Suffrage 125: Q & A with Lizzie Marvelly

New Zealand celebrates first! 19 September 2018 marked 125 years since the passing of the Electoral Act 1893, which enabled women to vote in Parliamentary elections for the first time. To celebrate that victory, and New Zealand’s pioneering role in women’s suffrage, Governor-General Dame Patricia Lee Reddy made a poignant speech at Government House Wellington on the day:

This anniversary gives us the opportunity to look back on 125 years of achievement for women. New Zealand has become one of the most gender-equal countries in the world and women undertake an incredible diversity of roles in our society. Women are successful business people, leaders in education and public service, they also serve as police officers, firefighters and in our defence forces. Today we have a woman Governor-General, Prime Minister and Chief Justice – and not for the first time.

As much as there is plenty to celebrate there is also plenty remaining to be done. In the last year, we have heard women’s voices raised in a way we haven’t heard for a long time and their anger is palpable. The women who have chosen to talk publicly about their experiences of sexual harassment under the #MeToo banner cannot be ignored. However, this is not just about the high-profile cases that have made it into the media.

There are still real problems in common workplaces and in the way power is exploited by those in positions of responsibility. For the benefit of everyone our cultures need to change. Together we need to raise our voices to challenge entitlement, abuse of power, bullying and harassment, and demand that respect be shown to everyone.

To mark this sweet SWEET historic milestone that is Suffrage 125 I asked Lizzie Marvelly if I could do a Q & A with her. Lizzie has recently authored a book and to rave reviews. She writes a weekly column for the New Zealand Herald and is a political commentator who often gets asked to head events. On her website villainesse.com she has many ongoing projects and contributing writers on various subjects. She’s also an award-winning singer and songwriter, who by the way, sings the national anthem beautifully. If you’re a rugby fan you would’ve spotted her at Eden Park in the last couple of years. It goes without saying that in my opinion, Lizzie is up there with the political influencers and is a global leader for young people.

I had a set of questions for Lizzie but found myself wanting to answer one.

What are the biggest challenges facing women in your industry the institution/ or establishment?

Warning: Rant below

The Wikipedia definition explains that, “Institutions’ mediate the rules that govern living human behaviour.” Said behaviour is “stable, valued, and recurring’; Institutions are permanent, which means that they do not end when one person is gone.” And, on the list of examples of ‘institution’ are “Government, education and marriage”. Anyone else feel pretty small and a little nauseous right now?! My god, are there assumptions about what is expected from men and women in the office, alright. Apart from having to pick up the slack for male colleagues who deem themselves too important to do certain jobs. It is that once I hit the great 30s, I was primarily asked if I have children, and when my answer was no, when was I planning to settle down and start a family. Oh yes, sexism is alive and well in the workplace. The assumption that as a woman I don’t have the choice not to have a child, and if I would dare to say otherwise, makes me wrong. My answer, I want to have both, a career and a family. I feel extremely privileged and thankful that I was able to study at University and that today I get to be part of the collective of women who make a difference through the work that they do.

Lizzie, New Zealand’s national treasure you are! I read your work and follow you on social media. You are well-accomplished, straight to the point, clever and BRAVE. It’s refreshing and admirable to say the least, and it’s cool, you have a huge following and I think you’re a great role model and leader for young women.

Congratulations on your first book That F Word, why did you write a book about feminism?

I was approached by HarperCollins to write a book about feminism in late 2016. From the outset, I felt that it was important to really throw myself at this project, because there haven’t been many books written recently about feminism in New Zealand. I wrote the book because I wanted to contribute to the conversation around women’s rights in New Zealand, and I hoped that maybe it might help a few young women to speak up and be heard.

We are beginning to see how big a role social media plays in connecting people around the world and very quickly. On The Villainesse the first project you launched was a global campaign #MyBodyMyTerms (2015) that sparked conversation about sexual violence, victim-blaming, revenge porn and consent. More than 500,000 people engaged in it around the world – what was your response to the success of it?

I was stunned. It pre-dates the #MeToo campaign, but I think that the success of #MyBodyMyTerms was a clear indicator that times were changing and women particularly were utterly sick of enduring abuse and harassment.

You write about issues concerning gender, race, class and LGBTQ. How important is ‘culture’ by way of conditioning and perpetuating stereotypes? The Russell McVeagh/ law industry scandal earlier this year, saw many feminists call out an ‘old boys club’ culture in the workplace… do you agree that one exists?

A society’s culture has an impact on pretty much every facet of human experience. A big part of making progress, in my opinion, is a community examining its culture and deciding to make changes. I think that a ‘boys will be boys’ culture still exists in many contexts, and many workplaces are still male-dominated. We’ve come a long way, but we’ve still got a long way to go.