There is a bogus email about PIN Reversal doing the rounds (below).

PIN NUMBER REVERSAL (GOOD TO KNOW)
If you should ever be forced by a robber to withdraw money from an ATM machine, you can notify the police by entering your Pin # in reverse. For example if your pin number is 1234 then you would put in 4321.The ATM recognizes that your pin number is backwards from the ATM card you placed in the machine.
The machine will still give you the money you requested, but unknown to the
robber, the police will be immediately dispatched to help you. This information
was recently broadcasted on TV and it states that it is seldom used because
people don't know it exists. Please pass this along to everyone possible.
Australian Federal Police. AFP Web site: http://www.afp.gov.au

The AFP is aware of this email. The AFP does not endorse this email.
Regards,
Steph
STEPHANIE CAMILLERI
EXEC. ASSISTANT TO MANAGER,
MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS CHIEF OF STAFF PORTFOLIO AUSTRALIAN FEDERAL
POLICE
Tel +61(0) 2 62757294 Ext 167294 Fax +61(0) 2 62757058 www.afp.gov.au

Thumbs up to Seventh Generation. Their corporate social responsibility extends beyond caring for the environment to caring for homeless women’s sanitary needs.

A simple donation program on their site encourages a click for a box of FREE environmentally safe sanitary products delivered to a shelter in the state of your choice (U.S.A).

Seventh Generations click for feminine products program is currently suspended while they clear the backlog of boxes to be donated. The success of the giving program is due to people like us, each wanting to do their bit to help others. Sign up for Seventh Generations free newsletter so that you know when the backlog has cleared and they are ready to receive your click.

Feminine hygiene products are expensive and an item that women cannot go without. When women flee their homes because of domestic violence or sexual assault, feminine products are not necessarily one of those items on the “I must grab now” list.

While many shelters make provision for supplying feminine products, the shelters still operate on tight budgets where every cent spent is at the cost of something else. Donations of any new hygiene products are always gratefully received.

Collecting the complementary bottles of shampoo and soaps provided at hotel/motels is another simple way to give to shelters or rape crisis centers. Many frequent fliers collect the complimentary goods and when they have a bag full, they take them to a women’s or children’s shelter. A fantastic thing to do that costs you nothing, please consider it when you next travel.

Many thanks to Thrifty Mommy for raising my consciousness about Seventh Generations excellent display of corporate social responsibility.

Another click for help program you may want to consider can be found in Click for Kids at the Child Health Site.

I’ve always said I wished I could click my fingers and make the world a safer place. Now we can all click away and spread the magic of caring and helping others. Who is going to click with me?

Individual fiscal increases are not the only motivating factor for investors. Many people give because they want to make the world a better place, because they have received assistance and are now prepared to give back to community, or because they just give a damn about the plight of people. This is socially responsible investing.
Even though my area of giving continues to be child sexual abuse, I am heartened that so many others have found their area of commitment that they support in whatever way they can.

I have just discovered a Giving Carnival: a collection of blogs written from a philanthropic view. Interesting and thought provoking I have checked links and blog rolls and am amazed at the number of people writing about giving.

In Philanthropy Blogs Growing Influence Sean Stannard-Stockton makes reflective comment on the maturation process of giving blogs. In a similar vein I reflected on How to Attract Site Traffic to Child Protection or Sexual Abuse Blogs.

Social topics and social giving appear to fall into three conversation areas: those who care and are passionate about their subject, those who care and give because it is trendy, and those who have a little interest but it is just all too confronting. Regardless of what fuels an individual to help others, Social topic blogs and Philanthropic Giving are not trends that will disappear.

I invest a good deal of time in maintaining my blogs, on top of home schooling my child with special needs and working part time in my consultancy business. Frequently frustrated by time deficits and a desire to do more I rely on others to also do their bit to make the world safer and more palatable for our children. Together, we can do it.

A recent reader has shared her commitment to the School of St Jude with me. On the other side of the world, her in-kind commitment helps to publicize the plight of at risk children in Tanzania. Gillian’s profile, “We can make a difference by giving vulnerable children a good education. The School of St Jude does this in Arusha, Tanzania. Add your support, tell others, make your efforts count,” resonated strongly with me and in an upcoming blog I will assist Gillian in assisting the children in Tanzania.

I encourage you all to consider your tactics of Socially Responsible Investing and Philanthropic Giving. Are your hands for helping or hurting? And…thanks for reading. Becoming socially informed is a first step on the ladder of giving back to those who need it.

Caroline Overington of The Australian, has today written on Innocent Seduction. An excellent article that offers a balanced argument on the alleged sexualisation and exploitation of children through the marketing and advertising of designer children’s wear, I was saddened to read that giant retailer, David Jones, has entered Litigious Street. Demanding that references to their company be removed from an Australian Institute research paper entitled, Corporate Paedophillia (see Revealing Children’s Fashion), David Jones’ CEO has called in the legal guns to support their “reputation for high-quality apparel and corporate decency.”

It would appear that the research report, “Corporate Pedophilia”, has upset many fashion brand labels. Add to this, everyday parents who view that the author of Corporate Pedophilia is way off beam. One father was quoted in Overington’s article as saying that, "Parents are doting on their kids. Children are saturated with love and affection and care."

This may be the case for many families. Certainly, my children are loved and protected as are the children of the vast majority of people that I am friends with. However, the reality is that the rates of child sexual assault remain high and eighty-five percent of child sexual assault is perpetrated by somebody well known to the child. While it is not the corporate entities that are sexually abusing these children, their marketing and advertising may well become skewed in the minds of a voyeuristic child abuser – a person who has access to innocent children, a person who may well collect and read advertising from their mail box and then carries out their perverted thoughts on the children in the home.

Discourse is needed around this. It is the responsibility of all of us to stop pedophilia. Child sexual abuse is an emotive topic and the divide between the believers and those unable to believe is wide. Somehow, we’ve got to find a common ground, a place where both parties can understand what the other is saying.

Many years ago I watched a Dave Allen skit on a scantily clad woman rubbing herself all over a car. The skit was a take off, of a car marketing add. Dave’s punch line was, “Buy this car and you’ll be fuc*ed!” That one line has stayed with me for twenty years. It assisted me to become highly sensitive to the use of sex or sexualised behaviour in marketing. Conversely, advertising that talks directly to pedophiles, telling them that what they are doing is wrong, unacceptable but that there is help for them, would also work on me. I would support that corporate entity in their delivery of exceptional corporate responsible.

If one in three adults have reported in survey that they were sexually abused as children, then this is a high number of potential children’s fashion label buyers, or non buyers. Already I won’t purchase several brands of clothing because the companies openly flaunt sex to sell their product. How many more people are there in the world like me? David Jones may well be concerned that they have been slighted as being non-protective, but it is their reaction that has concerned me to the point that they may well become one of those shops I stop shopping at. They are failing to hear the essence behind the report and have instead personalised it. However, if David Jones displayed corporate responsibility toward ending child sexual abuse, perhaps even donating to treatment programs for sexual offenders, then I would be likely to purchase all of my clothes there. If this was a similar case for the one in three prevalence statistic of people who have claimed sexual abuse then that is a massive increase in potential customers to David Jones or any other fashion label/house.

Please, it is time to end child sexual abuse. To the corporates, we need your help. To everyone else, the corporates that are displaying recognition and action for ending child sexual abuse need our support.

A giant fund raising top up from a giant Australian grocery retailer has helped thousands of farming families affected by harsh drought conditions and dieing livelihoods.

Woolworths raised $4.7 million for the Drought Relief effort and exceeded their expectations of $3 million. CONGRATULATIONS Woolworths and congratulations to every person that shopped in either Woolworths or Safeway supermarkets on January 23.

In the fair dinkum Australian Tall Poppy cut down mentality, Woolworths was subjected to criticism for holding their day of fund raising (100% of profit went to the drought relief) on what is traditionally their slowest day of the week. Further, two thirds of the funds have been given to the Country Women’s Association to disperse as Woolworths or Safeway vouchers. The criticism abounded with claims that Woolworths gives, but takes back. Where is the altruism in that?

It would appear that the traditionally quiet trading Tuesdays broke tradition on Tuesday the 23rd of January 2007. I for one, did not shop for three weeks leading up to the day so that I could do a massive grocery shop to support our Australian farming families. I know of a few friends who also did the same. The over target by $1.7 million would suggest that perhaps many others followed similar shopping patterns.

The use of Woolworths or Safeway vouchers to assist families is something that they would not have had if Woolworths had not dedicated their profit to the drought relief. Australians are quick to deficit saturate any business initiatives designed to help others. All I can say is, if you don’t like what Woolworths did, then do something better. Help our families. Spend less effort on cutting down giants and more effort on being proactive and community spirited yourselves. Our future, our children are in trouble because of the crippling drought facing parts of our country. We all need to help them: individuals, groups, small and big business.

Community support belongs in the community. Thank goodness though that we’ve got the Woolworths of the world because as a nation we’re not good at recognising individual need as it occurs. Rather we wait until the big boys organise relief efforts and then we freely give our support. Generous we are but gee I’d like to see us lose our penchant for cutting down the tall poppies.

Congratulations and thank you Woolworths. Your corporate social responsibility puts many other businesses to shame.

Any comments to Woolworths? I’ll be forwarding this post to their Corporate Social Responsibility Manager.

I have begun receiving applications for the voluntary blogging jobs for the world’s largest on-line child protection conversation. Thank you to those who have contacted.

Please ensure that your applications are complete. Until I have all of your information to review I have to keep putting your application aside.

As stated on the Problogger job board, to apply you are required to provide the following information by email:

1. Applications are to be sent by email (imaginifatbigponddotcomdotau).


2. Applicants may apply for two separate child safety topic areas. Please state the area of child safety you would be writing in.


3. Applicant writers will demonstrate in application a high knowledge in their nominated area of child safety by:
   * addressing particular dynamics of the issue and why you want to write in the area for no remuneration,
   * sending a short bio with a link to your blog or web site,
   * providing three samples of your writing (two previously published pieces please, this can be links to blog articles),
   * attaching a succinct resume or Curriculum Vitae and,
   * supply two referees (name, position and email address).


4. Applications with either a current suitability card for working with children or criminal clearance are highly desirable but not absolutely necessary. Please include a scanned copy or make arrangements to fax or snail mail to Imaginif.


5. Finally, if accepted applicants must be willing to interact with Imaginif, via email or phone. Please agree to this in your application.


6. I had overlooked asking applicants to state the country they live in and whether there is a plan to post duplicate blogs: one in clear English and one in their mother tongue. Please do include this information as email addresses do not always make it clear where the application hails from.
   

If you need help with applying for these voluntary blogging positions please have a look at How to Apply for a Blog Job .

The advertising benefits to you during your duration as a voluntary blogger include:

• Photo or Graphic on the About Us page including links back to your web pages and/or blogs.
• Link to your web page or blog on the Links page and in blogroll.
• Rotating banner display (must be supplied as ready).
• Signature links to your page/s at end of each of your blogs.
• You retain copyright of your material so you are free to post it elsewhere as well.

Please note that the bloggers will not be blogging to this blog, Child Protection: Serious Business. Imaginif is having a purpose built and highly interactive web site developed (http://www.imaginif.com.au/). The site will be ready to go live by the end of May 2007 and will include blogs written by many child safety focused writers and a pumping forum where members can raise any topics about child safety, child protection and what they are doing that works to keep their kids safe.

I’m looking forward to entering into the largest on-line, global conversation about child safety with you.

Attention all you Australians: Tomorrow, Tuesday 23rd of January, Woolworths will donate 100% of profit to the drought relief fund.

For the full story on Woolworths amazing Corporate Social Responsibility see, Woolworths National Drought Action Day January 23, 2007.

I’ll be off to Woolworths early to do a huge shop.

Thanks Woolworths. Here’s thumbs up to you.

Imaginif is about to launch a new protective behaviour concept: the largest on-line child protection conversation in the world.

Conversation topics covered will include, but not be limited to:

• Water, sun, farm, poison, snow and road safety (each is a separate category).



• Child sexual assault prevention.



• Healthy and safe food for kids.



• Travel safety.



• Internet Safety.
  


• Gang safety.



• Bully safety.
  


• Teenage and dating safety.



• Domestic violence safety.
  


• Business protection and safety.



• Assist dogs for children with a disability.
  


• Covert child photography safety.
  

Applicant writers will be considered either expert or highly knowledgeable in their nominated area of child safety,

This is a voluntary position and your commitment would be for a minimum three months. You may be able to do it as part of your Corporate Social Responsibility if you are staff of a progressive and socially responsible company. Alternatively, you may be like me and consider child safety so important that you are willing to write for the passion of it.

Accepted bloggers will email their weekly writing to Megan Bayliss (maximum 1000 words, average 550 words, no fewer that 350 words) to be posted on the new site. Blogs will contain a short bio of the blogger at the end of each blog with a link to either bloggers own site or place of business. In text linking back to own business, other articles or industry specific sites is encouraged. What a great way to increase traffic to your site.

Bloggers who have English as a second language are welcome to send duplicate posts: one in English and one in their mother tongue. Publishing both ensures that people who don’t speak English can still become part of the largest on-line child protection conversation in the world.

Volunteer writers will retain copyright of their material but please respect that once posted it should not be posted word for word elsewhere.

The new global conversation on child protection site will be monetized with Google AdSense and financial sponsor logos. This is required to meet hosting and site upkeep fees. Imaginif chooses to work independently without any government funding and supports the site from our other business income (sale of protective behaviour resources and consulting). Should you be accepted as a blogger, your company’s logo can be included on the front page at no financial cost. Your blogging will become your or your company’s, in kind support. If the new concept raises profit from the monetization of the site, decisions will be then made surrounding whether to share the profit pro rata with bloggers or to donate to a child sexual abuse prevention charity.

It is anticipated that the global conversation on child protection will launch in March 2007. There is no time frame on application for these voluntary jobs. Writers will come and go. Please send this to people you may think will be interested.

Thumbs up to the National Bank of Australia. Their recently launched Corporate Social Responsibility Report, 2006 , indicates an increase in community investment to 1% of pre-tax profit.

As part of their Corporate Social Responsibility, The National Australia Bank is “investing in the local communities in which we operate” and providing “private resources for public good – this is based on a genuine desire to make a meaningful contribution to society.”

Waiving bank fees or charges for financially disadvantaged or charitable entities, releasing staff on full pay for two days voluntary service per year, and community partnerships with staff nominated community groups are only a few of the ways that the National Australia Bank is improving the life of individual families and children.

Spread throughout the world, The National Australia Bank Group provides a comprehensive range of financial products and services organised around three regional businesses: Australia , United Kingdom (Clydesdale Bank and Yorkshire Bank) and New Zealand (BNZ). Each of these countries mirror the philosophy of the Corporate Social Responsibilities of the National Australia Bank. This equates to the real winners being global families: communities without borders.

In Australia, an on-line data base of community programs allows employees to find and register for volunteering opportunities. In the UK team challenges encourage groups of bank staff to accomplish a chosen community project in a day. In addition, financial sponsorship of literacy and numeracy programs throughout the UK are well established. New Zealand is less well organised with staff volunteering on an ad-hoc basis. However, it is the ad-hoc response that often provides the most appropriate and needed support to a particular community need. Not to be left out, American staff (nabCapital, New York) last year supported a community pantry that supplies emergency foodstuffs to disadvantaged neighbourhoods.

Reaching out and assisting community groups working with child disadvantage, social exclusion, barriers of participation and child abuse has more than a positive effect on a community. You may never know of the sparking moment it has provided to just one family, one child. In years to come, it may be your single day of volunteering that has made the major difference to a child’s life of not staying trapped in inequality and disempowerment.

Thumbs up to Fone Zone. Fone Zone is Australia’s largest specialist communications retailer specialising in mobile phones, accessories and wireless data technologies. But, more importantly than that: Fone Zone officially supports the Abused Child Trust.

Trying to track down Isabelle Lucas (Cairns girl and Australian actress: Tasha from Home and Away) for a fund raising initiative for the Abused Child Trust, I inadvertently discovered Fone Zone’s support of child abuse. Thumbs up to Fone Zone. Why not consider supporting them in return by purchasing your communication technology from them.

Many organizations support charity or have sound corporate social responsibility policies and procedures. Many of these organizations also keep their commitments quiet and ask for no recognition in return. While I understand the reasoning behind this, I also value public discourse on child sexual abuse and concerted community support of ending the pandemic curse on society. Support of child abuse charities is something to celebrate, make public and encourage of others.

Should you wish me to blog about your support of a charity that supports abused children, particularly child sexual abuse prevention, please leave a comment including a link and contact details of who I can talk to. Prevalence research supports that one in three female children are sexually abused. Those numbers equate to consumer driven power begging to do something to support ending child abuse themselves. Often unable to be proactive themselves, they may just be willing to support your business because you publicly support child abuse prevention or intervention.

We already purchase our communication technology through Fone Zone. Now that I know they support the Abused Child Trust I may well just have to update my mobile phone.

Advertising watchdog, Reuters, has metaphorically knifed coveted fashion house Dolce & Gabanna. In a 2007 fashion campaign Dolce & Gabanna take “life imitating art” one cut too far. Recreating the early 19th century Napoleonic period of art, Dolce & Gabanna defended themselves by claiming that their fashion images emphasized the theatrical effects of the genre.

Advertisements of gun and knife wielding male and female models (including models with gun shots to their forehead and chest) in a Napoleonic gangland warfare genre do little to encourage world peace and child safety. Dolce & Gabanna are in a perfect position to use their corporate social responsibility in a way that few of us can. Their market profit, influence and trend setting style could positively market child abuse prevention. Instead, they have inadvertently condoned violence and provided a message that wearing their clothes makes you tough: a killer.

The sexually provocative ad history of Dolce & Gabanna concerns me. These current visual graphics of trendy, beautiful people weilding knives and guns, threatening others and supporting injured peers, may send a message that sex with violence can be beautiful and trendy. When forced on another person, sex with violence is totally unacceptable, against the law and deserves the harshest penalities measured.

Thumbs down to Dolce & Gabbana. They have not displayed corporate social responsibility in this instance. I was going to replace my sunglasses this week and a beautiful Dolce & Gabbana pair were my choice. Because of this irresponsible advertising campaign, I will not now buy Dolce & Gabbana.

On an up note, a local, male, radio announcer suggested that perhaps the models should have been given a fork because they all look like they need a good meal. Well done to him. His comment aided the plight of people struggling with eating disorders and the insane belief that real people look like Dolce & Gabbana models. How fantastic to have a normal bloke speak out and indicate that model art is not model life.

Child abuse prevention requires effort from all of us, even from marketing campaigns designed to increase sales, profit and set fashion trend.

Corporate Social Responsibility is not fashionable but it is smart, stylish and well performing.

I’d like to hear about small business: the people who act out their corporate social responsibility without realizing what it is. Feel free to share a story about how you, or somebody else, contributes toward child abuse prevention. I look forward to reading your comments.

Giant grocery store, Woolworths, are in the business of taking their Corporate Social Responsibility seriously. On January 23, 2007, the fresh food people will donate 100% of that day’s supermarkets profit to help Australian farming families in need.

The Woolworths Fresh Future Children's Hospital Appeal has long soothed the deficits in Health funding and now they move into soothing the pain of drought by providing needed financial relief. This is corporate social responsibility at its best.

Congratulations to this Australian retail giant for supporting our kids and families in the outback. The bulk of money raised will go to the Country Women’s Association with the remainder allocated to sustainable agricultural research projects.

Shop at any Woolworths supermarket on January 23, 2007 and help Australia advance a fair and more sustainable approach to farming family life.

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR): “a concept that suggests that commercial corporations have a duty of care to all of their stakeholders in all aspects of their business operations.” But, is it just a concept? I suggest not. CSR is a way of being, a working and ongoing commitment to not only people who use your business services but rather to people you may never meet. CSR is business acumen delivered in an ethical and socially responsible manner.

The global monolith of semantics, McDonalds, has a CSR blog. Good for them. Impressive and interactive, I would encourage supportive comments on their blogs. Is there anyone not familiar with the fantastic service that Ronald McDonald Houses offer to sick children and their families? Even though I am not a McDonald’s food lover, I will support their fund raising efforts because they assist children.

The Body Shop, releases staff to do voluntary work in the community and they fund raise to support children and young people affected by domestic violence and abusive relationships. This is their CSR in action. I purchase their fundraising products not because I need the items but because I aim to support them support our community.

The prevalence rate of sexual abuse is as high as one in three. Shocking, horrific and unacceptable. However, if one in three of your potential customers is affected by sexual violence it would make good business sense to enact your CSR and dynamically support filling the huge gap in corporate support for sexual assault prevention and treatment.

Some academics find CSR distasteful. Their views oscillate around business is in the market of business, not in the market of government responsibility. Criticisms of business focused utilitarian actions and advertising gimmicks to draw more customers and profit are leveled at those daring to step into CSR. Certainly when I was a student social worker I struggled to understand how rich women, spending thousands on themselves to attend an expensive fund raising dinner for a cause could bring any lasting social benefit. It does! Most big business people have no time to volunteer but they may have disposable income and a yearning to be in the social set. Each to their own and if they can use their own needs and social standing to help others, so be it.

Social responsibility is not only the business of government. Child protection is the business of every single person. Child protection is serious business and those businesses serious about their CSR may do well to consider what they are doing to help protect the world’s upcoming consumers.

Do you know of any big business whose CSR supports people affected by sexual violence? Please, leave the name and link so that we can all support these businesses to support our children. The bigger the list, the greater the global support of our children affected by sexual violence.

Imaginif…child protection was serious business!

A related article on attracting male mentors: MEN TORch the Chance of Boys Becoming Non-Violent Men (please note that Big Brother/Big Sister Australia do not support the views in this article and were concerned that their linked association suggests that they share my views on why we cannot attract male mentors. I apologise to them for any concern raised.)