What's Going On Post-2015?

Have you heard of the Millennium Development Goals? A series of 8 international development targets set at a UN gathering at the turn of the 21st Century. Friday (5th April) marks 1000 days until these goals expire in 2015. The question of what will happen after these goals has been a hot topic for a couple of years now, and consultations are in full swing.

What's happening?

A WAGGGS representative adressing the Bali Meeting

Last week was the final meeting of the High Level Panel of Eminent Persons on the Post-2015 Development Agenda and it took place in Bali, Indonesia. They'll report back to the Secretary General on the UN, and that will feed into the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) Summit due to take place in September 2013 during the General Assembly. All of this consultation and discussion is leading up to the decision on what the international development framework will look like after the MDGs expire in 2015. I've been following this process from a youth perspective and Katie, who was in Bali as a Plan UK Youth Ambassador, has given a lowdown on the Bali event in her blog.

There was also an International NGO Conference in Bonn, which WAGGGS attended and have described in their summary of the Bonn and Bali events.

Read 'The Global Conversation Begins' online!

What's top of the agenda?

So there was some feeding back last week too with a 2nd Summary Report from the My World platform and a report called "The Global Conversation Begins" which is a snapshot of initial findings from all the Post-2015 consultations so far.

In the My World survey: education, healthcare, honest governments and clean water are the top 4 priorities globally for both men and women. Men place more importance on jobs, whereas women rate gender equality higher (but still only 8th). There is an interesting discussion of the case for gender equality and why deciding the goals through a purely democratic survey might not be the way to get the best end result:

"The number of women that have participated in MY World is slightly higher than the number of men (51% women). Although the ranking of “Equality between men and women” is higher for women (8th) than for men (15th), overall it features very low as a priority. The result is largely age neutral, but there are some slight differences depending on education level (a greater priority for both men and women with higherlevels of education) and Human Development Index (men and women in high and very high HDI countries give greater priority to gender equality). In the first offline representative survey conducted in Liberia, gender equality ranked higher for women in urban rather than rural areas.

There is a huge literature - backed up by practical experience – that shows how vital gender equality is for development not just in and of itself, but also its instrumental nature in reaching other goals. This serves to highlight one of the limitations of a survey of this nature; there is a riskborne out in this case – that critical development objectives can be underemphasized. This can be so partly because of the characteristics of the respondent, and also because the full multipliers are not well understood by all participants. Given the prevalence of men at policy decision - making levels, this tends to support the case for a standalone goal that looks at all aspects of women’s empowerment: access to services, economy and jobs, political representation."

What's next?

This timeline from the Guardian gives you a rough overview of where this process has been, and where it aims to go in the next 6 months. It'll all culminate in a summit at the General Assembly in September this year.

How can I get involved?

I'm now a Post-2015 volunteer for the World Association Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (WAGGGS) so I may well have some exciting things for you to get involved with that will be shared through this blog, Facebook and Twitter accounts. In the meantime, you can vote on what your top priorities are on the My World Platform. Is simple to do, takes less than 5 minutes, and you could help shape the course of the world's future development agenda.

What I Think About At Church

Peterborough Cathedral Nave Ceiling

Peterborough Cathedral. I do love the building. Having gone there as a pre-teen out of choice, we've been visiting it over the Easter period as the best source of organ music on a Sunday morning in this city. And it's my partner's favourite holiday of the year (and she's American and holiday's are a big deal)! I also quite like coming home smelling in incense.

I don't define myself as Christian anymore - I was baptised and confirmed at this very Cathedral when I was 12, coming up with the definition of a Christian as someone who believes in Jesus during my confirmation classes. I've since developed other beliefs, and don't fit into that category anymore. I do think spirituality is important though. And I do, for some reason, feel like the Church of England is my church, even if I don't fully belong there.

Easter Sunday, midway through one of the gospel readings, and there are shafts of spring sunlight breaking through the southern windows and picked out by the clouds of incense rising towards an absolutely stunning ceiling. And that for me is what this holiday is about - the sunlight breaking through at the (nearly) end of winter, the flowers poking up their heads and the ongoing turning of the seasons.

Gloucester, MA, Unitarian Universalist Church

It made me think of some of the sermons that I heard at the Unitarian Universalist Church I attended whilst in the USA a few months ago. The minister drew parallels of how the stories of the Bible might play out if they were to happen in this time. That it's the essence of these stories that is the message, not the specifics written for a different time and a different place.
Compassion, sacrificing pride to help those in need, these are the important lessons.

When I was a teenager attending the Cathedral services occasionally, and more often a youth group on a Sunday evening, I was kept engaged for one simple reason. The then Canon Stephen Cottrell (He's now Bishop of Chelmsford and he has a website). He was an advocate for women bishops even 10 years ago, and actually made me, as a teenager questioning my sexuality, feel like I could belong to this community. Going back in the last few weeks I'm not sure I'm welcome anymore.

The Octagon, Norwich

Over the summer I attended a Unitarian Church in Norwich, and each week was an interesting talk on ethics or spirituality, that then got dissected over our lunch at a nearby vegetarian restaurant. There were fewer people than the US congregation, but still the welcoming atmosphere was clear. My time in the USA showed me how a strong community can be nurtured within a church and still welcome newcomers whatever there disposition of faith. The Church of England, however, has done a lot to not just make feel excluded, but pass judgement on my life even when I'm not a permanent fixture in their congregation.

I remember running youth services where it was suggested that one day a woman bishops may preach fro behind the altar. Now that feels further away than ever. On Palm Sunday instead of a sermon, there was a reading divided amongst 7 or 8 characters. Women featured, but were reserved to characters of beggar and criminal. Easter Sunday and the highlight for the women's contribution is a couple of readings and the one line dismissal. I would be intrigued to know if a women has ever given the sermon from that pulpit.

Not evening mentioning the equal marriage debate...

Spirituality is important to me, but right now I find that more in a joyful walk across the countryside, taking in the wonder of nature, than in listening to men talking down to me.

I might stick to the country walks for now, or take a trip down to Chelmsford (do they have a good organ?).

Your Responses

So in repsonse to my blog on Saturday, I've had a number of responses including links to other blogs on the topic of rape culture.

This is a great list of 10 things that we can change in our everyday lives to help put an end to rape culture, and it references this post suggesting the alcohol has replaced the short skirt in the method used to blame the victim, not the perpetrator. It's also the most common drug used in a date rape scenario.

The posts also reference *trigger warning* this post by Laurie Penny in the New Statesman, but having read the trigger warning at the top of the post, I can't bring myself to read through it.

Then we have some posts about what's being done. This and this both talk about the 'Don't be that guy' campaign in Canada - using adverts and billboards to try and change the behaviour of perpetrators, rather than telling women not to make themselves vulnerable. Go Canada for actually doing something targetted at solving the problem. I don't think adverts will solve it overnight, but it's certainly a step in the right direction.

Blogs Etc From The Last Few Days

Here's a brief round-up of some of the most interesting blogs/online news posts I've come across relating to gender equality and gender based violence. 

Firstly If Peanut Was A Girl is a thoughtful parents discussion of raising a child in a world that demands to gender them even before birth. I must follow up on the book recommendation of "Ronia: The Robber's Daughter", and I'm partial to this post having been frequently refered to as Pippi Longstockings as a child. It's also worth checking out A Mighty Girl if you're looking for resources that paint a less gender stereotype picture. 

Then I stumbled across this article in Time about a recent study by scientists at Harvard. They've found that women who experience childhood abuse (before the age of 12) are much more likely than average to have a child with an autistic spectrum disorder. I find it interesting that this is tangible evidence that experiences of abuse have lifelong effects on survivors - and, in a way, effects on others a long time after. 

Thirdly *Trigger Warning* this op-ed in the New York Times by Emily Yellin. She tells how her own story that parallels what happened in Steubenville recently. Her touching account of how it took time for her to come to terms with what happen, along with a host of unhelpful responses, is a call for action for greater education on these issues amongst teenagers. Why should any high-schooler be able to say they didn't know rape was wrong?

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What Has Gender Based Violence Got To Do With Museums?

I got some potentially exciting news this week when I received a call for papers for the academic journal 'Museums and Social Issues'. Blog followers may remember I did my Masters dissertation on museums, non-formal education and social justice, focusing specifically on gender based violence. I approached this journal in the autumn asking if they were interested in my work, and they've come back this week saying they'd like me to submit it for an upcoming student research issue.

Now I have a little over a month to rework my dissertation into something half as long, and try to address the gaps that were pointed out when it was assessed in the process. My aim with this blog post is to summarise the entire document in about 1/10 for you. So here goes...

Support for social justice is growing worldwide, fuelled by greater recognition of human rights. Action against gender based violence is a key part of this with increasing focus everywhere from UN level summits to grassroots community projects. It is being approached through the media, popular culture, law and policy debates, and academic study across a range a disciplines. Museums have also started to raise awareness and advocate on the issue through exhibitions and education programmes and, sometimes unwittingly, document and display related objects in their galleries.

Ideas about the museum as an “instrument for positive social change” have formed part of their complex history since the 19th Century, but it was the UK’s Labour Party government from 1997 that re-initiated the idea of utilising museums for social policy. Museums tackle gender based violence, amongst other social isses, at a micro level through collaborative projects with learning outcomes for individuals, and work for broad social change at the macro level using advocacy, events and exhibition programmes.

Museums are influenced by, and in turn contribute to, our collective values and norms as a society. They are “sites of persuasion”, shaping norms and values at local and global levels, though to date the majority haven’t fully realised their potential to direct this. All museums are already agents – some consciously work for justice whilst others unknowingly support the unjust phenomena.

It is the museum's role as provider of non-formal education that lead to further research into learning in this context and its economic and social benefits. Adressing any issue through just formal education (e.g. schools) will only reach those currently enrolled – using non-formal education environments can reach a wider age range, at least, and perhaps deliver it in a more engaging way. Exhibitions provide unique learning experiences with a meaningful impact as they are packed with stimuli - the message is the experience as well as in the text and has a social element with visitors exchanging information. As free-choice environments, it suggests high internal motivation about when, what and where to learn in museums - a motivation missing in formal education context.

So where does gender based violence come in? It became defined as a human rights issue in the 1990s and gender inequality (including traditional gender roles and expectations), reinforced and maintained in institutions like museums, lies behind gender based violence. The influence of the media can shape perceptions, beliefs, attitudes, and behaviours that link power, sexuality, and violence against women – museums are part of this same phenomemnon.

My case studies are a variety of different museum programmes based around some kind of gender based violence. These include:

• Art Works For Change - "Off The Beaten Path: Violence, Women and Art" Exhibition and Programmes
• Gallery of Modern Art, Glasgow - "Rule of Thumb: Art and Human Rights" Exhibition and Programmes
• MoMA, New York - Sanja Ivekovic's retrospective "Sweet Violence"
• Against Violence and Abuse - "Pandora's Box" Exhibition

I compared the methods used in these different projects and came up with a number of best practice conclusions. 

Engaging with social justice issues, especially gender based violence, in a museum requires flexibility, a great deal of planning and a willingness to take some calculated risks. It needs to be embedded through an organisation’s structure, mission, vision and strategic plan in order to be effective and the scope of outcomes are reduced when the issues are restricted to just add-on projects or temporary exhibitions with no connection drawn to the core purpose of the institution.

Work on gender based violence and other social justice issues most probably meets the criteria of statutory, non-profit or grant making bodies thus enabling access to various pots of potential funding. Free admission is a key feature of the social justice programmes offered by GoMA and other museums and this needs funding from elsewhere. Support from trained professionals is needed to assist gallery staff, artists and educators when working on potentially sensitive topics such as gender based violence. Support from other organisation staff during outreach work is also needed to ensure that artists and educators don’t become therapists. Time is needed to allow for adequate training and preparation of staff members and also for debrief during and after the programme. 

Programmes need objectives from the outset and it is important to evaluate the qualitative impact of any social justice programme – recording the numbers of visitors and participants is not enough. Evaluation is also important for understanding the communities around the museum and informing any future advocacy work.

The design of exhibitions to allow personalisation and ownership of information will increase engagement with the subject. It is important to use the interpretation offered to make it accessible to certain audiences, whilst not being seen as ‘dumbed down’ to others. The advocacy function of content and interpretation is greatest if it is politically explicit – leaving some areas as open questions but reinforcing the view being advocated for throughout. Content also needs to be changed and renewed regularly and in light of current events to have the greatest impact with social justice issues. Relating gender based violence to permanent collections and leaving it unchanged is not effective.

Space for reflection on the issues at hand, especially for sensitive topics like gender based violence, is extremely important. At GoMA, their ‘dwell space’ was used extensively for the sharing of feelings, comments and reactions. Elsewhere, the International Slavery Museum in Liverpool has introduced a ‘campaign zone’ to mobilize visitors around human rights causes. All areas of the museum can be utilised as part of the learning experience – few currently make use of spaces such as the cafe and the toilets for their learning objectives. This goes beyond the physical space too – a museum’s website often has a far greater audience than the building itself so should be programmed like other spaces for social justice programmes – Art Works for Change, for example, make their exhibitions available as virtual walkthroughs online. Expanding the experience before and after the visit, through marketing material and installations such as the Barbara Kruger billboard in Glasgow Central Station for ‘Rule of Thumb’, adds to the impact of a museum’s social justice programme. Taking the project beyond the walls of the museum is needed to really engage with diverse communities.

Working on social justice issues in the context of museums is never going to be completely straight-forward. Previous projects have focused on the issue of violence against women (and within that domestic violence) – perhaps as its more widespread in those locales or easily tackled without challenging a culture that sees women as victims. A future approach could approach violence against men and transphobic violence in a more comprehensive programme on gender based violence. These forms of violence all stem from the same complex mix of ideas of power and social values. Programmes mostly taken place in art museums and galleries. The potential for other types of institutions to explore the issue of gender based violence is there, and encouragement is needed for such institutions to utilise experiences from engagement projects, such as with women in refuges, for wider public facing programmes.

I, personally, think it is important for all organisations considered museums, and indeed all those providing with education, to actively pursue a social justice agenda. If an institution is not actively working for social justice, they are letting the socially unjust status quo stand unquestioned.  

“Ignoring violence against girls, or pretending it’s not there, is the same as accepting it.”

- WAGGGS, Stop The Violence Video, 2011

If You're Happy And You Know It!

Today is the United Nations' inaugural International Day of Happiness. I hope you're having a happy day. 

The thinking behind the day is to encourage a different understanding of development - one where the priority is the well-being of citizens and their freedom to live happy and fulfilling lives. This comes in constrast to economy centred approaches of the past, which in many cases have served to increased inequalities between rich and poor, rather than improve the lives of all. It might also highlight how 'Western' countries aren't as 'developed' as they might like to consider themselves to be. What Ban Ki-Moon is saying is that economic growth isn't the be all and end all if the well-being of people is sacrificed in the process. 

Today is also several other things. Firstly the equinox - the day that winter becomes spring in the Northern Hemisphere and that summer turns to autumn down south. Watching the turning of seasons, natures cyclical development, is certainly something that makes me feel happy. 

It's also the day for the announcement of the UK Budget. Reviewing the key points there is some not so happy news. I'm not sure how the numbers work (my guess is population growth) but unemployment is up, even though there are technically more people in work. Fewer people are claiming job seekers allowance "probably due to tougher stances by job centres" says the Guardian. The increase in unemployment is pretty much down to 18-24 year olds becoming unemployed - maybe with the end of seasonal contracts over the Christmas period. Not good news for young people then.

Good news for the future is an increase in personal allowances (money you earn tax-free) is going up to £10,000 in 2014 - early than previously stated - and tax free childcare vouchers for families with both parents working which may benefit women in particular. Other good points come in investment in low emission vehicles, however I personally feel that promoting shale gas and carbon capture is missing the point a bit on the environmental front. 

I have to agree with some of the commentors though - why not raise the personal allowance rather than taxing people and giving it back to those who meet certain criteria through tax credits. 

One thing is for sure, I will be a happy person if more is done to stop ta avoidance, particularly by corporations.

A New Home

So I'm currently working on moving all of the back posts from my blog on www.soroco.org.uk to this platform - as it's easier to post through, add photos, edit etc. Than the back end system on the website. Hopefully it'll make the Speak Out, Reach Out, Camp Out blog posts more interactive with social media, encourage me to post more, and many one day I'll figure out how to make this all collaborative too (so it's not just me rabbiting on!). I also like that fact this system has a spell check (being dyslexic and all, I usually went back later and spotted dozens of spelling mistakes in my previous posts). The irony is it doesn't think 'blog' is a word...

Here I am typing away on my computer (taken at CSW in 2011, but it's by go to picture for this kind of thing).As life moves on at pace, I realise weeks (sometimes months) have galloped by without posting more than a few shared images to facebook let alone a thoughtful message on my blog. But reading the posts by this year's UK WAGGGS delegate to CSW has inspired me back into action - you can check out the posts in question at http://alittlebitrosy.blogspot.co.uk/.

I moved back to the UK two weeks ago, after just over four months out of the country. The majority of that time was spent with my partner in Massachusetts, USA, with a week long trip to Bali for the Global Youth Forum in the December. My partner is American and we moved back to the UK together (along with a beautiful dog) and so this post is about new homes in more way than one. Job hunting, house hunting and setting up life all over again is, I guess, a permissible excuse for my temporary slackness. But a combination of Rosy's blog and returning to my parents house, where I pinned my project roadmap to the wall of the bedroom, has made me think about how much more this project can achieve.

With that in mind, I have grand ambitions for another Camp Out event to take place in some form later this year, for another exhibition project using photography to highlight role models, for fundraising for these projects, and for developing the website and other online tools.

If you'd like to get involved in any of these projects, I'd love to hear from you!

Stand Up and Stand Together

For the last two years I have been part of the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts delegation to the United Nation Commission of the Status of Women in New York and witnessed the international women’s movement in action. Last year there was already a buzz about how big and important this year’s event is going to be, so I have no doubt that what Lynne Featherstone, UK Minister for Development, says in this article is true. 2013 can be the turning point. This year’s theme is ending violence against women and girls, and whilst I won’t be in New York this March, I will follow the event from afar and contributing what I can online – especially through social media. The draft agreed conclusions (the document that governments will be negotiating during the event) are already up on the UN Women website, and from an initial reading there is some really great stuff in there. That’s no guarantee it will still be there by the end of the two weeks, as last year’s failure to arrive at any agreement demonstrates. A lot of the language is based on previously agreed UN texts, resolutions and platforms for action – a good sign that the text should remain in this document, but also a glaring testament to the lack of progress made despite these agreements. We need action, not words, or at least words that inspire action. Yesterday I took part in the nearest gathering for the One Billion Rising campaign (http://onebillionrising.org/) – a campaign successful in achieving people to think, speak and act the world over. Check Google, your favourite news sites, or indeed probably your local paper and you’ll find reports of what Eve Ensler inspired people to do. And standing on Main Street, holding the banner between representatives from the police force and the health department, I could feel the solidarity in the air. I’ve blogged about my experiences of this topic before, and reading this article last month got me thinking again about how we tackle this pandemic of violence that infiltrates ever corner of the planet. I agree that the culture, expectations and social norms are at the root of the problem, but this is a real problem that is happening right now – we can’t divert resources away from the front line sources helping those survivors, but we need to tackle the cause. The statistics are appalling. In the UK we have a really low conviction rate, extra-long times to process the cases, extremely low rates of reporting the crime to the police, and all of this whilst 1 in 5 women will be on the receiving end of a sexual offence during their lifetime. So what would I suggest we do? Give. Funds and other resources are tight for your local services. If you want to make sure that you, your relatives, your friends or that person you passed in the street today has somewhere to go, and someone to turn to when they need it – you need to support the services right now. I don’t advocate turning up and dumping the things you don’t want any more on their doorstep – get it touch and see what you can provide that they might need. Time, money, or something else. Talk. We need to end this taboo. I’ve been affected by violence based on my gender, but I don’t need pity. Sometimes I do need the support of the people around me – the knowledge that I can talk to them and they won’t judge me. We can break the silence. Everyday Sexism is a great project doing just that. Check out their tweets showing how prolific those little instances of gender based violence are, and some women’s ways of countering it. Act. It takes more than words to see the problem, and when learn a lot more through what we do. If you work with a class, youth group, scout or guide unit or any kind of group at all (young or old) then there are lots of resources out there that can help you use activities to approach the topic and start the conversation. The World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts are bringing their ‘Stop the Violence’ activity pack out soon, and Girlguiding UK in partnership with AVA have recently released a Girls in Action pack on the same topic. You can download it from here. Whatever you do – stand up, and stand together.

But Those Are Boys Pants...

I’ve come to realise that I want to dress like an 8 year old boy. It’s something that strikes me whenever we take a trip to a clothing store that caters for multiple ages and genders. And I think I’m probably achieving this look as I head out in the snow piling up from the blizzard Nemo. I know my utmost motivation is to be comfortable in what I’m wearing. But I’ve never quite figured how much this has to do with an outward expression of my gender identity, and how much it relates to one of my disabilities – dyspraxia. It often makes me feel uncomfortable in whatever I’m wearing (I have been known to get changed 4 or 5 times a day if I’m particularly anxious) and I wonder whether clothing designed for boys of that age is designed for a freedom of movement, hence its appeal. So to backtrack, my motivation from this blog post is the discovery of ‘boyfriend style’ boxer shorts as my new favourite form of underwear. I had previously been wearing men’s boxers as I find them comfortable and warm in a cold winter – though there is a need to size up to allow for female hips which leaves space elsewhere. My partner couldn’t understand my preference for this type of underwear and on a visit to Target I found women’s boxers in the US have much more generous sizing than I’ve ever found in the UK. I’m thankful of the discovery of warm, comfortable underwear that allows for hips with no extra space elsewhere. Though I don’t understand why it needs to be branded ‘boyfriend style’. Now let’s hope the realisation that there are women who aren’t stick thin who enjoy wearing this kind of underwear reaches the UK soon. I mean, even with my passion for their fashion, I am most definitely not the size of an 8 year old, regardless of gender. I wasn’t even the size of an 8 year old when I was 8 - as the giant in the midst of my rugby team photo from that season will testify. From an early age I was crossing those department boundaries, especially in search of shoes. The gendering of clothing is something that has never made sense to me. Yes, it is rather convenient to have underwear designed for the particular genitalia you have – it fits better. But every other dimension of a person varies so much that to say the type of clothing you wear is dictated by your genitalia is nonsensical. Clothing does far more than ‘fit’ though. Every garment makes a statement about your personality, your gender, your social reading of the occasion, wealth, class, taste and so much more – whether you consciously think about it or not. This is why I think uniformed youth organisations can play a huge role in challenging gender inequalities. Ever since the inception of guiding and scouting the uniform has been a tool for breaking down barriers of wealth and class. Other barriers are less successfully crossed – I always felt a little like the odd one out as I was a much larger 9 year old than the organisation clearly expected and I turned up each week in culottes that my mother had made especially for me. They were as closely matched to what the other girls wore, but still quite distinguishable. In early days, yes, the uniform was probably something of a trade-off – guides can wear something functional, but not too functional. You can hike as long as you can do it in a skirt down to your ankle. If I’d had to wear a little brown dress I probably wouldn’t have stuck with Brownies. So I should be thankful that I’m a child of the 1990’s, old enough to thank Jeff Banks for the introduction of hoodies. So my theory. When girls and young women turn up to guiding activities and don’t need to use their clothes to display their gender (and actually have that freedom to not have to behave in a way that would be deemed ‘feminine’), it gives them space to grow, to build confidence in new activities and realise their abilities. The operation of gender in a single-sex environment probably is more complex than this, but I still think it gives an important space. Being a girl guide taught me that I can achieve more if I wear sensible and appropriate clothing for the activity. If keeping myself warm in a Massachusetts winter means wearing men’s or ‘boyfriend’ underwear, then so be it.

On My Bike And Cycling Uphill

Despite the title I’m not, in fact, talking about my sporting pursuits of late. I do have a bee in my bonnet about trying to find a job though.

My current employment contract (last renewed 4 months ago) comes to an end tomorrow and I have been submitting applications at a rate of over one per day for the last two weeks in an attempt to have a job lined up for when I return to the UK at the start of March. Up to that point it’d been a slighter slower, but not insignificant, rate of 1 or 2 a month since I started working on my MA dissertation in the late spring of 2012. I managed to pick up a temporary contract that helped to make ends meet while I finished studying and that has been renewed and continued since. But tomorrow it ends.

I know it could be said that I am in a more fortunate position that many other 22 year old job seekers – my level of education means I’m looking at jobs that do command a salary significantly above a living wage when I finally do get employment. I know that the minimum wage jobs many are desperately seeking just to be earning don’t actually pay enough to live on when you find one – or if they do supposedly ‘per hour’, they don’t come with any guarantees of those hours from one week to the next. I don’t want to bore you with the countless statistics that tell you how many 16-25 year olds are unemployed. What I’m concerned about is how this problem is making people feel.

Every rejection message digs away at your confidence, every unsuccessful interview makes you questions your own abilities, and every time I hear someone say ‘there was another candidate with more professional experience, would you consider doing an unpaid internship with us?’ I actually just want to cry. I’ve been working in office environments since I was temping at 16, I’ve volunteered since I was 12. I’m now 22. I’d like to turn around and ask how I’m meant to have more professional experience than somebody who’s been legally allowed to work for 4 times as long as me – but that would probably do nothing to help me get a job.

I even got turned down for a 3 month paid internship with that organisation I have volunteered for since I was 12 – apparently I didn’t have enough workplace experience… Now, sorry one moment, but I thought that was what an internship was designed for? What you actually wanted was a 3 month temp.

I know that when I fill out application forms, or answer questions in interviews, I sometimes sound a little desperate for a job. And I know that usually costs me the job. But for somebody who desperately wants to work and has been turned down so many times, it’s difficult to want to play this like it’s a game.

Lately I’ve found some employers have this little clause that gives me false expectations. There’s now a little check box that I see more and more: we guarantee an interview to any person with a disability who meets the minimum requirements of the role.  I am a person with disabilities – not significant enough to stop me working, but significant enough that I am affected by them. I have asthma, I have IBS (currently preventing me from eating dairy, egg, gluten, and red meat), I have dyspraxia, but it is dyslexia that I think disadvantages me in this process. Basically, I find filling out forms really difficult – the words and boxes swim across the page and it takes me as much effort to remember my first name as the date and awarding body of my Latin GCSE when it comes to write it in the right place.

So yes I’m grateful of any opportunity to hop to the front of the queue and try to show how I’m the best candidate during an interview. But then I wonder if this gives me false expectations. As I got a bye in the first round am I automatically seeded last before the interview begins? Would I have even been close to the short-list if there wasn’t this positive discrimination box to tick? I still have my doubts.

The disability doesn’t have to be specifically related to form filling, so there’s a big flaw in the concept. For example maybe I’ll find a form that lets you score points for every under-represented characteristic. Maybe something in the STEM industries: I’m female, check, multiple disabilities, check, LGBTQI+, check, went to an inner city primary school, check. Just got to keep my fingers crossed there’s no BME candidate to pip me at the post. Though then I’d in all likelihood end up in a misogynistic and xenophobic environment where actually I’d rather be unemployed than work for them. Let’s change the culture, not the application process. I remain on the fence about positive discrimination.

Time to get back on my bike. A way to make blogging into my own little business is just around the corner, maybe…