When WWA met Rotary

When WWA met Rotary
A few months ago I was asked to be a guest speaker at Rotary. My colleague who has quite an involvement in Rotary asked me to share what Women with Altitude is all about. It had been so forward planned that I forgot about it. A few days before when I was preparing, I thought about what I should talk about. This audience will surely not want a commercial about WWA or the Men’s Network and yet something was niggling at me. This organisation used to be exclusive for men only, women weren’t allowed. When I arrived I was welcomed by two females, members of the club who knew me from my WWA work, One lady I hadn’t seen in a long while and it was lovely to catch up. There were about fifty people in attendance, about seven of them women. I had never been to a Rotary meeting before, it was an interesting event with funny rituals for collecting funds, a singing of the national anthem and on the night I spoke it was John Lennon’s birthday, so the Liverpool Rotary club was toasted. The Rotary calendar is fuller than WWA’s and it is clear how much they do for their community.
When it came time to speak, my prepared talk sort of fell away. I shared a bit of our start and how we came to be but then I decided to address the challenges that women face. I talked about the movement toward equality and how good men who don’t behave in a derogatory manner to women, often don’t say anything either. I felt it was important to share a conversation. I was staring into a sea of silver-haired men, and I could see some gentlemen pulling faces, I knew what I was talking about was pushing buttons. I was sharing some of the experiences that so many women have experienced in male domination. Overlooked, ignored, unequal pay grades and differences in belief, risk and the differences in superannuation and the rising number of women on the poverty line later in life. I talked about that our social structures have women and men struggling with their lives and workloads. Obviously, I’m more experienced in women, and so I talked about the many women who are driving to work crying their eyes out. that once they park their cars, they compose themselves, touch up their makeup and then throw up the mask that everything is fine and get busy in their workplaces.

The Rotary Magazine which was on my table also held a fascinating story, about A lady by the name of Silvia Whitlock, a New York native and forty year member of Rotary. Silvia’s story is a great read. The local Rotary club had been black banned by Rotary Head office when she joined. To their credit, the club kept operating in rebellion and the male members backed Silvia until the Rotary overturned the rules in the 80’s largely due to this tiny Californian club.
When I had finished their president of the club who is indeed a female, asked for questions and a few beautiful men thanked me for openly discussing these issues. Another gentleman agreed with me and lamented about young women he sees in his practice as a psychologist who has no positive encouragement, support or strong female role models.
I was asked a question that referred to, how Australia wide, Rotary was struggling to find women, but the man who asked me said “We want more women in our club, but the women in the club don’t ask other women to come along” inferring that it was mostly the women’s fault.

When I sat back down a lovely woman whom I had just met that night, Thanked me for raising such important issues, and then she shared with me, that most of the office bearing positions in the club are now held by women. At that point, she said something I thought was so interesting. she said, “But Instead of the older experience male members of the club showing the newer recruits how things are done or have been done within the once male-dominated club, they criticise what we do.” I was saddened but not surprised. We have a long way to go in breaking old stereotypes and unconscious bias, and I felt glad that I had trusted my instincts and use my twenty-minute platform to talk about things that are uncomfortable but must be addressed, even if I was scared witless.

Until next week,
Love and hugs to all
Andy xx