Virginia Haussegger's Blogspot

Women's Empowerment Principles

2011-05-09T12:42:00.001+10:00

7 steps to empowering women - across the globe - to participate fully in all sectors and throughout all levels of economic activity... starting with strong corporate leadership - through to community initiatives and advocacy.

2010-10-28T10:12:00.002+11:00

This Blogspot is no longer active.

For all my latest columns, articles and event news, please go to my website www.virginiahaussegger.com.au

The burqa is a War on Women

2010-05-21T13:45:00.006+10:00

The Burqa is a war on women

By Virginia Haussegger

The Age 21 May 2010

See The Age for this article or my Website.

When young Afghan girls learn to fight

2010-05-21T13:31:00.003+10:00

(Najeeba, the Taw kwon do champion, training at Hope House, Kabul. photo 2009)

Sporting chance for girls

By Virginia Haussegger

The National Times 6 April 2010

The Canberra Times

(see The National Times for this article, or my Website)

The Baby Boom and 'having it all'

2010-04-02T12:44:00.006+11:00

Whiff of defeat in the air

By Virginia Haussegger

The Canberra Times 27 March 2010

See website for this article and leave your comments below.

An inconvenient truth: women are just not that important

2010-03-22T10:52:00.006+11:00

(Report by the Ministry of Women Youth and Children Affairs, Solomon Islands)

Acts of shame as girls die

By Virginia Haussegger

The Canberra Times, 20 March 2010

See Website for this article and leave your comments below.

Grief, sorrow and gifts from the dying

2010-03-14T14:08:00.005+11:00

Good grief in dying acts

By Virginia Haussegger

The Canberra Times 13 March 2010

See website for this article and leave your comments below.

Women's pay - are we there yet?

2010-03-14T13:55:00.008+11:00

(Photo: Zelda D'Aprano chained to the doors of the Commonwealth Building 1969)

It's back to the future

By Virginia Haussegger

The Canberra Times 6 March 2010

See website for this article and leave your comments below.

Young feminist awakening

2010-02-21T12:19:00.006+11:00

(Photo: A hardly "hairy" Germaine Greer)

Energised by entitlement

By Virginia Haussegger

The Canberra Times, 20 Feb 2010

(See website for this article and leave your comments below.)

Tony Abbott - God's gift to women

2010-02-13T17:44:00.004+11:00

(Photo, ABC. Tony Abbott learns to iron a shirt).

Beware the iron fist

By Virginia Haussegger

The Canberra Times, 13 Feb 2010

See website for this article and add your comments below.

Self-immolation in Afghanistan

2010-02-07T10:49:00.006+11:00

(Photo by Amin Palangi, from his film "Hidden Generation")

A witness to horror

By Virginia Haussegger

The Canberra Times, 6 February 2010.

See website for this article and add your comments below.

Virginity - the "ultimate gift"

2010-01-30T14:32:00.005+11:00

Virgin on absurd, Tony

by Virginia Haussegger

The Canberra Times, 30 Jan 2010

See Website for this article and add your comments below.

The spirit of giving... and donating

2009-12-19T10:36:00.002+11:00

(Photo: World Vision, Thailand)

Special gifts in giving

By Virginia Haussegger

See website for this article ... and add your comments below.

2009-12-13T15:57:00.010+11:00

It's been one hell of a pregnancy, but finally I've given birth ... to a website!

I've named her ... www.virginiahaussegger.com.au

... yes, I know! It's a hell of a long name. But I reckon it kinda suits her. What d' ya think?

Feminism, Bo-Tax and the Beauty Myth lives on ...

2009-12-13T14:27:00.003+11:00

Feminists buy into myth

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 12th Dec 2009

Every time I use the “f” word in public I get walloped. Feminism is a funny thing. Just when you think you’ve got the old dear worked out, she throws off the knee rug, leaps up from the rocker and pulls your hair. Nasty. It’s usually the result of some profound disagreement. And if we’ve learnt nothing else during feminism’s third wave, we’ve certainly learnt that hell hath no fury like a feminist scorned. So I tread with trepidation.

But I take refuge in the knowledge that feminism is indeed a “broad church” as writer Elizabeth Farrelly once put it, “its cults many and varied”. Which is a kind way of saying – it takes all sorts. Yet, I would never have thought the head of the most famous feminist group in the US, the National Organisation for Women, was the sort of feminist to fall victim to the beauty myth – all over again. But she has.

Last week Terry O’Neill, the President of NOW, came out swinging against a proposed US tax on Botox, arguing that it was a “tax on middle-aged women”. If Naomi Wolf was dead, I’d be saying that she’d be turning in her grave right now. Fortunately she’s not dead, but perhaps her 1990 treatise on how “images of beauty are used against women” has been laid to rest – and long forgotten.

As chief of NOW, O’Neill leads a massive organization that has long been one of the most powerful voices for women in the US. Founded by Betty Friedan, NOW has been instrumental in groundbreaking legislative reform, and the organisation’s energetic campaigns have served as a model for women’s groups around the world, including in Australia. The most famous NOW action - burning a trash can full of bras and girdles outside a Miss America beauty pageant – became the stuff of folklore, and made ‘bra-burning’ a universal symbol of women’s liberation. As a symbol it’s perhaps been over-hyped, but at least it grabbed attention and made a point.

So what on earth is O’Neill doing now by falling backwards into the bottomless pit that is the beauty myth? When quizzed by Judith Warner in The New York Times as to why a tax on botox was “devaluing” women “for being middle aged”, O’Neill argued that access to cosmetic surgery – botox, breast enhancement, face lifts etc – is an important contemporary feminist issue. In a nutshell, this leading feminist is suggesting that if middle aged women are serious about getting - or keeping - a job, then they must buy into the myth that they are only as good as they look, and spend money on a good plastic surgeon. “I know a lot of women whose earning power stalled out or kicked down as they entered into their 50s, unlike their male counterparts’, whose really went up”, she told Warner. And no doubt that is very true. But is cosmetic surgery really the answer? And are women really the problem?

This issue is hot in the US right now because the massive health care reform bill currently before Congress includes a 5 percent excise tax on cosmetic surgery and “related procedures”. It’s been dubbed the ‘Bo-tax’. O’Neill is arguing against it because she says it hits middle aged women hardest: which it no doubt does. But her claim that cosmetic surgery is not a luxury, but rather a modern day necessity is where she comes unstuck. Her argument that it’s up to women to nip, tuck and enhance themselves as much as they can afford, because “we live in a society that punishes women for getting older”, is where her particular brand of feminism not only falls apart, but shatters with contradiction.

As President of NOW, surely O’Neill is aware of her own organizations “Love Your Body” campaign? In its website blurb women are told how dreadful it is that Hollywood and the fashion, diet and cosmetic industries “make each of us believe that our bodies are unacceptable and need constant improvement”. The campaign calls on women to rally and “Together we can fight back”. So, where’s the ‘fight back” in encouraging middle age women to believe that the battle has been lost, and their best weapon of defence is the cosmetic surgeon’s scalpel, or the beautician’s syringe?

There is no doubt cosmetic surgery is no longer an ‘if’ but a ‘when’ proposition for many women. And as a dull ‘sameness’ pervades celebrity circles, where its getting increasingly harder to tell one puffed lip and expressionless brow from the other, perhaps it just doesn’t matter. Perhaps it’s just an exercise in choice. But where is the feminist scrutiny of that choice?

What hope is there of women receiving any respect and admiration for the wisdom and maturity they’ve achieved by middle age, if even NOW is telling them they’re old hags? Ironically the NOW “Love Your Body” campaign appears aimed at girls and young women, rather than those in their 40s, 50s or beyond. And yet it’s that older demographic most at risk of being socially sidelined and rendered invisible.

Tony Abbott's women woes

2009-12-07T11:48:00.005+11:00

The New Face of Politics

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 5 Dec 2009, and The National Times.

Picture this. And it's worth it, because it says something about what's happening to Australian politics.

Thursday night, Kristina Keneally and Carmel Tebbutt front an excited media pack. New South Wale's newest Premier and Deputy face a barrage of questions and lob back short, sharp answers. Keneally has just ousted her bigger, boofy colleague Nathan Rees. Unfazed by the scrum, she takes charge. Ever the pro, the long serving Tebbutt stands strong and sturdy by her side. She's done this before. First question to Keneally suggests she's not the real goods, but just a stand-in with strings attached: "Are you Eddie Obeid's puppet?" a journalist asks. "No," is the constrained reply.

Flick back a day to Wednesday late afternoon, and another attractive duo face the cameras. This time it's acting Prime Minister Julia Gillard with Climate Change Minister Penny Wong at her side. Both field questions from the press gallery, without the verbal flourish we've come to expect from the foppish PM and his predecessors. They're clear and concise, with just a hint of angry refrain. The Government's ETS legislation has failed in the Senate, yet again, and both women are choosing their words carefully. You get the sense they're gearing up for a major showdown, but not right now.

Flick back now to Tuesday, and it's another leadership duo in front of the cameras. This time it's the perennial Liberal bridesmaid Julie Bishop, standing next to her newest partner Tony Abbott. The impeccably dressed Bishop smiles awkwardly as Abbott throws an arm around her shoulders, squeezes a few times, and tells the media mob before them, "She's a loyal girl". His grin is wide and goofy. And just in case we haven't all caught the message about who is boss, he squeezes Bishop one more time. She didn't show it on the outside, but surely Bishop flinched on the inside, knowing she wasn't a "loyal" girl at all. She hadn't voted for Abbott in the leadership ballot, and only the night before she'd been mocking him with her ex. She'd been laughing about his budgie smugglers and – according to a jilted Malcolm Turnbull – saying a whole lot more.

So what's wrong with Tuesday's leadership picture? And what does it tell us about where political power is heading?

The selection of Tony Abbott as Opposition Leader and prime ministerial aspirant took everyone by surprise, including him. "It's the last thing I would have expected a week ago," he told the media, still panting from the rush. But in choosing him, his Liberal colleagues have taken a giant leap backwards. It's as if the deep, conservative core of a befuddled and wounded party is making a desperate, last ditch attempt to return to the "good old days". The days when a soft lens image of mummy, dad, two kids and a white picket fence was considered an appropriate way to sell Liberal party policy. It flopped backed then. And it's eons out of date now.

Tony Abbott might be an affable kind of bloke: good-looking, energetic and certainly not boring. At a social gathering, over a drink, some might even find him charming. The way he wears his heart on his sleeve, says what he thinks, and reaches out to people he's concerned about can be quite endearing. But Abbot's era has passed us by. Thankfully.

Australia no longer has room at the top for men who hug their female colleagues like baby sisters and call them loyal girls. Or mutter "that's bullshit" to their female opponents, while smiling for the cameras and refusing to look them in the eye. We've long passed the time when women will tolerate having their reproductive choices taken away from them: when they will accept a male health minister blocking their access to safe termination options. Women are well beyond being lectured to by men about unwanted pregnancies and told they must be "ashamed". And as economic and careers pressures continue to force women to delay childbearing, women are angry to hear the likes of Tony Abbot tell them that a woman at 43 is too old to deserve Medicare support for IVF. It may well be a difficult age at which to have a baby, but it's a woman's choice, not Abbott's. We all know that.

Such public patronising of women doesn't wash with the general public anymore. They vote it down.This is not a "red-fanged rage" against Tony Abbott, by "aggressively secular, paelo-feminists" as columnist Miranda Devine shouted. In fact, no one is shouting but her. This is simply a broad rejection by Australian women of old-fashioned patronising and a daddy-takes-charge style of politics. Daddy is no longer in charge. Nor is mummy, for that matter.

What we have in political leadership circles now is an emergent understanding that a diverse range of women have taken a place at the top table. And they're not all "working mothers". They can be single, childless, lesbian, Asian and atheist. The world has moved on since the conservative chorus — with Abbott's mindset — was in charge. Women know that. Pity the federal Liberal caucus hasn't worked it out.

Malalai Joya's battle for Afghanistan

2009-11-28T18:10:00.002+11:00

(Photo by RAWA; Malalai Joya)

Land of withering hopes

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 28 Nov 2009, and The National Times

She's pint sized, but she goes like a rocket and talks like a threshing machine. And for the past month Malalai Joya - dubbed by western media as “the bravest woman in Afghanistan' - has been raising her voice across North America to send a strong and unambiguous message to Barack Obama, ahead of his decision next week on Afghanistan.

Her message is simple - pull out now. Malalai Joya shot to international fame when she won a seat in Afghanistan's new Parliament, at just 27 years old. By 2007 her ranting against government corruption, misogyny and the presence of criminal warlords in parliament, eventually got her thrown out of office.

The US President has been accused of 'dithering' as he's taken several months to consider whether to commit the extra 40,000 troops General McCrystal has requested to fight the Taliban. He's under considerable domestic pressure to cease the inordinate spending – 100 million US dollars a day on the military alone – and is grappling to convince a disbelieving public that the war in Afghanistan is winnable, or worthwhile.If he wants an easy out, Malalai Joys is certainly handing him one.

She insists the “occupation” of her homeland by US, NATO and allied forces – including Australia – is doing nothing to help the most vulnerable and innocent victims of war - the women and children. In fact, she argues the reverse: that foreign troop occupation has destroyed many more civilian lives than it has helped. She blames the US and NATO for providing succour to criminal warlords, by propping them up with government positions and fattening their coffers with foreign money and resources.

She also blames the US for the massive increase in poppy production since 2001, which now has Afghanistan supplying 93 percent of the world's opium.

Joya argues that “democracy cannot come from war” and that Afghanistan can never be “liberated” by foreign forces. She insists that only Afghans can find a way towards a peaceful and secure future. While she is stridently anti-American, and its imperialist allies, Joya nevertheless reserve her strongest bile for Afghanistan's warlords and fundamentalists who treat women like “caged” animals.

To hear Joya rail is compelling. I've sat before her and was struck by her youthful passion and fearless dedication to her country. Those darting dark eyes have a way of pinning you down, and making you listen.

But at this stage of the war there is a hole in her argument, and it starts with some simple numbers.Yes, atrocious acts of war have killed innocent civilians. The cluster bombings in Farah province in May massacred at least 150, mostly women and children. It was a shocking act – for which the US later apologised. But women are dying across Afghanistan in much bigger numbers from basic neglect. They're dying because there is no government system that provides basic care and protection to help them when they're sick, when they're beaten, abused, or even when they're hungry.

The Karzai Government is criminally negligent in its failure to support its people. The UN's 2009 Human Development Index ranks Afghanistan at 181 out of 182 countries: almost the worst place in the world in which to live. By the time you've finished reading today's newspaper, another woman will have died from reproductive complications, due to a lack of health care. One dies every 30 minutes; that's 17,376 women a year. According to the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, 80 percent of those deaths are preventable. This is a human rights scandal, and yet the Karzai Government has not built a single hospital for women.

More than 70 percent of women submit to forced marriages, and according to UNIFEM more than half the female population marry before the legal age of 16. Female depression is widespread and the rate of self immolation has skyrocketed. Domestic violence is endemic, with one UK report suggesting it affects 80 percent of households. Yet the Karzai Government has not built a single shelter or welfare centre for women.

However, some gutsy Afghan women activists have stepped in where the limp and useless government won't.

Since 2003 six women's shelters have been quietly established by local women, with the financial backing of international NGOs and donors. One of the board members of the Afghan Women's Network, Orzala Ashraf, was clear about this when she told me “the opportunities to support women have increased tremendously with the resources available now through NGO supports”.

During the Taliban regime Ashraf ran underground schools. Now she heads a large network of health and education programs for women and children: “Before we didn't have any grants or funds to do this work," she said.Loosely networked, there is a plethora of small internationally supported women's advocacy groups doing vital work across Afghanistan.

Should foreign troops withdraw, even Malalai Joya has conceded there will be civil war, before a new regime is established. With such instability and lack of security, it's most doubtful international NGOs and donors will stay the course.

As the world pulls away from Afghanistan, the support funds will dry up. Then, as history has proven, the women of Afghanistan will be forgotten – again.

Colonel Gaddafi calls attractive girls to Islam

2009-11-22T19:30:00.004+11:00

(Photo: Gaddafi with one of his all female bodyguard team 2009)

Mad Dog's Muslim rant exposes hidden pain

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 21 Nov 2009, and The National Times.

So the mad dog of the Middle East is after Berlusconi’s beauties. And not just one or two high paid hookers. Colonel Gaddafi wants them in their hundreds and he’s happy to pay around 50 Euro’s a piece. Which sounds cheap, if it’s sex he’s after; but he’s not. He’s after the soul of their sex.

The story doing the international rounds this week about the crazy Libyan despot’s attempts to convert Italian women to Islam is funny. But like much tragi-comedy, beneath the slapstick lurks something that makes us very uncomfortable, even while we laugh.

Having ruled his fiefdom with unchallenged power for some 40 years, Gaddafi remains utterly contemptuous of the West; its traditions, rule of law, and its various religions. Most importantly, he is contemptuous of Western women.

He ranted like a demented fool during his last appearance in the US, demanding to know who killed JFK. And at an international gathering earlier this year he roared into the microphone that he was the one and only “king of kings of Africa and imam of Muslims”.

But this week, while attending a United Nations global food summit, Gaddafi grabbed the headlines not for raving, but for chasing girls. On the face of it that’s hardly shocking, particularly given the craggy faced 67 year old tyrant insists on travelling with 40 female bodyguards: all of whom are young, beautiful, and supposedly virgins. But it wasn’t his sexual urge that led to 200 women patiently sitting before him; it was Gaddafi’s mad and dangerous spiritual urge.

The crazed Libyan leader who celebrates appalling acts of violence and mayhem, wanted to turn these women away from their “Christian” god, and their “wrong” religion, and towards Islam instead. “God’s religion is Islam” he reportedly bellowed at the surprised young crowd.

The women had unwittingly answered an advertisement calling for attractive, “pleasant” females, aged between 18 and 35, and at least 1.7 metres tall. It also stipulated “well dressed” and no mini-skirts. Given the ad was placed by a ‘hostess’ agency, the women assumed they were to be glamorous extras at some high class party. Instead they were corralled onto buses and taken to the Libyan ambassador’s residence in Rome for a long, booming lecture by Colonal Gaddafi about Islam’s appeal to women. “It is not true that Islam is against women” he told them.

It’s tempting to make a joke about Gaddafi’s god embracing all women - except the short, unattractive ones, with drab wardrobes. But this isn’t the climate for such jokes.

Two important books by Muslim women have just crossed my desk, both highlighting – yet again – the shocking injustice and appalling treatment some Muslim women are made to suffer under the name of Islam.

In the compelling read “Cruel and Usual Punishment”, author Nonie Darwish adds her voice to the likes of Ayyan Hirsi Ali, Shirin Ebadi, Malalai Joya, and Phyllis Chesler, in detailing despicable levels of violence and humiliation against women in Muslim nations. Yet the gender apartheid these women highlight is taken to a whole new level of fury by Wafa Sultan, in her new book “A God who hates”. This powerful and relentless repudiation of Islam’s preoccupation with violence, and its subjugation of women, is the latest addition to a growing body of literature exposing the systematic oppression of women in Muslim countries.

Sultan’s much anticipated book was released in the United States just last month. But already she has had to go into hiding for her own protection. A Syrian born psychiatrist, Sultan is famed as the first and only Muslim woman to shout at a cleric to shut up. It was back in 2006, during a live television interview telecast across the Muslim world on Al Jazeera. Fed up with being lectured, Sultan told the revered man raving at her to “Be quiet! It’s my turn!” Such a public put down of a Muslim holy man by a woman was unthinkable.

No cleric wanted to hear Sultan then, and they certainly don’t want to hear her now. Calling herself a Muslim who no longer believes in God, Sultan accuses Islam of extreme misogyny. She speaks of “A God who subjugates women in the ugliest ways possible” and calls the “authenticity of that God” into question.

Sultan is forceful and unforgiving as she argues “The status of women in Muslim countries is a human catastrophe that the world has ignored for centuries and for which it is now paying a high price for ignoring”. But perhaps most controversially, she insists that women living in Muslim states have become complicit in their own oppression by accepting their inferior status. Pulling no punches, Sultan says her Muslim sisters are like “worms” who allow themselves to be “crushed underfoot”.

It’s a tough read, and far from the story about Islam that mad dog Gaddafi was preaching to the young women of Rome. And yet, according to an undercover journalist in the crowd, he won a convert. The Guardian reported that Beko Rea left the lecture saying “He convinced me”.

One can only wonder - was it the murderous tyrant’s charm, smile, or logic that won her over?

Virginia Haussegger is a columnist for The Canberra Times

Britney Spears: a lip sync sensation

2009-11-16T12:28:00.004+11:00

Washed out in limp-sync

By Virginia Haussegger

The article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 14 Nov 2009, and The National Times

Last night I was wishing I was Britney Spears. If only I could lip-synch.

Sometimes when I read the evening news on television, the words tumble out incorrectly. Take Wednesday night. Actually, I'd rather you didn't. It's best forgotten. But on some rare occasions, despite all the best intentions in the world, and the sturdy efforts of a sharp team of news journalists, producers and directors, things still go wrong. That night was a case in point.

With just 10 seconds to go before being live on-air, I made some rushed script changes. And whooska! I accidently deleted a couple of key sentences. It was at that moment I wished I could mime like Britney, and hear the right words, with perfect modulation, pour out. But of course I couldn't. I had to ad-lib. Unlike Britney when she's ''live in concert'', the television news is real – and live. Britney is not. She's an illusion and her performance is pre-recorded - which is nothing scandalous. It's just fact.

But what is scandalous, is that many Britney fans are shocked to learn that her show is all smoke and mirrors; that it's just theatrical entertainment, with state of the art technology that's so good at manipulating this thing called ''Britney'' that they took her for real.

Britney's Australian tour began just over a week ago, but already the controversy over her ''dud'' Downunder performances, and the lip-synch saga, have filled thousands of column inches and hours of talkback. While the global entertainment world is buzzing over the spat her tour operator had with the Australian media over the ''totally inaccurate reporting'' – yes she lip synchs, but no fans did not walk out of her first concert – surely the rest of the world is wondering why it matters.

It doesn't matter. Fans are better off allowing the illusion to do its magic. They ought to just sit back and enjoy the show. After all, if you're crazy enough to pay up to $1000 for a ticket, surely you'd want to indulge in a bit of make-believe and fantasy. Even those who shelled out $150 for the cheapest standing room tickets are entitled to a bit of high tech showbiz manipulation. Because, shocking as this might seem, the real Britney is not worth paying for.

Listening to what really comes out of those vocal cords, as she huffs and puffs her way around the stage, is like listening to a chubby and unfit mouseketeer, squawking on karaoke night. It's dreadfully unkind I know, but true – according to YouTube. And given we're sloshing around in the world of celebrity stardom – where Britney occupies a stratospheric ranking – it's fair to say cyberspace rules, even though the accuracy of cyber videos can't be verified. So I suggest you take a look at the YouTube posting that claims to be a true recording of what Britney Spears really sings into her microphone when she's performing. And yes, she's been lip synching for years.

Frankly, it should come as a relief for many young girls to learn that Britney sounds awful without high tech manipulation. The fact that she sounds just like any out-of- breath schoolgirl should be a great comfort. But I suspect the reverse is true.

Celebrity worship is a sort of modern day malaise – a condition that creeps into our emotional nerve centre and causes it to rot. Unfortunately, the cult of worship encourages starstruck nobodies to reinforce their own ''nothingness'' by idolising others - to the point of deifying them. Which is a problem, because the so-called ''stars'' aren't gods – they're just ordinary people. Like Britney.

Perhaps Andy Warhol was seriously misunderstood when he made his quip about our ''15 minutes of fame''. The common context for this quote is to suggest we all want our 15 minutes in the spotlight, our relished moment of fame. But such is the fleeting nature of the spotlight, we know the glow will quickly fade, and the public's attention will move on. So why 15 minutes? Why not five? Or why not the length of a television sound bite, 10 seconds?

The answer could be that Warhol wasn't talking about the public's attention span, but rather about the length of time we can pretend to be something we're not – before we're found out.

A bloke I know who's on TV every night, and has a sizable cult following of his own, told me he'd love to see Tiger Woods in the flesh. ''I just want to stand near him.'' Such is the power of celebrity, and the fascination with being in its orbit, that to be near a ''star'' brings inexplicable joy. But if this bloke was to stand near Woods for more than 15 minutes, would the aura fade? If he didn't know about the golfer's talent, and saw him at the supermarket, would he be stuck by Tiger Woods presence? No – of course not. The man with the nice teeth would be - just another shopper.

Which is not to suggest that Britney is just another slapper. But it's good to know she's nothing special either.

Virginia Haussegger presents ABC TV News in Canberra.

The artful complexity of pedophilia

2009-11-14T08:56:00.003+11:00

Why forgive a bad friend?

By Virginia Haussegger

The article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 7 Nov 2009, and The National Times

It is impossible to look at close up footage of Dennis Ferguson without feeling a toxic mixture of emotions. All of them painful: anger, shock, hate. And yet, at the same time, it's hard to take our eyes off him. The face of evil — in its human manifestation — is both grotesque and fascinating.

To see Australia's most notorious pedophile squirm under questioning from Liz Jackson during Monday's Four Corners program was riveting.

Ferguson's crimes of sexual abuse, molestation and sodomy of children as young as six have been well documented in the media, and I have no stomach to repeat the details. But his perverse lust and infamy have made him a well-hounded figure around the country since he was released from jail. As we've witnessed in ugly scenes on the evening news, every neighbourhood in which Ferguson has tried to settle has smoked him out with vigilante style gatherings outside his house.

Before the NSW Government passed a law to evict him, the Sydney neighbourhood that Ferguson had snuck into rallied hundreds of people to protest against a pedophile living in their midst. A makeshift coffin was delivered to his front door, along with written death threats and a noose, while awkward police officers shuffled about and asked the crowds to disperse.

But this was relatively polite and orderly in comparison to earlier scenes in Queensland. There public meetings ended in tears, with howling children scared out of their wits by all the talk of a molesting monster living down the road. The lynch mob that kept vigil outside Ferguson's bunker was deadly serious. Had the police not stepped in, it's possible Ferguson would have been chopped to pieces.

Australia hates pedophiles. No other crime seems to enrage and revolt the Australian public as much as pedophilia. In fact, you could say our collective disgust of pedophilia is one of the few things all Australians agree on. You could say that – but you'd be wrong.

A pedophile like Ferguson, who presents as a grubby, uneducated simpleton, is hated. But a pedophile such as revered artist Donald Friend, whose highly acclaimed work hangs in galleries around Australia, is not.

It's a national conundrum. Or is that "penumbra"?

The head curator of Australian art at the Art Gallery of NSW, Barry Pearce, says Friend's pedophilia puts him "on the light side of penumbra". Interestingly, he goes on to say: "But if you get into the dark side of (pedophilia), it is revolting, a disgusting part of the human condition, almost inexplicable to us and we are all afraid of it."

So it would seem that pedophilia — for Pearce at least — has a light and dark side and a whole lot of grey matter in between.

This complex "penumbra" and the issue about whether or not pedophile activity is acceptable, or forgivable, within artistic circles has been raised once again with last week's screening of a documentary film, Loving Friend, at the Canberra International Film Festival.

Melbourne film maker Kerry Negara tackles head on Donald Friend's flagrant pedophilia during his time living in Bali, back in the '60s and '70s. Friend died 20 years ago, having never been charged or convicted of having sex with minors, even though he wrote quite freely about it in his diaries. He openly describes his delight in the "innocent animal horseplay of an erotic nature", with children as young as 10, which "became something of an orgy". He muses that his little houseboys had "no inhibitions at all about a little session of sodomy".

In publishing the diaries, the National Library made the brave and correct choice to not edit out or censor Friend's own descriptions of his sexual trysts with Balinese boys.

But when the final volume was released in 2006, containing explicit sexual material in which Friend seemed to enjoy outing himself as an incurable pedophile, there was hardly a ripple of a murmur. Certainly there was no suggestion of indecency. No anti-pedophile crusaders stormed galleries demanding Friend's paintings of the nude little boys he sodomised be taken down.

Negara, whose own children are part Balinese, was outraged that the art world seemed to be ignoring — or at least excusing — the actions of a self-declared pedophile, simply because he was a great artist and a well-loved bohemian.

In her film, there's no shortage of art historians and friends of the artist who blithely forgive, or even deny Donald Friend's well-documented behavior. One art historian, James Murdoch, even suggests Friend was not at fault because the young boys he had sex with had in fact "seduced him".

Negara's film has not had a commercial or television release, and probably won't get one. The issue it tackles is just too hot. Which leaves one wondering how we make sense of a society that will bay for blood outside Dennis Ferguson's door, and yet sip champagne and toast the memory of a pedophile artist who was brilliant with a brush.

What is that "penumbra"? And why is it so artfully complex?

Virginia Haussegger is president of the Canberra International Film Festival.

Skinny girl syndrome?

2009-11-06T10:24:00.004+11:00

We should not tell girls it's Ok to be chunky

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 31 Oct 2009 and The National Times

Supermodel Linda Evangelista once told Ray Martin I was a 'witch'. I'd apparently upset her during a television interview for A Current Affair, in which I asked about her 'use-by-date'. Evangelista was 28 years old at the time – ancient in supermodel years.

This was way back in the unimaginable dark ages, before digital 'enhancement' of models existed. Back when what you saw in print was pretty much what you got for real. But in the cold light of day, without airbrushing and soft filters, the feline Evangelista was even more magnificent than I had expected. No wonder she refused to get out of bed for “less than $10,000 dollars a day”. Why bother? It's not like she had to go to the gym. The Canadian beauty could lounge about eating whipped cream and brownies for breakfast and still look slim and stunning. Why? Because she's a freak. She said so herself.

When I asked Evangelista about her eating, dieting and lettuce leaf lunch, she looked bored. When I quizzed her about exercise, she rolled her eyes. “Look, we're genetic freaks” she said, referring to herself and the other supermodels of the day. “It's just the way we were born”.

It was the smartest thing she said. And she's right. Evangelista and the beautiful goddesses like her are indeed 'freaks'. If only the rest of us could learn to accept that, and happily get on with our own less gorgeous lives, which require regular visits to the gym and fewer choc-coated indulgences.

This week's call for a national strategy on body image was unfortunately laden with mixed messages, which only add to the pressure on women, particularly young women. On the one hand a bevy of beauties from the celebrity magazine industry met outside Parliament house with Minister Kate Ellis to call for a truer, fairer representation of women by the media. They want an end to digital touch-ups that make women look more svelte and stunning than they really are. And yet the key spokeswomen from this group, Mia Freedman and Sarah Murdoch, have both built careers on trading beauty and teasing women's body image vulnerability. Freedman as a women's magazine editor, most notably of Cosmopolitan – the skinny-girl-sex-bible for teenage and young women. And Murdoch as an underwear model and most recently television host of “Australia's Next Top Model”. The contradictions are as bold as the women.

But putting that aside, there are other problems with this call to arms over body image. In calling for bigger, shapelier models to grace magazine pages and the fashion catwalks, we run a risk of feeding Australia's fat frenzy. The worst thing the Australia media could do right now is send a loud message to girls and women suggesting it's ok to be big and chunky – that it's normal and culturally acceptable.

Australia is a fat country and we're getting dramatically fatter. It's dangerous to our health and taking years off our lives. According to Professor Mike Daube, President of the Public Health Association of Australia, if the current trends in obesity and overweight continue the life expectancy of our kids will be reduced by two years. “That's the first time that life expectancy in Australia will have fallen”. And all because we are undisciplined, lazy and eat too much.

The number of Australians who are obese or overweight is scandalous. And yet, we pretend it's not happening. It's as if we are in national denial about our ballooning weight problem. According to the Australian National Institute of Health and Welfare, a whopping two and a half million Australians are obese. Another 4.9 million are overweight. That's one in four women and 41 percent of men.

In total, 42 percent of all Australian women over the age of 18 are either overweight or obese. You know how many are underweight? A slim 4 percent of women, and just one percent of men. Being underweight is not our national problem. Being overweight is.

The appearance of fat is ugly when it reeks of sloth and a lack of discipline. Being skinny is ugly when it reeks of malnutrition and starvation. But that's not what most women are objecting to when they criticise skinny models in magazines. What they're railing against is the fact that they're not gorgeous freaks like Linda Evangelista and her fashionista friends.

Karl Lagerfeld was crude, rude and probably right when he suggested that the women who object most to catwalk models and call them “ugly' are “fat mothers with their bags of chips sitting in front of the television”. Fat women hate skinny women. Maybe they console their misery with more chips.

The gauche and gaudy frock designer is right too when he says the world of fashion is about “dreams and illusions”. Of course it is. And it's easy to be seduced by those sumptuous illusions. But knowing the difference between what's real and what's fantasy has become less about common sense and more about a test of self esteem – so fragile are young female sensibilities.

There's plenty of good to come from a national body image strategy. But let's start with the biggest problem. Let's tackle fat first.

Afghan women fear abandonment

2009-10-30T12:11:00.005+11:00

(Women in Afghanistan protest against the Shia Personal Status Law, April 2009)

The Fight of their Lives

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 24th Oct 2009 and The National Times

Despite it being a long distance call and a bad line, I can detect the frustration in her voice. “Women? No-one listens to women”.

Hamida Hussan *is a young Afghan woman from Kabul, who has just spent four whirlwind days in Washington DC speaking to congressmen and women, addressing conferences and lobbying whoever she can corner. She’s exhausted and sounds like she’s about to cry.

Just hours before our late night conversation, a suicide bomber has killed 17 people outside the Indian Embassy in Kabul. Most were civilians. Gruesome footage posted on the internet shows a passerby pulling a severed leg out from under a car. We both search news websites for more information and find nothing.

“A dog or cat dies in this country (the US) and they put it on TV”, she says in exasperation, “And yet no-one knows or cares about these people killed today”.

I want to tell her that the problem is one of ‘compassion fatigue’ – that the world has seen it all before. Instead, I just tell her I’m sorry.

Hussan is one of a growing band of gusty, young Afghan women - mostly single, childless and in their 30’s -who are doing everything in their power to try and ensure the international community doesn’t turn its back on Afghanistan. They are terrified that history is about to repeat itself and that Afghanistan will once again be abandoned. Talk of “targeted counter-insurgency” and the US “reducing its footprint” in Afghanistan, and negotiations with so called “moderate” Taliban, has them lobbying hard against troop withdrawal.

This week the ANU hosted one of the most important talk-fests of recent times. Titled “The Afghanistan Conflict: Australia’s Role”, the conference brought together top level government, military, academic and NGO expertise, along with a few journalists. The good will towards Afghanistan was encouraging, but the pathway to peace remains utterly perplexing.

In the lead up to addressing this conference I’ve had many late night calls to women like Hamida, who are activists in Afghanistan, fighting to raise the status of women and build an understanding of human rights. “Until a few years ago, people here had never heard of human rights”, she says. Now the phrase has entered the Kabul lexicon, along with all those other NGO buzz words like ‘gender mainstreaming’, ‘equality’, ‘women’s agency’ and ‘civil society’.

But the words, just like the small gains made towards advancing women’s rights are little more than “dead letters” - as one UN report so bluntly put it - if they’re tossed around “in the absence of security and the rule of law”.

And this is what worries women most. Without a peaceful, secure environment, and without a government that can enforce the rule of law – which the current government clearly can’t - all the words about women’s equality are hollow. All the new ‘equity’ platitudes enshrined in the constitution, and the numerous gender targets and ‘action plans’ agreed to by government will amount to nothing, if the international community packs up and leaves before peace is secured. Every Afghan woman I have spoken to over the past month has spoken of a deep fear of “abandonment”.

“In eight years we have been standing on someone else’s feet”, says Wazhma Frogh, the 29 year old director of Global Rights in Afghanistan. “Of course if those feet pull out from under us now, we will fall over”. Wazhma says it hurts her to hear that the public in the US, the UK and Australia want their governments to pull troops out of Afghanistan. “Wasn’t this war about ‘the principle’? Don’t they care about human rights anymore?”

Like many of her female colleagues Wazhma believes women will be the first victims of the chaos and civil war that will ensue if troops withdraw in the near future. And they are in no doubt as to who will fill the power vacuum. “Look at all the international troops in Afghanistan, and yet still the Taliban is getting stronger ever day”, says Hamida.

The greatest fear about a return to Taliban control – be they ‘old’, ‘new’ or ‘moderate’ Taliban – is that women will inevitably be thrust back into the dark ages, again forced to submit to the most draconian rules and human rights abuses ever imposed on women anywhere in the world. It was only eight years ago when Afghan women couldn’t work, go to school, or leave their homes without permission and a male escort.

Right now it’s not only women’s rights and freedoms that are at stake. It’s their lives.

Until 2001 women like Hamida and Wazhma kept their activism well hidden. But the post-Taliban freedom has given rise to a growing movement of women who are politically active and visible. As such they are sitting ducks if there is a return to lawless patriarchy . “They will not leave me alive for a minute” says Wazhma. Most of the women I talk to know they are on assassination lists.

After I bid Hamida goodnight and suggest meeting up maybe early next year, she’s effusive “Oh yes, great”. Then as an afterthought, “If I’m still alive”.

(* not her real name)

Canberra International Film Festival

2009-10-08T00:38:00.008+11:00

Ok Film lovers ... and anyone who just loves to escape into another world - we've got the place for you!

The Canberra International Film Festival (CIFF) program for 2009 was launched today - 7th October 2009. Twelve days of some of the best film offerings from around the world - 48 films, from 23 countries.

CIFF Artistic Director, Simon Weaving - along with the CIFF board- has been working on this festival for the past 6 months. It's a huge feast of film that will challenge, engage, provoke and tug you... at every level. Come join us! Here is a wee preview of the program at ...

www.canberrafilmfestival.com.au .... or follows us on twitter

Women soldiers on the frontline

2009-09-13T21:58:00.004+10:00

(Photo: Australian women soldiers on the frontline)

Word war on sex front

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 12th September 2009

It’s a great shame that the Department of Defence has a media team that ducks for cover and hides in the bunker when it’s most needed. It’s as if the media strategy is “slam down the hatches men”, or “quick, go hide in an all-day-meeting chaps”.

That’s the sort of lame excuses some young lackey from Defence Media had to issue this week in response to a request for the head of Public Affairs, Brigaider Brian Dawson, to explain the role of women in Australia’s defence forces. Is there anyone in that lumbering media machine who can talk about the dangerous and vital work being done by women on our frontline? “No”. No? “Most people are tied up unfortunately”.

A quick glance across the mainstream media over the past few days gives the impression Australia’s defence forces have no women at the frontline. Or, that the few women who are stationed in dangerous combat zones do little more than keep the mess hall clean. It’s an insult to the many Australian women who risk their lives daily, performing a wide range of roles in our defence. And why on earth hasn’t Defence Media come out in their support this week? Why hasn’t it used the current public furore about women on the frontline as an opportunity to reinforce that women are there, and they are doing an amazing job.?

When the dour Minister for Defence Personal, Greg Combet , fronted up on Wednesday to announce a review of women’s eligibility for ADF jobs, he sparked an immediate “battle of the sexes” debate. Instantly talk back radio, and blogs on news websites, were hot with inane pronouncements about women’s strength – or lack of it – their periods, pregnancy and male chivalry – or lack of it.

If this wasn’t such an important issue, it’d be funny. I learnt from posted web comments that women “don’t make optimal fighting machines” because they have different “bone structure”. And that because “women eat less, they would be cheaper to keep” on the frontline. Others worried about “pregnant soldiers” and “nursing mothers” trying to shoot the enemy when they’re a wee bit emotional. Plenty of comments were quaintly prefaced with “I’m not sexist but …” My favourite coming from “Xy” who stated, “The primal function of the female is to conceive, bear and nurture life”. Well. I’m sure glad we cleared that up.

Ironically, Combet’s intent in raising this issue, is to do away with precisely these type of silly stereotypical arguments that undermine the role women play in Australia’s defence forces.

Currently, Defence employment and assignment policy is sexist. It’s pitched in terms of gender. There are a small number of jobs – 8 percent - not open to “women”. Those include navy clearance divers; some frontline infantry units; and apparently the SAS (although this is less clear).

What Combet wants to do is throw out the gender stipulation, and instead introduce employment criteria based on “scientific analysis” of strengths and capabilities. In other words, make all jobs open to women who can pass the test.

And the blunt fact is that for those specific jobs where the task involves superior physical strength – most women won’t cut it - such as hauling a 43 kilogram shell as a soldier in the field artillery. Sure, there will be some women who will physically outperform their male colleagues: whether in an arm wrestle, a fist fight, or on the frontline battle field. But they will be a minority. Women are generally not as physically strong as men. We know that. And it would seem that the current Defence employment policy has clumsily tried to reflect that. Now, what Combet aims to do is simply take the sex out of it.

Perhaps if Brigaider Dawson had stepped forward during the week to proudly highlight the invaluable contribution women make to the Australian Defence forces, media space wouldn’t have been wasted on useless and old-fashioned debates about who is the stronger sex.

And for his part, I suspect Neil James, from the Australia Defence Association, has been somewhat unfairly pitched as the Brylcreem badie in this media frenzy. James’s claim on ABC radio that Australians didn’t want to see “their daughters, sisters, wives or female friends killed in disproportionate numbers” is a reasonable comment. I think he’s right. But James isn’t suggesting women shouldn’t remain at the forefront of Australia’s defence strategy. Far from it.

When I asked James if he feared that women who met the “biomechanical” criteria, and won a spot right up there in short-range combat on the frontline, might be a distraction for their male colleagues - his answer was refreshingly straight. “Yes, they are a distraction. But that’s human nature, and you’ve got to try and manage that. It’s just like men and women in any work place. “ Indeed.

But the last wise words should go to “battle weary”, who posted a comment on the ABC website, suggesting there would be no issue about the who was or wasn’t on the frontline, if we could only find “a way to stop this silly activity called WAR”.

John Della Bosca - down & dirty?

2009-09-07T11:54:00.004+10:00

(Photo: An embarrassed John Della Bosca fronts the media to announce his resignation as Health Minister. "I've taken my medicine")

The Daddy of all fools

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 5 Sept 2009

There is just one thing I want to know about John Della Bosca and his young lover. Did the 26 year old call the aging MP “Daddy”?

Given the 30 year age difference and the fact that she’s young enough to be his daughter, it’s not out of the question. And given Della Bosca allegedly told the girl to say she was his “niece” if anyone in Parliament asked, it’s fair to say there is a hint of a “daddy” complex going on.

But sadly for the hapless Della Bosca, the “daddy” thing isn’t working for him in the same way it does for Italy’s Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi. At almost 73, Berlusconi’s extramarital dalliances tend to strengthen his hold on power, not weaken it. Back in May, news suggesting yet another Berlusconi affair - with an “aspiring model” who had just turned 18 - sent his approval rating skywards. The fact that young Noemi from Naples called her hero ‘Papi’ didn’t seem to bother anyone too much. Except perhaps Berlusconi’s long-suffering wife Veronica, who issued a press release saying her husband was “consorting with minors”.

Not long afterwards, a highly paid hooker – and former “actress” - complained to the media that Berlusconi spent the night with her and failed to leave the cash on the table. Word from Berlusconi at the time was simply that he never “paid for sex”. Of course not. Why would he? He’s Berlusconi. And he’s in charge.

But not so for Della Bosca. Now he’ll never be in charge. And like an honourable Aussie trooper, he fell on his own sword. It was excruciating, yet riveting television on Tuesday morning to see the contrite power-broker look limp and vulnerable as he told the media he was resigning his position as New South Wales Health Minister. “I’ve made some poor decisions”, he said. “I’ve taken my medicine”. But it was his punch line, thick with self styled heroism that sealed it. “You have to live up to the consequences of bad decisions”, he told the media with all the earnestness he could muster. Right then you could hear mumbles of approval right around the nation. Then we turned to the matter of the scorned wife, and began musing over scary Belinda Neal and her capacity for revenge.

There is something quaint about how Australians respond to political sex scandals. We’re really not too bothered by them. Steamy revelations about Della Bosca having sex with his young lover on the couch in his parliamentary office, or when he was supposed to be on official business cutting ribbons and opening hospitals, doesn’t faze us much. Should the Labor heavyweight, resign over the affair? Apparently not – if online and radio talkback polls are anything to go by. But should he resign if he’s found to be incompetent? Absolutely.

It’s not the sex, illicit or otherwise, that worries the Australia voter. It’s the job. Can the tarnished politician get on with the business of doing his or her job? That’s the prime criteria by which we judge those extra curricula scandals. Which, let’s face it, are disappointingly dull here in the Antipodes. Former Prime Minister Bob Hawke confessed his dalliances and the public forgave him. Paul Keating and his wife Anita split acrimoniously, and no-one has been rude enough to probe why. Australians cheered when Tourism Minister John Brown’s wife left her sexy knickers in the office ashtray, after engaging in marital relations on his desk. And many of us felt embarrassed for John Hewson, after his aggrieved first wife aired the couple’s dirty linen on prime time television.

But ultimately, it’s all pretty tame stuff in Australia. We just don’t have the perverse bondage and spanking type of scandals that leak through the cracks of Britain’s House of Lords. Our politician’s penchant for leather, fishnets and Shirley Temple curls has never really progressed beyond Alexander Downer and “that” shot in stilettos (which was in fact an innocent plug for an arts festival). Unlike France, we haven’t enjoyed gripping headlines about our head of State’s lovechild. (Although we did momentarily have Tony Abbot’s long-lost love progeny. But even that turned out to be a mistake). Nor do we have those tearful, “I have sinned” media performances so common in the U.S. No wonder we were all transfixed by Bill Clinton’s claim “I did not have sexual relations with that woman”. But far from blame him, I suspect most Australians felt sorry for him.

When it comes to sex and scandal, Australians are admirably reluctant to pass judgment. Perhaps it’s something in our cultural DNA that makes us more inclined to delineate between the private and the public – even when the two are enmeshed and messy.

But then again, it’s hard to get indignant over news that an aging egomaniac, with a wife who might eat bricks for breakfast, was besotted with a young blond who thinks he’s powerful, and calls him “a spunk”. It’s hardly scandal – just an embarrassing spectacle.

As for that now dumped daddy’s girl, who sort her revenge through a media outing, well - she’s the biggest spectacle of all.

The creative sting at Vogue

2009-08-29T09:47:00.006+10:00

Photo:( left) Grace Coddington, Creative Director of Vogue.

(Below) Anna Wintour, Editor, Vogue.

A devil of a partnership

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 29th August 2009

Funny isn’t it, how we can fixate on silly, minor things, in the face of a crisis. For me it was the salad sitting on Grace Coddington’s desk. I just knew she wasn’t going to eat it.

Coddington, the Creative Director of Vogue magazine, had been working ridiculously long hours, under enormous pressure, and she needed food. But that salad was staying untouched. I wanted to urge, ‘go on Gracie – eat it!’ But I know how she feels. I can’t eat when I’m shattered either.

This salad fixation came at a climactic moment in the stunning documentary, “The September Issue”, a voyeuristic trip inside the workings of Vogue magazine and its fearsome editor, Anna Wintour. Or “nuclear Wintour” as Maureen Dowd dubs her. A single stare from Wintour can do more than just put you off your food. It can end careers and send fashion labels into oblivion.

Wintour is terrifying. Her ‘ice-maiden’ demeanor, and ‘Cruella de Vil’ guise are legendry. Dowd’s not the only one to ask “Is Anna human?”

Yet, all that fear and loathing about Anna Wintour has been more folklore than reality. Given she doesn’t normally do interviews, and is painfully private, this film is the first time anyone outside the rarified world of Vogue gets a real look at the woman who – its widely agreed - is the most powerful and influential figure in the 300 billion dollar global fashion industry.

Up close, in action, Wintour is even steelier than Meryl Streep’s cold and calculating take on her in “The Devil Wears Prada”. That was fiction - which just happened to be written by Wintour’s former assistant. But “The September Issue”, by award winning film maker R.J. Cutler – is fact. And as such, it is truly fascinating.

The fashion is just the backdrop here. What this film is really about is the intensely painful process of creative expression and the pursuit of perfection. At its dramatic heart is one of the publishing world’s most successful creative collaborations of our time.

For some twenty years under the stewardship of Wintour and creative direction of Coddington, Vogue magazine has shaped and dictated fashion trends across the world. Yet their collaboration is painful to observe. They share a deeply felt admiration and respect for one another’s brilliance – and say so. In the only compliment to pass her lips, Wintour calls Coddington a “genius”.

Yet, this creative marriage borders on abusive. Like many co-dependent relationships, the power share is not equal. Wintour is capable of crushing the life out of Coddington. And she almost does.

Which bring me back to the salad moment. Wintour has just trashed what Coddington thinks is her best work. It’s a sumptuous photo shoot and fashion spread, with rich fabrics and velvet tones that echo a luxurious Ingres painting, with a Delacroix flourish. The shots are simply sublime. And Coddington - who at 68 is still a dreamy romantic - is chuffed with the result,

Enter Wintour, arms crossed and shoulders tilted towards the page proofs. Without a word she stares at the images. Like a forensic scientist looking for DNA links, she’s meticulous in her scrutiny. The silence is deafening. Then there’s an inaudible mutter, as she shoves Coddington’s centerpiece to the side. That’s it. It’s out. There is no discussion.

Later Coddington’s face says it all, as that salad sits uneaten on her desk. She tells the film crew she is “furious” and that Wintour has just “thrown out $50,000 worth of work”. But it’s her look of utter shock and childlike bewilderment that tugs at your heart. It’s not about ego. And it’s not about pride. Rather it’s pain felt by a fierce blow to the creative spirit.

As the wistful half of this creative marriage, Coddington is doing far more than styling fashion. She is fashioning moods and emotions, with an eye to the historical and cultural context. There is a lovely moment in the documentary when she stands in a grand stone portico, and slowly takes in the exquisite landscape before her, musing over its age and graceful beauty. She is an aesthete through and through. And like Wintour, Coddington is a perfectionist in her work. Her photo shoots are lovingly created, with an immaculate attention to detail. So when her art is tossed aside, or indeed tossed out, you feel her devastation.

Such seemingly heartless action by Wintour could cast her as the wicked witch in this tale. And no doubt, many will interpret her that way. But Wintour’s handling of those tough and hurtful decisions, says more about her talent, than her nature. Her greatest strength, as she tells the film-maker in a rare moment of openness, is her “decisiveness”. She doesn’t pander to others. Nor does she pretend.

With Wintour there is no compromise and no half measure. She is absolutely clear about what she wants. And she has no qualms about getting it. Even if it means striking blows to those she needs most. There is strategy in her warfare. And the truth is - Coddington’s creative juices are energized by it.

I just hope she gets to eat her lunch.

Afghanistans rape within marriage law

2009-08-23T12:29:00.005+10:00

Afghan women lose again

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 22 August 2009

There is little that separates the joy and the pain. Within one short moment that energetic life force that makes the people of Afghanistan so passionate and so engaging, can suddenly give way to a flood of tears. It’s impossible not to cry with them.

Beneath the tough and courageous surface of just about every Afghan I’ve had the privilege to meet, is the heartbreak of loss. Each has known firsthand the brutality of sudden death. Yet, a tremendous resilience and pride keeps them moving forward. But right now, an overwhelming convergence of greed and political expedience is shoving Afghanistan backwards.

On Wednesday Australia’s diplomatic community gathered at the ANU to celebrate the 90^th anniversary of Afghanistan’s independence – from British rule. To mark the moment, we raised our glasses to toast the Queen. If anyone noticed the irony they certainly didn’t show it. I just stared at my shoes.

But my heart went out to the Ambassador, Amanullah Jayhoon, as he addressed the crowd. It wasn’t the anniversary that was on everyone’s mind. It was the very next day – Afghanistan’s presidential and provincial council elections. There was something poetic about Jayhoon’s words as he lamented that his home was once a “peaceful and beautiful country ‘not a hell hole’. The people were poor, but generous, honest, proud and loved their freedom”, he said.

There was so much hope in that moment back in November 2001, when President George W. Bush thrust his chest at the TV cameras, just after the Taliban fled Kabul and the coalition tanks moved in. As the US flag was raised again outside the American Embassy, Bush proclaimed, “Today the women of Afghanistan are free!” World leaders, including the then prime minister of Australia, John Howard, quickly joined the chorus declaring the liberation of Afghanistan’s women. Stories highlighting the inhumane brutality and degradation women were subjected to under the Taliban rule swept the media. Even the usually demure Laura Bush, wife of George W., took to the talk show circuit to proclaim the new “freedom” of the most oppressed women in the world. Quickly the plight of Afghanistan’s women and their desperate need for “freedom” became an international catch-cry, and a key justification for waging war in Afghanistan.

Now, eight years and countless billions of dollars later, the international community has quietly, conveniently, forgotten about that once trumpeted issue. The so called “liberation” of Afghanistan women no longer rates a mention at the international negotiating table. Not because the war against deeply rooted prejudices and female oppression has been won. But rather, because it’s been lost.

Although the official election outcome is yet to be determined, the US installed incumbent Hamid Karzai remains the Presidential front runner. Early on Karzai – whose own wife remains one of Afghanistan’s ‘invisible women’ – tried to present himself as a ‘moderate’ on women’s issues. Nevertheless, when under pressure from the misogynist and influential forces of Shi’ite clerics, Karzai has chosen to ditch women’s freedoms in favor of votes, to save his increasingly shaky hold on power.

In April, news that Karzai had approved a law which sanctioned rape within marriage caused an outrage among international women’s groups and human rights organisations. The Shi’ite Personal Status Law, which applies to between 15 and 20 percent of the population, gives fathers full custody of children; allows a husband to starve a wife who withholds sex; and bans women from leaving the house without permission. The law also provides men with immunity from rape charges, if they agree to pay the victim’s family “blood money”. At the time President Barack Obama called the law “abhorrent”.

Under pressure, President Karzai agreed to ‘review’ the bill. That happened. Not surprisingly little changed. And just before this week’s elections those “abhorrent” rules quietly, secretly, became law. Just over a week ago Human Rights Watch got wind of what Karzai had done. It slammed the law as “an unthinkable deal to sell Afghan women out”. But Karzai needed the backing of the fundamentalist Shia clerics and the vote they command. He ignored the outrage and criticism. And so too did the international community’s power-brokers.

Shamefully, the US led coalition has been as good as silent on the official ratification of these disgusting laws. And how ironic is that? The incumbent, Hamid Karzai is reviving the very barbaric style of laws that we – along with Bush and Co – thought we were trying to defeat. No wonder we’re all confused about what we’re doing in Afghanistan.

Once again, Karzi’s and his cronies are reminding us that women’s freedoms are tradable and expendable.

And yet, didn’t we all applaud the Afghanistan constitution, introduced in 2004. Article 22 states that men and women “have equal rights and duties before the law”. Foolishly we believed that. The nonsense about women having a 25 per cent quota of seats in parliament did little more than install political puppets, or young and brash independents like Malalai Joya, who have no chance of ever being heard above the rabble raising and ruthless power plays and that had her disqualified from Parliament.

The votes are still being counted, as money, arms and influence are traded. But we already know the outcome. The women of Afghanistan have lost. Again.

Bowled by art's beauty: Frederick McCubbin

2009-08-16T12:42:00.006+10:00

(photo: NGA's Ron Radford, with benefactors M Wylie & A Dawson-Damer viewing "Violet & Gold 1911")

Bowled by art's beauty

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 14 August 2009

You may have heard of tree huggers. But what about art huggers? I think the Head of Australian Art at the National Gallery, Dr Anne Grey, might just be one. And she’s not alone.

Grey is curator of “Last Impressions ” , a retrospective of the work of Australian artist Frederick McCubbin, drawn from the last decade of his life, 1907-1917. It opened at the NGA yesterday. And in a word, this exhibition is simply – sublime.

It’s difficult to describe the emotional punch one feels when standing in front of these immensely joyful works. But as I stood there this week, I almost did it. I almost hugged a painting. I wanted to lift it off the wall and waltz across those impeccably shiny floors, out into the glorious sculpture garden and fly across the lake. I wanted to take the gorgeous object to perch on the highest point of the Brindabellas – and hug it. That’s how happy the painting “Violet and gold” made me feel.

What is this strange and wildly emotional response? Is it normal to suddenly swoon over a painting? Particularly a painting that I’ve seen many times before in books and in various online reproductions. But now that I was seeing it for the first time in ‘real life’ – in the flesh – I was smitten.

Fortunately it was a private moment, and no-one saw my loopy expression, or that fat tear tracking down my face.

Grey, who has spent her life surrounded by beautiful objects and is immersed in a world of creative celebration, had warned me about this sort of thing. Before we toured the McCubbin exhibition, she happened to mention an experience she’d had some years back when visiting the National Gallery of London. It was the first time she saw in the flesh – so to speak – “Bathers at Asnieres” by Georges Seurat. “I wanted to go up and hug it. The emotional response was like seeing someone you love”, she enthused.

And yes – odd as it sounds, that’s how I felt when I laid eyes on McCubbin’s “Violet and gold”. It’s not as if I was swooning over some object in the painting. After all, it’s just a Victorian landscape of trees and cows. And I don’t even like cows. But rather, it’s the light, the atmospherics, and the breath of the bush that pierced me.

When something is so beautiful, and so unexpected – the power of that discovery can momentarily unhinge us. And we submit, falling into the glorious pull, allowing ourselves to be transported to a dream like place. It’s an exquisite experience.

But here’s the thing: it only happens in real life. You have to be there to feel it. You can’t sense it second-hand. It doesn’t come from looking at pictures in a book. Or from clicking through photos online. Or from watching a video, or checking it out on facebook.

In an age where we communicate - or ‘interface’ - via technology, and our buddies are people we’ve never touched in person, but met via broadband, it may come as a surprise to learn that there are some things in life that can only be experienced – if you are there. If you witness it, feel it, sense it yourself.

My new smart phone is clever at transmitting my words, voice and photos. But it hasn’t worked out how to transmit my feelings. No doubt the day will come when it emits a blue aura to let callers know when I’m feeling sad, and a warm yellow glow when I’m happy. But we’re not there yet. Thankfully.

Some of the best moments in life can only be experienced firsthand. Our deepest emotions are felt when we’re face to face. Visiting the McCubbin exhibition has reminded me of that. Ironically, this collection is testimony to the artists own lesson in the need to see and feel beauty in the flesh.

Like his contemporaries, Tom Roberts, Arthur Streeton, and Charles Condor, McCubbin had poured over reproductions of the great English and European masters in various books. He had seen printed versions of the extraordinary play of light and air in the dramatic paintings by Turner. But it wasn’t until at the age of 52 he journeyed to England and Europe himself, to stand before them – that he was possessed of their intrinsic beauty. And deeply moved by their power.

After seeing some of Turner’s work up close at the Tate and National Gallery, McCubbin wrote to his wife about witnessing the “dreams of colour – a dozen of them are like pearls” he said. “They glow with a tender brilliancy that radiates”.

The impact of the experience affected him deeply. He wrote to his friend Tom Roberts to say they had all been “too timid” in their painting. From that moment his work took on a whole new life – and light.

Seeing such powerful beauty firsthand infused McCubbin with a vigor that changed him profoundly. And it can us too. Even the plodders and non-painters among us. I suspect an army of art huggers may soon unite.

Whipping women who wear trousers

2009-08-10T08:36:00.005+10:00

(Photo: Sudanese journalist, Lubna Ahmed al Hussein; charged with wearing "indecent clothing" - trousers)

Scourge of Oppression

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 8 August 2009

Every woman in

Australia

wearing trousers right now is violating Article 152 of Sudan's criminal code. Thankfully, unlike our Sudanese sisters, we don't get whipped for it. If we did, I wonder how many of us would have the guts to seize the whip and thrash back?

Journalist Lubna Ahmed al- Hussein has got more than guts. She's got a steely spine. And she's going to need it. She could be in for one hell of a thrashing.

But before they get a chance to flog and humiliate her, Hussein is taunting these so-called men of God - to bring it on! Charged with wearing ''indecent clothes'', Hussein is facing a punishment of 40 lashes. Outside court this week she said, ''I'm ready to be whipped not 40 but 40,000 times'' if it can be proved that such law really is the word of God, and therefore constitutional under Sudan's Islamic sharia law.

Hussein and 12 women friends were caught wearing trousers in a popular Khartoum restaurant early last month. They were rounded up and herded into custody.

Ten of the young women panicked and agreed to forgo a trial, plead guilty, and get it over with. Their sentence was reduced to 10 lashes, and they were each flogged before Hussein's court appearance on Tuesday.

I don't know how ''official'' flogging is done. But it's worth contemplating - just for a moment - in order to dwell on the barbarity and monstrosity of men who claim they have God on their side. I suppose they hold the woman down on some sort of table, so that her face and chin smashes into a hard surface each time she is hit. Or perhaps they stand her upright and string her arms up above her head. Maybe that hurts more. I suspect the whip cracks the skin on impact and draws blood instantly. It's possible some of the women pass out before the thrashing is over. Given they're in their 30s, their skin is still young and will rip and slit easily. The sting is unimaginable. Scars may form, and the wounds may eventually heal. But I suspect the women will never, ever recover. I doubt I could. The rage that must rip through them every day, at every moment, would send most of us mad.

Lubna Hussein is mad. She is furious at the idiotic rule of law that suggests women wearing trousers is an offence. Unlike her mortified friends, who have now been thrashed to within an inch of their lives, Hussein says she wants to be tried. She wants the opportunity in court to challenge such arbitrary and hateful laws.

Sudan is the largest country in the Arab world and, unlike elsewhere, the women of Sudan are prominent in public life. Female soldiers and police officers even wear trousers as part of their uniform. So rounding up and flogging other women for doing the same can only be seen for what it is - part of an ongoing war against women in which radical interpretations of Islam are used to excuse despicable and extreme misogyny, and wield brute power.

A devout Muslim, Hussein defies her accusers to defend their barbaric actions. ''If some people refer to the sharia to justify flagellating women because of what they wear, then let them show me which Koranic verses or hadith [sayings of the Prophet Mohammed] says so. I haven't found them,'' she said.

It's a call to ''prove it'' that echoes the arguments of Iran's Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi. A Muslim human rights lawyer accused of innumerable offences, Ebadi was thrown into Iran's notorious Evin prison. Perhaps the beginning of her undoing was her argument before the Iranian Parliament in which she insisted there was no text in which Islam insisted a woman needed her husband's consent for divorce. ''So why are you insisting that [there] is?'' she asked. Ebadi was never forgiven for that comment. And she was severely punished. Later she reflected, ''It is not religion that binds women, but the selective dictates of those who wish them cloistered.''

Like Ebadi, Lubna Hussein is a woman of great courage. Employed by the United Nations to work in its Sudanese media office, Hussein is afforded diplomatic immunity, and could avoid prosecution altogether. But instead of taking that safe way out - as advised by her lawyers - Hussein has quit her UN job in order to face trial and fight those who whip women for wearing trousers.

On Tuesday the court adjourned her case while the status of immunity is clarified. Rather than express relief that she'd won a reprieve from a possible flogging, Hussein said the trial should not have been delayed. ''I'm absolutely not afraid of the verdict'', she said, to the cheers of hundreds of women supporters who'd gathered outside the court. Riot police then moved in and used tear gas to disperse them.

Across the world, women are applauding the brave and outspoken Lubna Hussein. But until many more are prepared to stand and fight - for more than the right to wear trousers - this insidious war against women will rage on, fuelled by phony religious justifications. Surely such abuse is an insult to any god?

Chinese film censorship backfires

2009-08-01T10:42:00.011+10:00

Photo: Rebiya Kadeer, Uighur leader

Censors sweeten the fruit

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 1 Aug 2009

Censorship of art inevitably backfires. It’s a pity Chinese government officials here in Australia haven’t worked that out yet. Their attempts to silence a Melbourne film-maker, along with considerable efforts this week to intimidate the director of the Melbourne International Film Festival , MIFF, have backfired beautifully.

But first, here’s a little parable about film censorship.The new Artistic Director of the Canberra International Film Festival is Simon Weaving. Film-makers around town know Simon well, and some of you will be familiar with his film reviews and occasional features in The Canberra Times. Like many of those passionate about the power of film to transcend and inspire, Simon was smitten from a young age. He tells a charming tale of when he was a kid at school in England, he one day wandered past his local cinema and saw a noisy crowd of protestors shaking placards. They were followers of the moral crusader Mary Whitehouse and her Festival of Light, on a rampage to wipe out the filth on English screens. That day, the film in their sights was “The Exorcist”.

Being just a kid, Simon admits he had no idea what the film was about. But thanks to Mary and her noisy gaggle of chanting protesters, he was stung with curiosity. “If there was something up on the screen that caused this mush fuss – man, I wanted to see it!” And he did. Of course. As Simon says, “We are all wondrous creatures who delight in novelty and controversy”.

It is that same universal curiosity that’s led to sell-out screenings in Melbourne this week of the documentary “10 Conditions of Love”, about Rebiya Kadeer, the exiled leader of the World Uighur Congress.

Until now, most of us had never heard of Kadeer. We didn’t know how hated she is by the Chinese authorities, or that they call her a “terrorist”. Nor have we known – or cared – much about Uighurs: the Chinese Muslim minority who claim to be brutalized by Han Chinese.

For many Australians the bloody Uighur uprising early last month was just another news item, albeit a shocking and violent one. Once Chinese soldiers stormed the north western province and cracked down on the protesters, the news stories dried up, and the Uighurs were almost forgotten.

But now, thanks to the foolish efforts of the Chinese government to silence dissent, we’re all going to hear a lot more about both Kadeer and her campaign for Uighur justice. And I suspect this feisty little old woman will win over many more hearts and minds than she ever dreamt possible: simply because China has tried to thump the fist of censorship.

The documentary about Kadeer is by first time film-maker Jeff Daniels. Seven years in the making, it slipped quietly into the Melbourne festival’s program. Although the recent Uighur unrest gave it the sort of edgy currency that festival programmers delight in, it wasn’t until MIFF executive director Richard Moore received a terse phone call from the Chinese Consulate in Melbourne, that he realized just how ‘edgy’.

The caller, a Mrs Chen, urged Moore to remove the film from the program, and told him he had “no reason to justify” its inclusion in the festival. Moore stood his ground, and refused to be intimidated or bullied. He insisted the film will be screened and the public can make up its own mind about Kadeer and her Uighur cause.

Since then, MIFF has had seven films withdrawn from the festival by Chinese, Hong Kong, and Taiwanese directors. According to Moore none of the directors have been prepared to say why they’re pulling out.

Given the festival opened last week and has another week to run, those sudden withdrawals had the potential to cause chaos. So too did the hacking of the MIFF website, which caused Chinese flags to pop up continuously, and online ticketing to meltdown. But rather than turn audiences away, the Chinese action has had the reverse effect. Ticket sales have never been stronger. And Kadeer, who arrives in Melbourne next week, will be hailed as an underdog hero. She’s already been invited to Canberra to address The National Press Club on August 11.

Open discussion and debate is a fundamental tenant of any liberal society. As such, freedom of speech is not negotiable. It’s a great shame that China, once again, has failed to understand that debate is in fact transformative, and indeed progressive. Those societies that inhibit introspection of themselves are ultimately doomed. The human spirit will always triumph over state enforced silence. Thankfully.

And thankfully too film makers the world over remain courageous and defiant, despite the threat of censorship - or worse. Film festivals are there to support them and their efforts, and to encourage a discursive response.
Perhaps the last word on censorship should go to Melbourne film-maker Daniels, who this week watched his documentary go through the diplomatic wringer: “Considering the Chinese government’s recent demands to silence my film in Australian I am not surprised so little is heard of the Uighurs’ plight. But I have the privilege of living in a society that finds strength in dissenting opinions”.

And may Australia ever be so.

(Virginia Haussegger is the President of the Canberra International Film Festival which runs from 28 Oct - 8 Nov 2009)

"Mahboba's Promise"

2009-08-01T09:54:00.007+10:00

"Mahboba's Promise"

By Virginia Haussegger

The 7.30 Report, ABC TV, 2 July 2009

After almost three decades of bloody conflict, Afghanistan has one of the highest rates of widowhood in the world, and more than one and half million orphans. It takes a brave woman to roll up her sleeves and dedicate her life to fixing the problem. Sydney woman Mahboba Rawi travelled Australia raising money to feed, house and support the orphans and widows of Afghanistan. Last month she returned to her homeland after a two year absence, only to find life on the streets is tougher than ever. Virginia Haussegger travelled with her.

Camera & sound: Amin Palengi

Photos: Palwesha Yusuf, Sanaz Fotouhi, Virginia Haussegger

Transcript

Video story

Should we stay in Afghanistan?

2009-07-26T17:17:00.013+10:00

Photos by Virginia Haussegger: The girls from the Abdara School for Girls, Panjshir Valley, Afghanistan.

Little Europa, an orphan at "Hope House", Kabul, Afghanistan.

Education's ray of Hope

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 25 July 2009

For a moment I wasn't sure if Europa was about to cry. Her huge brown eyes were fixed on the Australian soldier towering over her. He was handing her a little toy. She looked at it, then back at him. Both he and I held our breath. Finally, slowly, Europa's face softened into a beautiful smile. She took the toy.

This was probably the first time this little Afghan orphan had encountered a friendly face in uniform. It's hard to explain the power of that moment. Even harder to explain the value of such an exchange. But I got the feeling it will be lasting - for both of them.

And yet, beyond the walls of this orphanage in Kabul, no exchange is this straightforward. And very little makes sense.

What are we doing in Afghanistan? The case for Australia's involvement in this war has never been clearly explained.

If this is a war against terrorism, we're losing - badly. Terrorist attacks are more prevalent and sophisticated than ever before. And they're happening well beyond the borders - or control - of Afghanistan. We need no reminding of Jakarta, Bali, Mumbai, London or Madrid. Nor do we need reminding that Australia too is now a key terrorist target.

If this is a war primarily against the Taliban and al-Qaeda, how much responsibility are we - as United States allies - prepared to take, for creating these monsters in the first place? Arming, training and supporting those who have now turned their fighting skills against the West. And how much responsibility do we take for sitting on our hands for five years, while the Taliban was in control and brutalising the women of Afghanistan? Why didn't we hear the call for foreign help then?

Not even General Stanley McChrystal, the recently installed commander of operations in Afghanistan, will try to suggest this war is being won. The best he can say is that it's ''tough, very tough''. He insists it's not about killing the enemy or taking ground, instead he says it's about ''governance''. Which in theory sounds interesting. But in the context of Afghanistan's poverty, massive unemployment, shocking corruption and lack of basic infrastructure - not to mention generations of civilians traumatised by war - to talk of ''governance'' sounds glib.

Clearly the war in Afghanistan is not being won. There is no ''victory'' in sight. We're not sure if victory means a partial return to ''moderate'' Taliban control - which appears to be the current agenda. Or, if it means a complete annihilation of all Taliban members and sympathisers: with the instalment of some other stronger and kinder faction in their place. With victory so unclear, there can be no credible timetable to end this war.

So why then is Australia's defence chief now talking about a withdrawal strategy? On Tuesday Angus Houston said that within ''four [to] five years the job will be done''. Does this signify a retreat? A hand-back to local factions to fight it out among themselves, because we're bereft of ideas or strategies to sort out this unholy mess?

At this point I must confess I am deeply torn by Afghanistan. And little Europa, her orphan sisters, their friends and all the little girls like them are the reason why.

Five years ago I clipped a newspaper photo which showed a dozen young and bedraggled Afghan girls standing in scrub, north of Kabul. They were aged between about five and 12, and yet looked like weathered old widows in children's bodies, with dark and bereft expressions.

Recently I travelled through that same area and into the majestic Panjshir Valley, to visit the recently opened Abdara School for Girls. Tucked away deep within the valley, where roads are little more than winding, rocky goat tracks, I was staggered that anyone could even contemplate building a school here, much less do it. But Australians did.

Built entirely with Australian donations and determination, this little school is now educating 200 girls. None of them have ever been to school before, and this is their only shot at an education. Like most of the women in the valley, their mothers can't read or write.

But now, for once, there's a chance that a generation of girls might just get the helping hand they need to lift themselves above the poverty, illiteracy and unemployment that has kept their families subservient to feudal systems and tribal factionalism. Unlike the sad, weary little girls in my faded clipping, the Abdara school girls simply shine with enthusiasm. Learning does that. So does hope, and a sense of optimism.

Since 2007 the Taliban has bombed, burned and closed 640 schools and waged a murderous campaign against teachers. Girls' schools are their key target. While mired in its own chaos and corruption, the Afghan Government is not rebuilding them. But international aid organisations are. Australia's included.

If little else, this is a good reason to be there. And to stay. At least until the education of girls is understood to be a valuable weapon against Afghanistan's violent cycle of rule by warrior and warlord. It is the key to unlocking the nation's hidden strength and capability.

ANU Public Debate: Should we ban the Burka?

2009-07-26T17:08:00.007+10:00

(Photo: Virginia Haussegger, Julie Posetti, Prof Hilary Charlesworth, Dr Sharkira Hussein)

A video recording of the public debate "Should we ban the Burka", held at the Austalian National University on the15 July 2009, is now available at ABC Fora online.

The event was hosted by the ANU and chaired by Prof Hilary Charlesworth. The speakers were Virginia Haussegger, Dr Sharkira Hussein and Julie Posetti.

A 12 minute preview is available, click play clip, or the full clip is 1.20 hrs.

You can also listen to an audio podcast recording of the debate.

Why discuss the Burka?

2009-07-18T10:08:00.015+10:00

(Photo: Rabiah Hutchinson at Manly Beach, Sydney, by Vanessa Hunter)

Cloak of Silence over us

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, July 18, 2009

Picture this: the place is Cairo, and two Egyptian women are eyeballing each other on the subway. One is dressed from head to toe in a burka, and the other is wearing a hijab. The black clad woman asks the other why she is not wearing a burka. The young woman points to her headscarf and says, “Is this not enough?”

The woman in the burka responds, “If you wanted a piece of candy, would you choose an unwrapped piece or one that came in a wrapper?”“I am not candy”, the younger woman replies. “Women are not candy”.

And with that, Mona Eltahawy, a Muslim feminist who had worn the hijab for nine years, decided to ditch it altogether.

Eltahawy detailed that exchange in a column for the International Herald Tribune in early July in which she added her voice to the call for a ban on the burka.

“I detest the full-body veil, known as the niqab or burqa. It erases women from society and has nothing to do with Islam but everything to do with the hatred for women at the heart of the extremist ideology that preaches it.”

It’s no coincidence that women’s voices, including mine, are rising up in protest against the burka and niqab at this time. Despite the garments sill being rare in Australia, the issue has surfaced because women – and men - have been watching with alarm as this extreme practice of subjugation has enjoyed a revival among pockets of fundamental Islamists. French President Sarkozy’s call for a ban simply wrapped headlines around the issue.

Eltahawy laments a broad ambivalence among her fellow Muslims to speak out against the burka. “They will take on everything – the right wing, Islamophobia, Mr (Jack) Straw, Mr Sarkozy – rather than come out and plainly sate that the burqa is an affront to Muslim women”. She blames the “ultra conservative Salafi ideology”, as practiced in Saudi Arabia, for claiming the high moral ground of piety and purity, and thereby silencing other Muslims.

In Australia I blame a bad case of cultural relativism for our extreme nervousness over tackling the issue. And perhaps a touch of political correctness gone mad.

The public outcry over the burka during these past few weeks is evidence that we need to discuss it. We want to understand what it means to see women in this apparently submissive state, fully shrouded and hidden from view, as she trails behind her husband. The problem is – we don’t know how to talk about it.

The charge of racism or Islamaphobia has shot through cyberspace, on comments to my blog, in letters and emails, with little or no reference to the role of the burka and an examination of what it does to women. Not surprisingly, many Australians place freedom of choice above all other considerations. “It’s her choice, she can wear what she likes”, has been chanted like a mantra. And there’s something reassuring about our fierce defence of the right to “choose”. The problem however, is our cultural aversion to intelligent scrutiny of that choice.

Not all choices are good choices and not all choices are made freely.

Australia’s most flamboyant Muslim, the surfi chick convert, Rabiah Hutchinson, wears the full black niqab with a slit for her eyes. There’s no doubting it’s her own choice. Even her Islamic teacher suggested the ostentatious garb was unnecessary and provocative in Australia. But Rabiah has made a series of provocative and questionable choices, including marrying into Osama bin Laden’s inner circle, and arranging to marrying off her ten year old daughter to a 21 year old man.

The burka and niqab is less about choice for women, and more about conformity to an unyielding system of segregation and subjugation. It highlights a culture of deep divisions and mistrust, in which women have no power outside their home, and men cannot be trusted to look at any women to whom he is not related. The mere sight or shape of women is viewed as a corrupting influence, as she is little more than an object of sex. Within such a system all political, judicial, and religious authority is owned by men. Public space is owned by men. Women have no free agency – at all.

Rather than see women as a moderating and civilizing force in society, those who insist on women wearing the burka and niqab, reduce them to servitude.

The purpose of a ban on the burka is to send an unequivocal message to men that none of this is acceptable in Australia. Here all women are free and equal participants in our society. No woman need cover her face or hide her identity.

This is not about religion, nor is it about piety. Piety is a private thing that doesn’t require layers of candy wrapping to prove itself. This is about power over women.

There is a risk that those women already suffering under the heavy hand of fundamentalism, may be further restricted by a ban on wearing the burka in Australia. But the bigger risk is if we do and say nothing. Our silence is seen as endorsement of a system that debases and humiliates women. We must speak up.

Ban the Burka

2009-06-30T02:02:00.014+10:00

(Photo of Rabiah Hutchinson shopping in Sydney. By Vanessa Hunter)

Ban unAustralian Burka

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 27 June 2009

I 've seen it elsewhere around the world, but I didn't expect to see it here. Certainly not on a hot summer's afternoon at the Canberra Centre. But there it was. A ghostly figure walking towards me, clad from head to toe in a heavy black niqab, black gloves and dark shoes. She was trailing along behind her husband and four little children.

The sight of this hideously shrouded figure in an Australian shopping mall is confronting and offensive. And it makes me angry, very angry.

I wanted to stop and ask why she had such disrespect for herself and our culture that she would hide her face and body under all that black cloth, designed to render her shapeless and inhuman. But her husband shot me a glance, and I was silenced. Dumbfounded.

I abhor the burka, and the niqab. I hate what it does to women. I am appalled that women are separated from the world in this way. And I am furious that some women will continue to choose to wear it. But then, throughout history, feeble women who are afraid of modernity have always been complicit in their own oppression.

The burka, with its tiny window of mesh over the eyes, and the niqab, with its letter-slit opening, are tools of patriarchy used to subjugate women. This shroud of cloth thrown over women defies freedom. It is a symbol of control. Wearing it signifies an acceptance of segregation of the sexes. The cultures which demand such segregation are societies in which men are considered the natural superiors to women.

The fact that Western, democratic governments allow this garb to be worn in secular societies is evidence that "gender equality" and the "liberation of women" are still just vague aspirations, mouthed with weak intent. Unless of course you're French.

In an historic address on Monday the French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, called for an outright ban on this hideous instrument of control. "The burka is not a sign of religion," he said, "it is a sign of enslavement. It is a sign of subservience." His rally cry has been brewing for years, as the French parliament has watched with alarm the growing number of burkas and niqabs appearing in French cities.

The Urban Affairs Minister, Fadela Amara, who is also a passionate advocate for Muslim women's rights, says the ugly shroud is akin to putting a woman in a "tomb". She's called on France to "stop burkas from spreading". It's a tough call, given there are around five million Muslims in France.

The 2004 ban on wearing hijabs at school, or in public offices, was met with furious protests around the country. A ban on the burka has the potential to ignite riots. Sarkozy knows that. And yet he is still determined to push ahead. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd must do the same.

The burka is not yet common here, but it's only a matter of time. Australia is positioned in a region being transformed by the rise of Islamic fundamentalism. Radical Islam's plan for domination is utterly incompatible with women's equality. Put bluntly, Islamic fundamentalists view Australia, and all Western democracies, as immoral and decadent - because the women are free. Australia must not allow that radical and overt tool of fundamentalism - the burka - to be worn here. It defies our cherished values of equality and freedom.

Wearing the burka - or niqab - in Australia is an aggressive way of saying "I will not integrate into your society, and I care nothing for the cultural mores and social traditions of this country". Instead, the woman wearing it is demonstrating that she would rather submit to gender apartheid than embrace the social norms of this place. The burka is an arrogant display of disrespect to Australia and the Australian way of life.

Covering women like this, and rendering them sexless and shapeless, is apparently to stop men looking at them. It is to ensure the sexual urges of men are not stirred or tempted. It is also a fierce display of proving a man's power over his woman, and his ownership of her. The Koran calls on both men and women to display modesty. Why then don't men wear burkas? Women too are sexual beings, who may also have their urges stirred and tempted by the sight of a man. But of course that doesn't register in societies that view females only as sexual objects and temptresses.

By covering herself in a burka, a woman is relinquishing the right to express herself as a female. She is agreeing to suppress her own sexuality.

For a woman to argue she feels more comfortable hidden beneath her burka, away from the gaze of men, is unacceptable in modern society. Such a claim represents total submission to sexual subordination. That sort of thing might have been understandable - perhaps even forgivable - when women were uneducated and utterly dependent on men for food, shelter and protection. But women must no longer agree to such secondary status. And most certainly, not when they are in Australia.

There is no place here for the burka. Australians must rally to have the burka banned.

Afghanistan's refugees and asylum seekers

2009-06-30T01:52:00.002+10:00

Dress code for refugees

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 20 June 2009

I will never know, or understand, why I won the passport lottery and Sedique, or Meena, or Obaidullah, or any other would-be refugee lost out. I just happened to be born into one of the safest, cleanest and wealthiest countries on earth - Australia.

Those three happened to be born into one of the most dangerous and deadliest countries in the world - Afghanistan. There, if military battles or tribal warfare don't get you, perhaps drought, poverty and an appalling lack of health care will. Either way, Afghanistan is a hell of a place to live in right now. Which is why so many have fled. One in four of the world's refugees is from Afghanistan. There are nearly three million of them scattered across 69 different asylum countries, including Australia.

Today is World Refugee Day, and therefore a good time to focus on a few simple truths about refugees from war-torn Afghanistan, given they make up the biggest refugee population in the world.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees has billed today as being all about "Real People, Real Needs". And the UN Refugee Agency is using the superstar pulling power of Angelina Jolie to plug the message. Given her stratospheric celebrity status, you couldn't get a more "unreal" person to talk about real people. But it works.

Jolie's 30-second video advertisement telling us that "refugees are the most vulnerable people on earth" has already been replayed thousands of times across the United States entertainment media. If you can look past her exceptional beauty - which, admittedly, is pretty hard - Jolie's message about refugees is beautifully simple. "Every day they are fighting to survive. They deserve our respect."

In Australia it's easy to talk about respect and kid ourselves that as a nation we are "respectful" of those who are either disadvantaged or different. But as recent displays of racial hatred against Indians in Melbourne, Sydney and even here in Canberra have shown, we're only a beer or two away from revealing our racist underbelly.

And when it comes to refugees, and those seeking asylum, Australians have proven we're quick to judge, and condemn. Two months ago, when a boat-load of asylum- seekers from Afghanistan was detained off Ashmore Reef - the second boat to attempt illegal entry in a week - the Australian media engaged in debate about how "well- dressed" some Afghan asylum- seekers were. The snide implication was that these desperate people, who risked their lives to try to make it to our shores, were really just untrustworthy frauds. Not needy, persecuted people, but upwardly mobile "queue-jumpers".

This kind of suggestion, and the astounding cultural ignorance it displays, is not new. On this Australia has form. We have long treated asylum-seekers and refugees with cynicism and suspicion. Our policies on detention have been unreasonably tough and void of compassion. And politicians have repeatedly seized on media discussion over illegal entries to whip up racism, and feed our deep- rooted fear of difference. Afghans, in particular, have copped considerable scorn.

Back in 2000, the then premier of Western Australia, Richard Court, spoke about a group of Afghan detainees with unconcealed contempt: "We're not talking about genuine refugees, we're talking about people who are smart alecs." He went on to say they "should be turned around straight away". Back then, anyone fleeing Afghanistan was attempting to escape one of the world's most brutal and undemocratic regimes - the Taliban.

Days before Australia's frenzy over the dress code of asylum-seekers, I returned from a trip to Afghanistan. On my last day in Kabul I spent time with a 33-year-old Afghan called Obaidullah. He works in an orphanage built by the Sydney-based charity Mahboba's Promise. A refugee herself at the age of 11, Mahboba spent years in refugee camps before she made her way to Australia. Since becoming an Australian citizen, she's dedicated her life to helping the widows and orphans of Afghanistan. Obaidullah is one of her tireless foot soldiers.

Before I left, we talked about Australia and Obaidullah revealed that he'd made three attempts to flee Afghanistan and come here. Each dangerous trip in leaky boats ended in near disaster. Some of his fellow passengers died from hunger and exposure when they drifted for days, lost and with no fuel. The closest Obaidullah ever got to Australia - the paradise of his dreams - was Ashmore Reef. There the boat was apprehended and turned back at gunpoint. After three years, 11 days and 20 hours in detention in Indonesia, Obaidullah was sent back to Afghanistan.

Since then the lawlessness and suicide bombings in his neighbourhood have become worse. He still owes more money to people smugglers - despite the failed ventures - than he could ever hope to earn in Afghanistan. And the prospects of peace in his country are hopelessly grim. But Obaidullah says he'll never again try to make it to Australia.

As we politely bade each other goodbye, I noticed his crisply ironed shalwar kameez, with a neat vest on top. Is he just another failed asylum-seeker who's too well dressed? Or a would- be refugee who deserves an apology and our respect?

Bad boy Gordon Ramsay

2009-06-30T01:42:00.010+10:00

How we love a swine

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 13 June 2009

So Gordon Ramsay is a pig. We knew that. He's paid to be. In fact, Ramsay is probably one of the highest-paid pigs on the celebrity circuit right now. And after his most recent piggish act Down Under, he's probably in for a pay rise. He's proven - yet again - that bad behaviour is a ratings-puller.

The public outcry this week over Ramsay calling Tracy Grimshaw a pig and a lesbian reeks of mock indignation. And Ramsay, if he had enough brains, ought to call us on it. But unfortunately he's not that smart. Instead of apologising to Grimshaw, and "anyone else I offended", Ramsay should have told the complaining public to pull its finger out. The faux outrage over his comments is hypocritical in the extreme.

First, let's be clear about what is and isn't an insult here. Being called a pig is an insult. Being called a lesbian isn't. Although Ramsay says he's been misquoted.

"On my children's life, I never ever called Tracy a lesbian," he told a reporter. But sheepishly he admitted that using "innuendos [and] a picture of a pig, was not clever".

The Prime Minister was so incensed by the attack on Grimshaw, a highly respected television presenter, that he called Ramsay "a new form of low-life". The Deputy PM also weighed in, suggesting Ramsay should curb the comments and stick to the kitchen.

Naturally, each instalment to the week-long story caused hits to websites and blogs, and television ratings to shoot up.

It began last weekend, when Ramsay was doing his usual thing in front of a live audience of 3000, at a Melbourne cooking event. Ever cocky and crude, the master chef was in full flight when he put up a rather revolting image of a pig on the screen behind him. With a human-like head and numerous teats, he told the audience it was Tracy Grimshaw, the very woman who had only recently interviewed him on A Current Affair, politely smiling and tolerating his ballsy humour.

As the public got wind of the celebrity spat, which was well stirred by tabloid media coverage, the theme of the TV beauty and the bad-boy-beast took hold. Suddenly it seemed everyone was shocked and horrified that Gordon Ramsay could be so rude to such a pleasant and professional person as Grimshaw. Prominent Australians scoffed, "He's no longer welcome here." Talk-back callers insisted that Ramsay was the real pig in this story. A brute. A boof-head. And so it rolled on. Tut-tut.

But in all the noisy indignation, we have failed to 'fess up to our own complicity. We're pretending we're rather prudish and feigning offence. Just who are we kidding?

Gordon Ramsay is famous because he is obnoxious and offensive. That is his "brand". He doesn't have television executives banging on his door and begging him to sign a contract to appear on their network just because he is a chef. The world is full of great chefs. They want Ramsay because he yells and screams and berates people. He spits into saucepans, he smashes dishes on the floor, throws food at plates and he terrifies his young apprentice underlings, as he bellows in their ear to "shut the f--- up".

Gordon Ramsay is an atrocious bully who seems to get off on his own hideousness. And so too does his drooling audience. They can't get enough of him. In

Britain

, the

United States

and of course here in

Australia

, a Ramsay cooking class will pull thousands, and his television series is watched by millions. Let's be truthful. We like humiliation. We like to watch others berated and belittled. Offence is a kind of modern-day opiate to the TV- watching masses. Reality shows are full of it.

It began years back with The Weakest Link. When it first screened in

Australia

audiences were mesmerised by the cruelty of Cornelia Frances, as she scorned the "losers" and kicked them off the show with a tart "goodbye". Before long, kids were playing it in school yards. Whoever could be nastiest, got to be the TV star - the host.

Ever since, cruelty and intimidation have become key ingredients in reality shows. From Big Brother to The Biggest Loser, with Ladette to Lady somewhere in the middle, program-makers have zoomed in on a public lust for nasty stuff. We're glued to the box when housemates are picked on, or ostracised, then double-crossed. We revel in the fat and frumpy struggles of others as they parade their naked humiliation on screen. We watch wide-eyed as the hapless and the meek are berated.

It would seem humiliation has become our favourite form of entertainment.

But what kind of sustenance do we get from watching others verbally abused and demeaned? Perhaps it's a fleeting sense of smugness. A whiff of power - when in our own dreary daily lives we in fact feel powerless.

Whatever it is that makes us tune in to bad, bullying behaviour, that dummy Gordon Ramsay has worked it out. And it's making him rich.

Afghanistan's RAWA spokeswoman

2009-06-30T01:36:00.001+10:00

Brave voice for freedom

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 30 May 2009

What a strange place Australia must seem to Shazia Shakib. She arrived in Adelaide on Wednesday, having flown from war-torn Afghanistan, via Pakistan. She's 25 years old and has never been to "the West" before.

By the time this petite, young Afghan stands to face an audience at the University of South Australia, on Thursday night, she looks positively overwhelmed. This is to be her first public speech and the words she's about to say could get her killed back in Afghanistan.

I can't tell you what Shazia looks like because that would betray her identity and place her at risk. But I can tell you what she sounds like. Shazia's voice is soft and small. Yet there is a fierce strength in her words. She means it when she calls the Taliban "poisonous germs", and refers to members of the Afghan Government as "criminal warlords" and "jehadi fundamentalists".

But it's when she gets talking about the United States and NATO occupying forces that Shazia's pitch rises. When I ask about Australia and its involvement in her country, this young revolutionary steadies the nervousness in her voice and remains firm. "Yes, Australia too," she says. "Australia must get out of our country. They are following bad US policy and Australian troops are attacking and bringing suffering to our people. They must go."

They're fighting words, and Shazia knows it. She is here to pick a fight. And now is the time to bring it on.

This November it will be eight years since US troops stormed into Kabul, raised the US flag, and President George W. Bush declared, "Today women are free." It was a grand and pretentious claim, which now looks like nothing but an empty slogan. A cynical bit of political spin to help drag the doubting public over the line, and get broad voter support for the billions of dollars and tens of thousands of troops that would be poured into Afghanistan.

The women of Afghanistan are not free or liberated.

We all know life under the Taliban was atrocious, but to hear Shazia say that Afghanistan's women are now living through a "catastrophe" that is even worse is startling.

Although accurate statistics are difficult to determine in Afghanistan, there is a lot of research on women that indicates record high levels of domestic violence, acid attacks, rapes, forced marriages and self- immolation. The rate of females attempting suicide by burning themselves has never been as high. Shazia puts that down to extreme depression and despair. "Life is too hard for women."

Yes, they are no longer confined to the home, as they were under the Taliban. And, yes, women are permitted to work and study. But a toxic cocktail of poverty, massive unemployment, rampant corruption and a desperate sense of frustration has led to what Shazia says is a major "violation of basic human rights and women's rights that has no parallel in the history of Afghanistan".

With warlords and drug barons now occupying government seats and positions of power, and enjoying immunity from prosecution, thanks to a "national reconciliation law", passed in 2007, the strong have grown stronger and the weak - the women - even weaker.

Shazia is a spokesperson for the clandestine underground movement known as RAWA, the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan. Hated and banned in Afghanistan, RAWA operates through a well-organised network of women throughout Afghanistan and in Pakistan. The group is fiercely anti- fundamentalist, and abhors the use of Islam as an excuse for the continued persecution of women. For the past 30 years it has called for a democratic and secular government in Afghanistan. But it's a call that continues to fall on deaf ears.

Now Shazia and her fellow revolutionaries are feeling particularly pessimistic. "After the US attack on the Taliban back in 2001 and the arrival of Hamid Karzai everyone was hopeful that there would be change," she says. "There was so much hope." But that hope has now turned to deep cynicism. RAWA believes the presence of more than 70,000 troops from more than 40 countries, and the billions of dollars spent, has only driven Afghanistan into the hands of the terrorist groups, including the Taliban.

Shazia isn't alone in arguing that Afghanistan's official ranks have been deeply infiltrated by self- serving corrupt individuals, including Taliban and those who RAWA calls "jehadi fundamentalists": men who are stuck in a misogynist mire. "They do not believe in women's rights," Shazia says. "They have old and ancient ideas about women."

Although the last election in Afghanistan ushered 68 women into parliament, only three of them have ever spoken out strongly in defence of women's rights. Each has received several death threats.

So what does Shazia make of Australia? It's almost too embarrassing to ask. But I do. "There is so much freedom for the people here - we should be like this," she says almost in a whisper. "But no country can grant freedoms or democracy to us. It is the responsibility of our people to bring peace and security to our country."

So what do we do? Just wish them well?

* Shazia Shakib is not her real name

Chic's topless chicks

2009-06-30T01:31:00.001+10:00

Summernats? Get it off

By Virginia Haussegger

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times, 23 May 2009

There's a beaut line in the film Annie Hall, when Rob, who's just moved to LA, is taking Alvy and Annie on a car tour of the ritzy Beverly Hills. Rob loves the place and can't stop boasting its charms. "And the women, Max, they're like the women out of Playboy magazine, only they can move their arms and legs."

Annie laughs. But Alvy groans. He comments on the absurd architecture, and its mish-mash of pretentious style.

Fast-forward, and this could be a scene in Canberra, as a bunch of excited blow-ins motor down Northbourne Avenue in early January, here for the National Capital's biggest spectacle of the year - Summernats.

Out there at EPIC the women are also like Playboy Bunnies, but without the ears and the air-brushing. They're a little more earthy, a little more dusty and dirty. Their arms and legs certainly move. Arms go up as tops come off. And those legs strut, stretch and sprawl.

But while Woody Allen's take on bare-breasted bimbos who can walk and talk always makes me laugh, the Summernats real-life versions never do.

It's an odd thing to stand in the crowd watching the Miss Summernats contestants purr to the chanting mob, and listening to the pudgy young boy beside me yell "show us ya tits". It was even odder to hear his mate call out "Ah, ya stink down there". Odd because the women on stage, with the arms and legs that moved, were lapping it up. They were smiling, waving, and smiling some more. An odd response to vicious insults.

Later, backstage, with the crowned winner alongside Miss Second and Third, it was fascinating to learn that the women felt adored. Flapping the sort of eyelashes that would make a drag queen proud, Miss Third told me that all that adoration was good for her self-esteem and "personal development". She was dead serious. "It makes you feel beautiful when everyone is calling out." The fact that they were shouting at her to get her gear off didn't seem to be a problem. Miss Third thought that was "Just all part of it".

And she's right. Lewd, bawdy and bad behaviour is part of Summernats. It's famed for its celebration of topless girls and tit action. Girls who have perhaps never stripped in public before suddenly turn into breast-flashers, goaded by mobs of blokes who trawl the grounds looking for signs of skimpy clothing. The standard greeting is "get it off!". And women do. Repeatedly.

Last year the drunken mob chant of "tits or rubber" got so loud and overbearing that the Miss Summernats parade was halted - for a moment.

For newcomers to Canberra who venture out to Exhibition Park, drawn by the "family fun" publicity, Summernats can be quite a shock. It's rough, tough and dirty. You've got to watch where you walk, and where you look. It may be billed as a "Mecca for the totally committed revhead" but you'll get plenty more than screeching tyres and low-slung cars.

In fact, what you get is a hyped-up mob on heat, dizzy with petrol fumes and sexual tease. Some come for the cars, others for the publicly sanctioned smut fest. All here to have fun in the Canberra sun.

Just how Summernats made its way into the national capital's social events schedule is hard to fathom. Canberrans are proud libertarians. But is endorsing an event like Summernats an expression of liberty verging on stupidity?

This week we heard that Summernats is up for sale. Its popular and hard-working chief, Chic Henry, says he's keen to keep the event in Canberra. And why not? The ACT Government has generously supported the car-fest for years, and watched it pump money back into the local economy.

While Summernats' reputation as a misogynisticMecca has grown, and the crowds swelled, no Canberran has dared stand in the way. Or in judgment.

Perhaps now is the time.

Chieftain Chic knows he's long been on to a good thing here in Canberra. He's well aware that the heady cocktail of hot cars and girls can be a recipe for deep trouble.

This week on his offical blog, Chic thanked his lucky stars that Summernats is in recess right now, given the current media attack on sex- crazed footballers: "Thank goodness we aren't just about to open the gates at this time. The media would be on my case."

He sounds a warning to his patrons. "Boys there are women who will nail us for everything that sounds like the slightest sexist remark or sign of disrespect of women" (sic). Then, reflecting a befuddled morality, Chic makes the following observation: "We have all done stupid stuff in our lives, but we live in dangerous times made worse with the invention of camera phones."

Perhaps for some, the greatest danger in life is getting caught on camera.

In closing, Chic insists, "Summernats cannot be compared". He's right. But it can be cleared out of town.