On page 50 of the current issue of The Gentlewoman (a self-described bi-annual bible for fabulous women) lies a refreshing interview with fitness queen, Joslyn Thompson.

As the magazine describes her, Joslyn Thompson is the face (and body) of fitgirlabouttown.com. She’s a ‘…straight-talking personal trainer who fights faddish diet and exercise myths with her back-to-basics blog and one-to-one sessions’.

Joslyn, 34, discovered her love and passion for fitness training while studying economics at Trinity College Dublin. With that came the discovery of her desire to be a positive force in the lives of teenage girls who had given up on fitness and were more interested in ‘sexy dancing’ or didn’t think they had the ability to push themselves physically and boost their levels of health and wellbeing while doing so. 

She’s now a Nike master trainer and on a mission to encourage teenage girls to overcome their fear of sweat and find some better role models. As part of her role, she teaches other trainers to teach within a group called the Nike Training Club - a project aimed at getting girls back into exercise. She works in schools with 15 to 16 year olds, the age at which she feels most girls give it up. 

‘A lot of girls hate sweating,’ she says. ‘But more than anything, girls lose interest in physical exercise when they become interested in boys. It’s changed a bit since when I was at school; girls’ role models are now very different: The Kardashians, Rihanna…’

For her, she explains, its important to get teenage girls ‘…to realise their bodies are capable of something other than impressing some guy.’ In one particular instance, Thompson recalls working with a class of girls who never came to gym class and were always in trouble. ‘…All they wanted to do was sexy dancing. I left there thinking, ‘this is never going to work.’ Thompson, it seems isn’t quite fully aware of the effect she has on girls as when she returned six weeks later to the same class, the teacher reported that the girls had been exercising nonstop and had led the school sports day with a 5k run. ‘That was huge for me,’ she says. 

I think supporting the mental health, nutrition and fitness of children and teenage girls in particular as they rapidly transform into young adults, goes hand-in-hand with the promotion of their rights and welfare. This is a notion I’m sure Joslyn Thomas would readily attest to.

Thompson hosts monthly live Q&As on the Fit Girl About Town Facebook page, where she answers all fitness related queries.

For the full article with Joslyn, pick up a copy of The Gentlewoman from your nearest newsagency.

To learn more about Joslyn and her Fit Girl About Town quest check out:

Her website www.fitgirlabouttown.com 

and

Her Facebook page:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Fit-Girl-About-Town/102532739727

 Josyln showing off those amazing arms of hers which she hesitantly admits get a bit of attention, even from perfect strangers.

(Source: thegentlewoman.com)

The UTS Law Society Community Ambassadors are a group of extremely good-looking, talented, and generally kick-ass movers and shakers dedicated to social justice issues in Australia.

This weekend we got together to create a series of photographs and a video to promote our upcoming CITY2SURF team who will be running to express their support for the rights of our children and the bright and prosperous futures they deserve. Pretty damn cool I know. All the money raised will go to the Child Rights Taskforce (for whom I am the Youth Reporter of 2012).

The Child Rights Taskforce as many of you know is a coalition of 100 NGOs and advocates dedicated to the protection and advancement of child rights in Australia.

There’s every reason to support the Community Ambassadors and our cause: A UNICEF study has shown that 10.9% of children in Australia are living below the poverty line The amount of children in out-of-home care has risen by 51.5% since 2005. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are 24 times more likely to be imprisoned in juvenile detention, 10 times more likely to be in out-of-home care, have a lower life expectancy and suffer 3 times the child mortality rate compared to their non-aboriginal peers. Australia is the ‘lucky country’ for many children, but we can do so much better for our most marginalised and vulnerable. Be a part of the movement, Support our effort to protect and promote child rights by donating via http://www.everydayhero.com.au/uts_lss_for_child_rights

x

Marius Janusauskus is a masters student at the prestigious Antwerp Royal Academy of Fine Arts. He studies fashion and considers himself both an artist and an activist. He says in an endearing Belgian accent: ‘…fashion for me is research, it’s research about the human…about who they are and how they think’. He perfectly embodies this concept in his obscure collection above where models walk the catwalk with cone-like fixtures attached to their heads, symbolising an inherent ‘tunnel vision’ complex and blatant disregard for the possibilities that surround them. 

Janusauskus’ work would suggest that gone are the days where activists were only hippies sporting patterned flare pants and bandanas. Perhaps it doesn’t matter who you are, what you do or what you wear. Perhaps what matters is the kind of mindset that you choose for yourself and your willingness to shout about it. 

If we’re able to think about one’s mindset defining human right activism rather than one’s clothes, profession or ego - perhaps you could say that human rights activists are artists in their own right. Now, before you write me off as dazed and confused - think about it. 

The role of an artist (fashion designers, painters, sculptors, filmmakers) is to imagine and create an alternate version of their subject. Van Gogh famously painted an alternate version of a fruit bowl. Henri Matisse created quite striking and provocative alternate versions of discerning women. Monet, impressionist interpretations of his secret garden. Picasso’s pioneering of the avant-garde Cubist movement in the early 20th Century saw him take ordinary subjects, like women and transform that subject into something completely new until it hardly resembled its original form. In Cubist artworks, objects are analysed, broken up and reassembled in an abstract form - instead of depicting objects from one viewpoint, the artist depicts the subject from a multitude of viewpoints to represent the subject in a greater context. This same process of ‘unpacking’ in this case, social justice issues, assessing a multitude of viewpoints and finding solutions in alternate policies, programs and frameworks is all but too familiar to human rights activists like the Child Rights Taskforce. 

In Picasso’s case, society called him outrageous but in time, decided he was a genius. In the same way, society had had the audacity to deem women’s rights outrageous, the concept of unity between ourselves and our first people was ridiculed. In time, although these groups still face prejudice, the idea of equality itself has become widely accepted.

Artists, and if I may, human rights activists choose to play and work with possibilities rather than What Is. They dare to dream up alternate versions of society rather than accepting the way things are often under the pretext of being a realist. If you’re a fan of Abed from American smart-comedy show Community you’ll know what I mean (reference Abed’s obsession with alternate timelines). 

I feel that regular people live their life based on what they’ve been given and what they have - rarely stopping to not only consider other options or alternatives but considering that those alternatives could become a reality. I find this frightening. A world without imagination and critical thinking is dangerous because it places boundaries upon ourselves and on each other.

One way these boundaries are placed is in how we label ourselves and each other: right, wrong, undeserving, outcast. These labels are so powerful because honestly, we care about what people think of us and it effects even the strongest of people, we see examples in how regularly celebrities complain about how they are portrayed in the media and in the dangerous plague of cyber-bullying of ‘outcasts’ which have taken over our schools nationwide.

It doesn’t stop there. The problem also lies in how we limit ourselves. I’m talking about  (insert name) who is a talented interior designer yet has spent the last 10 years in a job that she hates, but is nevertheless secure. The lawyer who is in it for the money but wants desperately to run a cafe. Once we’ve killed our own dreams, we give ourselves permission to kill those of others. I’m talking about those that argue that the sufferings of indigenous children in Australia are the consequences of abuses our generation didn’t commit, and are therefore not our problem. Activists instead take What Is and imagine, draw, visualise and campaign for an Australia where indigenous children have the same opportunities and same access to basic services and have the same life expectancy as their non-aboriginal peers. It takes an artist to be able to see past what is and conjure up the infinite possibilities that could and should make up our future as a nation. 

The message here is simple: when we place limitations on ourselves in those around us, especially victims of human rights abuses, we’re limiting our future as a community and a nation. 

We must dispel this idea that human rights activism is a niche focus group - it is something that every single person has a connection to and should take on board in their daily lives. After all, there’s an artist in us all. Get your Picasso on and get painting, help us conjure up and materialise a better, stronger future for Australia. 

If you’ve switched on the radio or television in the past week, cringed, and promptly switched it off again out of pure frustration, if you’ve flicked through pages of your local or national newspaper (although the Fairfax job cutting sitch would suggest you haven’t) taken a deep breath and slammed it shut again, I’m with you.

It seems all I’ve heard or seen of late is the political to-and-froing of our political leaders, over issues we’ve discussed a thousand times: mining, carbon tax, asylum seekers and the malaysian solution, Gina Rinehart and the threat she poses to quality, independent journalism. My frustration at least, comes from a place of wanting to hear (bipartisan or not), an in depth, informed, genuine solution-based discussion rather than a perpetual  blame game. 

As we’re here in Canberra for the parliamentary event ‘Listen To Children: a voice that matters’ held by the UNICEF Australia Parliamentary Association together with UNICEF Australia, Save the Children, the National Childrens and Youth Law Centre and The Healing Foundation, we’re all hoping to generate a quality discussion that will provoke a genuine and ready response to the issues facing our children.

Addressing the root causes 

I’m reading a great presentation by the Australian Centre for Child Protection which seems advocates exactly that: an open discussion of the root causes for issues. What are the reasons for the rate of children out-of-home care increasing by 51.5% since 2005 and that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are 24 more times more likely to be in jail between the ages of 10-17? Rather than looking at who we can blame for these issues, the presentation looks at the reasons for behavioral and health patterns, the psychology behind the decisions made by juvenile offenders, linking cause and effect between what we’re not giving these kids and what they’re doing in reaction to that.

Investing in quality research and data collection 

Quality research and data collection is something we need to both invest in, talk about, and take seriously. The government can start by allowing themselves to be educated by the Child Rights Taskforce, and all of you out there being humanitarian rock stars who have genuine knowledge of what kids need and want and how we can go about supporting and empowering them. 

New and improved solutions 

The statistics that come out of effective research are so powerful because they establish a pattern. Where there’s a pattern there should be a light-bulb moment where we go ‘there is something wrong with the environment we’re providing here and that needs to change’. There’s an enormous opportunity for change and we’re often playing the same game and expecting different results. For example, many rural and regional Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children still don’t have access to basic health care, safety, security, education much less culturally sensitive mechanisms to hear their voices and concerns.If the government does not commit to better, more informed solutions, we will have the same results. We will have 10.9% of children living in poverty, and a lower life expectancy for our indigenous children and their community.

An inclusive approach

This goes to all of you out there who’ve yelled the right answer at your t.v screen during Who Wants to be a Millionaire and wished you’d had the chance to be more than just a spectator.

I’ve only just come to realise the wealth of resources and information we have in the wider Australian community: we have academics, researchers, teachers, parents, sociologists, psychologists and regular Australians who need to be let in on this conversation. 

Political football is in essence spectator sport. We don’t want to be spectators we want to be players to a fair game. 

(Source: flickr.com)

I’m sitting all cosied up at ‘The Front’ cafe in Canberra. I’m here with all the incredible individuals that make up the Child Rights Taskforce, led by UNICEF and NCYLC.

We’ve gathered the troops, and we’re here to put forward our collective voice in asking the parliament to Listen To Children. We’re all here in Canberra for a parliamentary event called ‘Listen To Children: a voice that matter’ held in celebration of the introduction of a National Childrens Commissioner. The Child Rights Taskforce have invited MPs and political leaders from a broad range of areas, encouraging them to HEAR the voices of our children.

To give you a bit of context, the National Children’s Commissioner Bill passed barely 48 hours ago (meaning its a done deal, guaranteed), the United Nation’s Concluding Observations from the Review in Geneva earlier this month have just come out last week (this means we now have no misgivings as to what exactly the UN thought of how Australia is protecting and advancing the rights of its children). Just yesterday, The Age Reported that according to the UN ‘We fail on child rights’. Click here to read that article

CEO of UNICEF Norman Gillespie and head of NCYLC Mathew Keeley as well as members of the Taskforce will be imparting their wisdom and vision for the NCC - I’m so excited about hearing their thoughts no doubt I’ll be scribbling down notes and quoting them on twitter @JanChildRights so watch this space! 

I’ll be participating in a Youth Panel Discussion specific to the National Childrens Commissioner. The Youth Panel Discussion will be led by Canberra based ABC Journalist Stephen Dziedzic. He’ll be holding a discussion with Benson Saulo (Former UN Youth Ambassador) and Mujitaba Ahmadi, (Youth Representative from ChilOut) and myself! 

I’ll  be keeping you posted via:The Blog

                                               Facebook.com/ListenToChildren

                                               Twitter @JanChildRights

Look forward to hearing your thoughts! x

(Source: digbicks)