Australia: Julia Gillard speaks out on sexism

AUSTRALIA’S first woman prime minister has told of her surprise at the level of aggressive sexism directed at her during her three years in power.
Julia Gillard was ousted by her Labor party in June this yea. Picture: APJulia Gillard was ousted by her Labor party in June this yea. Picture: AP
Julia Gillard was ousted by her Labor party in June this yea. Picture: AP

Julia Gillard made the comments in her first interview since she was deposed in June in a ballot of her centre-left Labor party by 57 votes to 45, as public opinion polls suggested the administration was heading for a catastrophic election defeat.

She was replaced by Kevin Rudd, a prime minister she had deposed in a similar leadership showdown three years earlier in the face of poor opinion polls. Mr Rudd led his party to a crushing election defeat last month, causing some observers to ask whether the leadership change had served any purpose.

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Ms Gillard told a sell-out audience of 2,600 in the Sydney Opera House, in an interview televised nationally, that she reacted angrily to the sexist attacks on her. Asked if she felt it was upsetting, she joked: “More like murderous rage, really, so for my personal liberty, it was a good thing I didn’t focus on [sexism].

“Yes, it’s about me, but it’s about all of us and about the kind of society we want to be for all of us. We can drop the murderous, but we should feel a sense of rage about it because it’s only something that really spurs you on to action that is going to change.”

She was called “witch” and “bitch” on protesters’ banners, while a radio broadcaster said she should be dumped at sea in a sack.

“I was surprised by it. I had issues related to my gender before I became prime minister,” she said, mentioning a senator condemning her as unfit to lead because of her decision not to have children.

“There was this underside of … really violent, ugly sexism that came forward, and I think it finds easier expression because of the social media. But I think it would have been there anyway.”

Tony Abbott, who became premier after his Conservative party won the election, has been criticised for appointing only one woman to his Cabinet. The 55-year-old former Roman Catholic seminarian was branded “a misogynist” and “sexist” by Ms Gillard in a speech to parliament last year that was lauded by feminists around the world.

The former prime minister returned on Sunday from the United States, where she accepted a position with the Washington-based Brookings think tank.

She also met Hillary Clinton and said the former US secretary of state was “full of ideas” about politics and the world.

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“Wouldn’t it be fantastic to follow the first African-American president with the first woman president?” she said.

Ms Clinton’s supporters have encouraged her to run for president in 2016, but she has not revealed her plans.

Ms Gillard said her administration, and others such as Barack Obama’s in the US and David Cameron’s in Britain, have struggled with the evolving media environment, which she felt contributed to her political demise.

She said social media allowed governments to instantly get the truth “to thousands and thousands of people in a way that you never could before, but in an age in which lies and half-truths and odd political claims and silly slogans can also get automatic and widespread currency”.

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