Social media's ability to give anyone access to the public conversation can be as much a force for good as evil, according to writer, feminist and social commentator Jane Caro.
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Caro, who will visit the Border for next month's Write Around The Murray literary festival, said sites like Facebook and Twitter offered people an unmediated platform.
"We are hearing voices that we never used to hear," she said.
"And now any woman with a voice and a point of view and something cogent and topical to say, any LGBTQI person, any person of colour who wants to make points about what it is to live their life or how they've been treated, if they can resonate with others, will get an audience, and that's a fantastic thing."
The author of 12 books felt while social media did attract bullies and abusers, it also exposed them.
"In a way, those people with those voices have always been there," Caro said.
"Now we can see it in front of us. Yes, it's been emboldened, but it's also made us look squarely in the face some of the appalling forces that are at large in our society.
"Previously we were able to ignore a lot of that - didn't mean it wasn't there."
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Caro, a Queen's Birthday honour recipient in June, will join friend and collaborator Catherine Fox in Albury Library Museum on September 11 for a festival session titled The F Word, the name of their joint book a decade ago.
"Really the themes and the ideas we were talking about back then remain the same," Caro said.
"Because if you shrug your shoulders and basically don't care very much that women retire on average with half the super of men and fully one-third of women retire with none at all, you're not taking taking their life, their future, their emotional wellbeing or their rights seriously.
"So that remains the fight, to say we're just as human as anybody else."
She planned to keep pointing out the role of feminism in all communities, such as people with disability, people of colour and LGBTQI people.
"Feminism matters, taking half the human population seriously matters and it is not just a middle class thing, it is about the right and financial security of all women all over the world," Caro said.
Describing herself as a proud product of NSW government schools, Caro is a director of the Public Education Foundation.
"I feel that I received a first class education from the NSW public education system and the least I can do is fight to make sure that every other child gets the opportunity to get the sort of education I did, regardless of who their parents are or their capacity to pay," she said.
"Education systems were created and ought to break down class systems and be about giving everybody an opportunity to use their talents to the best of their abilities."
For more information, go to writearoundthemurray.org.au.
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