ABC TV panel show Qanda will mark International Women’s Day in its March 6 program with a panel consisting entirely of women, and hosted not by the urbane Tony Jones, but by Kitchen Cabinet’s Annabel Crabb.
The panel consists of Julie Bishop, American Roxanne Gay, Professor of English at Purdue University; Holly Kramer, CEO of Best and Less; Germaine Greer, “feminist icon” etc. and Yassmin Abdel-Magied, founder of Youth Without Borders, an organisation focused on enabling young people to work together for the implementation of positive change within their communities.
Indigenous women are not represented on this panel.
As was noted in the recent Qanda panel on domestic violence, no Indigenous women were invited to participate in that either, although Antoinette Braybrook, CEO of the Aboriginal Family Violence Prevention and Legal Service Victoria, was allegedly asked by producers if she could recommend an Indigenous man to appear on the show.
The exclusion of Indigenous women from the national broadcaster’s celebration of International Women’s Day reveals again the depth of racism and apartheid in which this country is so thoroughly steeped it is normalised, and unremarked.
There is no possible excuse for this exclusion. It is absolutely shameful.
If you are moved to ask Qanda why Indigenous women have been excluded from their IWD panel you can do that here. You could also invite the producers to get really adventurous in democracy, and adopt the practice of inclusion.
You could also remind the ABC that Indigenous women and men pay taxes, and it is their ABC as much as it is any other citizen’s of this country.
I also wish they would stop wheeling out Germaine Greer as our “feminist icon.” I don’t know what a feminist icon is, but I do know Greer hasn’t said anything interesting for a long time though other women have, including Indigenous women.
This woman won’t be watching.
No Place For Sheep 
They’re not having a good run at the moment with selecting panelists. To be fair, we don’t know how the process works and who might be a ‘late replacement off the bench’. I’m hoping that’s the case with Greer because I feel like this must be her 3rd or 4th appearance.
Anyone else going to the ‘All About Women’ conference this weekend?
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I can’t, but if you go would love to hear your impressions.
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A transgender woman on the panel would be welcome too.
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Oh, they aren’t going there, that’s for sure!
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They’ve had Cate McPherson on before. She could challenge some of Greer’s toxic views on what constitutes a woman.
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Now that would be a really interesting and useful discussion, but I doubt Greer would engage.
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Michael, I enjoyed Cate McPherson, she can come again…
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Apologies. I meant Cate McGregor.
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We all made the same mistake, our bad.
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There’s no woman with a disability either. Maybe since Stella’s death they can’t find another one to be the token WWD
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I think Q&A has outlived its usefulness. It’s become a parody of itself.
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We live in a post-parody world. It is a dead art form. Abbott murdered it.
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Ever seen the film Beyond Therapy? It has strange echoes of our political environment at the moment.
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It’s getting very long in the tooth for this sort of show.
The real problem has been the increasingly unintelligent choice of clowns for guests when intelligent discussion of issues should be centre stage. The white collar death-masks who actually run the ABC have ruined it, like shortsighted oiks murdering the goose that lays the golden eggs.
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PW, I agree with all you’ve said but remind me, what is an oik?
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Someone like me, without the intellectual flexibility.
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I so enjoy your turn of phrase. 😊
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Michaela, I will mansplain further…The significant difference between the average oik and myself probably relates to that factor of intelligence most often designated as EQ (emotional intelligence).
Given this factor, you can quickly ascertain that I would have coaxed the goose first, that it produce an extra golden egg, then sedated it before I dismembered it.
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Oh no cooking the goose!!!! I’m fond of geese – they are very good at keeping guard, like those amazing Anatolian sheep dogs. So mansplain away but please save the goose.
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I hear you and am becoming partial to you, so like President Obama’s ThanksgivingTurkey, the goose will be spared.
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Geese everywhere will rejoice. Now tell me you’re not into the Paleo diet!
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Especially if said goose lays golden eggs.
It shall live in luxury for its full 30 or 40 years.
🙂
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..A wise person would say it, DQ. Apparently they make quite affectionate pets and good company, what’s more.
Michaela, I regularly stalk the wily weekly specials and low-codes at local supermarkets..yesterday I scored a couple of pizzas reduced from $6 to $3.
But I try to balance the temptation for fatty salty over processed crap out with fruit vegies etc.
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I hope you don’t end up with botulism, PW
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PW, you’ve made my day!
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Oik. Yes, I like that.
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I had to turn off this week’s Q&A, could not stand the irritating IPA girl…
Usually the women are just sitting there as book-ends, Tony does not draw them in at all..
And please spare me Germaine, she’s been there too often, nothing new to say.
As for the sugary cake-maker, give me Sarah Ferguson any time.
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I know, I want Sarah back too.
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Another tragic example of how badly the ABC has deteriorated in just a few years.
I can’t be bothered with most of it, Occasionally you get a good 4 Corners MW or QA, but on the whole it has been gutted as to substance and content and the right wing bias throughout news and current affairs is overt and provocative as well down-dumbing for the nation.
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paul, Q&A is usually only good when they have some International authors or scientists a guests, the political stuff is pretty dismal, comedians usually lift the standard somewhat. Last week I started to watch some ‘home-made ‘ show, called Hiding…hopeless. I miss MY Aunty… I prefer the SBS news, ads or no ads….
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I just can’t forgive the bastards who have ruined public broadcasting for ruining it and this for blatant and sinister ideological reasons, imho. ABC 24 esp is just propaganda dog sh-t.
Thinking further, the reason they don’t want aboriginal women given a place in discourse is because they are usually very effective in representing not only indigenous people, but blue collar people in general. The last such woman, whose name escapes me, made a powerful impression on QA last year in a fiesty and Greer-like way that had her applauded right across social media ( what is this weird grudge against Greer, in many so called progressive corners, btw?)
It’s all part of the Great Dumbing Down, to suit Big Business and Politics; also why education is being stuffed up.
A related issue, meta data/ whistleblower legislation, is clearly intended most of all to blunt media, as MW demonstrated on Monday Night, but still the Tories try to ram it through and still the ALP squats, vaselined cheeks splayed in some sort of attempt to attract Abbotts most intelligent member, to show that it is some how being wise supporting it.
Whooda thunk that Labor could deteriorate so badly that someone like Sen Leyjonholm is to the left of them concerning this sort of thing?
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My gosh you have a splendid turn of phrase, PW. vaselined cheeks splayed….
I don’t know why all the journos aren’t up in arms abut this data retention business, it’s as if they don’t understand what it means for them.
I don’t have a grudge against Greer I’m just sick of her.
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Marvellous and groundbreaking as she was in her time, she is now certain that she is indeed the suppository of all wisdom. Not that she’d ever speak so clumsy a malapropism!
(Did everyone notice that Turnbull used that phrase right there in parliament in front of Abbott?
Et tu Brute!
– roll on the Ides of March. 🙂
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Jennifer, I overdid the hyperbole. Thinking on it, some may have cause for offense at my turn of phrase. I can only say, it was rattled off during a moment of dark frustration.
I just can’t for the life of me, see why Labor wants to side with the government on journalistic sources protection, let alone most of the rest when it would do better showing up Abbott’s extremist policies for what they are and where they must eventually lead.
Be nice to Germaine.
Germaine is a good, intelligent woman who usually has had perceptive things to say, as far as I have been able to see.
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I loved the hyperbole.
I doubt anyone will be offended, given my own turns of phrase from time to time.
Labor is doing what it did with asylum seekers. Apparently some 44% of the population approve of data retention.Mostly older generations I gather. That’s a lot of votes.
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Yes, Am just back for a second bite, on just that subject.
My thought, having a drink of cold water, was if the politicians and their backers weren’t so keen to dumb down media and education (why, for god’s sake?) and fostered rational thinking, a pathway would surely open leading to a resolution of the near superstitious nonsenses that occur about wars, ecological thinking and more thoughtful and purposeful economics, finally, particularly perhaps, attitudes to asylum seekers and about Islamic and other cultures.
If you had more imaginative stuff like the SBS doco a few of years ago, “Send them back where they belong” and less of this constant tabloid harp about “border security” and the night-terrors “terrorism” baloney, maybe people could break clear of last century, finally.
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There is one reason: Indigenous Australians make up around 2.5% to 3% of Australia’s population.
That they should be represented in a forum which has five or six persons is not required by the demographics. No doubt there will be several in the studio audience, especially with articles like this one.
Who do you exclude from the forum to install an indigenous woman? If so, which indigenous woman, and what are the criteria of selection, other than to have 50% or 25% indigenous ancestry?
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DQ, you are being mischeivous. Indigenous people are grossly over represented on the Misery Quotient; they probably should fill half a panel on politics in Australia, given the realities of their existance(s).
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Yes, he is being mischievous. So Guinevere won’t reply.
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Just back from something on the idiot box that so dovetails into this thread and also reminds me of much contributed recently at New Matilda.
The show. that I only caught parts of, was on NITV, and involved a long interview with former PM Kevin Rudd, fresh from an address to indigenous people about things going downhill since his PM- ship. Given that NITV news and current affairs is being slashed by Abbott budget cuts along with other elements of indigenous funding, I’m inclined to see if I can’t find the full show online, but for now I’d think it interesting that something of a critical mass is beginning to develop concerning consciousness of Abbott cuts on most things involving disadvantaged people and the role of realor defacto censorship and dumbing down to prevent public consciousness of things like cuts to welfare, humanitarian aid and Indigenous programs and so forth.
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I’ve asked Annabel C via Twitter about the composition of the panel, and why it excludes Indigenous women. No response yet.
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Holding you breath, are you?
You’ll learn..
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According to some test I did at work the other day, I’m an eternal optimist! It explains so much.
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But you are smart, too. Maybe some scars before its all over, but you’ll get there.
Better a well rounded person than a mean spirited cretin.
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