Community effort really makes event

Heartfelt thanks to everyone who supported La Fiesta! You helped us celebrate our ninth festival programme in style. It was our biggest festival in its history, with around 90 events on offer, and a record number of event partners running activities.

This kind of community effort is pretty special, and it's one of the things that make this event so dynamic. There really isn't else anything like it in the country, well not that we know of anyway.
We look forward to celebrating our 10th anniversary next year.

We're already on the look-out for event partners and sponsors. With such extensive experience co-ordinating this event, each year seems to allow a bit more time and space for me to actually participate, as well as continuing to do all the important aspects of organisation and marketing. Many of our out-of-town presenters and participants were amazed at the diversity of activities on offer.

International visitors remarked on the hospitality they received at our events.
One couple I spoke with who were visiting from Germany met some folk at an event they participated in, and ended up at their place for dinner as guests. It is stories like these that remind us that this place is really rather special.

Something else special is that 2018 represents the 125th anniversary of New Zealand's world leading achievement of universal suffrage.
The legacy of our courageous and determined suffragists is one that continues to inspire me in my life and work. Fronting a women's organisation is often challenging, and like any challenge, this also comes with opportunity.

What is particularly interesting when I talk with folk about the work that we do, is that the first response is often "so where's the men's network?"
Of course, I wholeheartedly support the establishment of one.
However, more importantly, this is work for men to do, and not a topic that I wish to be drawn into discussing at the risk of losing the opportunity to share what it is we do in the community to enrich the lives of women, men, and their families.

A learned friend of mine, a doctor of anthropology with a specialist interest in violence against women, recently sent me a fascinating editorial piece by Jessica Eaton that refers to the common response of deflection best described as "whataboutery".
It is the art of asking "what about men?" whenever a woman raises an issue that is real, lived and experienced by other women.
Jessica set up a charity with her husband to support men's mental health and wellbeing, The Eaton Foundation, in the United Kingdom.
Having helped hundreds of men annually in its five years of operation, and secured hundreds of thousands of pounds in funding, she has never once received any whataboutery in relation to what about women's mental health?
"I can't tell you about the hundreds of messages or tweets we get asking 'what about women?' because it's never happened. I don't have any stories about the times we got sent a tonne of abuse when we conducted research with general public in the community about male mental health stigma — because it's never happened."
Yet in her academic research relating to the victim blaming that women experience, she receives untold abuse accusing her of sexism.

We don't need to centre men in every conversation we have about women.
What we do need is to get to a point where we can talk about women's issues and get the same level of respect that we get when we talk about men's issues.

One only has to look at the recent negative public response to Julie Anne Genter, Minister for Women, calling for more diversity on New Zealand boards to see that we still have quite a way to go before accepting that it's okay to centre women at the topic of conversation. I look forward to that day.