Category: Women's Suffrage

Scenes at the Museum

31/3/2018

Along with five other members of BFWI I attended an event at the Royal Albert Hall last weekend. It was chaired by Lynne Stubbings, the National WI Chair and featured talks about the history and the future of the WI movement. Ann Stamper, the WI Archivist, went through the early years before the WI was big enough to need the Albert Hall for its Annual General Meeting but had already organised itself into many of the good practice still used today. Then Charlotte from the Shoreditch Sisters WI talked of the physical problems of setting up WIs in London and ran through her WI’s successful campaigning activities. Charlotte would definitely have made a good suffragette if she had been born many years earlier than she was. Lynne concluded by giving the figures for membership at present and gave us some details of future events.
Then two of us scampered across Hyde Park to take a very crowded underground train to the Barbican where the Museum of London was hosting an afternoon of speakers whose subject was the Suffragettes. There is an exhibition in the Museum at the moment. First up was Diane Atkinson whom we had heard speaking at Denman College but this didn’t matter as she altered the angle of her talk slightly and she is easy to listen to. Next Julie Purves talked about the personalities of the women drawn into the suffrage movement. Elizabeth Crawford followed to give an interesting exhibition of the artistic talent among the women shown in their posters, cartoons and general publicity material. She pointed out that they were ahead of their time in their use of advertising leaflets and merchandise. Caitlin Davies concluded the session by giving us an illustrated talk about the history of Holloway Prison and its part in the treatment of the imprisoned suffragettes. Caitlin has written a book called “Bad Girls” which I should imagine would be useful reading in support of the WI campaign for Care not Custody.
The novel which the local WI Reading Group has been reading this month was “Behind the scenes at the Museum” by Kate Atkinson which has nothing to do with real museums as she is likening our lives on display to others as museum pieces but we keep the background history which led up to our present day character shut away in the drawers and cupboards of our personal memory. We all enjoyed reading Kate’s novel as she is a favourite author with our group. It was good to have something which made us laugh although it was a sad story telling of early deaths in childhood, disfunctional marriages and poor childcare. Doesn’t sound funny, does it? A case of if you don’t laugh you might cry.

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www what women want

1/3/2018

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Well, it could stand for that in an age when everything is reduced to abbreviations. At the last local WI’s monthly meeting we were asked to remember the experiences of the Suffragettes in the fight to get the women the vote a hundred years ago. There have been many articles in the press and on the media to commemorate the occasion. We now take this right for granted and indeed many do not even bother to exercise their freedom to vote. We don’t have to fight as those women did to achieve recognition in society: after two female prime ministers, it’s proven. At present it is still a struggle to get equal pay and in other cultures the battle is far from won.
The WI persisted in working towards providing educational opportunities for its members and established Denman College after World War II and now we hear that some members think this is a drain on WI finances and should be closed. Another snub to worthy achievement and based on misconceptions as none of our subscriptions is used to support the college. Our current membership certainly lacks the drive of the early stalwarts: imagine, large WIs closing because they cannot get officers. What’s the point of being on a committee if you will not take a turn at being an officer?
So if we don’t appreciate having the vote and we don’t want to undertake responsibility as an officer at any level, what do we want? It still comes through that women join to be a member of a group within the community, to enjoy the company of other women and to learn about the world we live in; to learn crafts and to help others worse off than themselves wherever they live and to have the recognition of being able to speak up about matters of social importance. Isn’t that what the WI is about? Isn’t that what we need, a framework with the power to achieve what the individual cannot achieve on her own?
The resolution selection process is entering its final stage and two of the topics featured in the media recently. The first case of a father being sued for his part in allowing his daughter to undergo FGM and the continuing fight by the young Royals for improved care for those suffering from mental illnesses.
At least 4 members of the local WI have been to Denman College during February to listen to Diane Atkinson talk about The Remarkable Lives of the Suffragettes. They all appreciated the presentation, enjoyed being in that lovely house and looking out over the gardens and meeting members from all over the country over a super meal. Many visitors new to Denman were vowing to come back and went home armed with the latest brochure of courses. It is the jewel in our crown: for Heaven’s sake let’s hang on to it!
The local WI’s interest groups have met during February to read, to sew, to eat and to walk. Soon they will be making poppies in various media for Remembrance Day and attending the events planned both by BFWI and by our Group Convener. A full schedule of things at home and with friends in the wider community.

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Looking on

7/2/2018

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Today I am wearing purple not just because I am already old and want to learn to spit but in memory of the fight which the Suffragettes waged to obtain the vote 100 years ago. How brave they were, not only physically but mentally as well! It takes a lot of courage to take up a banner and march in demonstrations even in the present time, when women are more visible in the public eye and much more confident in expressing their views. I was interested to hear at a talk given by Simon Heffer that the reason the women were granted the vote after the age of 30 was not because they were considered not to be mature enough to vote until they were 9 years older than males but because the government of the day wanted them at home to replace the loss of about two generations of the population in the Great War: don’t let the women have the opportunity of further education and a place in industry and the professions but keep them at home producing children.
Three generations of women have escaped having to fight for the right to vote so they are beholden to use it whenever the need arises. The WI is always in the forefront of sensible campaigns on behalf of the family and women’s welfare and are no longer bound by strict conventions on what is acceptable to be discussed in order to gain results. This week there is a question in Parliament about the practice of surgical mesh implants (Sling the Mesh) so why do some people think we cannot discuss FGM?
Every year once the short list for resolutions is released, it surprises me how many articles appear either in the national press or on the media on these very topics. This can be a good thing or not---are these ideas going to be old hat before the WI comes to discuss them in June or are they useful preparatory work as a build-up? Last year’s mandates are doing well. Lots of articles about plastic litter and measures to combat loneliness. The latter crosses over into the 2018 homelessness and modern slavery issues. The problems of self-image and the media and the selfie culture which is on the short list is appearing more often and also open talk about mental illness.
The sort of press interest we don’t need is people carping about the cost of the annual subscription and suggesting that the WI is closing branches. Is £41 for 11 meetings and for having the backup of a national organisation to look after our interests expensive? We are attracting younger members nationally although not locally. If we want younger members we really need evening WIs and operate where there are a lot of young women living and working. Reading the WI Life it seems to be the thirty year olds who are coming in perhaps to learn crafts but more likely to combat loneliness beyond work. Can we attract the older lonely too to get a good mix, since the sheltered accommodation these days is being built in the larger towns?
Our WI craft group has met twice since Christmas. We are turning our attention to making soft toy animals for the Annual Council Meeting competition. (This ties in with the resolutions about domestic abuse as the toys are to be given to women’s refuges). The book group has been reading The Girl on the Train which led to a lot of discussion about mental and physical abuse in the home. Because of a break over Christmas we had also read The Essex Serpent which was set in late Victorian times when women were beginning to question whether they had to obey convention and stay in the home rather than be educated and take an informed interest in the emergence of science and medicine.
So I’m back where I came in. We must not let the Suffragettes down by taking for granted all that they have won for us and remember that the early WI members were actively lending their support to their struggles. We can and should use their legacy to keep improving the lot of our families and others who find themselves suffering from injustice wherever they are.

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Deeds not words

17/11/2016

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14th November
The first coach party of Bucks WI members set off on a rainy day to travel to London to walk in the footsteps of the Suffragettes. Another group will do the same next week. We disembarked in Pall Mall to find a quick lunch before meeting our guide. Several of the party ate in the National Gallery and had found time to look at the Rokeby Venus which had been slashed by Mary Richardson and the portraits of the members of the Pankhurst family. We gathered below the 4th plinth in Trafalgar Square to meet our two Blue Badge guides dressed in the purple and green used by those women. Many of us had looked out clothes in the same colours. It was interesting to hear passers-by recognise what we were representing. From Trafalgar Square we walked 2 miles around Westminster to cover the places where significant events of the campaign had occurred and where the pioneering women had lived. The guide also tied in the historical events with the recent filming. We didn’t get as far as visiting Holloway Prison. The guides were full of information and answered all the questions fired at them. We walked past the Home Office, saw the window from which Margaret Thatcher had acknowledged the crowd, admired the statue of Emmeline Pankhurst and the recent monument to the Women’s suffrage. It is an inspiring story although some of their deeds not words were very anti-social towards the beginning of the first world war. On the way home we glimpsed the Christmas decorations in Kensington High Street which were already lit up and saw the huge angels suspended above Regent and Oxford Streets which were to be switched on later this week. The journey there and back worked to time and everyone was delighted with her day and we really felt a deep admiration for what the suffragettes had achieved for us.
9th November
The topic for the Discussion Group tonight was “Automation versus Control”. I think it had been suggested following the work going on in Milton Keynes with driverless cars which is an alarming idea to most of us. However, there is so much in our daily lives which is automated that we cannot contemplate doing without: in fact, we would not be able to lead the lives that we do without the help of these computerised machines. The thought of robots wandering around our houses being helpful is unsettling. What happens when they go wrong? When they start to be master rather than slave?

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