Pinewood Student Participates in the European Youth Parliament
April 23, 2015

After being selected out of 126 students from schools all over
Thessaloniki, I became part of the European Youth Parliament of Greece.
On March 28th the Greek European Youth Parliament flew to Luxembourg for Luxembourg’s 2nd National Selection Conference.
Being
part of the FEMM Committee our topic was Addressing, Eliminating and
Responding to Gender Based Violence. Some of the fundamental points made
were creating “safe houses” for men, and of course educating people and
strengthening the justice system that handles the perpetrators. A
significant point risen during debate was that being part of the FEMM
Committee means giving gravity to men’s situation as well as women’s
because despite the notion patriarchy that everyone is fighting against
many forget that men are also objectified and society has a set of
expectations for them too, such as being “manly”.
Our
committee’s resolution was one of the few that passed and was regarded
as one of the most successful in the whole General Assembly. What was
more successful of all however was meeting people from all over Europe
like Germany, Lithuania, Spain, Bosnia and many more countries. For four
consecutive days we lived under the same roof, ate together, traveled
around the city, shared our opinions and ideas and challenged ourselves!
The European Youth Parliament even though has no direct influence on
the decisions taken by the actual European Parliament has an influence
on the youth who are tomorrow’s
global leaders. This experience was one that I would recommend to every
single student because it changes your worldview and gives voice to the
thoughts in your head that you often are afraid to express.
Galini Poimenidou, ’16