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Today I was called an extremist when I came to the conclusion that 'half push-ups' (typically performed by girls and women) were sexist. To give you a little context, my sister is training for a musical that she will perform in at the end of this academic year and she was telling my brother and I about the routine and told us about how guys do regular push-ups and girls only do the half ones. Surprised, I asked why that was the case. My sister explained it was because regular push-ups also train the pecs and women shouldn't/don't have to train their pecs. I asked why that was the case and I couldn't get a clear answer except that pecs on girls aren't pretty and their breasts would melt down. I laughed and said well, shouldn't girls be asked what they want to do, isn't it the size of their breasts their own problem? I also said if these were the reasons, they are sexist. It is then that my siblings said I was exaggerating. I am not one that gives u...

I wrote an opinion piece for the Independent Voices , rejoice! Hurray! Dancing all around! Okay don't get your titties in a twist, it's just that I hadn't been published in so long, it feels quite nice. I just hope I get more gigs like that. If you've read my last post, which was a more personal one, you'll know I've come out as transgender to a few people and mainly myself. I've been going to the gender therapist and it's helped me a lot - but wait, what has it got to do with journalism? I'm gonna tell you, wait for it! The therapist is part of this charity Genres Pluriels  which is actively trying to get more and better rights for trans people. So Iv'e been talking to them and I really want to start a magazine for them. Fingers crossed, that would be amazing. Also I've got another project, a short documentary about an Egyptian NGO that works with orphanages to upgrade quality standards to give better chances in life to the...

The Holocaust workshop at the Manchester Jewish Museum will open on Tuesday In preparation for its new Holocaust educational workshop due to launch next Tuesday on Holocaust Remembrance Day, the Manchester Jewish Museum opened its doors this Sunday for a preview and a commemoration talk. Rose Stanyon, the learning officer and outreach manager at the Museum opened the ceremony with a definition of the Holocaust according to the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust and reminded the audience about the six millions Jews that lost their lives to the cruelty of the Nazis, as well as the disabled, homosexuals, Roma and political dissidents that were equally persecuted. The Holocaust Remembrance Day has been observed since 2001 in the UK. As set by the HMD, this year’s theme for the ceremonies was “keeping the memory alive,” and so the museum decided to share the stories of three survivors who currently live in Manchester: Haim Ferster, Helen Taichner and Peter Kurer. The worksh...

Today, like millions of people in the world, I walked to defend our democracies' values. I took the streets in Périgueux having decorated my bag with the words "Je Suis Charlie" especially for the occasion. This walk meant so many different things to me. People walked to honour the memory of the 17 victims of different terrorist attacks, to show the world they care, to defend freedom of speech, freedom of thought, freedom of cult, people stood together as one in Paris and several other cities in France and the world. Today millions of people were Charlie. As well as regular citizens, 50 country representatives joined the French president, François Hollande, in Paris to show their support to France. Among them were representatives of Greece, Israel, Algeria, Turkey, Egypt, Palestine, the Emirates, all of which walked arm in arm in the name of Freedom of speech. All day in the press I heard no mention of the 12 Palestinian journalists who died in the last 4 weeks in ...

"The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers and be capable of reading them." – Thomas Jefferson There are times when people ask me if I’m French and I reply, half-jokingly, “don’t call me French, I’m Belgian!” I take an offended tone; I don’t want to be French. But today, I am, everyone is French, I am and everyone else is Charlie. Sitting in my mum’s house in the French countryside, we’re grieving, the tears and whisky are flowing. We are scared at the idea that there are people in this world who are willing to kill because they didn’t find a joke funny. The radio is on, we’re following the development of the events, listening to the day-long homage to the...

Aaaah London, what a glamorous town London is! A town where everything’s possible, where dreams come true! Back to reality. So I went to the One World Media “kick-start your foreign correspondent career” event yesterday, and it was great. I mean it. First there was a conversation between the former director of the BBC World Service, Phil Harding, and Alex Crawford, Sky News’ special correspondent who is based in South Africa and flew overnight for the event. Alex was the first reporter to broadcast live from Tripoli’s Green Square as the rebels took over. She’s reported from all over the world, including some very dangerous war zones and has been arrested, abducted, interrogated and shot at. Explaining how one eventually gets to cover war zones Alex said “war zones are like the world cup, you don’t start playing football one day and play the world cup the next, you have to go through the second, first division, everything before you eventually get there. Being a foreign...