Sarah Hanson-Young

I read about Sarah Hanson-Young when I was researching Bob Brown. She was one of his MySpace friends. I had a quick glance at her MySpace as well. It's very....Well, it looks like a typical MySpace page of a young adult, not one of a politician.    I'm fine with that.

Hanson-Young was born December 23 1981. What is the deal with the December birthdays? Really! What is it? November Australians blog and December Australians go into politics?

Hanson-Young is a Capricorn and her numerology number is 9. 9 is the humanitarian. Janette Howard (John Howard's wife) is a 9 and didn't seem like much of a humanitarian. Will Sarah Hanson-Young be any different?

Lord Wiki says she is South Australia's first Green Senator. He also says she is the youngest woman to be elected into the senate and parliament. But I think Despoja was the same age. I think Lord Wiki is a bit confused.

She was born in Melbourne--in a place called East Gippsland. I don't know what that is, but it's near Orbost.

Well, I got that wrong. She was born in Melbourne, but I guess then she moved to East Gippsland which is NOT in Melbourne. It's a 5 hour drive away.

What would our world be like if we

knew for sure there 

was life after death, and 

we could easily talk to our 

dearly-departed on the Internet?

The Dead are Online a novel by Dina Roberts 

She was president of the student association at the University of Adelaide. This is exactly what Despoja did.

It seems that Hanson-Young HAS done some humanitarian work. She has been involved with Amnesty International. She was a board member of an organization called Unibooks. This group sells text books and professional books, but they're a nonprofit organization. Interesting. They say they have the best discounts for textbooks.

She has been a mentor in a program called The Smith Family. The mentoring program sounds a bit like the  Big Brother/Big Sister program we have in America. I guess you guys have it too.

Lord Wiki doesn't have much about Hanson-Young, so that's already over and done with.

Now I'm going to get a better look at her MySpace page. She has music on her page. Right now it's playing Hilltop Hoods. Aussie hip hop.

It says she last logged in 12/11/08. Is that November 12 or December 11? I have no idea. Whether it was November or December, when she logged in her mood was happy; She looks happy in her picture. Happy and mysterious. She looks like she could be Wiccan. I'm going on looks alone here. Although if a Wiccan was going to be a politician, I think she or he would be part of the Green party.

She has a pretty detailed list of her interests. She likes house, blues and roots, and hip hop. I never heard of house. What is that? I'm very ignorant when it comes to music.

Lord Wiki says it's electronic dance type music.

I'm also not sure about Blues and Roots. I googled it and got stuff about an Australian music festival. So, maybe it's an Australian thing?

As for movies.....Her most recent favorite is Juno. I've seen parts of that movie and totally love it. She seems to like progressive political stuff: Thanks for Smoking, An Inconvenient Truth, and The Yes Men. I've heard of all those movies except the latter. I shall look it up.

It's an anti-corporate movie and Michael Moore is in it.

I'm not a huge fan of Michael Moore, but I think it's awesome that a politician would like an anti-corporate movie.

Her TV show list seems to be a mixture of American and Australian television. Maybe mostly Australian. Lateline. That's Australian, right? Summer Heights High. I'm guessing that's Australian too. American shows: The Daily Show, West Wing, and Brothers and Sisters. Why the hell doesn't she watch The Stephen Colbert show?

 The Daily Show is okay, but I like Colbert much more.

I was curious about Summer Heights High, so I found a trailer for it on YouTube. It looks fun. Do any of you watch it?

Oh! It is (or will be) available in my little country! Thanks, HBO.

Her list of favorite books includes some classics: To Kill a Mockingbird, Eighty-Four, and The Lion, Witch, and the Wardrobe. She likes John Marsden's famous When the War Began. Two books, she lists, that I haven't heard of are The Magic Faraway Tree by Enid Blyton and No Logo by Naomi Klein.

The Magic Faraway Tree is children's fantasy. It's interesting that she likes children's fantasy books, but she didn't list Harry Potter as a favorite. I'm a bit disappointed in her!

No Logo is anti-corporate. It looks like a pretty good book!

Hanson-Young is married, and it seems she has a child. Well, she say she's a mum. I guess she might have a cat. Once my mom and I were talking about how motherhood is hard. My younger sister piped in and said something like. I know. I know. I understand how hard it is. I have a cat!

Yes, we laughed at her. The best thing is she's pregnant now! She did later get a dog though and I think that's slightly closer to taking care of an infant.

Maybe there's more people who believe taking care of a child is as easy as taking care of a cat. Maybe THAT'S why so many people think we don't need paid maternity leave. You certainly don't need to take time off of work to take care of your cat.

All right. She has a paragraph about herself--a little bio thing and it is not a cat that she's a mother of. She actually has a human toddler.

It seems her favorite place to eat is Big Table at the Central Market in Adelaide. It looks yummy, although I'm a little disappointed that a Green politician wouldn't go for something a little more vegetarian. I mean it doesn't have to be full on vegetarian, but maybe a place that serves cage-free eggs. Maybe they do and they just don't advertise it. Maybe cage-free eggs are commonplace and expected in Adelaide.

The people she wants to meet are Nelson Mandela, Angelina Jolie, Martin Luther King, and Audry Hepburn.

She has 608 friends including Sarah Blasko and The Audrey's.

She supports gay marriage and is disappointed with Rudd for being against it.

I like this woman.

This Green website has her first speech, not the transcript but the actual audio. She has a beautiful voice. She sounds a bit nervous, but I would be too! She's doing much better than I'd do.

I don't want to listen to the whole speech though. I'm not good at listening. Hopefully, I'll be able to find a transcript later; maybe on the Parliament website.

The Green website has some bio info on her. They're like Lord Wiki in that they say she's the youngest in the Senate and Parliament. I guess she beats Despoja by a few months. Maybe Despoja was twenty-six and not twenty-five?

She writes for a woman's health magazine. I'll have to check that out later.

Her page has information the Green's beliefs about women. They're all fairly typical and expected...such as right to freedom from violence. My favorite is: Women have the right to equal pay for work of equal value, and to have their unpaid caring responsibilities acknowledged and properly valued throughout their lifetime.

In America, the main goal, in terms of families in poverty, is to find jobs for woman. Get them on their feet. So, they get a job and then struggle with the daycare issue. I think it would be so much better if there was a way to pay these women to stay home and take care of their own babies. I know not every woman wants to stay home and make motherhood her main job.  But if she wants to, I think the government should help make that possible.

Hanson-Young and the other Greens are pushing for 26 weeks of paid maternity leave. That would be GREAT; although I think 18 weeks is good too. 26 weeks would be over six months. Babies are supposed to be exclusively breastfed for at least six months.  Having 26 weeks at home would make it easier for moms to breastfeed at least that long.  

Hanson-Young doesn't concentrate only on mothers staying home. She also deals with daycare issues. She wants to reduce the childcare ratio to 1:3 for babies. Right now in Australia, it's 1:5 for babies. That is NOT good. I can't imagine how that would work well for the babies or the daycare worker. The United States isn't really better. Although I think it varies from state to state.

Hanson-Young does speak out against Mem Fox's statement--the one where she said putting children in childcare is child abuse. I despise how people throw around that word. Locking your child in a closet and not feeding them is child abuse. Beating your child and breaking their bones is child abuse. Constantly yelling at your child and calling them worthless is child abuse. Molesting your child is child abuse. Sending them to daycare is NOT child abuse and neither is homeschooling, circumcising, raising them vegan, spanking once in awhile, or letting them eat donuts for breakfast. We might not agree with other people's parenting choices, but it doesn't mean we need to call it abusive.

We DO need to fix childcare though. Due to poorly paid and poorly trained childcare workers, CERTAIN childcare situations MIGHT be abusive. But that doesn't mean all situations are bad. If a mother chose to stay home and she abused her infant, would that mean all children who stay home with their mothers are abused?

I am now following Sarah Hanson-Young on Twitter. I need to remember to do the whole Twitter thing. I keep forgetting.

Here's the parliament website. Now I can READ her speech. It was done on September 1, 2008. This was the same day I wrote my post about forgiveness.

She mentions that it's the first day of Spring. I actually remember that day because people wrote about Spring in their blog and I was surprised because here we start our new seasons in the middle of the month.

Her language is very flowery. Is that the right term? Here she says: May this, the first day of spring, mark the time when we as Australians shake off those cobwebs of cynicism and distrust. It is a time to bring out the broom and sweep up the mess left after years of inaction, mindless consumerism and self-perpetuating fear.

We need to shake off those cobwebs and sing Tomorrow. Tomorrow! I Love Ya! Tomorrow. You're only a day away!

I do like the terms mindless consumerism and self-perpetuating fear. I think in some ways they go hand in hand. Retailers thrive on our paranoia and fear....so do Republicans.

I like what she says here.

Despite always being an active member of my school and my town, I never thought that one day I would be standing in this chamber giving my first speech. As a kid there seemed very little to believe in when it came to politicians and their parties. Most of it seemed much like what I witnessed in the schoolyard—games and tricks played among those who sought power and privilege. So even though aspects of representing my community appealed to me I never wanted to become what I saw as a stereotypical politician.

That actually brought a few tears to my eyes. I think most of us can relate to what she says. We want to believe. We want to have faith. We want to have hope. But it's so....HARD.

Oh! Wow. She speaks VERY strongly against the treatment of asylum seeker: I was appalled that here in the land of a fair go we punished and violated those people who needed our protection and safety. I still shiver when I remember the images of children with their lips sewn together, who, in desperation for understanding and help, had no other means of communication but the mutilation of their own bodies. I was disgusted that our government was perpetrating the fear of innocent children in the display of political might. A strong sense of rage fueled me to take action and I felt compelled to join the Australian Greens, who had stood strongly against the disgrace that was the Tampa.

That's very powerful writing there. It makes up for the cobweb stuff.

She's passionate about the Murray River issues and uses the book Storm Boy in her pleas. That book was one of my birthday presents. I haven't read it yet. I'm guessing it might have something to do with the Murray River.

Hanson-Young worked at the Human Rights Arts and Film Festival. It seems the festival happens in November and December in various places around Australia. Hanson-Young participated in Melbourne on a discussion about a film regarding the Dalai Lama.

This blog talks about how Hanson-Young supports fair trade chocolate. She wants to help stop exploiting and child slavery. One way she she said she'll do this is by seeing if it's possible for fair trade chocolate to be available in Parliament House. Cool!

I found her woman's magazine writing. It looks like she does a Q&A column for Woman's Day. They don't show much, just a question about biodegradable diapers. I didn't realize there are biodegradable diapers. That is so cool. I found this Australian company, but they sell in the US too. It really sounds like a great alternative. Plastic disposables are evil in many ways. I'm ashamed we used them. But cloth doesn't make me feel all that better. All that washing and use of water. I wonder what's better for the environment...biodegradable or cloth?

I'm very impressed with Sarah Hanson-Young and I'm very impressed with Australia for having her in their government. Really. I thought Obama was cool. Sarah is even better. Well, at least I think so.