The Coalition and mainstream media have blasted Clive Palmer over his stupid and sexist comments about Peta Credlin. Noely Neate wonders where they were during Julia Gillard's prime ministership (please note sarcasm font).
Unless you have been living under a rock, you would be well aware of Clive Pamer's stupid and sexist comments about Tony Abbott's chief of staff, Peta Credlin.
I say ‘living under a rock’ as the media are ‘outraged’. Clive made his comments on Monday night and journo’s were ‘shocked’ — tweeting how ‘nasty’ he was.
Ahh... I fondly recall the same disparaging commentary by Sky's Laura Jayes every time Julia Gillard was dissed. Oh wait...
By Tuesday morning, James Massola was admirably quick out of the gate with 'Grow up: Clive Palmer's comments about Peta Credlin have embarrassed only himself' and the outrage had seriously begun.
By Tuesday afternoon, we had Sky News host David Speers (the selfsame apologist for Liberal Party staffer Grahame Morris after the latter had said former PM Julia Gillard should be kicked to death) focussing almost exclusively on the sexism — not only outraged by Clive, but also that members of the ‘left’ and the ALP have not exactly been overwhelming in their condemnation of Clive Palmer, nor yelling very loudly for him to apologise to Peta Credlin.
Yessiree! The media have ‘finally’ seen the light, they know sexism when they see it and with fire in their belly will call it out and name it!
Now, on Wednesday, we find it is not just the ‘left’ that are silent on Clive, Ms Miranda Devine is seriously disappointed with the ‘feminists’ too and with the same fire in her belly gives them a flogging in 'Feminists let Clive strip them of their integrity'.
Of course it goes without saying that Mia Freedman, the doyen of women’s issues, is disappointed too — but thankfully she has her own Jamila Rizvi to set things right in Mia’s world (sorry, no link to that one — a principal of mine).
Yes, the same Mia who so staunchly stood against sexism with her defence of what Julia Gillard was copping. Oh wait, sorry, that was in defence of Tony Abbott, my bad...
Again, Mia is blaming 'the left’.
I could carry on with examples, but I won’t; every single news show from Sunrise to ABC Breakfast News is up in arms, fighting the good fight against sexism and Clive.
It is a thing of beauty and wonder to see. It is also the height of hypocrisy.
Not many are condoning Clive’s comments. In fact, many I speak to are cranky that Clive screwed up a perfect opportunity to display exactly how unfair the PPL of calibre actually is.
At the moment, more than a few punters are seeing Clive as the only thing that can help us in regard to the terribly inequitable Coalition budget being inflicted upon us. Instead, the drip misses the mark politically and to add insult to injury, displaying his ridiculous sexism in the process.
Australia in recent years has probably seen the ultimate in just how nasty sexism can be.
Julia Gillard herself experienced everything from subtle and snide sexism to full on misogyny. Our esteemed media response was *crickets*.
And not only Ms Gillard, but Penny Wong and many others from the so-called 'left' also experienced some serious nastiness.
Again, media informed the public that it was just politics”, “taken out of context”, had a very serious discussion about just what exactly 'misogyny’ really means and finished by saying we dumb punters just never understand the ‘context’ of any situation so we should just pipe down.
So, Coalition women are lecturing Palmer about saying hurtful things about a female. You couldn't make this shit up. pic.twitter.com/j5W7daMKGr
— Dave Donovan (@davrosz) June 3, 2014
I remember those days when that picture was splashed all over the screens of the TV with demands for Mr Abbott to apologise and maybe even step down. Oh wait, that was my imagination.
Many women, many men and awful lot of younger people were seriously enraged — yes there was outrage, the intensity of which came from the fact that the ‘media’ did not highlight, nor did they did not call for anyone to apologise; in fact, they explained it all away and made out that any of us who were outraged were simply hysterical?
Having an "attack of the vapours" in the words of Tony Abbott:
Tony Abbott the Minister for Women said "stop having the vapours" to Tanya Plibersek yesterday http://t.co/jqkrAD85EE pic.twitter.com/HMigpwyoqn
— Sylvie Stern (@sylviestern) May 27, 2014
To Mia, Miranda and every other snooty journo commenting how the mythical ‘left’ & ‘feminists’ are not outraged. You know why we are all not yelling?
WE DON’T NEED TO!
You in the media have FINALLY noticed political sexism and called it out.
Shame it is so bloody late, but hey, better late than never.
I would naively like to think that this sudden change of heart in not accepting sexism in our politicians is the media have reflected and learned their lesson and this is the standard of reporting we can expect in the future.
Sadly, after watching in recent years, I am more inclined to think that the outrage is more that someone from ‘their team’ has experienced it, so it is ‘different’. Not to mention they all tend to loathe Clive, so it is a bonus that they can actually whack him with something of substance.
At my most cynical, I also wonder if it is currying favour with Ms Credlin herself, as it is patently clear she is the gatekeeper for the PM – and, hence, the Government – so backing the injustice against her is a pretty good career move too?
Yes, I know, I will probably go to hell for suggesting that.
Let’s hope that my cynical thoughts are way off base and the Australian media have actually seen the light in regard to sexism.
I would seriously suggest that before you – the media* – go lecturing us punters about outrage in regard to sexism, you take a good hard look at yourselves, your past inactions invalidate you and do NOT give you the right to lecture us!
Cheers,
The author would like to note not all media ignored the sexism in politics in recent years, there was the odd shining light. This piece was originally published on yathink.com.au and has been republished with permission. You can follow Noely on Twitter @yathinkn. For a detailed analysis of the relic media's attitude towards sexist attacks on 'the left' read 'The conspiracy of silence about Grahame 'kicker' Morris' by managing editor David Donovan.
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