"Normal" advice to not walk around at night in Bristol.

hi Motherfunster - apology accepted.

Rape Crisis are indeed amazing, we are so lucky to have them. fingers crossed they're funding continues - if not we will have a fight on our hands.

if you can go tomorrow that would be amazing. i can't be there (work) but it really makes a difference when the public come out in support, with much cheering and booing.

We did have a daytime meeting planned last year about motherhood but was cancelled as the woman running the discussion was moving house. so if you fancy running a meeting in the day, get in touch!

Hi there
The meeting starts at 2pm. I'm not sure how long it'll go on for but the public forum is at the beginning. We can say our piece (we're going to submit a statement) and then either stay or go depending on how the meeting progresses.

Thanks for the compliment on Rape Crisis. However, I can't take any credit for what they do as I'm not affiliated to them in any way. I work for...actually...probably better not say on a public forum!... and this campaigning is all in my spare time (what an exciting life I lead). I'm taking annual leave to be at the meeting on Friday afternoon (ditto).

Thanks for the cartoon that you've sent to BFN. I'm sure someone will get back to you soon about it. I'm not an admin for the BFN e-mail and it's looked after by 2 BFNers who are both working full time but I'm sure they'll be in touch soon.

Hope to see the cartoon on the website soon!

Understand completely if you can't make it on Friday. These meetings can be awkward to attend. Hope to see you at a BFN/Fawcett meeting or event at some point in the future anyway.

Jess

Hi Motherfunster
Apology accepted! Thanks for that.

If there were to be daytime meetings, I'm sure there'd be people up for that. I can't as I work full time but there must be plenty of others who would be up for meeting.

I'm not sure if you've seen the other thread about the sex entertainment venue legislation but if you're free on Friday at 2pm, it would be great if you could join us at the Council House for the licensing meeting. If you can be there, I'll be coming from work so will be in a grey suit and probably a blue shirt.

We've looked at the documentation that has been issued (all 119 pages of it [fed up face emoticon!] and have submitted a question and are hoping to submit a statement as well.

On the other thread I mentioned that the licensing committee have only accepted one study that only involved interviewing lapdancers and lapdancing club owners as "independent evidence". All the other reams of academic studies and report that we, Bristol Rape Crisis, the Centre for Gender Violence Research and the NHS put forward in their consultation responses were ignored.

Needless to say, we are not impressed!

Thank-you dear, yours are pretty large too...

huge spotlights.

but it will be dark then. how are we going to get there??

Hi Riven
It is a public meeting. I'm not sure which item it is on the agenda though. I'll see if I can find out and will post on here.

Thanks! It'll be great to have more support there.

JIA

Any Bristol feminists would be very welcome at the Council licensing meeting, Friday, 2pm at the Council House. They are going to be signing off the incredibly poor SEV (sex entertainment policy) that day. I am taking annual leave to attend and will be meeting MumBristol there.

We are also going to be spending an evening each making a list of loopholes in the policy. If anyone else has time to help, that would be great. The draft policy is available on their website but I will post a link to it later.

Any help greatly appreciated and support at the meeting would be very welcome.

Sorry for the short notice. We only found out about the meeting yesterday.

Whilst this thread has gone into different issues, it's worth bearing in mind that the murder victim Jo Yeates was by far and away most likely NOT attacked by reason of being on the street. Without trawling over details, far more likely that (in one way or another) her killer entered her house. Equally, in the scheme of things, far more likely that he killer was known to her in one way or another than a random psycho wandering on the loose.

I can't give you statistics, but in my work in crime, I can only say empirically that it seems more likely that men will be attacked unprovoked on the street in terms of pure numbers of instances. However, two key issues (amongst many) may be relevant:

1. Men are likely to be attacked for a much wider variety of reasons, whereas attacks on women run the obvious risk of arising from more specific sinister motivation and stand every chance of being more serious for that reason.

1. There are many more men than women wandering around the streets at night.

Anyway, I am glad that the Bristol Feminists have asserted their credentials following the original ill-judged attack. Having witnessed many of the meetings in my house (whilst emptying the washing machine, doing the ironing etc of course) I can verify that singing does not take place. More's the pity. An image of the massed choir of the Fawcett Society banging out "Angel From Montgomery" has been stuck in my mind for an unhealthy period of time.

Riven - men are welcome at meetings although they rarely come along. The website has more information about this. I believe Fawcett meetings are women only.

It's very well to accuse us of being defensive but this whole thread was started from a very mean-spirited perspective by someone who felt they had the right to criticise us when she has had pretty much nothing to do with BFN in the past.

Hi Riven

We are open to men and women, although find that most meetings generally attract only women.

We haven't had any problems with men dominating discussion. In fact, we once had a 'men in feminism' discussion group where trying to get the men to talk was incredibly tricky, as they were very aware about not dominating the discourse!

if, for example, we had a meeting about violence i think we would discuss whether to make it women-only, and the recent workshops for survivors of violence were, of course, women only.

Bristol Fawcett is women only.

A lot of the issues we discuss do effect men too, and of course the patriarchy hurts everyone. We expect everyone to be respectful and observe confidentiality in meetings and have never had any trouble in the past.

Hi Motherfunster

Thanks for your message and glad we have resolved this!

We look forward to seeing you at meetings soon and if you would like to get involved in putting on a discussion group etc then let us know.

You might also be interested in Sistershow Revisited which is an art exhibition and educational event about the women's liberation movement which an amazing Bristolian woman is putting on.

motherfunster - BFN welcomes men and women, and anyone beyond or between those gender binaries. I very much doubt that anyone from BFN asked you to prove that you are a woman.

The issues of childcare and access are very iimportant, and I agree with you on those issues. However, it's also important to remember that the majority of feminist networks across the UK are run by volunteers, often with other full-time employment and no funding whatsoever. It's amazing what can be achieved with such limited resources. But that does mean that those of you such as yourself, and Riven, who want to join us, but feel that you can't because of childcare or access issues, could work with us instead of against us.

If you are available in the day - why not offer to hold some groups then, and report back to the group? There's really nothing stopping you. If you need a venue with access, instead of critisicising us for holding meetings in inaccessible venues, why not find one that is suitable and help us to hold meetings there? We are only as strong as our membership and as a member I find it really sad that people would rather criticise the hard-working people of BFN than actually do something to help.

Riven, if there's enough Bristol interest then maybe the coach from Cornwall will stop and pick up for Million Women Rise.

JessinAvalon, let's see what we can do for the next BF meeting! (warbles: I am Strong, I am Invincible,I am Woman)