to ask you to pledge support for the GIRLS MATTER campaign?

[momb]

[http://new.girlguiding.org.uk/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=The+Guide+Association&utm_campaign=4811635_Girls+Matter+chaser+email+-+9+Oct+2014&dm_i=C8V,2V4OJ,2SWSA2,ADOV3,1 GIRLSMATTERCAMPAIGN]]

This campaign was born from a survey of girls and young women done by GirlGuidingUK. Please sign up if you agree.
Thank you

can you explain more please

rats!! would have had more impact if I hadn't messed up the link!!!

GIRLSMATTERCAMPAIGN

but what is it about
I don't want to just click on a random link

Not a fan. Boys matter. Children matter.

About girls voices being heard?

I'm not a fan either, sorry, all kids are equal.

i caved and clicked
what is the point?
why are girls more important than boys?

It's The Girl Guides trying to be all right on, relevant and modern, when my DD1(16) would far rather they got on with going hiking, camping, doing crafts and cooking.

She is happy to accept the need for international action on Women's rights and the need for much better sex and relationship education.

She has very very mixed feelings about body image stuff because while agreeing girls AND boys need to realise many images are airbrushed, she found it made her class more body conscious rather than less.

It's a campaign by the Girlguiding's youth panel calling for:

1. Young girls and women to be listened to and taken seriously.

1. A zero tolerance policy in schools towards sexual bullying and harassment.

1. Schools to teach body confidence and gender equality

1. Girl's rights to be a priority in international development

1. Stop children's exposure to sexualised content of females in mainstream media

1. Empower girls and young women to speak out on the impact of sexism and stereotyping

1. Modernise sex and relationship education so everyone is informed and can stay safe

1. Guarantee that women will be equally represented in Parliament.

These are the things which the girls within girlguiding have said matter most to them.

all those thing are relevant to boys too

Girls aren't more important than boys of course: it's a campaign based on equality, and lack thereof, currently being experienced by young women and girls (over 50,000 polled).
It's a call for equality: how can this be a bad thing?
An 8-point plan, not derogatory towards boys in any way.
1)Listen to girls and young women, take them seriously and make sure their voices count.
Promise to regularly consult girls and young women from all backgrounds and ensure their views are considered in policy decisions that affect their lives.
2)Demand that schools take a zero-tolerance approach to sexual bullying and harassment.
Promise to introduce guidance that all schools must use to tackle this issue.
3)Call on all schools to teach body confidence and gender equality.
Promise to make Personal, Social and Health Education (PSHE) compulsory and urge schools to include lessons on body confidence and gender equality.
4)Make girls’ rights a priority in the UK’s approach to international development.
Promise that the Department for International Development will focus on equality for girls, including advocating for girls’ rights to be central to the post-2015 sustainable development agenda.
5)Stop children’s exposure to harmful sexualised content in mainstream media.
Promise to bring print and online media in line with the principles of the broadcast watershed.
6)Empower girls and young women to speak out and be heard on the impact of media sexism and stereotyping.
Promise to establish a girls’ and young women’s advisory panel to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.
7)Modernise Sex and Relationships Education so all young people can make informed decisions and stay safe.
Promise to make Sex and Relationships Education (SRE) compulsory in all schools and update the curriculum to include healthy relationships, sexual consent, online safety, violence against women and girls, and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender relationships.
8)Guarantee that women will be equally represented in Parliament.
Promise to set a target for an increased number of female MPs in your party by the 2020 General Election and do what it takes to meet it, no excuses.

This is what a poll of 50,000 girls and young women have asked for, based on their experiences of life in the UK. Why would you feel this disadvantages boys in any way? Equality is about having a level playing field, not having it pro female or male....
I've signed up, and I can only hope someone listens and my daughters feel the benefit eventually...but I'd still sign up if I had sons.

Girls Matter has a considerable focus on campaigning against sexual bullying and 'everyday sexism' (to steal a phrase from another campaign) and to encourage gender equality, both here and abroad.

Heysoul - you say all kids are equal. It would be nice if they were but unfortunately, at the moment, they're not. It isn't about saying that boys don't matter, of course they do, but they don't face the sexual bullying and gender stereotyping to the same extent that girls do.

I don't believe girls in the Guides sad those were the most important things to them. I believe they think they're important, but I don't believe they made a list. I believe this list was drawn up by a senior in the guiding organisation.

It irritates the arse off me that women drive their own agenda for the girls they profess to guide.

The list applies to kids of both genders.

I would sign if it was a petition about CHILDREN matter, not just girls!

Boys have just as much right to be protected from these things.

Girls should be taught to realise they have a right to equality, not to strive for superiority and superior rights.

TSS - it wasn't just Guides (10-14) that were consulted. Senior Section members are aged 14-25 so it is quite reasonable that they did say these were the most important things to them.

FGS people, "Girls Matter"=/="Boys don't matter". Stop derailing.

I signed.

It's very telling that this thread has turned so quickly into "but what about the boys?" momb and Permanentlyexhausted are right, I think; a campaign by girls for equality does not say that girls are more important than boys (or that boys have to lose something so that girls can gain), but that equality does not yet exist.

I wonder what would have happened if this had been posted under Feminism.

Feather Girls should be taught to realise they have a right to equality, not to strive for superiority and superior rights.

That is exactly what the campaign is trying to achieve.

well you posted it in chat
not campaigns or feminism
so you will have to accept that thinks just girls matter

This list does largely apply to both genders. It is only in areas where girls and young women polled are disadvantaged that it pushes their cause. That is what equality means: levelling.
When I did this as an exercise in awareness with my Brownies (aged 7-10) I approached it from my own viewpoint. I'm a woman in an academic field who has never felt disadvantaged by my gender. The feedback I got from these girls was actually shocking to me: their view on the world as male dominated will colour their lives, in a way that my view will never be: I grew up with a female PM, when 'having at all' was seen as a possible. For our daughters' generation that is patently not the case.

Sounds like feminists using children (girls) to further their own campaign

yabu
(well you di post in AIBU)

I have already signed it

when we live in a equal society where neither sex is sexualised because of what sex they are, when females are treated as equals there will be no need for a campaign like this

sadly that is not the case there is still work to do

It's a very sophisticated campaign, it almost looks like very sophisticated people lobbied were involved in it.

I grew up at the same time with the same values Momb.

Boys matter just as much- they seem to get forgotten.

The negative replies make me feel like I've stepped into a parallel mumsnet.