In this week’s episode, Josh chats with Paige Horrigan who was the Winner of the Spirit Super Create Change Award at the 2022 Northern Territory Young Achiever of the Year.
In 2019, Paige was the victim of a hate-motivated assault while at school and no one was held accountable. This sparked their passion to highlight LGBTQIA+ issues and create positive change for queer young people in the Palmerston and surrounding communities. They have worked for organisations like Rainbow Territory to help in the fight against discriminatory legislation and advocated for the creation of safe spaces dedicated to LGBTQIA+ young people.
“People need to step up and speak up”
“I’m proud to be an LGBTQ person, and I’m proud to be an active member in the community. I wish there was things we didn’t have to fight for. I wish it was just basic human rights that we had the same as everyone else. But just because of our gender identity or our sexual identity, it means we have to work harder to be respected or have the same rights as others”
If you enjoy the Inspirational Australian’s Podcast, we’d love it if you could subscribe, rate and review. Find out how here.
Links
Connect on Instagram: @paige_horrigan_cos, Facebook: Paige Horrigan and LinkedIn: Paige Horrigan
Follow us on our Inspirational.Australians Instagram Page
Want to recognise someone making a difference? Nominate them now in 2 mins!
Find out more about partnering with Awards Australia
Transcript
[00:00:08] Christine
Welcome to inspirational Australians, where we share stories of Australians making
[00:00:13] Christine
a difference in their communities and in the lives of others. We at inspirational Australians acknowledge the Wurundjeri
[00:00:20] Christine
and Bunurong people of the Kulin nation as the traditional owners and
[00:00:25] Christine
custodians of the lands and waterways on which this podcast is produced. We pay our
[00:00:31] Christine
respect to elders, Past and present, and those who are emerging and extend our respect to all Aboriginal and Torres
[00:00:39] Christine
Strait Islander peoples. At Inspirational Australians, we are inspired by the world’s oldest living culture
[00:00:46] Christine
and pay homage to their rich storytelling history when we share stories on our podcast.
[00:00:58] Josh
Today I’m joined by a fantastic guest who I met over
[00:01:02] Josh
a year ago now. In Darwin for the twenty twenty two Northern Territory Young Achiever Awards,
[00:01:08] Josh
where Paige Hagen was announced as the winner of the Spirit Super Create Change
[00:01:13] Josh
Award as it was known back then, the awards now the Spirit Super Connecting Communities Awards. So quite cool Page
[00:01:20] Josh
is actually the first and last Spirit
[00:01:22] Josh
Super Create Change Award winner for the Northern territory. I had the pleasure of meeting Paige that night and having
[00:01:29] Josh
a really great chat and could just see the energy that Page was bringing. And if I
[00:01:36] Josh
recall quick last Page directly,
[00:01:37] Josh
but pretty sure Page was then straight off that weekend to it to do some amazing
[00:01:42] Josh
things will see if I can test the memory later. But a bit about Page four,
[00:01:47] Josh
I bring it before I bring Page on in twenty nineteen Page was the victim of an LGBT
[00:01:53] Josh
IQ plus motivated assault while at school,
[00:01:56] Josh
yet No one was held accountable. This led Page on a mission to establish
[00:02:01] Josh
a greater awareness and acceptance of LGBTQ people and issues within the palmerston community and surrounds. Paige helps plan,
[00:02:10] Josh
innovative events including the first pride event eponymous in history. They also
[00:02:15] Josh
have managed spaces dedicated to supporting the Youth and LGBTQIA+ people. They
[00:02:20] Josh
worked with organisations like Rainbow Territory and helped fight against
[00:02:24] Josh
discriminatory legislation. Page has taken stage two legal studies and has written
[00:02:28] Josh
external inquiry on the rights of LGBTQ plus people. In the Australian legal system,
[00:02:35] Josh
they aim to create greater awareness and change surrounding gender and sexual diversity. So welcome to the inspirational australian’s podcast,
[00:02:43] Josh
Page Horrigan. How are you going?
[00:02:45] Paige
Hi Josh. Good. Thank you for having me.
[00:02:48] Josh
Yeah, absolute pleasure. So some of that bio that I’ve just read out was about
[00:02:55] Josh
a year old now. Yes. Stepping back from last year. Young achiever woods.
[00:02:59] Josh
Was there
[00:02:59] Josh
anything started at the top there that stood out as being a bit out of date,
[00:03:02] Josh
or it needs a bit of refreshing?
[00:03:07] Paige
Well, since then the Rainbow Territory discrimination has made great progress. As of December last year, we have successfully,
[00:03:18] Paige
a changes made to the Northern territory anti-discrimination act. So now it doesn’t
[00:03:23] Paige
allow people to discriminate against LGBTQ plus and plastic to see.
[00:03:29] Josh
Yeah, that’s a pretty big update.
[00:03:31] Paige
Yeah, it was massive and the changes that were made didn’t just affect LGBTQ people,
[00:03:37] Paige
but it also helped refugees, victims of domestic violence, indigenous people, women and so many more.
[00:03:48] Josh
That’s awesome. That’s yeah, quite wide reaching.
[00:03:52] Paige
Absolutely. Yeah, the day too long. I think it was over the Past twenty six years rainbow territory
[00:04:00] Paige
and other people of the community have been trying to advocate against that bill as
[00:04:05] Paige
it actively related against many people within the community. Despite it being an anti-discrimination act.
[00:04:16] Josh
Mhm. It’s funny. It’s not funny at all, but it’s interesting how often that happens. Something was introduced for
[00:04:21] Josh
a certain reason and actually didn’t hit the Mark whatsoever.
[00:04:25] Paige
Absolutely. And specifically, one of the ones that ran for one of the sections of it,
[00:04:29] Paige
the rainbow territory’s trying to advocate against section thirty seven,
[00:04:34] Paige
which has been completely abolished. And that before, as it stood, it allowed religious organisations to discriminate against LGBTQ people.
[00:04:46] Josh
What’s the feeling like when you get
[00:04:48] Josh
a big milestone like that you’ve been able to achieve a really big change?
[00:04:52] Josh
Are you able to have a feeling of joy in celebration,
[00:04:55] Josh
or is it purely relief or something, some other type of emotion?
[00:04:59] Paige
Even at the time, there was also quite a bit of hate towards LGBTQ people,
[00:05:05] Paige
Australia wide with the election and the change of government. And for the change of government,
[00:05:11] Paige
the Morrison government was trying to push through some last minute bills like anti religious discrimination. No, I’m sorry,
[00:05:21] Paige
I might have gotten the title of that one wrong. That bill was incredibly harmful
[00:05:26] Paige
to LGBTQ people and especially young people as well. And it tried to
[00:05:33] Paige
show these young people that they weren’t welcomed or accepted in their own
[00:05:38] Paige
communities. And they shouldn’t feel like that. Yeah.
[00:05:42] Paige
And that kind of, that,
[00:05:44] Paige
that kind of legislation can be incredibly harmful to young people,
[00:05:48] Paige
especially with the statistics of mental health issues and suicide rates in LGBTQ Youth, especially trans Youth being,
[00:05:58] Paige
I think it’s forty two per cent higher than in cisgendered,
[00:06:03] Paige
heterosexual. Those kind of statistics going up and shouldn’t be and that legislation enables those.
[00:06:13] Josh
Yeah, that’s yeah, that’s, that’s interesting and you know, massive. Congratulations to you, Paige,
[00:06:21] Josh
for being so active in that area. I mean, you’re still such a young person. You know,
[00:06:27] Josh
it’s frustrating that you have to be doing this work at your age.
[00:06:31] Paige
I feel that
[00:06:33] Paige
people need to step up and speak up and it wasn’t just me like I can’t take credit
[00:06:39] Paige
for that fight because that was twenty five years worth of advocacy work. Done by
[00:06:45] Paige
hundreds of LGBTQ plus people in the ninety that have paved the way for so many
[00:06:51] Paige
things before me. And I’ll be forever grateful to those leaders within the community. And elders, I am just
[00:07:00] Paige
a small pebble in the ripples that are being created in the community. It
[00:07:07] Paige
doesn’t necessarily anger me that this is that we’ve had to do this. I’m,
[00:07:12] Paige
I’m proud to be an LGBTQ person,
[00:07:15] Paige
and I’m proud to be active. An active member in the community. I wish there was
[00:07:22] Paige
things we didn’t have to fight for. I wish it was just basic human rights that we
[00:07:28] Paige
we had the same as everyone else. But just because of who our gender identity or our sexual identity,
[00:07:37] Paige
it changes our scene in that way and means we have to work harder to be
[00:07:44] Paige
respected or have the same rights as others. Yeah.
[00:07:50] Josh
Yeah, for sure. That is. Yeah, I can kind of see what you’re saying, like even just and you know,
[00:07:54] Josh
not being directly in that community myself. Like for me being outside looking in,
[00:08:00] Josh
sometimes I can kind of get the feeling that it must get tiring,
[00:08:04] Josh
kind of constantly having to stand up for things and ask people just to be polite
[00:08:10] Josh
in how they refer to you and to so it’s just so many things that you said that you
[00:08:15] Josh
have to stand up for and other people like myself, you’re white cisgendered person, straight person just takes absolute advantage,
[00:08:23] Josh
doesn’t even have to think about it.
[00:08:26] Paige
And like even just in our everyday lives less
[00:08:28] Paige
so on that larger scale. The huge impact small things can make some myself,
[00:08:33] Paige
I’m non-binary so I use they them pronouns and gender diverse. So every
[00:08:39] Paige
day I’m having to either correct people or just be misgendered unless they already know me,
[00:08:45] Paige
they don’t assume that because I am female presenting. They don’t just assume that
[00:08:51] Paige
I am non-binary, and the big difference makes such a huge difference as well. People, even if they’re cisgendered,
[00:09:00] Paige
even if they’re not part of the LGBTQ community. A huge thing that allies can do is starting
[00:09:05] Paige
a conversation or like even on their social media profiles or on the email,
[00:09:10] Paige
signatures is having the pronouns written, starts the conversation in
[00:09:15] Paige
a way so that someone who is gender diverse doesn’t always have to make the first
[00:09:21] Paige
move in every single moment of their lives. So I know
[00:09:25] Paige
a lot of organizations are now putting the pronouns in their signatures and
[00:09:32] Paige
social media is have now made it an option to have that there. And people finding
[00:09:37] Paige
that even in a face to face interactions, which is where it’d be most daunting for
[00:09:43] Paige
a gender diverse person, cisgender person to start in the opposition. Hey,
[00:09:47] Paige
my names age and my pronouns this, you know, it, it makes
[00:09:54] Paige
a huge difference. And also lets someone who is gender diverse in that social
[00:09:58] Paige
situation, your workplace, your friend, group know that they are accepted,
[00:10:04] Paige
they’re safe there. And they don’t need to be the one to instigate that
[00:10:09] Paige
conversation. It can be awkward for them, it can be daunting for them.
[00:10:14] Paige
As well, yet
[00:10:17] Josh
so true and like I always stepped up the interest to be honest like myself
[00:10:20] Josh
because I, I always do it. I go off script and I was like,
[00:10:24] Josh
I have my notes and I’d prepared and it’s just go for the go. Come on, Josh,
[00:10:29] Josh
but anyway, it was all fun and I think,
[00:10:30] Josh
but you’re right that it’s just practice. Doing that as you suggested,
[00:10:34] Josh
is just another way of practicing and not. You know, I think some people get
[00:10:39] Josh
a bit like intimidated almost that they’re going to get it wrong. But I think as
[00:10:44] Josh
long as you just approach it with a genuine nature, absolute integrity, everyone gets things wrong. Every single day,
[00:10:51] Josh
every single hour we get stuff wrong. So
[00:10:53] Paige
how I’ve misgendered myself before you know?
[00:10:58] Josh
Yeah, totally
[00:10:59] Paige
like my friends put me up on it. Paid for it. What are you doing?
[00:11:03] Josh
That’s pretty funny.
[00:11:04] Paige
Yeah, it is, but it happens and.
[00:11:07] Paige
And as long as people are polite and respectful about it and
[00:11:09] Paige
they don’t, it’s like if someone else correct them,
[00:11:12] Paige
you don’t get all your whatever. You actually say, oh, you stop yourself,
[00:11:16] Paige
you correct yourself yet. Sorry they or she or he, whatever their pronoun is. You correct yourself,
[00:11:23] Paige
it’s kind of just fresh possible to make a huge deal about it or thinks they did this or discussing,
[00:11:33] Paige
you know, just making a mental note, making it aware in
[00:11:37] Paige
a conversation and then continuing on. Not making this huge deal about it is when someone
[00:11:45] Paige
a lot of the times when someone does misgender someone and the person there. And
[00:11:49] Paige
then they go, oh, I’m so sorry. I’m sorry. They made
[00:11:51] Paige
a big deal about it.
[00:11:52] Paige
It can make the gender diverse person feel
[00:11:55] Paige
a bit in the wrong as well if that makes sense. Like they’re just like,
[00:11:59] Paige
oh of course this awkwardness because of who I am you know and,
[00:12:04] Paige
and now and then there’s like, hey, yeah, exactly,
[00:12:08] Paige
that position. Exactly. So just not making the biggest deal of it and just going Oh
[00:12:13] Paige
yeah. And then continuing on, correcting yourself and then moving on. Yeah. Yeah. And as long as you’re not
[00:12:19] Paige
misgendering someone maliciously as well. Like that’s, that’s incredibly harmful. Yeah. To people. So yeah, like I’m
[00:12:30] Paige
a huge advocate for educating on gender diverse issues like that and especially to groups, peers,
[00:12:38] Paige
organizations that can utilize this knowledge to help well as well.
[00:12:43] Josh
Sorry. Yeah.
[00:12:45] Paige
And it is a constantly changing thing because it is so gender identity and sexuality is so
[00:12:52] Paige
fluid that it can be
[00:12:54] Paige
a bit difficult to keep up with things. And I understand that and trying to come
[00:13:01] Paige
at this kind of topic with an empathy and understanding rather than aggression because as you said, people can feel
[00:13:09] Paige
a bit confused or scared or concerned about getting it wrong. So approaching the topic with people in
[00:13:18] Paige
a safe and understanding and empathetic environment is key. Yeah,
[00:13:29] Josh
This episode is brought to you by Spirit Super,
[00:13:32] Josh
the Super fund for hardworking Australians. Let’s be honest. Most of us don’t pay
[00:13:37] Josh
enough attention to our Super. It’s either too hard, too confusing. We simply don’t know what Super is,
[00:13:43] Josh
but that’s okay. Spirit Super makes learning about and looking after your Super, Super easy, with
[00:13:50] Josh
a focus on strong returns and award winning service and Super experts offering
[00:13:55] Josh
practical and helpful advice. Spirit Super is here for you and your Super. For more info,
[00:14:01] Josh
go to Spirit Super ABC.com. Today you consider the PBS and TMD experience Super dot
[00:14:06] Josh
com to the useless PDF before making a decision. He sure is motor trade association of Australia,
[00:14:13] Josh
Superannuation fund PD. Loyalty advice is provided by quadrant first PD Loyalty day.
[00:14:18] Josh
Past performance isn’t a reliable indicator of future performance. Well,
[00:14:24] Josh
that scene was talking about having conversations and you know how sometimes it’s
[00:14:28] Josh
not always easy. I was saving this question for a bit later on. It’s the,
[00:14:32] Josh
it’s part of Spirit super’s sponsorship of the Australian,
[00:14:35] Josh
strange podcast we’re interviewing the Past and current winners of their awards. And so they’ve actually, I was really impressed,
[00:14:43] Josh
sent me specific questions for specific guests that I’d planned to bring on.
[00:14:48] Josh
So the
[00:14:48] Josh
question that Spirit took of submitted to you Page very timely of what we’re
[00:14:52] Josh
talking about. As I said, I was saving it later. What is the secret to having a courageous conversation or
[00:15:01] Paige
courageous conversation, at least the way I interpret that, I see that as being
[00:15:07] Paige
a safe environment is key in my opinion, and that’s why,
[00:15:12] Paige
over the years I’ve advocated for safe spaces, LGBTQ people and allies,
[00:15:18] Paige
as well because having that space where people can openly have
[00:15:23] Paige
a conversation about something they might not know or something that they’re
[00:15:27] Paige
concerned to ask people, you know, because it’s, it’s, sometimes it’s gotten to
[00:15:34] Paige
a point of, you’ve been around this thing so long and not understanding it,
[00:15:37] Paige
but you’re too afraid to ask about it because it’s been so long and people should
[00:15:42] Paige
people or you should just know, but yeah,
[00:15:45] Paige
we can’t just have that assumption that everyone knows this. So when I am kind of
[00:15:51] Paige
doing these, like sort of educational talks with people,
[00:15:54] Paige
I try to also explain to them different definitions of things. While it may sound
[00:16:01] Paige
so simple like the difference between sex and gender. Because the amount of times
[00:16:05] Paige
that get confused is astronomical. I this year I’ve started University at the
[00:16:12] Paige
Australian National University and one of the courses I did last semester was
[00:16:17] Paige
gender and sexual identity. There’s a whole course about that,
[00:16:21] Paige
and I’m like out of the two hundred to three hundred people that were there. When
[00:16:28] Paige
the teacher asked the, sorry, the lecturer asked,
[00:16:31] Paige
how many of you have ever interacted with someone who is diverse and the amount of
[00:16:37] Paige
people that didn’t raise their hands? Is quite surprising to what you might think. Because you think it’s twenty,
[00:16:44] Paige
twenty three, that people would have interacted with someone. But
[00:16:48] Paige
a lot of these people are coming from sort of rural towns that might not have had
[00:16:53] Paige
these order to this sort of topic before. They also were unaware of the difference
[00:16:58] Paige
between gender and sex yet are,
[00:17:02] Paige
it’s ensuring that these definitions are clear and concise as well so that it’s not
[00:17:08] Paige
an information overload for people. And that they can get an understanding and then
[00:17:13] Paige
be able to replicate this knowledge into their every day so that they can be more
[00:17:20] Paige
empathetic and create these safe spaces around in Massachusetts. Yeah,
[00:17:26] Paige
so I think understanding empathy and purity is key to having a courageous conversation and
[00:17:35] Josh
a good one. That’s great. Thanks for that,
[00:17:36] Josh
Paige. So you mentioned and you so are you still based in the territory?
[00:17:43] Josh
Are you in Canberra now or we’re about to you.
[00:17:46] Paige
I’ve just got back from Canberra,
[00:17:48] Paige
I did come up to Darwin in the semester break. It’s great to be back home.
[00:17:54] Paige
Definitely missing the Darwin. Warm weather for sure. But I’m loving it down here. Definitely exposing myself to
[00:18:04] Paige
a lot of different culture and people as well as all these different
[00:18:11] Paige
people that I never would have met in Darwin, it’s great to get their experiences,
[00:18:15] Paige
their knowledge and be able to get this,
[00:18:20] Paige
expand my knowledge. So I can bring that back to the ninety and help create more
[00:18:27] Paige
change and progress up there, which would be the long run.
[00:18:32] Josh
Yeah, for sure. So in the bio, it mentions that you’ve taken stage to legal studies. So
[00:18:40] Paige
that was,
[00:18:41] Josh
I really know that that’s the way you are. Now. You’re in gear virtually at uni.
[00:18:45] Paige
Yes.
[00:18:46] Paige
So stage three legal studies is the highest level of law related
[00:18:52] Paige
subject. You can take in high school or college, whatever. Every state pulls something else through. And for the
[00:19:03] Paige
external inquiry that was the very large essay, it’s a lot of like
[00:19:08] Paige
a mini thesis that we had to write at the End of the course. And we got to choose
[00:19:13] Paige
what we wrote it on. We wrote our question for it and then we answered the question
[00:19:17] Paige
and did our own research and that was into it. I worked alongside some of the
[00:19:22] Paige
people from rainbow territory. They helped me with that. And by helping me conduct
[00:19:28] Paige
some surveys and collating lots of data that we’d had already recording about
[00:19:35] Paige
in regards to the Northern territory anti-discrimination act. At the time of writing this piece,
[00:19:41] Paige
the legislation hadn’t been changed yet. It would still not. So if I was going to
[00:19:46] Paige
go back and reread that currently
[00:19:47] Paige
a lot of the information would be quite outdated is great. And always glad to see
[00:19:53] Paige
change and progress being made there. So yeah, that’s that one is
[00:20:00] Josh
maybe interesting like time capsule pace. You know,
[00:20:02] Josh
it’s down to track that can in many years to think that that was almost was such
[00:20:07] Josh
a pivotal time where you’d written it and then let you know
[00:20:10] Josh
a year later. It’s completely different situation and I wonder what, you know,
[00:20:14] Josh
hopefully there’ll be so many other positive changes in the years to come.
[00:20:18] Paige
Absolutely. With those positive changes that come, it is still unfortunately what seems
[00:20:25] Paige
a never ending battle for it. For these changes,
[00:20:29] Paige
because one of the big things that happened after same sex marriage got legalized
[00:20:35] Paige
in Australia was it got legalized and people like who fight over. They’ve got
[00:20:40] Paige
a right to marry.
[00:20:42] Paige
It doesn’t matter anymore,
[00:20:42] Paige
but the fight doesn’t stop there and there’s so much more to it than just being
[00:20:48] Paige
able to marry. And the government tried to play it off that way of like, oh,
[00:20:53] Paige
you can marry. Now we don’t need to worry about all these other pressing issues
[00:20:57] Paige
that are occurring in the community. And that’s
[00:20:59] Josh
- End of it. We’re done.
[00:21:01] Paige
Yeah. But now the voices are getting louder and they can’t silence them.
[00:21:07] Josh
Well, sadly I’m trying to on my back,
[00:21:10] Josh
I can’t remember what year that that vote was. Do you recall what time
[00:21:13] Paige
I
[00:21:13] Josh
believe how old you would have been at the time.
[00:21:17] Paige
Oh geez, how old was I? Did it have been. And of an eleven or twelve,
[00:21:22] Josh
I think at that time did it mean anything to you like or you know, had you edgy kind of
[00:21:29] Paige
at that time I was sort of figuring out my identity a bit. Yeah. Well, it seems like so long
[00:21:38] Josh
ago. I know that’s hard, isn’t it? Yeah.
[00:21:42] Paige
So it wasn’t the biggest thing on my mind,
[00:21:45] Paige
but I also wouldn’t have been able to convert. I couldn’t say yes or no. So yeah.
[00:21:51] Paige
And that was another thing I found that sort of, it’s sort of big Postal votes,
[00:21:55] Paige
and these decisions being made about LGBTQ plus lives is young people aren’t
[00:22:02] Paige
considered into the equation all that often. Yes. Eighteen to twenty five year old.
[00:22:08] Paige
But anyone below that is, is counted and not,
[00:22:12] Paige
not acknowledged in these changes and that is a voice that needs to be heard,
[00:22:18] Paige
but can’t be because they legally can’t vote they. And with politicians that are
[00:22:23] Paige
trying to make these changes and are advocating for or against the changes they
[00:22:29] Paige
don’t hear those voices because they mainly care about the voices that can vote for
[00:22:35] Paige
them next election. And that is a terrible mindset to have. And I know those that’s, that’s not the,
[00:22:41] Paige
that’s not the rule. And that’s not how everyone is, but it’s how a majority is. There are a few,
[00:22:48] Paige
especially at home in the anti that actually really do care about the Youth voice
[00:22:54] Paige
and are trying to make changes for young people. And I’ve worked alongside quite
[00:23:00] Paige
a few of those people and especially in regards to the apartments and Council,
[00:23:05] Paige
many of them help towards the safe spaces in palmerston,
[00:23:10] Paige
that are now there. And with what, before I started this journey of advocacy work,
[00:23:17] Paige
there was no, I would set LGBTQ plus safe space in palmerston and now there’s
[00:23:23] Paige
a Headspace with a permanent area there called PRISM. And that’s a group that meets every week,
[00:23:29] Paige
supporting LGBTQ young people. And there’s also the concentrix centre and the library, those births and
[00:23:38] Paige
a constant supporters of things like comets and pride and pride picnic and pride
[00:23:43] Paige
Youth day as well. Because pride events regarding young people are often ignored or
[00:23:51] Paige
forgotten about with these big organisational committees. And it’s great to see
[00:23:56] Paige
that city of Homs and continuing that work to create this safe space in the
[00:24:03] Paige
community for our young people four years on after the first palmerston pride event
[00:24:08] Paige
or pride picnic in twenty. Nineteen.
[00:24:11] Paige
Sorry twenty twenty,
[00:24:12] Paige
sorry I know my use for three years on the pride picnic in twenty, twenty, twenty, sorry,
[00:24:21] Josh
stopping. I mean we also blended together at that point.
[00:24:25] Paige
They have around the core of a time was Yeah,
[00:24:28] Paige
it was crazy. But now with city of palms and continuing to support these pride
[00:24:34] Paige
Youth events from twenty twenty. That was the first pride event bumps in history,
[00:24:40] Paige
hope and organized by myself and the other people that constantly supported me in
[00:24:45] Paige
organizing that from Amanda Stevenson, from city of palmerston, Irish scenes from Headspace and
[00:24:54] Paige
a bunch of other Incredible allies and LGBTQ plus people in the community
[00:25:01] Paige
to help make that happen. And then going back to
[00:25:05] Paige
a couple weeks ago I was back home in Darwin and pride Youth day happened as part
[00:25:10] Paige
of the palmerston Youth festival. And even after I’d moved away,
[00:25:15] Paige
I had forgotten organising that other than when I Grew up, I would just empty and speak at the event.
[00:25:22] Paige
And it was amazing to see how much it has grown and how it has continued to evolve. And yeah,
[00:25:32] Josh
now that’s fantastic. There’s some good crossover there between what you’re talking
[00:25:36] Josh
about with Council, with engaging with young people and, and what you were saying about, you know,
[00:25:41] Josh
below that eighteen twenty five year limit. Eight year old with another chat I’ve had recently with in South Australia,
[00:25:48] Josh
the city of Marion has the Youth collective committee was
[00:25:50] Josh
a win NSF Australian awards. And their winning submission was really focused on what you’re talking about,
[00:25:57] Josh
engaging with young people at that age. So it’s good to see there are some examples happening of that.
[00:26:03] Paige
Absolutely.
[00:26:04] Paige
Because the Youth voice is so crucial and important
[00:26:07] Paige
to listen to with them being literally being our future. And I couldn’t be more
[00:26:13] Paige
proud to be a young person, even though in the End,
[00:26:16] Paige
especially they don’t have the best reputation. But that is something that needs to
[00:26:20] Paige
train. Instead of just grouping all the young people into this category of trouble makers that young people, that, that,
[00:26:27] Paige
that all this stuff. Young people are an amazing the, the things that they hear the,
[00:26:34] Paige
the ideas that they have and the passion that they have to make change and to drive
[00:26:39] Paige
forward. Things that will help other young people and help community as
[00:26:44] Paige
a whole is amazing that needs to be heard. Especially by people that can,
[00:26:50] Paige
that are higher up and can make those changes happen with the support and the
[00:26:56] Paige
knowledge that the young people bring to.
[00:26:59] Josh
Sure, it’s why I’m so passionate about the young achiever words as well,
[00:27:03] Josh
because it gets to highlight a lot of these things and you know,
[00:27:06] Josh
a common saying people are young people are the future leaders. Or you know,
[00:27:12] Josh
future’s in good hands, but I actually, I completely rally against that because young people are leading right now and
[00:27:17] Josh
you’re an amazing example of that, Paige.
[00:27:19] Paige
Thank you. Yeah, I couldn’t agree more. Young people aren’t just the future leaders. They are now
[00:27:26] Paige
young people like because in the future they’re not going to be young people anymore. You know, they are.
[00:27:32] Josh
That’s kind of how it works.
[00:27:33] Paige
Exactly. Aging wow. Grew to something that
[00:27:38] Paige
know they are leading now and they’re making changes now and the ideas and the
[00:27:43] Paige
voices that I have heard need to be heard
[00:27:49] Josh
Going back one step. You mentioned I.R.S.
[00:27:51] Josh
as a quick shout out to Ira Osborne, what’s actually in the young achiever awards?
[00:27:56] Josh
Back in twenty sixteen. I think I just quickly checked it out while we were chatting. That’s cool. Yeah.
[00:28:03] Josh
Amazing.
[00:28:04] Josh
Awesome to hear that too.
[00:28:06] Paige
Yeah. He’s Incredible and the work he does in the community. He works quite
[00:28:11] Paige
a lot with the prison groups and in communities in schools in everywhere to
[00:28:17] Paige
advocate better mental health and for young people for mental health as well. He’s, he’s amazing.
[00:28:24] Josh
So speaking of the awards,
[00:28:26] Josh
quickly travel back in time to the awards night last year in April at Minto beach casino,
[00:28:34] Josh
you potentially won best dressed Page. Incredible. Thank you. Green velvet suit
[00:28:41] Josh
looked outstanding. What was your memories around that event?
[00:28:45] Josh
And I have this inkling that if you were jetting off somewhere straight after,
[00:28:50] Josh
or I don’t know if you remember that one. But I’d love to get your thoughts on that
[00:28:53] Josh
and how that
[00:28:55] Paige
event saw earlier that day. We had the first
[00:29:00] Paige
anti Youth conference run by no one left behind which is spearheaded and
[00:29:07] Paige
earned by the amazing twenty twenty two local hero with the MP
[00:29:13] Paige
Rebecca forest. Who and it happened again this year.
[00:29:18] Paige
She wants to have Youth voices
[00:29:20] Paige
heard. She wants to show the anti and all the Youth committee that she worked with,
[00:29:25] Paige
how virtual and important young people and their voices are and how amazing young
[00:29:30] Paige
people up. And she’s started this event with the support of the Youth committee,
[00:29:37] Paige
which I was on last year. And we held that event that day and it had, I think over
[00:29:45] Paige
a thousand young people attend from schools across the nt. And it
[00:29:52] Paige
had speakers from orange sky from taboo, which is a Youth led
[00:30:00] Paige
a period poverty prevention group. And they are aiming to raise awareness and prevent period poverty. And orange sky is
[00:30:14] Paige
the, the washing machine vans that go around to help homeless people. And many,
[00:30:20] Paige
many other amazing speakers like SES or Fiona owl, Northern territory twenty, twenty two young Australian of the year. Yeah,
[00:30:29] Paige
and that that conference was an Incredible day full of so many
[00:30:36] Paige
young voices being heard and passing on ideas and information and education
[00:30:43] Paige
to all these other young people and inspiring them to go out and make their own
[00:30:47] Paige
change. And then later that night, all of us went to the all of us, quite
[00:30:52] Paige
a few of us who were at the conference and on the committee all went to the young achiever awards.
[00:30:58] Josh
Yeah, that’s what it was on
[00:30:59] Josh
a
[00:30:59] Paige
few of them was nominated.
[00:31:00] Josh
It was beforehand and I remember I remember that you were saying it was a massive,
[00:31:05] Josh
massive day or weekend. Yes. That is what
[00:31:09] Paige
it was. And it was so great and
[00:31:11] Paige
on the night because I outside of my advocacy work, I work as
[00:31:16] Paige
a sound and lighting technician. And my boss was also nominated for an award Jeremy,
[00:31:21] Paige
silent day for this business award official fish. And he won his award as well,
[00:31:28] Paige
which was great to see. Yeah. And it was just an Incredible night with. And it was
[00:31:33] Paige
really great to see all the other young people as well alleged for their hard work
[00:31:38] Paige
and everything they’re doing in the community.
[00:31:41] Josh
Yeah, fish, we love fish because he’s a real, you know, go getter like such
[00:31:46] Josh
a driven dude. And he come up to us afterwards and he’s like, I would love to,
[00:31:52] Josh
you know, to work with you moving forward.
[00:31:55] Josh
And so he did this, you
[00:31:58] Paige
know, three productions did the production for young people awards this year, which
[00:32:01] Josh
is that’s right. The opportunity popped up. It was last minute because we had a previous arrangement,
[00:32:07] Josh
but it just wasn’t really working. And we kind of had to make a call,
[00:32:10] Josh
and so we called him up and he’s like, yeah,
[00:32:12] Josh
I can do it. No worries. And yeah,
[00:32:15] Josh
it was stunning. So anyone holding an event in it and definitely go to E3
[00:32:19] Josh
productions, but absolutely. But yeah, so that’s,
[00:32:24] Josh
that’s awesome to hear. And so Paige and we’ve talked a lot about your work,
[00:32:29] Josh
your advocacy and a lot of this stuff. You know, I guess one thing we kind of did skip over
[00:32:34] Josh
a little bit is how it all started. You know,
[00:32:37] Josh
I did mention at the top where you faced, you know,
[00:32:40] Josh
a pretty horrible incident. Are you comfortable to talk about that? And I guess lay
[00:32:44] Josh
a bit of foundation as to why and how you’re just so driven.
[00:32:52] Paige
And so in twenty nineteen myself and
[00:32:55] Paige
a few of my friends were victims of homophobic attacks at school. And Despite it
[00:33:01] Paige
being reported and no one was held accountable,
[00:33:05] Paige
we knew who did it. We gave them names, there was lots of evidence of it too,
[00:33:08] Paige
but they were protected by another Youth organization that I have a lot of respect for. I won’t name,
[00:33:14] Paige
but they said that it went against their cultural beliefs.
[00:33:18] Paige
And that’s why they did which I disagree with personally,
[00:33:25] Paige
because just because your beliefs disagree with my lifestyle doesn’t mean you have
[00:33:31] Paige
the right to physically assault me or anyone else. Yeah. And at the time,
[00:33:38] Paige
my friends they, they weren’t doing too well after it. I I personally don’t take
[00:33:45] Paige
a lot of time for myself or my mental health too often I’ve made changes for now
[00:33:49] Paige
and I do acknowledge my own mental health and look after myself
[00:33:52] Paige
a bit more. By that time I just wanted to
[00:33:55] Paige
help. And I wanted that to not happen to
[00:33:58] Paige
anyone else ever again because it was an awful experience. And also as a society,
[00:34:04] Paige
a very long way away from having zero hate crimes and other hate crimes.
[00:34:11] Paige
Real progress is being made and I wanted to work towards that progress.
[00:34:19] Paige
It was an awful experience or I I started to work in the spaces,
[00:34:27] Paige
Youth spaces where I could make change. And I first I found out about PRISM
[00:34:34] Paige
and I tried to get my friends involved in that so that could help them
[00:34:37] Paige
a bit. And that worked. But at the time prison was only in city of Darwin and
[00:34:43] Paige
casuarina area. And that’s a bit far from palmerston,
[00:34:46] Paige
that we were and the transporting was just built for it. So
[00:34:53] Paige
I wanted something in palmerston and a safe space that they could go to and and
[00:34:59] Paige
a twenty nineteen start of twenty twenty.
[00:35:01] Paige
I applied for a spot on the Northern territory Youth Roundtable,
[00:35:05] Paige
which if people don’t know what that is, that is a Youth advisory board,
[00:35:12] Paige
the Northern territory government that works closely alongside the Department
[00:35:19] Paige
of Youth affairs in trying to bring attention to issues that young
[00:35:26] Paige
people are facing and that is affecting the Youth community. Are these young people
[00:35:33] Paige
from Darwin, palmerston, Nolan, Boyd, Alice Springs,
[00:35:37] Paige
Katherine everywhere in the empty and remote communities as well as people on that
[00:35:43] Paige
community on that board. It’s. It’s a great thing. It’s
[00:35:47] Paige
a year long position. There’s like four quarterly meetings and the last meeting leads up to
[00:35:53] Paige
a big presentation to stakeholders within the community and the chief
[00:36:00] Paige
minister and some other politicians of I’ll say projects or
[00:36:07] Paige
ideas that these young people have and work for. And so for me that was building an
[00:36:12] Paige
LGBTQ place in palmerston and As before, in between the third meeting and the fourth meeting, the final one,
[00:36:22] Paige
I held the first pride event in history as a consultation event. It was initially just going to be
[00:36:28] Paige
a small thing in the rec center, inviting people to come down, have a chat,
[00:36:33] Paige
fill out some surveys, and be in a space that they,
[00:36:39] Paige
they felt safe in to have these open discussions that ended up blowing up and being
[00:36:44] Paige
a lot bigger than what we anticipated,
[00:36:46] Paige
and we ended up having one hundred and thirty four people through the door on the
[00:36:50] Paige
day. So we had to expand it a lot more before because we had our interviews and stuff we had,
[00:36:56] Paige
we got drag territory on board. They came in, they did some performances,
[00:37:01] Paige
they spoke and talked with the young people as well,
[00:37:04] Paige
which was great to see interactive with them. We had the consultation station where
[00:37:10] Paige
I’ve had two people to fill out
[00:37:11] Paige
a survey about what they wanted to see in the community. How that, how,
[00:37:16] Paige
what services could we provide that could support them all, and out of one hundred,
[00:37:22] Paige
out of all the people that serve one hundred percent of them said they wanted an LGBTQ plus safe.
[00:37:29] Josh
That’s pretty resounding of
[00:37:30] Paige
them said that they wanted that.
[00:37:33] Paige
And that was one of the things that stuck out to me and so I clearly there is
[00:37:39] Paige
a want and a need for this in the community. So let’s make it happen. And two years later,
[00:37:46] Paige
the Headspace in palmerston got opened,
[00:37:49] Paige
which acts as that safe space as well as the Compton rec center and the pumps. And
[00:37:54] Paige
the library, as I said before, being a sort of unofficial safe space,
[00:37:59] Paige
but it is safe for LGBTQ people.
[00:38:02] Paige
And that continuing support of the community is wonderful. Also
[00:38:09] Josh
It’s great to see. Yeah. Especially when you put lots of effort and work into something and,
[00:38:14] Josh
and you get that feedback from the community and might add how good of events for
[00:38:18] Josh
that. Because you can get surveys, you can send them out digitally, of course,
[00:38:21] Josh
but getting someone physically there in front of you and being inspired by what’s
[00:38:25] Josh
happening around them. You’re going to get such better input into a survey. So yeah,
[00:38:30] Josh
well done. That’s awesome. And so that was the first one and now it’s an annual
[00:38:34] Josh
event by the sounds of it.
[00:38:35] Paige
Yep. It was called the pride picnic,
[00:38:37] Paige
but it has been amended to the pride Youth day to more focus on the young people in
[00:38:43] Paige
the community. But it is still an event open to people of all ages. Yep.
[00:38:49] Josh
That’s yeah, that’s very cool. So, sounds like you’re coming back to the territory pretty regularly. Have you got any,
[00:38:58] Josh
any plans for your next trips and, you know,
[00:39:01] Josh
it always seems like you are heading back in and factoring in different events. You
[00:39:06] Josh
can be part of by that.
[00:39:08] Paige
So I definitely will always be home to me
[00:39:12] Paige
and I’m very proud to be from Northern territory. And I’m enjoying being able to
[00:39:19] Paige
get this new life experience and then take back and help make further changes and
[00:39:25] Paige
evolve and spread more awareness and education. And also while I’m down here,
[00:39:30] Paige
it’s putting me in an opportunity to know about the Northern territory,
[00:39:35] Paige
and it has so much more to offer than just crocodiles and hot weather. You know,
[00:39:41] Paige
because that’s the general consensus. I get from
[00:39:43] Paige
a lot of people down here of it just have this assumption about the Northern
[00:39:48] Paige
territory, but they’re so incorrect. Oh, well Yes,
[00:39:52] Paige
we’ve that so much more to the place. Also spreading awareness of things that we
[00:39:58] Paige
don’t have there. So the lack of services and well not, not lack of services,
[00:40:04] Paige
the lack of support that the services receive. Yeah. Because of how remote we are
[00:40:10] Paige
and how we don’t have the staff or source resources to sustain the amount of people
[00:40:17] Paige
that need to access these services. And how one person
[00:40:24] Paige
can only do so much in one of those service roles. Yeah. And what needs to be changed?
[00:40:31] Paige
What other states and states with more people and resources and people who might
[00:40:38] Paige
be looking to move off University and stuff like that. What they can do to help
[00:40:43] Paige
maybe move there or provide in the Northern territory. Sure.
[00:40:48] Josh
Yeah, I always love when I get to visit up in Darwin and I do want to visit some other
[00:40:54] Josh
spots as well in the territory, but it is just kind of logistically,
[00:40:58] Josh
it is usually Darwin and people.
[00:40:59] Josh
I often ask if I say, what’s my favorite spot to, you know,
[00:41:02] Josh
to go visit for work for the awards or things like that. It’s hard to quantify
[00:41:06] Josh
sometimes because there is just like this really amazing vibe and atmosphere and
[00:41:12] Josh
probably just due to the people to be honest because everyone’s so friendly and I
[00:41:18] Josh
just find everyone so interesting that you get to, to me in the territory.
[00:41:21] Paige
Absolutely. Yep. The territorians is something else. The
[00:41:25] Paige
people in the Northern territory are so welcoming and friendly and they always
[00:41:32] Paige
open to having people understand and like really get an
[00:41:38] Paige
idea of what the territory is. And it’s always great to see when people from other
[00:41:45] Paige
states come up and it is like, oh wow, get into you so much more than I thought.
[00:41:52] Josh
Yeah, I agree. I feel like just everyone has to go visit. Absolutely,
[00:41:58] Josh
absolutely. You have to do it. So, Paige, you know,
[00:42:02] Josh
I’ve been finding you very inspirational today and still, you know,
[00:42:08] Josh
forgetting sometimes that your invested University life. I completely forget that at the start,
[00:42:13] Josh
just the way that you carry yourself.
[00:42:15] Josh
You explained things very eloquently and your
[00:42:18] Josh
passion is outstanding. So I’m inspired by you, but I want to find out for me, Paige,
[00:42:23] Josh
what is it that inspires you and you can interpret that any way you like.
[00:42:29] Paige
Thank you. What I think inspires me most is seeing the effect
[00:42:36] Paige
a positive experience can have on a person and specifically
[00:42:40] Paige
a young person and and something that vividly sticks out to me is the first pride
[00:42:47] Paige
picnic that we run. A little girl of maybe about eleven or twelve came up to
[00:42:54] Paige
- And this was after I had done a speech on
[00:42:58] Paige
a panel and said thank you for having this. I didn’t know about it until we were
[00:43:05] Paige
walking Past and I dragged my mom in here saying we have to go,
[00:43:08] Paige
it’s my people. And then she gave me
[00:43:12] Paige
a big hug and just thanked me for the event and really resonates with
[00:43:19] Paige
- Resonated with me at the time and still does just to see the effect that being
[00:43:24] Paige
seen and being heard and your community being seen and being heard as on
[00:43:31] Paige
someone is astronomical. And I can’t I can’t recommend
[00:43:38] Paige
it enough to be able to have voices heard and visibility of a community.
[00:43:45] Josh
Yeah, for sure. Great message Paige and I can only imagine that feeling that you can
[00:43:52] Josh
carry with you to know that someone and you know,
[00:43:55] Josh
they feel that they’re going to have that just that event at that age as well as
[00:43:59] Josh
that pivotal also you know, you know that maybe like your memory unlocked,
[00:44:04] Josh
like literally will be that for that person. I’m sure so, yeah,
[00:44:08] Josh
thank you for your time. If people wanting to stay in touch with you and you know,
[00:44:12] Josh
connect or follow your journey, is there any way that you’d recommend that they could do that?
[00:44:17] Paige
You can find me on my social media is on the Page horrigan. And yeah,
[00:44:22] Paige
from there I tend to post things. I know a lot of people use LinkedIn,
[00:44:28] Paige
I can’t say I’m one of them, but I am on that if you want to find me. Yeah.
[00:44:33] Josh
Awesome, thank you Page. Well, yeah,
[00:44:35] Josh
thank you so much for your time. Today really appreciate taking the time to come on inspirational stories podcast. Yeah,
[00:44:40] Josh
I’m looking forward to following your journey from a personal standpoint. And we’ll see see what’s next, especially in
[00:44:48] Josh
a couple of years when you finished University. Thanks, Paige.
[00:44:51] Paige
Thank you so much.
[00:44:57] Christine
The inspirational australian’s podcast is brought to you by awards, Australia we recognise,
[00:45:02] Christine
celebrate and share the stories of inspirational Australians through our awards
[00:45:07] Christine
programs across the country. To find out more to nominate an inspirational
[00:45:13] Christine
Australian in your life, or to partner with our awards, visit awards, Australia dotcom. If you enjoyed today’s story,
[00:45:21] Christine
we’d love it if you could subscribe rate and review to make sure you don’t miss an
[00:45:25] Christine
episode. And to help our guests reach more people with their inspirational stories
[00:45:30] Christine
. episode. And to help our guests reach more people with their inspirational
[00:45:29] Christine
stories.
