No I don't think young women who are victims of sexual violence should be removed from there community, I think it is the perpetrators who sexually abuse women and girls who should be removed and incarcerated until they choose to change there harmful behavior. That goes for abusive men in all communities. I also think we need to stop perpetuating the culture which breeds rape and sexual violence against women i.e. the sexualisation and trade of the bodies of women and girls.

Wow, TurnRightThenLeft that was a long bow to draw.

Melinda has done so much work and research with women, and written extensively on all sorts of issues to do with women and their protection. It's a bit rough to suggest that she is obsessed with anti-contraceptive sentiment, furthering her political agenda and that her pro life views are necessarily Catholic. What's political about what she wrote? It's a shame that intellectual debate can't occur without people judging someone's noble intentions.

Among other topics, Melinda's work includes women suffering from post-abortion trauma, women protecting their children from a eugenic culture and the issue of pornogrpahy in indigenous communities. Articles or book reports on these topics are linked below for your information. None seem to be about contraception and political agenda.

http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=6114

http://www.capersbookstore.com.au/scripts/shop_item.asp?by=cat&item=2164

http://www.duffyandsnellgrove.com.au/titles/giving_sorrow.htm

Thanks Melinda for your article and the enlightening points you made.

Reist,

you're world really is a very negative and despondent one, when it comes to your projected (gender based) self identitiy.

Do you have any positive, empowering or hopeful things to say about the female gender experience and by inference, anything remotely positive or supportive to intimate about the male gender experience?

Your 'woe is me by association' platitudes are a very effective way for the powers that be to sit back whilst you keep you and your ilk firmly down.

Typically emotive and dissapointing offering melinda.

Stop&Think, and Jane -

No, it's not just the other articles she has written. In this piece, she makes no concession to the fact that at times the implanon treatment may, sad as it is, be the lesser of two evils.

Aside from the throwaway comment that pregnancies may be regrettable, the piece is just one large emotive tirade against the practice, because she claims it brands girls for sex.

As I see it, these girls are clearly being abused, and yes, they should be removed. But in lieu of that happening, the implanon implant is better than them getting pregnant unwillingly.

I don't believe Reist accepts that at all. She doesn't discuss alternatives. The entire piece is designed to make people want to halt the idea of the implants altogether.

It's a sad situation, but I don't believe just yanking the implanon implants would improve things. I sincerely doubt they would be used in anything but the most obscure instances.

So no, it's not a long bow at all.

And stop and think... uh, yes, those articles you linked to are most definitely to do with issues of contraception. Hell, the third one is tales of grief associated with abortion.
If you're trying to show a case otherwise, no offence, but you're doing a poor job.

I don't doubt that unfortunate stories with abortion do occur, but again - she's doing her damnedest to bring the one negative side of the story to the fore, without acknowledging that unfortunately it may be necessary. It's most definitely one with a political agenda.

She may argue for women - on her terms. Same with her pieces against pornography.

This piece isn't balanced.

Where's the honest analysis of the situation, or suggestions? Where's the discussion of the situations that DO warrant an implanon implant? Why hasn't she discussed those too? Is she seriously trying to tell us there's NO situation's where it's warranted? If so, does that sound more like concern for the victims, or an agenda?

TurnRightThenLeft, very well summed up in both posts.

I agree with the first part of Annette's post in that ideally it's the abusers who should be removed. I doubt that's going to happen at an effective scale anytime soon (for a variety of reasons) nor do I think we are ready to handle the flow on effects of doing so.

Dealing with the problems in some of the remote indiginous communities is something we struggle with. Few want a repeat of the stolen generation nor do we want even greater numbers of indiginous adults locked up. Various governments have run large number of inquiries and produced large number of reports to mixed reactions.

I struggle as an outsider trying to work out which indiginous leaders are really trying to help and which are so tied up in milking white guilt that they undermine anything which looks like it might help.

If I had a daughter who was engaged in sexual activity that for whatever reason I was unable to prevent then I'd want to minimise whatever harm I could.

As a middle class suburban parent there are a number of strategies I could consider to protect my child, having the offenders dealt with, professional help for my child, relocation if other strategies did not work. Things don't seem to work that way for many of the families in the remote communities.

R0bert

History repeating itself Melinda,

State medical services engaged in unilateral temporary
or permanent sterilisation of Aboriginal women in the 1970's on Palm Island and in Western Australia. They used Depo-Provera, producing
three-to-six month infertility, and more alarmingly in Queensland, the "non-explained" tubal ligations.

See Roger Moody, ed. The Indigenous Voice, Visions and Realities, vol. 1, Zed Books, London, 1988, at pp.324-6.