Cheryl's Life

Recent reports involving former Senator Cheryl Kernot have raised questions as to whether the media apply different standard to their reports on male and female politicians. Here are two reports, one by Kaz Cooke and the other by Pamela Bone.

Sexual Politics

In this article, Weekend Australian columnist KAZ COOKE looks at the reporting of Ms Kernot's move to the Labor Party.

Is there any particular reason that so many cartoonists and journalists get so utterly freaked by the idea of (titter) a woman (phwoaaarrrrrr) switching political parties (way-heyyyyyy) that every original idea flies out of their heads (like that scene in Alien when Ripley opens the side bay and the alien gets sucked out into space) and they have to draw pictures of Cheryl Kernot as Juliet, a boosie-baring Boadicea (I'll think you'll find most women leaders of history are uncontrollable exhibitionists) or a flushed, floppy sated, naked chick under the sheets who's just been thoroughly rogered by Kim Beazley AND Gareth Evans (as if) or she's described as "seduced" "wedded" "married" "wooed" and, one imagines but for the sharp eyes of a roving sub-editor, "thoroughly rogered", and "... shivering as his political manhood hardened, she ran a perfectly manicured finger dipped in chocolate crackles down the front of his briefing papers"? (That was rather a long sentence. Unfortunately the subs are too busy putting their pencil through Kernot stories with the word "love pump" in them.)

I know it's a challenge to get up a political cartoon at short notice, but some people managed to find an image that doesn't look like a slightly sanitised catalogue for mysterious bakelite material aids with hand-whiffling attachments. And hello, how come the girrrl politician is always the passive, dopey one in these scenarios? The commentators are so fixated on the idea that the former Democrats leader was a passive wall-flower who moped around until she got "seduced" they've missed the obvious "Wanton Kernot has her way with ALP: short foreplay" or "Shameless hussy puts the moves on" possibilities. Not to mention: "Kernot grabs a shortcut to Prime Minister. Crean to get stuffed".

I mean, when Mal Colston ran away from home clutching nothing but an old oxygen mask which had dropped from the ceiling in the event of an emergency, did we get cartoons of Kim Beazley sobbing with a broken heart? Or calling 11-505-RAUNCHY to fill his aching need? Was Robert Ray depicted as the crazed stalker, driven mad by a love which turned to a twisted obsession? Were we subjected to cartoons of John Howard offering Mal bunches of gerberas and a quickie on the front bench? Did we get headlines about nuptials and rooting and carry on up the sheltershed shenanigans? Were there hilarious little drawings of Peter Reith with his hands down Mr Colston's Y-fronts? Was Mr Colston depicted as a famous nude army deserter of history?

When the Prime Minister was promising Methuselah Harradine a chicken in every Tasmanian pot and an end to contraception for anybody over the age of nought, or whatever the deal was, to get him to vote for flogging off Telstra, did editorialists have Howard wearing leather chaps in a gay bar chatting up the snowy-haired Senator in a sleeveless T-shirt and hiking boots? And when the deal was done, were they any images of the two of them in the cot after a vigorous shagging, sharing a cigar and port? Not bloody likely. That'd be offensive.

KAZ COOKE

(Originally published in The Australian Magazine. Reprinted with the permission of the author.)

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"... And Why Was Kim in Hobart?

In a second article, Age columnist Pamela Bone, a publisher member of the Council, looks at the reporting of Ms Kernot's presence at the ALP National Conference in Hobart.

Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home, your house is on fire and your children are all gone.

And where was Cheryl Kernot when a truck was hitting her house, her husband shocked and injured, and her daughter distraught? If she'd been home, instead of gallivanting around at an ALP conference, maybe this accident wouldn't have happened?

Once again, the treatment of Cheryl Kernot by the media raises questions about where the line should be drawn between the public's right to know and the right to privacy of public figures. It also raises questions about the adversarial nature of our parliamentary system and our media, and about the role of women in politics.

The reporters who rose before dawn to confront Ms Kernot at Hobart airport did not do so because they bear her any personal malice. They did so because Cheryl Kernot is a story. Women politicians are still rare enough to be a story, especially if they are talented and attractive. And if Cheryl Kernot cracks up on television, that's a very good story. It's a story because it shows she can't take the heat. It shows women can't take the heat.

"How come your move was organised during the Labor Party conference?" asked the ABC journalist. It does not surprise me that the questioner was a woman, because women can be even more judgmental than men about other women.

But how much of a story was it really? Cheryl Kernot's "emotional outburst", as one headline put it. You call that an outburst? She didn't swear, she didn't raise her voice, she didn't cry, or at least not in front of the cameras. Maybe, when she got on the plane, she went to the toilet and shed some tears of anger and frustration. I would have.

She did say: "That is a disgraceful way to treat me in the circumstances." And she was right. At a time when normal courtesy demands that she be given sympathy, if not privacy, Cheryl Kernot was met by a barrage of media, and a question implying that she was neglecting her family. Would the question have been asked of a man in similar circumstances?

When the national Parliament was established at Canberra instead of Sydney or Melbourne early this century, feminists complained that the distance from their homes would deter women from entering politics. Perhaps family is more important to female politicians than to males - though several male politicians have speculated lately whether it's all worth it.

But Ms Kernot has appeared vulnerable only when her public profile has affected members of her family. The first was during the 1996 election campaign, when it was reported that her seriously ill brother was on criminal charges. This was only newsworthy because he was her brother. The second was the exposure last year of her relationship with a former student, nine years younger than her, 25 years ago.

There is a public interest in exposing aspects of a politician's life if it conflicts with their public stance on issues - if he or she preaches about family values but has affairs on the side, for example, or preaches about honesty and then evades tax. There was no public interest in exposing Cheryl Kernot's old love affair, and in fact, not a great deal of public curiosity. The media often say they merely reflect public opinion. They do, but they also shape it, in a self-perpetuating cycle.

Political life is hard, but does it have to be this hard? Cheryl Kernot said on The 7.30 Report: "Not many people have to sit down with their 14-and-a-half-year-old daughter and discuss their sexual past of 25 years ago." It is a shame that a young girl, at a vulnerable stage of life, should have to cope with such public speculation about the morals of her mother. And it's not surprising that when her family was again unwillingly put in the spotlight, Ms Kernot should ask herself whether her political career is worth the cost.

Would there have been this amount of conjecture about Ms Kernot is she had been a man in the same circumstances? When Bob Hawke cried on television over his daughter's heroin addiction, was it ever seriously said that this showed his political career was over? Rather than being seen as a sign of weakness, many saw it as a welcome permission for men to show emotion.

While commentators speculate whether Ms Kernot's quite restrained anger means she is not strong enough for the cut and thrust of politics, many ordinary people might think Ms Kernot's consideration of her family shows she is a decent person: indeed, just the kind of person we need as a politician.

If it becomes accepted that politicians' private lives are fair game, many of the best and most talented people, male or female, will refuse to enter politics. We need strong, determined people in politics, but we also need people who are sensitive and compassionate. The way we are going, we'll end up with only the hard men.

PAMELA BONE

(Originally published in The Age. Reprinted with the permission of the author.)

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