>Totally.
>
>And , for one, am tired of being told that women are too 
>stupid/naive/inexperienced to know/understand/mediate the risks.


I don't think women are stupid - I do think volunteers are sometimes 
inexperienced and unaware of the risks and in extreme cases, when the 
risks materialise into actual undesirable phenomena, I don't think it 
should be the individual's sole responsibility to fix things. That's 
the job of her colleagues in the organisation she is volunteering 
with.

>
>
>It's interesting, that those belating the lack of a strong 
>infra-structure and regulation to 'protect' the volunteers, are all 
>from organisations that started exactly as Eats on Feets have - 
>women just getting up and doing it!  :-)


True, sort of :) , though  I don't argue for 'regulation' especially.

There are indeed many organisations that started with women 'just 
getting up and doing it' in order to offer help and support to other 
women and to support 'self-help'   - off the top of my head, in the 
UK, I can think of the Rape Crisis centres; the various  domestic 
violence charities; the pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding 
organisations;  women and HIV;  lesbian women.

The point is that all - *all* -  the ones that have survived have 
learnt  you need something more than 'getting up and doing it'. They 
*all* learnt that volunteers (and recipients of the service) need the 
back up of an organisation who sorts things out when  Really Bad Sh*t 
happens because of other people's behaviour.... other people who 
(often) are not women, as it happens.

Of course, I 'trust women'. Of course I know 'women are strong'.

Please.

But I don't trust all women (or their partners, or the people 
pretending to be women). I don't think all women are strong, either.

Why ignore the 30-50 years of women's experience, garnered by women 
in these very organisations?

Heather Welford Neil
NCT bfc, tutor, UK


-- 
http://www.heatherwelford.co.uk

http://heatherwelford.posterous.com

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