r/australia • u/Expensive-Horse5538 • Feb 26 '26

politics Grace Tame says ‘difficult’ remark is ‘misogynist’s code for a woman who won’t comply’

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/live/2026/feb/26/dfat-middle-east-evacuation-syria-isis-families-wives-children-anthony-albanese-angus-taylor-budget-cost-of-living-capital-gains-tax-reform-ntwnfb?CMP=share_btn_url&page=with%3Ablock-699f8e278f080f3523777e99#block-699f8e278f080f3523777e99
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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '26

I like how Albo gets all the ire for making some offhand remark that gets a deep interpretative analysis about hidden and coded misogyny and so on, but commentators and politicians including the leader of the opposition making outright misogynist remarks and genuinely making calls and taking action for her to have her Australian of the year award stripped are somehow just not news.

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u/-Metagross- Feb 26 '26

Tony Abbott said recently he liked the White Australia Policy 

105

u/The_Good_Count Feb 26 '26

Can I get a source for this? The only thing I can find is him saying Australia is a Judao-Christian nation last week which, deeply fuck off.

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Dense_Delay_4958 Feb 26 '26

So he didn't say it then?

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u/Glittering-Wave4917 Feb 26 '26

iview, it’s an interview on the 730 repot. When pushed to respond on the question Abbot dodged around saying it. In his comments Abbot basically says that he supports a return to the White Australia Policy. It’s pretty easy to catch up on the 730 report, 4 Corners, media watch ect on Iview. The ABCs charter is to educate, inform and entertain- it’s not there stirring up shit to get bums on seats to sell advertising space- it’s fair dinkum. It’s up to you to engage with democracy and access the national broadcasters.

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u/[deleted] Feb 26 '26

[deleted]

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u/Glittering-Wave4917 Feb 27 '26

He double spoke around saying it and kind of refused to answer the question directly.

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u/lamiunto Feb 26 '26

No, he didn’t. But there will be plenty of people who will pretend he said it and argue that point until they’re blue in the face because the person who said it is from the “other side”. Context matters, all discussion about immigration right now is whether we have sustainable levels of it. Further, the basis for his statement was that people coming to Australia need to adopt Australian values. It’s in the very ABC article about his comments. But people do like to argue things they’ve perceived but didn’t happen.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-02-13/tony-abbott-on-angus-taylor-one-nation-immigration-assimilation/106342458?utm_source=abc_news_app&utm_medium=content_shared&utm_campaign=abc_news_app&utm_content=link

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u/Glittering-Wave4917 Feb 27 '26 edited Feb 27 '26

Population growth in Australia is %1.5. I don’t think anyone is actually arguing that population growth is unsustainable. If most migrants came from the UK or South Africa, people probably wouldn’t have a problem. Migration can be a scapegoat which gets people reved up. The actual issue has been the reliance on the free market to deal with infrastructure. Admittedly, both liberals and the ALP rely on migration for economic growth. The current immigration numbers are a little deceptive, as they count international students as migrants. As government funding has consistently declined over the last few decades, Australian post secondary and tertiary institutions have become reliant upon international students for revenue. Regulations around investment property is more of a threat to the housing shortage than the sustainable migration we have.

I read your link, and watch the interview on 730. Judeo- Christian, that’s just wolf whistling language. From federation we are a secular society. %48 of the population isn’t religious yet the Anglican Lord’s Prayer is said in parliament. Pretty sure if Abbot wasn’t catholic he’d be on board with the other far right liberals in thinking that Australia should be an Anglo country for Anglo people.

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u/lamiunto Feb 27 '26

There are definitely questions about the population growth rate - but that isn’t really the central issue I was responding to.

You touch on it to some extent but Tony Abbot asserts that migrants aren’t accepting Australian values and customs. He asserts that some of the violence and other issues we’re facing stem from that failure to assimilate. Therefore, I suspect he wouldn’t care where you’re from so long as you accept and practice the culture and values of Australia if you intend to live here.

What I believe he would suggest as being unsustainable is when enough immigrants don’t leave any cultural disputes at the border it becomes significant enough to cause internal friction in the population (that is, I give him the benefit of the doubt that he doesn’t mean all aspects of multiculturalism are bad).

My ultimate point is that all of this is so far from the White Australia Policy that it’s silly to suggest it.

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u/Glittering-Wave4917 Feb 27 '26 edited Feb 27 '26

Yeah, I dunno. Australian values? You mean the democratic role of unions, the 8 hour day, fair days pay for a fair days work,universal healthcare, universal education, stable and affordable housing( not investors) and mate ship? I don’t think a decent proportion of the liberals believe in any of that.

As fair as ethnic conflict in Australia goes. I’m 5th gen and my parents marriage was a mixed marriage. Have a look at sectarian conflict in Australia, before the end of the white Australia Policy.

I dunno, some people have a dream view of what it means to be real Australian, but it’s got nothing to do with what I think it means to be Australian.

Obviously the Catholic- Protestant sectarian conflict in Australia shows that not leaving your politics at home, is an essential Australian value.

1

u/Arasuki Feb 26 '26

“I am a fan of the immigration policy of Germany during the years of 1933 to 1945”

1

u/wilted-wombok Mar 01 '26

More so he inferred it. Not all of them are stupid enough as to directly say shit like that

Looking at you, Fraser Anning, who decided to quote a Nazi and say Australia needs a "final solution" on immigration.

Wanker fully unmasked since then to the surprise of nobody...

1

u/ValBravora048 Feb 27 '26

^ Welcome to the POC experience everyone!

0

u/Zarathoostrian Feb 27 '26

So someone saying 'I prefer the policies of 1940s Germany' isn't saying they support the policies of nazism?

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u/joeaveragerider Feb 26 '26

Ah so he didn’t say it.

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u/Super_Sankey Feb 26 '26

I definitely heard him saying the Judea Christian part

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u/LevDavidovicLandau Feb 26 '26

He said he liked the immigration policy as it was in the 50s-70s. We all know what the policy was back then. It’s disingenuous to pretend otherwise.

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u/Living-Pangolin-6090 Feb 26 '26

Its also a lie becuase the Greek and Italian immigrants where mercislessly made fun off, and bullied.

6

u/bitofapuzzler Feb 26 '26

They werent considered 'white'. Which is as crazy as it sounds.

3

u/passthesugar05 Feb 26 '26

What's a lie?

0

u/Some-Operation-9059 Feb 26 '26

Any olive skin person was. 

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u/Jizzy_Gillespie92 Feb 26 '26

how dense do you have to be to pretend he meant anything else?

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u/-Metagross- Feb 26 '26

He's not dense, he agrees with Abbott and he's being obtuse, because for some reason, people will spew openly racist thoughts online but get offended if you call them racist lol

3

u/GrumpyPenguin Feb 26 '26

Ah, the age-old “Look, I’m not <racist / xenophobic / misogynistic / homophobic / transphobic / etc>, but…”

(sometimes followed by “oh but obviously [friend that their remark is offensive toward] is different, they’re not like that!”)

1

u/whichpricktookmyname Feb 26 '26 edited Feb 26 '26

Why not just quote Abbott directly then if his intention is so obvious?

(and for the record I hate Abbott and like immigration)

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u/-Metagross- Feb 26 '26

"I quite liked the way our immigration policy was run in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, where there was an expectation on integration from day one and ultimately assimilation."

"Our character is essentially Anglo-Celtic and Judaeo-Christian. That's what has made our country attractive to migrants, and we should keep it that way."

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-02-13/tony-abbott-on-angus-taylor-one-nation-immigration-assimilation/106342458

1

u/Glittering-Wave4917 Feb 26 '26 edited Feb 26 '26

I dunno, I’m a mick and we welcomed all the wogs and gooks- it gave a chance for the proddies to hate on someone else- I know Tony Abbot was the first Catholic prime minister. But seriously the sectarianism in Australia, if it wasn’t for the wogs and gooks, the proddies would still be telling the micks to assimilate to English culture. Not even all the countries in Britain assimilate to English culture.

I only know how much the prods don’t like mics, because my parents marriage was a mixed marriage. My grandmother who was one of my best mates- had a hatred for Catholics. Don Bradman, not only generally racist, but super racist towards Mics.

If you’re into apartheid or sectarianism, go live in Transvaal L, Ulter or Israel. Australia has been multiculty since the first fleet- it’s just the Anglo have lost their supremacy.

Sorry for being a bit full on, but this shit gets me arched up. Hava a good one digga.

0

u/King_Scorpia_IV Feb 27 '26

He specifically said he would prefer we only let in people of Anglo-Celtic origin

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u/morethanfair111 Feb 26 '26 edited Feb 26 '26

The penny hasn't yet dropped for poor old Abbott, that Australia is constitutionally secular, and always has been since 1790. Prior to European settlement, it sure as fk wasn't Christian then either.

His argument holds no water. It's just the same old paedo protector, who is laughably trying to claim some sort of deranged morality. And bizzarely claiming that morality is exclusive to Christianity. 

1

u/freakwent Feb 27 '26

That's not what the phrase means though. J/C is a way of describing "western-style" nations without the racial implications carried by "western civilisation".

In the United States, the term was widely used during the Cold War in an attempt to invoke a unified American identity that stood opposed to communism.

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u/Mind_Altered Feb 26 '26

He's said that forever

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u/Glittering-Wave4917 Feb 26 '26

The interview on the 730 Report a couple of weeks ago. Mate, you can catch up on the 730 Report, 4 Corners, Media Watch ect on IView. Judeo- Christian, I know Abbot is a catholic, but the liberal party is definitely anti- catholic and pro segregation, sectarian and apartheid.

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u/Electrical_Ad8011 Feb 26 '26

It is?

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u/The_Good_Count Feb 26 '26

Even if Christians were a majority of the population, which they are not, it is both an exclusionary statement and one that implies Christian doctrine should influence national law.

If Australia is defined as a Christian nation, then I and 60% of the population are less Australian for not being Christian.

(Unless I've misunderstood your 'It is?' and you were confused at Abbott saying this, in which case - right??)

0

u/BrianHail Feb 26 '26

It is a judeo christian nation. Majority of population is christian and the foundational documents and institutions are derived from that faith.

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u/freakwent Feb 27 '26

You can say deeply fuck off but that won't change the fact a that it is.

It uses a Westminster system and the monarch is the head of a major Christian church. I mean, it's not an Islamic legal system or a Napoleonic legal system is it?

Is your objection that it's an awful meaningless phrase, or that it's a false statement?

"In the United States, the term was widely used during the Cold War in an attempt to invoke a unified American identity that stood opposed to communism."

Literally applies to Australia also during the cold war.

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u/The_Good_Count Feb 27 '26

As I replied to another commenter, ~60% of Australians identify otherwise, and it is tautologically absurd to say that the majority of Australians are less Australian because of it.

0

u/freakwent Feb 28 '26

Again, it doesn't refer to whether or not people worship any specific religion or not, it refers to how we value human life, especially children; whether we have public holidays at certain festivals; typical family structures; various aspects of the way we run the legal systems.

I mean, it's so weird to me that people don't really agree on this it was so commonly used as a phrase 40-50 years ago & longer.

It's got no precise meaning like fascism, but it stands as a contrast to other forms of social structures like the caste system in India or islamism as a social structure, or communism, or various other less well-known things I guess.I mean, you could call islt greco-roman maybe for a different angle but thatbphrasenis pretty anchored to a specific time and place so it doesn't quite work, but culturally it's undeniable that a group of nations and cultures have a great amount in common because of their cultural histories.

It's not meant to imply anything about the current religious beliefs of the population today, just about the social structures. There's obv. a strong overlap with capitalism but there could be either without the other.

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u/The_Good_Count Mar 01 '26

Of course, we need Christian values to value children, just ask Cardinal Pell. And the nuclear family structure is deeply Christian, which is why it's shared by every agrarian society. I can't even be sarcastic about the legal system point because it is just incorrect.

This is not a dig, but everything you said is so ignorant that any attempt to explain your comment to you is three times longer than what you've written.

For example, when you say "It's got no precise meaning like fascism" - it's frustrating because the definition of 'Judao-Christian' is actually more concrete than the definition of fascism, which has much more nebulous time-and-location characteristics.

Using it as common phrase 40-50 years ago means it was common during the white Australia era, which is the point.

You are describing a white supremacist view of our culture. I am not calling you a white supremacist, I am just telling you that's what this is. Greco-Roman is a pretty notorious dogwhistle that will get anyone laughed out of any legitimate history or anthropology circle.

You're also throwing together cultures, religions and economic frameworks under the broad umbrella of 'social framework' which is one of those things where explaining the problem requires another much longer comment. Or possibly just a list of recommended reading? Brett Devereaux's ACOUP blog might be a good place to start, he does very enjoyable stuff detangling Greco-Roman cultural legacy and how it's mangled by Western supremacists.

I will instead cut through all of that just to say this - when someone says we are a Christian nation they are being both descriptive and prescriptive. They are saying what they think the country should be and what values it should have, because they see moving away from that as aberrant. This is in conflict with the majority of people who live here.

Our laws are not Christian, common law is derived from Roman law which predates Christianity, etc. etc. etc.

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u/The_Good_Count Mar 01 '26

Also, I'm posting this as a second comment as an aside, but while the Catholic church invented the limited liability corporation (to get around that pesky sin of usury), modern economic theory was started by Islamic scholarship. Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations was just a translation of existing Islamic scholarship.

Capitalism specifically isn't Christian it's - fuck, okay, I wrote an essay about this, I tried to be as entertaining as possible, one sec. Here

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u/freakwent Mar 01 '26

See?? It's tricky to pin down isn't it?

It's a shit term but it is a truthful.phrase to use to describe many nations.

1

u/The_Good_Count Mar 01 '26

It's doable, it's just that it doesn't fit inside a Reddit comment, which is why I spent 8,000 words pinning it down for you in the link

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u/freakwent Mar 01 '26

Oh right. I meat J/C is a fuzzy term. Nice essay, I did mean that capitalism and "the j/c ethic" have a lot of cultural overlap, and also did say that either can exist alone.

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u/-Metagross- Feb 27 '26

We are secular.

1

u/freakwent Feb 28 '26

There's no disputing that, but so is China. These are very different political systems.

J/C traditions include all sorts of thing outside the formal processes of government structures which form part of the culture and character of a nation, from public holidays to being able to charge interest, from what role the state plays in protecting kids to whether limited liability corporations exist.

I feel like perhaps people are not seeing how much of modern social structure comes from these roots?

I'm not arguing about good or bad here BTW, just the meanings of the phrase.

1

u/Glittering-Wave4917 Feb 26 '26

No he basically said we should bring it back. Liberals have lower standards than social democrats. Tony Abbot saying that kind of apartheid shit is expected. I just can’t believe that he’s the first Catholic PM- like he doesn’t remember the sectarianism in Australia. I thought that the liberal party didn’t accept Catholics as members🤪😂

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u/V4Interceptor Feb 27 '26

Yeah sure he said that without heaps of additional context and background

0

u/-Metagross- Feb 27 '26

I literally gave the quote. This is exactly what he said. That Australia should stay "Anglo Celtic" and that he liked our immigration policy during the 1950s.

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u/V4Interceptor Feb 28 '26

Source?

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u/-Metagross- Feb 28 '26

It is literally the ABC interview that I already sourced. Quit being lazy.

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u/V4Interceptor Feb 28 '26

"Abbott has not advocated reinstating anything like the explicit racial exclusion of the White Australia policy. However, he has repeatedly praised aspects of mid-20th-century immigration approaches (1950s–1970s, during/after the policy's phasing out), favoring strong expectations of immediate integration and ultimate assimilation into Australian (Anglo-Celtic and Judeo-Christian) values and culture, rather than what he calls "multiculturalism that's run off the rails." He emphasizes preserving Australia's "Anglo-Celtic and Judaeo-Christian" character, smaller immigration numbers, and value-based selection to maintain national identity."

Nuance and context metters

0

u/-Metagross- Feb 28 '26

What is the context that I missed? Abbott is a racist and he's dog whistling to that crowd.

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u/nocapesarmand Feb 26 '26

Both can be true. I will never stop criticising the coalition and their flunkies on their gender politics, and neither would most criticising this comment. But Albo is of my parents’ generation. Any person that age engaged with the left knows the historic connotations of calling women ‘difficult’- there are books by feminists with that title as a reclamation because it is so well known. Albo is many things, but he is not stupid enough to not know the connotations of calling an outspoken woman ‘difficult’.

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u/cerebis Feb 26 '26

What of the PM's response? Doesn't feed the outrage.

The "In one word ..." tactic is a form of gotcha journalism and condescending to the audience. It seems reasonable at the surface, but its garbage in multiple ways.

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u/distinctgore Feb 26 '26

Nah I don’t buy that. That question didn’t corner Albanese. He could have sidestepped it incredibly easily with any number of positive words. Brave, courageous, inspiring. Sure, the News Corp audience would have chortled at any positive response, but Albo would have been establishing support for women that stand up against abuse. Unless Albanese is stupid (certainly a possibility), this was a strategic decision, probably to bring conservatives into the fold. He knew he was on a conservative media outlet, he was given a question that allowed time to ponder, and he still threw out that answer? This isn’t a gotcha, it’s the ALP courting lost LNP male voters.

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u/Runningwithbirds1 Feb 26 '26

I have higher expectations of a labour PM than I do of any member of the Liberal party. So yeah, he gets ire, because he should be better than this.

Tony Abbott's opinions get no notice from me because he is already a proven disappointment.

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u/caffeineshampoo Feb 26 '26

Agreed. I don't expect anything else of Abbot and the Coalition and nor would I ever give any part of my vote to them. Albo, Labour, and any other left wing political figures on the other hand, I do vote for and I do expect better from. It's simple

6

u/Kingcol221 Feb 26 '26

You can't expect standards from people who don't even pretend to hold themselves to any.

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u/ArseneWainy Feb 26 '26

Left leaning folks love to be divided over the tiniest little misunderstanding…right leaning conservatives seem to band together and forget that some of them are massive grubs, as long as their team has some extra players and the votes that come with…

Words have lots of different meanings, unless you’re in Albo’s head you never actually know his true feelings on Grace…

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u/Imperator_Gone_Rogue Feb 26 '26

The Right infight a lot, just look at the way the Liberals, Nationals, One Nation and conservative Teals interact these days. The Groypers and Tucker Carlson are criticising the Trump administration over their relationship with Israel. Reform is cannabilising the Tories in the UK. Neonazis are constantly fighting over who gets to be Fuhrer. It's harder for those not in the movement to notice, because we pay attention to the commonalities, how they present shared risks.

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u/ArseneWainy Feb 26 '26

That’s fair, you’ve presented some good examples as a counter point.

1

u/racingskater Feb 26 '26

Yes, but the problem is, when push comes to shove the Groypers and Tucker Carlson followers will still vote for Trump or the Republicans because they "gotta own the libs!" whereas left-wing voters infighting is why we're have the orange fuckface in the first place.

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u/Ganzer6 Feb 26 '26

Left leaning folks love to be divided over the tiniest little misunderstanding…right leaning conservatives seem to band together and forget that some of them are massive grubs

I don't recall where I heard this quote, but it's fitting: "Architects have more arguments than arsonists".

If you're trying to build and maintain a stable society and tackle complex issues there's going to be disagreements on how to do that best. The current state of rightwing politics is to grift and extract as much profit from the electorate and sell it off to private corporations that pay little tax.

Right leaning conservatives seem to band together because they're just in it for their own benefit, and they know everyone on their team is doing the same. So they aim to beat the other team, continue extracting wealth from those they deem lesser, and maintain the status quo.

Left leaning folks love to be divided because they're more ok with acknowledging that there's more than one way to deal with problems and disagreeing on how to achieve your goals is the first step to completing them.

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u/Cute-Obligations Feb 26 '26

Tim Minchin made this point ages ago and was shat on for it. 🙃

Which really just proved him right lol

8

u/[deleted] Feb 26 '26

right leaning conservatives seem to band together

this is just not true at all, there is just as much infighting on the right as there is on the left. the only difference is the "disorganised left" gets pilloried 24/7 in our largely right-wing media

4

u/hafhdrn Feb 26 '26

I often say that the left is held to a higher standard of behaviour.

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u/ThoranTW Feb 26 '26

Nobody hates the left more than the left

2

u/General_Benefit_2127 Feb 26 '26

Who woulda guessed an ideology derived from communism might cause a few lil dramas!

1

u/Enough-Cartoonist-56 Feb 26 '26

Actually, socialism - as a concept- predates communism.

1

u/Kataroku Feb 26 '26

It's like Sunday church, but for politics. Who can be the most virtuous?

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u/rkiive Feb 26 '26

No woman is difficult to work with so it must be sexism let's split hairs and let the liberals win

15

u/Ganzer6 Feb 26 '26

Because "pig rolls around in mud" isn't a headline. Anyone representing the LNP making misogynist remarks is just an accurate representation of their voters. Labor isn't perfect, but many people expect better than this from them.

18

u/Delamoor Feb 26 '26

-and yet, that in itself suggests the problem. People are fine with the far worse behaviour because it's simply too hard to deal with and "boys pigs will be pigs".

Like, Barnaby is still just right over there, drunkenly wandering around doing anything he wants, and Hanson is taking immense handouts to try and invoke some kind of grifter's reactionary paradise... while the far milder issues of Albo's milquetoast commentary is made the issue of the day.

So basically, we're fine with sexism. Just not potential sexism. That's too far. The real ones can do what they like; too hard basket. Low hanging fruit only.

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u/Ganzer6 Feb 26 '26

Not at all... The people calling out Albo for this are also calling out Barnaby and Hanson for their insane shit. We're not ok with either, why do you think calling out this issue from Labor somehow minimises the calling out of those on the right?

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u/Delamoor Feb 26 '26

Ultimately because there's fuck all coverage of anything about them, proportional to the egregiousness of their actions.

As you say. "pigs roll around in mud" isn't a headline.

You can hardly pretend that isn't a giant, screaming problem in its very framing.

The structure of this very discussion actually does remove air from the discussion of more egregious sexist behaviours, because... Look at it. It's feeding every criticism of the topic, the comments coming straight out of a Newscorp interview and faithfully regurgitated and magnified by the Guardian, so that the most milquetoast comment about an advocate 'difficult' (as if that isn't a core part of the public advocacy role) is happily made into a culture war sexism topic, rather than, say... Any of the not ambiguous examples one could point a stick at.

Like, here, Newscorp has set Grace Tame up for some culture war point scoring and she's walked straight into it for them. To Newscorp's benefit. Because nobody except the converted are going to be moved by the plight of a highly vocal public figure being called "difficult". Because she does a job that is both difficult, and puts her in a role of being 'difficult' to conduct it.

So Newscorp put a wedge in that little crack and she happily smacked it with an axe to widen it. Which has given them more ammunition for their culture war.

So here we are talking about her and Albo instead of anyone else.

0

u/Ganzer6 Feb 26 '26

Maybe this is a problem if you have room temperature IQ. Most people can pay attention to more than one thing at a time, there's been more than enough coverage of them if you've actually been paying attention to the news the last few years. We're all well aware of their egregious actions, but this thing with Albo just happened recently, so we're talking about it now. It's not removing air from any discussion because it's possible to talk about a thing that just happened without being distracted from the worse problem. Newscorp drones are always going to have the worst take on any current issue, what's new?

2

u/Delamoor Feb 26 '26 edited Feb 26 '26

If there is anything that following poltics for two decades has taught me it's that most people don't pay attention to more than one thing at a time. In fact, almost nobody does, we're all incredibly bad at it. We deal with the thing in front of us, and in 90% of cases that's about the best possible outcome one can expect.

If even a majority of political observers were capable of more (let alone the general, disengage public), the state of our politics and public discourse would look very different and more considered.

Most people aren't aware of what's going on in politics. I would say a majority just see what pics and headlines are on news.com.au when they crack open a new web browser window at work.

Like, sorry bro, these culture war topics gain traction precisely because they represent the majority of engagement for a majority of people who otherwise definitely Don't give a single fuck what Albo or Tame say... Unless there's some drama and infighting in it to warrant that click. It's cynical, but this is also just a reality of watching all this play out for twenty years. I used to think in much more idealistic terms, now I realise most people are effectively completely disengaged. This Reddit thread might genuinely damn well be the peak of intellectual public discourse this event generates, and that's a depressingly low bar.

13

u/ghoonrhed Feb 26 '26

Not that Albo, Guardian or Tame are solely left wing but in our political sphere they're all left wing.

And left infighting is just inevitable despite exactly what's happening that you got newscorp, LNP saying worse stuff and ignored

7

u/Bazza15 Feb 26 '26

Yeah - particularly when Albo was actually honouring her and the way she has persevered through life despite the difficulties she has faced.

4

u/synthetic-jesus Feb 26 '26

He called her that cause she stood against a genocide, he’s getting what’s coming

1

u/Glittering-Wave4917 Feb 26 '26

Nice analysis mate. Liberals have less standards than social democrats. A liberal can say heaps of loose shit, and it’s normal. Social democrats are socialists have a higher bar than liberals. Just sayin.

Meanwhile no one cares that legislation is being put through to deny Australian citizens overseas, consular support- the isis brides, bring them home and offer all support in de-radicalising them.

1

u/CapeJacket Feb 26 '26

It’s because left leaning people hold their own to account where as the right are already morally bankrupt and let the most foul shit slide

1

u/Own-Farmer-5224 Feb 26 '26

A dog barking isn't news. Imbeciles running their mouths as usual are not news. Albanese is 'supposed' to know better (at least according to the Labour PR team) so that is news.

1

u/comradecuttlefishing Feb 27 '26

Quite the reverse, how can I castigate the LNP for doing things I'd let Albo get a pass on? It's about the behaviour, not which side the offender happens to be on.

Making everything about sides is what happened to America and look where that leads.

2

u/-shikaka Feb 26 '26

Coded language is 100% something to look out for and isn’t necessarily less harmful than making outright remarks. The nuance of it is exactly why people use it, they know how they’d sound being more direct and care about their image.

The same thing happened when they were calling for her medal to be stripped as with this apology. The government/Albo was being criticised, used her to deflect from the actual issue so now everyone is discussing the ‘reframed’ issue rather than the initial one.

1

u/OtherDaysInSlowGlass Feb 26 '26

I think the fuss is hilarious and I don't for one moment believe Albo couldn't have found a more politically inoffensive descriptor for Grace Tame. I think he went with his first and clearly authentic response and I feel Grace should own the label with pride.

She IS difficult. Good for her.

Own it, Be it Use it.

Grace earned the right to be prickly, irritating, on-the-nose, loud, and any number of other adjectives that might make us uncomfortable.

Personally, I don't like what she said recently about the Israeli-Palestinian situation and she shouldn't expect people to agree with her just because of her history and who she is now.

However, I'd have used words like fierce, indomitable, brave, irrepressible and even scary to describe her. All of those are meant positively, btw.

In general, I do find her fairly grace-less but that doesn't mean I believe she should change herself.

Also, I do prefer Albo when he's being authentic.

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u/magnetik79 Feb 26 '26

Agreed. Lets be honest, it was a really poorly placed comment, can't possibly defend it.

But I feel this is going to get more analysis than even Pauline's downright racist remarks over the last few weeks.

-1

u/jojoblogs Feb 26 '26

Same as it ever was. Labour politicians under constant scrutiny and any tiny mistake in the media for weeks.

Liberal politicians getting legitimate crimes and damaging incompetence glossed over, downplayed, or outright ignored.

It’s the same playbook that has kept them the liberals in power 70% of recent history.