Ducks on the Pond
A podcast for rural women... by rural women. Hosted by Kirsten Diprose and Jackie Elliott, they seek expert advice and the stories of other rural women on issues such as succession planning, motherhood, starting a business...running for politics and much more!
Ducks on the Pond
Getting the Issues that Matter to Us on the Political Agenda
We’re in the middle of a Federal election campaign…and you can already see that issues such as the cost of living, housing, health and crime are going to be crucial areas of focus for pretty much any candidate hoping to get elected.
But what if the issue that matters most to you, or to your family or your community… is NOT one of those hot button topics?
And while we are seeing progress being made in terms of the representation of women in politics, there's still a long way to go before we have true parity on issues that affect women's health, safety, and general wellbeing.
So how can rural women make sure they're heard when it comes to raising important issues in the lead up to the election? And how do you have productive and meaningful conversations with people who are on the completely opposite side of the political spectrum? That's what we are talking about in this episode, with our guests:
* Cynthia Mahoney - Facilitator, Mentor and Author of “Cultivate: How Neuroscience and Wellbeing Supports Rural Leaders to Thrive”
* Gillian Fenell - Farmer at Lambina Station, SA and ‘Agvocate’
This episode is sponsored by ByCC Fine Jewellery. Australian made, ethically sourced, keepsake pieces. Check out the ‘Beyond the Pond’ drop made for Ducks on the Pond!
This podcast is produced by the Rural Podcasting Co. Love this podcast? You might also like, Two Smart Blondes.
It so frustrates me, Kirsten, that people still refer to all of the human skills that it takes to manage staff, manage yourself, manage a business, as the soft skills.
Gillian Fenell:Talk about what you want and the change you want to see and acknowledge when people that you may not traditionally align with are doing a good thing, and I think that's probably going to start a bigger, better conversation.
Kirsten Diprose:Welcome to Ducks on the Pond, brought to you by the Rural Podcasting Co. I'm Kirsten Diprose and we're back for season seven. It's so wonderful to be here. I know it hasn't been long between chats, which is great, and I just wanted to start off with our big announcement. If you hadn't caught our trailer or our socials, I wanted to let you know that Buy CC Fine Jewellery is our sponsor, which is awesome. They create amazing jewellery, and when I say they, it's really just Ashley Malloy, who is an entrepreneur. She started designing jewellery. She lives in New South Wales, in the Warrumbungle, and the jewellery is really simple, elegant, all gold from Australia, ethically sourced, and we'll be doing a giveaway later on in the season, so that's pretty exciting.
Kirsten Diprose:Now, before I get into this episode, I wanted to also mention that it'll be me in just this episode and we will hear from Jen Jen McCutcheon, that is, who is still a co-host. We will hear her on some of the recordings but unfortunately she won't be with us as a co-host. Very sadly, there's been a personal tragedy affecting her family. So, sending a lot of love and support to Jen and we're thinking of you. Jen did record some interviews for this podcast earlier, before this happened. So, as I said, you will hear her lovely voice occasionally, but not as a co-host. It's just me for this episode, and this one I have purposely kicked off with because right now it's essentially election time.
Kirsten Diprose:We know that the campaign trail seems like it began ages ago, but it is election time and you can already see that issues like the cost of living, housing, health and crime are going to be crucial areas of focus for pretty much any candidate hoping to get elected. Also, at election time, we know that some people can feel quite left behind, particularly if your issue is not one of those hot button issues. And if you're in a rural area, it can be even harder to get noticed. There just aren't as many of us, and while we are seeing progress being made in terms of the representation of women in politics, there's still a long way to go before we have true parity on issues that affect women's health, safety and general wellbeing. So how can rural women make sure they're heard when it comes to raising important issues in the lead up to the election? That's what we're talking about In this episode.
Kirsten Diprose:You'll hear from two women who have been able to stay true to their rural roots while lifting up other people in the country as well and, yes, engaging in a bit of good old fashioned politics. You'll meet Cynthia Mahoney, who's combined her skills in science and her passion for mentoring to build her own business that aims to help teams of all kinds. So her first book is called Cultivate how Neuroscience and Wellbeing Supports Rural Leaders to Thrive, and it really sums up her entire ethos around the work she does and with her we really talk about having those conversations that go deeper, particularly when you're having a conversation with someone who comes from a really different political set of ideals to you. And you'll also hear from Gillian Fennell. You'll probably be familiar with Gillian. She's in a previous episode called being Outspoken in Ag, but just to remind you, she is in South Australia where she runs a giant cattle operation called Lambina Station and she's gathered decades of farming experience.
Kirsten Diprose:I'm going to kick things off with my chat with Cynthia. In this conversation she talks about her admiration for the work of American author and academic Judith Glasser, and if you want to check it out, her book is called Conversational Intelligence. For now let's hear from Cynthia on how she forged her own path to becoming a mentor.
Cynthia Mahoney:So I'm an agricultural scientist by training many moons ago. However, I've never really been a technical like in terms of agronomy or nutrition or anything like that. That's never been my bag. My bag started out as being an economist with the Department of Agriculture in Victoria, but my master's thesis, which I did when I was working with the department, was actually on rural adjustment, and so it was more a socioeconomic project and it was looking at how farmers who were successful had made change in their businesses. And so back in the 1990s it was all about economic rationalism. So it was the thinking was we'll pull some economic levers and people will make decisions based on economics.
Cynthia Mahoney:But my research found that people make decisions not on economics surprise but on a lot of things around what was happening in their actual personal lives, so what was going on in their families, what was going on in their stage of life as well. So people had different goals when they were young compared to when they had a family, and that got me really interested in how people change and how people have conversations about change, and that got me interested in facilitation and people. And so now it was only a bolt out of the blue. Last year I realised, oh, actually I'm like a people agronomist my technical specialty because I felt like a bit of a blue. Last year I realised, oh, actually I'm like a people agronomist my technical specialty because I felt like a bit of a shit ag scientist.
Cynthia Mahoney:But I realised my technical specialty is actually all the people stuff and the great thing about the neuroscience because I'm a scientist is that it gives all the cred to the people stuff. Because often it so frustrates me, kirsten, that people still refer to all of the human skills that it takes to manage staff, manage yourself, manage a business, as the soft skills and they get shunted to the side and it's like an afterthought or they're fluffy. They're not as important or as hardcore as the technical agronomy or nutrition or soils or whatever genetics. But the neuroscience actually gives those people like me the tools to be able to say actually the brain science, it's really technical. It's really important that people who want to get the best out of themselves and their staff and their people actually understand the science behind people management. So that's why I'm really obsessed with it and in ag I guess I'm trying to get that message across that it is not fluff, it is not an afterthought, it is just as important as all the other technical skills that people pride themselves that they have expertise in.
Kirsten Diprose:It's election time and that can be a really difficult time sometimes because people are vying for attention. There are so many issues that need to be addressed. There are so many issues that need to be addressed. How do you, if you've got an issue that you really want to be addressed by someone at this federal election, how do you go about forming a campaign and getting your voice heard, knowing that you might not be able to affect who the prime minister is? You've got your vote, but how can you affect change in a meaningful way as the person that you are?
Cynthia Mahoney:For people that do want to try and make a difference. I think the first thing is to get really clear. So clarity clarity is really important. What is it that you actually want to focus on? Because there can be 20 million things and you're not going to be able to do all of them. So I think, prioritizing and looking around at perhaps either there's a gap with the issue that you want to focus on or there might already be other people who are interested in that area as well. So I think, if there are other people that are interested in the area that you're interested in, it's really good to have conversations with those people, to ask them how you can help to make those alliances and to contribute to something that's already going on, to get the biggest bang for buck in this attention economy, because that's what it is right.
Cynthia Mahoney:The economy and that's what has been so interesting about watching politics in America is that Elon Musk and Donald Trump have actually realised that the biggest commodity in their election was attention and being able to so. Having Elon with Twitter I can't call it ex-Twitter that alliance was amazing, because that was a way of being able to grab people's attention and get eyes on content. So I think it's really important to think about that. If it's something that you, it's an issue that you can't see that anyone's addressing, then I would really be thinking again about your network and who is in your network and who is not in your network, and in a lot of the work that I do with leaders and teams, I often talk about what is your network, infrastructure, what does it look like? And thinking about it like drawing a map, and so you can think about who's in your network and who's not in your network and who is it that might be missing if you want to get your issue across.
Cynthia Mahoney:And so, in terms of if there are people missing and you don't have those connections, mentors can be really important, teaming up with people that are politically savvy and that do know how to navigate political environments. You shouldn't have to do it on your own and you shouldn't just have to discover it and be alone in this. There are plenty of people out there who have traveled this road before, and so in local communities, we have the community independence movement, which I know many listeners will be familiar with, and that is a whole network of people who are really interested in learning how to have a voice within their local community, and so that community independence movement. There's a website. There's lots of really good resources there that people can tap into for help on how to have influence during a political campaign.
Kirsten Diprose:Yeah, and there's alliances of councils in different regions that can really amplify a local issue. So one of the big issues where I live in the southwest of Victoria is childcare. It's an issue for many, but it's really difficult where we are. People are waiting three years, four years their kids start school before they even get a place. It's ridiculous. So there are all these sort of alliances forming now, people who have perhaps never even worked together, which is amazing to see. So I wanted to ask about how do you have those conversations? So some practical advice perhaps on when you are going. Okay, this issue let's just say it's childcare is really important to me and I want to improve it. You found those people that also feel like the way you do, but perhaps you've got very different views on other things in the world. How do you have conversations to find that common ground? How do you have conversations to find that common ground?
Cynthia Mahoney:I've spoken with you before, kirsten, about one of my favourite books ever, which is called Conversational Intelligence by a neuroscientist called Judith Glasser, and Judith's got a really great way of thinking about conversations, because she says that when we're having conversations with people, we can either influence their brains to feel distrust and feel fear, or we can influence their brains to experience trust and therefore be able to have really great conversations. Now she talks about there are three levels of conversations, and when we're really passionate about something, it's easy to forget that we actually have two ears and one mouth. Often it's like we have no ears and we just have a megaphone right and you can get so caught up in your own issue that you just want to tell people tell. The thing is that when you tell people if they've got maybe they're not quite on the same page as you. What that does is that sets up a reaction in the brain that closes us down. It shuts us down. We feel under threat and often too, when we're passionate like I think I'm a very passionate person and I know that in the past when I get on my soapbox about something and start you know, I do start pointing the finger and use the hands and all of that kind of stuff. That passion can actually be experienced by someone else as aggression. So often it's really good to think we've got strengths and our strengths can also be our kryptonite if we overdo them. So my passion at times I'm not intending it, but it can be experienced by someone else as aggression. So I have to really think clearly about when I'm having conversations, setting myself up to have a conversation where it's calm, where I'm not ranting and telling. So the thing is, when you tell people it's very much. I don't even want to hear what you've got to say, I'm just going to tell you.
Cynthia Mahoney:And Judah calls that level one conversations, level two conversations. She says that's where we ask questions of other people, which is good, but actually we're not that interested in their answer and we're really just asking them a question so we can tell them what we think. And that has a similar effect on our brain. We go into that amygdala, we go into that reptile part of the brain when we're just thinking about how do I survive this conversation? As the receiver, gina, says that if we're to have really great conversations we need to adopt a level three conversation. And that's where we're saying there's this issue right, and I actually don't have all the answers. I don't know, and so what I'd really love to have a conversation about is how can we work this out together? What are your ideas? How could we pursue this issue in a way that works for both of us?
Cynthia Mahoney:And the thing is, with curiosity that skill of curiosity and being able to ask questions without needing to be right or needing to know the answer what we're doing is we're actually affecting the other person by enabling them to get into their prefrontal cortex, which is the higher thinking part of the brain. When we're in the higher thinking part of the brain, that's when we can actually think really strategically, we connect with other people, we're able to think at our best, we're able to innovate, we're able to collaborate, and that's what we want when we're trying to find solutions about things that we're really passionate about. But if we've come in and we've got a position and we're just like pointing and ranting at someone, that shuts their brain down into the amygdala and that's where they can't think creatively, or even they can't even hear what we're saying, because they just want to either fight, they want to run away, or they just want to. They're the deer in the headlights.
Kirsten Diprose:Is it also okay to just realise that you might be wasting your time with someone? So I think it's worth having that openness to you. When you start a conversation but you can't control the other person, you can hope that they come along with you in your approach, but if they're not, what do you do? Is it best to just shut it down?
Cynthia Mahoney:Yeah, there's another really great tool. I love a little tool in my work. There's another it's a terrific tool about conflict and it asks us to think about how important is the relationship versus how important is my goal, and so I think that's a really a really helpful thing to think about. So, if the relationship with that other person actually doesn't matter, you can afford and this tool calls it to be a shark and it's it's my way or the highway. My opinion matters and I need to advocate and push for my opinion. I think there can be assertive sharks, which that's what you would prefer to be, versus aggressive sharks. Aggressive sharks are probably not that helpful, but the shark is all about. I actually do need to stand up for my goal and the relationship actually my goal is more important. On the other hand, if you need to still maintain relationships with people, then you can't afford to just be my way or the highway all the time, and often people. If it is more important, the relationship is the most important thing then the conflict style that you will adopt is it's called a teddy bear and that is actually you know what. This doesn't matter to me, it is a bit irrelevant, and that is actually you know what. This doesn't matter to me, it is a bit irrelevant. I'm just going to let it go and, yep, you just do what you want, because it's not worth it. It's actually not worth it. There's also the turtle, and the turtle is actually I just want. I don't think this is a great time to have this conversation. I'm not interested and I just want to go away. So I just want to remove myself from the conversation. So again, you might start having a conversation with someone and it gets very passionate and the other person starts or ranting at you, and so it might just be really sensible to go. You know what we don't need to. Let's just agree to disagree and I'm going to go away and leave it.
Cynthia Mahoney:When the relationship's really important and the goal's really important this model talks about, can you use either a compromise, which is I'll give a little bit, you give a little bit, let's meet in the middle, or the other way is to be what they call an owl, and that is like, actually this goal is really important to you and me and the relationship is. So, rather than either, or can we think of an and Can we think of a totally new way of, and that's that, judith Glasser, level three conversation of. We don't know the answers here. What can we come up with together and create together? But I think all of that means that the other person has got the same motivations as you, which means they actually want a really good outcome. There are people they don't want a good outcome. They just want to score points, they just want to shame, they just want to. They're actually, they don't have integrity and so I think you need to walk away that was such great advice.
Kirsten Diprose:So we've got the shark, the teddy bear and the turtle. I can remember that that's really good. And it's so important to have this conversation because I think many of us as women, we find it hard to be in some of those political situations. If someone is trying to score points, it can be nasty, or there's this idea that it's nasty and my initial inclination is to be. I don't want to be part of that, but there are issues that I care about, but I just don't want to ever be part of the yuckiness of politics and where it can be personal and all of those things, but then if you don't step into it, you can't change it.
Cynthia Mahoney:Oh look, it's such a great point, kirsten. It's like a sea of toxicity, right, it's a sea of toxicity. And again it feels really disempowering in a sea of toxicity to be this little individual trying to change it on your own. And so there's a little concept called the island of sanity. So, in a sea of toxicity, what can? And again this comes down to your original point of what can you control? You can control yourself, but you can also who else can you get around you who have similar values, and create your own little island of sanity where you've got behaviours, values that you all agree with.
Cynthia Mahoney:And I think and I'm not, I don't want to get political here, but I in all honesty, I have been involved in that community independence. I helped organise a couple of the forums for that and facilitate some of those conversations, and I feel like that's what those community independents have tried to do. They have tried to say and I know there are people out there who don't believe this and who think that they are a party and it's not for real and whatever so if that's, you just block your ears for a couple of minutes and agree to disagree with me. But I think the premise of that has been around in our community. We've got people who have the same values and we want to have a community approach to having conversations in our communities about what the important issues are and trying to find new ways of doing politics differently. And so I reckon, in a way, that's what those community independents have tried to do in Parliament.
Cynthia Mahoney:They do align with each other, but it is more on a, I think, on that values thing of almost trying to create this island of sanity in a sea of toxicity, because a lot of them don't want to play that same game. And it is interesting that a lot of them are women, that they don't want to play that game of power over, and I think that a lot of that it's 1990s power over domination I'm right alpha male leadership, whereas I think our communities are crying out for power with how can we do this together? And I reckon a lot of women and men, but particularly women, they just don't like the whole way of that. We need to dominate, we need to shame, we need to point score. They actually just want to see how do we come up with the best solutions, because we've got really complex problems that we're facing and they require voices from everywhere coming together to be able to have conversations, to find new ways of doing things.
Kirsten Diprose:Writing a letter to your MP is just never going to cut it. Yes, how do you build anything, make connections, understand each other? If you're just writing a letter to an MP, what are they doing? Filing it away, and when you get to a certain number, then it's something they care about. I don't know, I don't think that's how they do it, but it just seems like a silly way of representation.
Cynthia Mahoney:I think it's again, it's uniquely it might depend what seat you're in at the time, martin that if you're a marginal seat, maybe they do listen to you more than if you're in a safer seat. But yeah, I think, again, the world is being disrupted all the time and there's a great quote from Marshall Goldsmith, who's a world-renowned coach and I love him, and he says what got us here won't get us there. So I love that, like we've done the best we can. We've designed these systems with the best of intentions because they've enabled us to make certain changes for the world that we knew it at the time, changes for the world that we knew it at the time, but they got us here.
Cynthia Mahoney:But we have got this whole raft of really different, complex problems. I mean we haven't, kirsten, we haven't even touched on AI and the disruption that is going to bring to humanity, and humanity trumps partisan politics like for me Humanity is and a lot of these really big, wicked problems of climate change and all of those things. They're problems for humanity and partisan ways they're not going to cut it to find the solution. So the more people that we can engage and involve and hear voices that we haven't heard before who might have different perspectives to our traditional ways, is going to be the best chance that we've got to come up with really new ways of doing things in this environment of disruption.
Kirsten Diprose:And that was Cynthia Marnie. How good is she. I recently saw her talk and it ended up with a song. Instead of, these boots were made for walking. She changed the lyrics for a women on farms gathering and it was hilarious and she got up and sang it with a whole bunch of other women on stage and it was magic. What else can this woman do? Stay with us. We'll be right back after this message from our sponsor.
Ashley Molloy:Ash Malloy here from by CC Fine Jewellery. We're proud to sponsor Ducks on the Pond and I feel part of this community of rural women. I'm based out in the Warren Bungles in New South Wales with my husband and young children. I love designing elegant heirloom jewellery that's also practical for women just like us who are busy running around after the kids, getting their hands dirty and juggling multiple roles. We have a new drop based around the podcast and it's called Beyond the Pond. A few goodies in there, but we've decided to give a 15% site-wide discount to all listeners of Ducks on the Pond. Just use ducks at checkout.
Kirsten Diprose:Speaking of amazing women, gillian Fennell is one of those. So, on top of managing the rather large Lambina cattle station in rural South Australia and being a mother and an advocate in agriculture, I started our conversation by asking her how she believes rural women can be seen and heard when it comes to political issues, and we all know that Gillian's not shy in coming forward.
Gillian Fenell:That is a challenge, isn't it?
Gillian Fenell:Because collectively there's not a lot of us and we are across a very broad political spectrum, I guess you'd say, because depending on where your views lie and what your life experiences have been, you may have very different views about what is the best political party to represent your particular needs.
Gillian Fenell:I think where our strength lies is that, as women especially, we're really good at finding common ground with people who may not be in our immediate sphere, and some really good examples of that have been, for example, like the Parenthood who are advocating for increased access to childcare. So they're urban based, but they have acknowledged immediately that there's a massive problem in regional and rural Australia. And making those sorts of connections with people who do have that urban base and have that broader support than our tiny little group does is a really good thing to do. And I think when things are that important, things that fundamentally affect your life and your family and your ability to do your job, I think it's well worth putting your political sort of, I guess, mindset aside and thinking okay, who can I reach out to, team up with, learn from to get the best result for me and my community? And it may not always be who you think. That's why it's well worth keeping an open mind and just not immediately dismissing or disparaging other people because their views might be different to yours.
Kirsten Diprose:I like that idea of teaming up with sometimes unusual suspects, if you like, and thinking differently, so across the issue or even across your geography. So sometimes it might be geographically based your issue, and so then you do have to join forces with. It might be local councils, or it might be local businesses or organisations. What are some of the challenges there?
Gillian Fenell:I guess the challenges that we face in making those connections is the time factor, and distance is an issue, and if you've been even remotely paying attention, our telcos in the bush again have completely gone downhill. Thanks very much to the 3G shut off. We have to do it. No one will do it for us. But how do we fit that advocacy and fit that connection making into our everyday lives?
Gillian Fenell:And social media is one way to do that, obviously, because you can do it from the comfort of your own couch and a lot of it comes down to just being like I like to phrase, just don't be a dick to people like you may have different views about certain things, if they both, if we like.
Gillian Fenell:And a good example of this is when you look at, like the csg, the coal seam gas fight that's going on in the darling downs, like farmers are teaming up with environmentalists and usually you couldn't even get them in the same room, but they have the same goals and objectives in the sense that they want to protect the land.
Gillian Fenell:It's not so much that they're my enemy and they'll always be my enemy, it's if you can find that common ground, then that's when you can really make great gains and I surprise a lot of people, because the Greens have some really good social policies when it comes to housing and supporting disadvantaged people and education and health, and obviously, oh no, you can't support the Greens and in reality I never would or could, because they don't have a lot of candidates in my area but if you say these policies are good, then perhaps the major parties or your party that you're aligned to might start thinking hey, I've got a bit of competition here, so maybe I have to start listening to people instead of just having this sort of one-eyed view and relying on that rusted on voter base.
Gillian Fenell:Talk about what you want and the change you want to see and acknowledge when people that you may not traditionally align with are doing a good thing and I think that's probably going to start a bigger, better conversation doing a good thing, and I think that's probably going to start a bigger, better conversation.
Kirsten Diprose:It can be really hard in a lot of country areas that might have had the same party in for forever, it seems, and it always goes that way, and you feel like you're not going to get listened to because you're a safe seat. I'm in the seat of one which has traditionally been very safe liberal, and now there's an independent, alex Dyson, who's actually given Dan Tien a real run for his money. There's a race on and it's really energised the community with all of the things that we want to get done, because we know we've got people fighting and I've never seen it like this before. It's really exciting. And childcare, housing are just two major issues. Roads is another one that people are really coming together and making those sorts of connections.
Gillian Fenell:And this is the thing like when you have an electorate, especially in your area, where it's probably your electorate's probably pretty small in geographical size. My electorate of Gray, federally is enormous, covers like three quarters of the state nearly. So you grow up and you're in a community with your local nominee and your local party representative. They're not a bad guy or girl like lady. They're not a bad person. Your kids and their kids hang out together and it's so. Oh, I'll vote for them because I like them.
Gillian Fenell:But they're standing for a party who may not have your area's best interest at heart, because party politics is a whole other thing. And we're seeing a rise of independence and community-driven independence. And whilst they might never be in a position to, I guess, take over the show, they're going to start making some rusted on sort of parties in, especially in regional and rural areas, very nervous and they're going to have to start changing their policies because if they want to maintain power, they're going to have to listen to the people that elect them. Just being a well-respected, nice person from the local community isn't going to cut it anymore. So I think it the rise of the independence of whatever you want to call them. I know people like to group them in with the teals who have that environmental bent or whatever, but it's a good thing. I think we need to see more independence in government.
Kirsten Diprose:So what are some of the issues that you would like to see on the table for yourself, but also for rural women in general?
Gillian Fenell:For rural women in general, and this is I'm coming from a remote perspective. So there's been commitments to building more childcare centres and employing more childcare workers in regional areas, which is great because it's definitely well needed, but that never gets extended into remote women. It's for me, it's. It's such a no brainer, it's such an easy fix. If we have a remote child and you're under the age of currently, you've got the AIC Assistance for Isolated Children when they start school and stuff. They don't cover preschool and you're not allowed to employ a childcare worker who can also be a governess.
Gillian Fenell:So all these sorts of rules and things exist that are just over-complicating our lives when it could be quite simple support the actual families, give them access to the same amount of funding that you get in rebate through accessing traditional child care. It's not a hard fix, it's an easy fix. Telecommunications is another big thing like and Telstra's come out and saying, oh, I think it's the phone settings that you guys are using, not actually the problem with our network, which is classic PR. You, you're the dummies, not us, we're doing nothing wrong, and so it maintains their share price and everything like that, and they can table the reporting in government and say oh look, it's these dumb farmers with their wrong phone settings that are actually the problem.
Kirsten Diprose:The other one that you have done a lot of advocacy on over the last few years is schooling for remote children, and it's such a hard one for you and the broader group because you're a small group and you probably just it's hard to get heard, it's hard to even relate to what the problem is because people just think, oh, you're crying because you want the government to pay for boarding school for your kids. I'd like the government to pay for boarding school for my kids.
Gillian Fenell:And that's it. And that's the sort of barriers that we need to overcome. Like I would love to have access to a high school where I don't have to send my kids away, because once and a lot of mums like any, each family is different, but I speak to a lot of mums with this and said as soon as you send your kids away, they're left home essentially. Yeah, they come home for holidays, but they have this whole other life that you're no longer a part of. So for parents who get to see their kids all the way through high school, all the way to age 18, that's really nice. You get to grow up with them through their teenage years. We now send our kids away when they're 12. They're not even teenagers yet and we're missing out on all of that, and it is a heartbreaking thing to have to do. But for the child's best interest, for their education, for their social development, to play team sports for the first time, to develop social skills, to be able to find a partner in life, like they need to do it, and it's not a want, it's a need. And some people may choose to educate their kids all the way through to grade 12 at home. That's their choice and that's the decision they can make for their family.
Gillian Fenell:But a lot of us feel the need to send our kids to boarding school and it's not that we want to send them to the most elite I don't know inner Sydney boarding schools where they have all those terrible scandals and stuff. We just want our kids to go somewhere they're going to be safe and educated and can get their leaving certificate and maybe get into uni or get a trade. Like expectations for their education they're pretty moderate. We don't expect gold-plated service. We just want access to what everyone else has got. And oh well, you choose to live out there.
Gillian Fenell:Okay, but it's my job, it's where I live. Someone has to grow food, someone has to look after countryside because it's not just farmers and I think this is what also gets lost. There's a lot of people who live in remote australia who aren't but are providing essential services nurses, police, emergency services workers, people who run the road houses that tourists love to go to. We all have families. We all need to send our kids somewhere for school. So it's not just about our greedy farmers in their brand new Toyota Land Cruiser wanting money to send their kids to city boarding schools. It's like, well, we have a job to do, but we also need to educate our children and there's no one coming behind us to take on these jobs, because they are tough and because they're in a remote area. It takes a special type of person to live and work in these areas, so we can't just pack up and leave a big gap in the community or a gap in that service.
Kirsten Diprose:With that in mind, you have to play the game to get heard, to make change, though, and so, talking about issues that are important to us as rural women, what are some? What's some advice you might have? And you spoke at the start about getting together with other people, but if you're sitting there and you're thinking I'm just not being heard or can't access childcare or whatever that burning issue is, where do you go To?
Gillian Fenell:put this sort of into context about cut through and women. There was a few incidences in Sydney nightclubs where men were king, hit and got concussions or were killed and then all of a sudden overnight they changed nightclub opening times. How many women have been murdered by their intimate partners so far this year and they haven't done a single thing about it.
Kirsten Diprose:To be fair, that is more complex, though. I am very angry about the rates of domestic violence. It's appalling, but what could the government do? They are funding programs. What could they do about that? I want more to be done, but I sit there and think what could a government possibly do to stop men killing women?
Gillian Fenell:I guess it comes back to listening to the victims or the victims' families about things, because quite often when these incidences occur then you hear about oh, he was out on bail or he was given her address by the local police station, all those sorts of things. So there are methods like, there are things that they can do, but it just appears that they are not doing anything at all. And so I think rural women have we've got the double-edged sword, like the double thing of we're women, which we're traditionally not taken very seriously by anybody in power, which is a whole sort of feminist, misogynic thing that goes back I don't know many years and I don't know how many men listen to your podcast, but we'll probably get comments about how that's not true. So this is a safe space. This is a safe space and we're also rural, so we're a very small number, so we're a small subset within a small subset with very little power, and I guess it comes back to. So you need to take advantage of those existing power structures and not spread yourself too thin. So, like it can't be all things to all people.
Gillian Fenell:Like the NFF exists, it has all these different subcommittees that cover education, transport, telecommunications, social issues. So use those existing pathways and they are tied to agriculture agriculture, but they're also for agriculture adjacent industries. You can weasel your way in there somewhere, I'm sure, and they do have a direct line to parliament. They're up there all the time advocating and that sort of stuff and they make policies and election things and that sort of stuff and it's getting people.
Gillian Fenell:I think is the biggest battle is to acknowledge that your need is valid and exists and for a lot of reasons we really struggle with that and I think currently a lot of it is because everyone has a lot of their own really big problems and I found this really interesting like in the past, probably 12 to 18 months, with the cost of living increases, people are working more than one job. They don't have the time or capacity to worry about my kids not being able to access secondary school because they can't pay their rent and they can't buy enough food to feed their family, so my family is not even a blip on their radar and it's those sorts of things that I think we're entering a period where it's a perfect storm of everything's going really badly for everyone and we need some really strong, clever leadership to lift us out of this, and unfortunately I don't see anyone on the horizon that's capable of doing it.
Kirsten Diprose:There's only one rule with communication and that's that you cannot communicate enough. So when you think that you've said it enough, say it again. Like you, you cannot communicate your message enough. And I think, having that patience with people, I think most people are really good hearted people and they may not understand why it's such a big issue, because they don't understand your life and that's what's happened to us as women all the time.
Kirsten Diprose:So when we say something like childcare, we say we don't have childcare and they don't. People don't understand what that means in terms of it's not just oh, it means I can't work or I have to pay more for a nanny or something. It means if I can't work, then I'm not furthering my career, I'm not bringing in an income that's going to set me back for the rest of my life in terms of super, in terms of, yeah, my career and my ability to earn more and all of those factors. And then if I'm in a relationship and want to leave, that's going to really affect me more, all of those knock on things. And when you communicate it like that, then often people go oh, so it's not just an inconvenience for you, it's actually a huge impact on your entire life.
Gillian Fenell:Yeah, it's not just that I don't birth these children and don't feel like raising them. Like because that's what you often get told as a woman, if you didn't want to raise your own children, why did you have them? And because that's what you often get told as a woman, if you didn't want to raise your own children, why did you have them? And because it's always our fault. It's never the fact that we have other shit to do with our time. And there's so many things like you might need child care to. If you've got multiple children, one may have severe medical issues. Then you might need to take them to multiple doctor's appointments. So what do you do with the other kid if they're not school Do you cart them around to multiple hospitals and doctor's appointments and things like.
Gillian Fenell:And it's that disconnect from family. We don't have those grandparents or aunts and uncles around us anymore to assist us, that sort of thing. You can't leave your kid with a total stranger. You want them somewhere that's safe. You know, and I had this discussion the other day with a man, a truck driver, on social media and he was like, oh, why do we need more childcare? We should just the women should be at home raising the kids. I said you can't ignore the fact that the majority of teachers and nurses are women and they're already understaffed. So do you want them just to lose? Do you want to just lose the workforce? When they all start to have children, who's going to do that work Most?
Kirsten Diprose:women actually can't stay home and not work for five, 10 years or beyond while they're raising kids. It's not even like we live in a world where we're all expected to work and then there's this kind of blip in the system that happens to be women when they have children, and we don't acknowledge it. I find it really weird.
Gillian Fenell:And it is really weird, especially in like my context in the remote and like my context in the remote and family farming context, what we do is not perceived to be work. So we might do the books or we might go and work outside, but that's just. Oh, you just take the kids with you. The kids just have to be with you while you're doing that work. You don't put the kids in the pram and send them to the workshop while they're welding or anything like that.
Gillian Fenell:So if it's not all right for one gender, why is it all right for us to do our work and like a lot of our work, traditional gender roles. Everything else is done inside the home and is part of being a housewife or wife or mother, whatever you want to call it. But it devalues our job yet again, because I don't know how many women would be in the same situation. But it's just like well, I just need to come. I just need you to come down the yards and help me draft these cattle or help me brand these calves, or I need you to drive out along this fence line, okay, so what am I going to do with the baby? Bring it to an environment that it's not designed to be in?
Kirsten Diprose:I really want to ask you as well about your new podcast coming out, the Succession or Suck Session. I should say podcast, because that is something that, again, is really complex and similar to domestic violence, in that there is not the ability for the government to just make one policy and poof the issue goes away. It's complex, it's intergenerational, it's across genders, it's so many things, but how do you get heard with succession and the bigger ramifications that it has beyond just individual families?
Gillian Fenell:I think there is a shift coming and part of that is because now women do have a public voice. Social media has been great for that and the ability to remain anonymous but still tell your story in a compelling way and finding that you're not alone. That's probably one of the biggest things that I've seen happening, because I don't think the older generations realize, or, if they do realize, they don't care or they don't value it very highly about what they are doing to their own children when they don't do succession properly. And that's really dangerous from a family perspective and that's really damaging. And then they get to like their 70s and they wonder why their kids don't speak to them and why they don't come to visit for Christmas.
Gillian Fenell:Because you've ruined the relationship, because traditionally we have this sort of thing in agriculture that we don't value relationships. It's all tied up in duty and it's all tied up in respect and it only really flows one way because tradition and it's such a thing that it is eroding our industry. We like to talk about how much we value the family farm and how much we value families being involved in food production and that's the safest way rather than letting a corporation do it. But if you don't do your succession properly, there's only one option and that's sell up. And we, the second generation or even third generation by the time some people get around to doing it cannot afford to buy it.
Kirsten Diprose:I think you're right there. I think most of it comes from being uncomfortable. It's not because people are bad people and all of those things. It's difficult conversations that don't want that. You just kick the can down the road and then, unfortunately, that can explode. What have you learnt from some of the conversations? You've had Any new insights? Because what you're doing really is a form of research. It might not be scientific in that you've got a perfect cross-section of society or anything like that, but you are essentially doing qualitative research and you will learn something. Can you share any insights yet, or are you still in the middle of it all?
Gillian Fenell:I'm just starting to go through, so I have the survey and it is still open for the time being what I've learned from those survey results?
Gillian Fenell:Because that was based around domestic violence and coercive control in farming families, especially through the succession process.
Gillian Fenell:So you must do X if you expect to inherit, so that sort of type of thing, Coercive control within the people that I've surveyed is very prevalent, and it's not just the females that are on the receiving end of it. A lot of sons have said until I read this survey I had no idea that's what my parents were doing to me Restricting access to cash, not putting anything in writing, controlling all their movements, their motor vehicles, their education, everything, their living circumstances. They said that they had no idea it was abuse. They just thought that that's how it was and if they wanted to inherit it then they had to just live like that. And again it's a type of intergenerational trauma, because then they take a partner and then they're operating in this very dysfunctional environment and so they raise their kids in a dysfunctional environment and it really affects communities in a way that I don't think we've fully seen yet, because we're very good at keeping all of this stuff inside and the public facing us is very different to what might be happening at home.
Kirsten Diprose:That's really interesting what you're talking about coercive control and not realising it. And interestingly, we hear now and it's a good conversation that's happening broadly about elder abuse and about children who are telling their parents oh, if you don't do this, I'm not going to look after you, I'm not going to do this, or I'm not going to see you or I'll keep the kids from you, or all those horrible things. And it's great we're finally talking about that. But I really think you're opening a completely new conversation because I don't think it's been spoken about in that succession familial context before.
Gillian Fenell:And that is the other side of the coin because that's my own personal bias showing us like the older generation has all the power, and so that's where the power imbalances lie.
Gillian Fenell:But once succession does happen, then the parents are at the mercy of the children. You can't stay on the farm, mum and dad, you have to move to the home in town, and they may not want to do that, they may be more than capable of staying in their home, but they're turfed out of their home where they've lived for decades, or you have to sign this over to me now, or I won't come home for Christmas, or all these sorts of things. And they do happen, and there have been some responses in the survey along those sort of lines, and we can't ignore that Because, again, it's this whole big, complex family dynamics, those sorts of things. And how did we reach this point where you're treating your own parents like that? Are you just a terrible person? It's all these sorts of things. And I guess we don't have these conversations when you're talking about succession, because you never anticipate that someone who's your own family member is going to do that to you?
Kirsten Diprose:Is it something that you think you'll be knocking on I don't know government doors for anything, or can you Do you see a role in that?
Gillian Fenell:It's a challenging thing. I live in hope that these sorts of small programs that are, in the whole scheme of things, won't cost a lot, may eventually be funded, because again, it will just help our rural communities and help us as people and families like because we deserve to be happy and healthy in our places as well and that's it for this episode of Ducks on the Pond.
Kirsten Diprose:Thank you so much for listening. If you want to check out Gillian's Suck Session podcast, that's Suck S-U-C-K dash Session C-E-S-S-I-O-N. It's coming very soon and you can find her on social media at Station Life 101 or Google Succession Podcast. Thank you to Cynthia Marnie and Gillian Fennell for making time to speak with me, but also for their important work in raising rural voices, and thank you to ByCC Fine Jewellery for sponsoring not just this episode but the entire season. We really appreciate your support. Make sure you check out their website. She's got some beautiful jewellery at ByCC, so that you check out their website. She's got some beautiful jewelry at BuyCC. So that's B-Y and just C-C. This is a Rural Podcasting co-production. I have a couple of other podcasts too Two Smart Blondes, where we chat about media, tv, film and pop culture, and Town Criers, which tells the big stories of the small towns of Australia. So go check them out. Back for season seven, I'm super excited and I'll speak with you soon.
