Listeners to a recent morning show on Tasmanian radio station Heart 107.3 were treated to a frank and up front interview with a local representative, Senator Jacqui Lambie.
During a lighthearted and non-political Q&A last Tuesday, the 43-year-old revealed that she hadn't dated for eleven years due to commitments to her children and her job.
When asked what she would look for in a prospective suitor she replied that “they must have heaps of cash and...a package between their legs. Let's be honest.”
Later, on the same show and with the hosts acting as a dating agency, a 22-year-old man named Jamie called in to ask the senator on a date. Spurred on by one of the presenters, Lambie asked the young man if he was “well-hung” to which he replied “like a donkey”.
Cue the inevitable 21st century, 24-hour-news-cycle storm with experts and opinion makers from here, there and everywhere drafted in to give gravitas to this most serious existential and political crisis.
For her own part, Lambie later issued a statement in which she apologised to people “she may have offended [and] especially the elderly” but she qualified the apology by saying “there's a few people out there offended and there's a few people that are laughing their rear end off. Let's be honest.”
Even her harshest critics would be guilty of being deliberately obtuse if on listening to the relevant clips of the interview they still viewed her comments as anything other than one hundred per cent tongue in cheek.
But of course official Australia got stuck in straight away. There were “disappointed” colleagues while opposition members thought her “an absolute disgrace”.
Tasmania's anti-discrimination Commissioner, Robin Banks, felt that Lambie could have been “light-hearted without objectifying or being sexist or demeaning to other people.”
Brett Whiteley an MP and member of the ruling Australian Liberal Party pointed out that ignoring her comments would mean applying something of a double-standard.
“I can only imagine the public outrage if a male member of parliament, myself included obviously, had participated in a similar interview and referred to the opposite sex in such a way,” he said. “All hell would've broken loose.”
Whiteley does have a point and if he and the men of Australia are offended by the senator's comments then so be it.
Maybe it's the feminist in me though that gets some satisfaction from the thought of the macho Aussie man going into his bathroom with a ruler or a measuring tape just to see if what he's got down under really was adequate.
Because, and “let's be honest”, if Jackie Lambie's comments, made in the context of a lighthearted radio show, made some men feel uncomfortable it is nothing compared to the regular abuse, judgments and comments on physical shape that women have to put up with; particularly in the world of politics.
Not a week went by during former Australian Prime Minister Julia Guillard's tenure that some comment about her personal life and/or femininity wasn't made. Germaine Greer, of all people, told her she had a “big arse” and that she needed to change her dress sense because of it. Protestors' placards repeatedly referred to her as a bitch and a witch while reference was made over and over again to her decision not to have children.
In 2007, Liberal Party Senator, Bill Heffernan said: “Anyone who has chosen to remain deliberately barren … they've got no idea what life's about.”
Similar comments were made about South Korean President, Park Geun Hye, who has been judged for the same thing. Moon Jae-in, a rival Presidential candidate suggested that because his opponent had “never lived a life agonising over childbirth, childcare, education and grocery prices...she has no femininity.”
Barren-brained comments like these are not restricted to Australia and South Korea of course. In the United States, Hillary Clinton was subjected to repeated abuse during her battle for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination. She was either too emotional, meaning hysterical, or not emotional enough, and therefore cold. Nutcrackers were produced in her image and at a rally in New Hampshire she was ten minutes into a speech when a man stood up from the crowd with a large placard reading “iron my shirt!”. He shouted the same many times before being ejected.
Two years ago in France, Cecile Duflot, the then French housing minister, was subjected to oh-la-las and wolf-whistles as she took to the floor in a dress to deliver a speech. Rejecting claims that the incident was sexist, representative Patrick Balkany, put the blame on Duflot, suggesting she had worn the dress so they, the male parliamentarians, “wouldn't listen to what she was saying".
Since issuing her apology, Lambie has said that she “doesn't regret saying what she said”.
“If you can't have a bit of laugh over breakfast,” she continued, “I have to ask where's our Aussie sense of humour going?”
Unfortunately for Lambie, it would appear to be gone already. A poll conducted by The Sydney Morning Herald asked its readers if they thought “the comments were inappropriate”. Of the 26,485 voters 77% said yes while 23% said no.
Around the World with Jonathan deBurca Butler is on The Moncrieff Show every Monday from 3pm.
You can follow Jonathan on Twitter on @deburcabutler.
