Ms Fifikins

Yeah. It’s today. Internation Women’s Day. 8th March. I blogged about feminism 12 months ago. This year, I share this:

And, hey… This is what feminists look like:

We’ve had chats today about men and women and stuff. But we do that all the time anyway!

To paraphrase old Bill: That which we call a Corker by any other name would smell as sweet.

When I married I changed my surname. It wasn’t something I really thought about, I just did it! It gave a sense of connection- a family unit as we shared a family name. In the course of moving around I met people who married and hyphenated their names- husband and wife. I also met people who did not change their name when they married. When a close friend of mine saw her parents divorce, her sister hyphenated her surname with the surnames of her parents. She has kept this name after marriage.

Now after separation I have chosen to revert to my maiden name- or my Dad’s name. It is the name I grew up with. Changing ones name is a challenge. I have needed my birth certificate, and sometimes marriage certificate and have changed it at around 20 places. At one place, a lady told me she married last year and had to change her name at 72 different places. 72! Great! I suppose when one considers all those loyalty cards one collects then yes, it does add up.

Some places are easier than others. Medicare and Centrelink took a photocopy of my birth certificate and it changed straight away, with new cards issued within the week. Work was one of the first places I changed it at and they just changed it without any questions. Then I got a letter from my superanuation company asking for a Decrees Nisi or Certificate of Divorce. I just ignored this and thought I would deal with superannuation later. Then I went to the Queensland Transport. Sigh! They will not change my name until I am divorced. DFAT (The passport office!) was kinda easier- well if I don’t mind paying another $240! Yes, I can either apply for a new passport and forfeit all that is left (over 5 years!) or wait for a divorce to come through and if I apply to change it within twelve months, with new photos, it will be done gratis.

So I am waiting for a divorce to come through. This will give me yet another certificate and will ensure that my name can be changed officially in more places.

But what is in a name? One of the constant things I am told now that I have reverted to my maiden name is that I now have a different surname to my kids. My usual response is that when I married I spent 15 years with a surname different to my mother and we coped! The kids’ school has been great on the whole. My kids are not the only kids in the school who have different surnames to their parents. Even the teacher aide from when the kids were in Prep has stopped calling me Mrs Corker after 5 years of me telling her my name is Fiona!

My inner feminist tells me that a woman should not be forced to change her name upon marriage. Saying that a woman takes the name of her father before taking the name of her husband is just pure wrong! Women are not property to be passed from father to husband and I doubt many people would see this.

A sense of family unity though is created by a common family name. Therein lies the connundrum. You can choose to be linked to the past through the family name you received at birth or the future through the family name your children are given at birth. Perhaps that is the choice to make? At least as women of 21st Century Australia we have that choice and we should be grateful.

What I am experiencing is actually a legal issue- the right to choose my name. If I am still married to someone then I don’t have that right (unless I go through a formal name change process) in certain instances. This is the inequality that something needs to be done about. If I can go into Medicare and change my name without the need for a divorce, then I should be able to get a drivers licence and my own superanuation funds changed too.

I preferred to be called Fiona. It is the name my parents chose for me at my birth. It means more to me than a family name and it is the name that most people call me by. Seldom am I called Ms Henderson or Mrs Corker. My GP calls me Princess Fiona and I have been known to don ogre ears… I am known as Fi, Fifi, Fifikins, Fozzy and Mum or Mummy. What is important is that I know who I am and who I am not. I’m me whether you like it or not!

Today is the 99th International Women’s Day, or for some Womyn’s Day. So what have the last 99 years brought us? Yes women can vote in a lot of places now and more women are in the paid workforce than ever before, with employment rates amongst the 20-29 year old age group virtually equal for males and females (according to Triple J’s Hack last night.)Economically women are not equal to men, especially with regards to superannuation. There are still career paths that are traditionally male and female. I would love to see more male teachers, however the remuneration offered to teachers is not enticing. An experienced classroom teacher (10 years experience) will usually not earn more than around $70k/annum and that assumes they are taking on extra responsibility. Consider engineers where remuneration starts at the $100k/annum mark and increases considerably it is pretty much a no brainer, why would you become a teacher? But that is for another rant!

I have minimal superannuation. I spent 10 years as the unpaid slave Vicar’s Wife, yet did most of the administration, typing, publications etc. But then again rants against religious organisations are also for another day! I will need to do an extreme amount of salary sacrifice and get a high paid job in order to be able to retire comfortably and afford Bombay Sapphire over Vickers Gin. Perhaps I have weird worries about retirement…

But what is feminism? I grew up in a white middle class family where Mum stayed home and Dad worked. Mum did school runs and tuck-shop duty once a fortnight and Meals on Wheels every week and helped at church and ran her local Liberal Party branch and had dinner on the table every night at 6. She left school after her Leaving Certificate and went to Kindergarten Teacher’s College but didn’t like it so became a clerk at a stockbroking firm. She worked there until she was 6 months pregnant with me. She is also fortunate that she has never been in a financial position where she has had to work. Mum has always held very conservative views- politically, economically and socially. Whilst she was pleased I went to uni from school, and may have been a little dismayed at me marrying so young, she was please I ran away to join the circus church. One of my teenage memories is being dragged along to an ordination service at St Paul’s Cathedral in Melbourne where women were protesting at the doors for the right to be ordained. Mum was horrified at their actions and said their actions made her more against women’s ordination. She has since changed her views, and deep down I think believes in equality but also has trouble with the word feminist.

I suppose I class myself as a ‘born again feminist.’ I thought marrying young and having lots of kids and being the vicar’s wife and having a husband to support me would be way cool. Things don’t always turn out the way one plans! So what brand of feminism do I subscribe to? I support political, social and economic equality amongst the sexes. I don’t see this being achieved by women becoming like men so I do was my legs and various other parts of my anatomy. I wear skirts and fishnet stockings and shoes with small heels (I am too tall to wear stilettos I have decided, plus the pain!) I wear make up to work and wander past the fragrance counter each morning choosing a new scent. My hair is getting longer, even though it has been very short at various stages of my life! I don’t mind if a guy opens a door for me, but I don’t expect it, nor look for it. Now that I have reverted to my maiden name, even though this is proving very difficult to do in some areas until I get a decree nisi, I don’t think I will change it again, not that I am planning on marrying again, but I also wonder what is in a name. I would love to have taken my maternal grandfather’s name as it has now died out and he did so much for me, but it is just a name. I used to joke I had a corker surname…

I don’t want to be dependent on other people financially which means I work, but I also believe that women should be able to stay at home with their children should they choose and ways should be found to remunerate this work.

I am very pro choice when it comes to abortion, even though I don’t think I would be able to have one myself. Even though I had male obstetricians when I had the kids, this was because of perceived risks and I would have liked being able to have midwives and even contemplate a home birth. I am passionate about breastfeeding and educating and empowering all women to exclusively breastfeed for the first 6 months and continue breastfeeding until their child is 2 years old, as per the World Health Organisation guidelines. I don’t refer to menstruation as a ‘curse’ but don’t go around celebrating it either, no matter how revolting some periods can be!

I suppose that deep down I position myself as me. I value diversity, equality, social justice and human kindness. I think I am too left wing for my mother… I wonder how my kids will view feminism? I suppose all I can do is lead by example. In many ways this is what my mum did and even though we may have differing views, we have respect for one another. She is an amazing woman who has achieved so much- her career has been voluntary work, still doing Meals on Wheels, on the Australia Day council, working behind the scenes in politics, helping with the Geelong Footy Club, philanthropy beyond belief, a doting Nanny Fran to her two grandkids and a pretty cool mum.

Last night, for Immy’s birthday we went to see Circus Oz. It must be about the 5th Circus Oz performance I have seen live. My favourite part is the ‘Life is a Bikini Parade’ video which is at the top of this post. Rather fitting for Woemn’s Day don’t you think?