It is a sentence that I have to carry for the rest of my life. My mother, father and sister now carry this sentence. Our relatives and friends, Tom's friends, carry this sentence.

We are not alone, there are many many thousands of other who are directly affected by senseless violence every year. Today, I am preparing to complete Year 12 at the King's School, with my HSC only weeks away. My graduation is this Friday.

I still remember sitting in the hall with my parents and Madeline, watching Tom graduate. Now it's my turn. How will I feel when the headmaster shakes my hand?

I want to ask all of you in this room right now to think of your children, or the children of someone special that you may know. Would you want them to be here on this stage now making this speech? It's time for change. Action is needed through strong leadership from the NSW state government and the federal government. Action is needed by our friends and our families across all of our communities - change to stop the growing epidemic of drug and alcohol abuse and misuse that is turning now into senseless violence.

Premier will you make this promise tonight? Australia is an alcoholic; we need to rethink the way we drink. Tonight your involvement and your voice can and will make a difference. To finish I would like to read a short poem that my father read at Thomas' funeral. It is a stark, blunt message to us all, it started with 'The Guy in the Glass':

"When you get what you want in your struggle for pelf,
And the world makes you King for a day,
Then go to the mirror and look at yourself,
And see what that man has to say.
For it isn't your Father, or Mother, or Wife,
Who judgement upon you must pass.
But the man whose verdict counts most in your life
Is the man staring back from the glass.
He's the feller to please, never mind all the rest,
For he's with you right up to the end,
And you've passed your most difficult test
If the man in the glass is your friend.
You may be like Jack Horner and 'chisel' a plum,
And think you're a wonderful guy,
But the man in the glass says you're only a bum
If you can't look him straight in the eye.
You can fool the whole world down the highway of years,
And get pats on the back as you pass,
But your final reward will be heartaches and tears
If you've cheated the guy in the glass."

Thank you.

To support the Thomas Kelly Youth Foundation and promote change to Australia's drinking culture with a view to reducing violence, visit its page or donate here.