United Women's Convention

Press, 13 June 1977, Page 16

United Women's Convention

Sir, —The Women’s Convention left me feeling happy, sad and angry’. I think such conventions are essenti 1 and good. Many women learn techniques for strengthening their positions at home and in society and for gaining confidence vis-a-vis men. Perhaps in a few years we can have a series of man/woman conventions where we can learn from one another. But women will have to gain further confidence before that occurs. Sadness resulted from many demonstrations of poor administration and murkiness in presenting issues to be voted on. This may derive from women’s conditioned timidity and the denial of administrative jobs to them. Anger was caused by’ the well-organised group of lesbians who used high-pressure tactics to force voting conclusions. They rammed anti - motherhood and anti -marriage, words down our throats. In the future, the majority must prepare in advance.—Yours, S. WESTERMANN. June 8, 1977. Sir, — I fail to see why the media should have made such a fuss about the justifiable exclusion of a male reporter from the recent convention. On a recent All Black tour of South Africa, the team decided to exclude all female reporters after a team member made comments about his sexual prowess off the field. The

media made no fuss then; but, of course, it was only a woman reporter who was excluded. It would have been more to the credit of “The Press” if, instead of indulging in sensationalism, it had produced a balanced report of the convention, such as the report broadcast on the National Radio Programme “Viewpoint” of June 9. That report at least set out to report on what happened, not indulge in minor asides. It succeeded very well. You did not. — Yours, etc., ANTHONY P. F. de JOUX. June 10, 1977. [We do not doubt the satisfaction to be had from the “Viewpoint” programme, but we suspect that our correspondent has not read our extensive reports of the convention’s business.—Editor]