guy smiley wrote:Clogs wrote:guy smiley wrote:_fatprop wrote:
We treat all our politicians badly, it is one area of true equality
I can't agree with you there mate, in this context. Australia treats women poorly and women in politics extremely poorly. There's no equality apparent. No male PM has ever had a radio announcer suggest he should be tied in a chaff bag and dumped at sea. No male pollie has ever had to deal with the ongoing campaign of harassment that Sarah Hansen Young deals with regularly. There are other examples but there's two easy ones off the bat.
I think Penny Wong is Australia's most effective political operator within the parliament but I don't think the country is mature enough to deal with her as opposition leader. I'd love to be wrong and see her crucify opponents... but I think she'd attract too much negative attention and besides, she can't do it from the Senate and there's no way of moving her to the lower house without engineering a by election result.
And I happen to think right there is where part of the problem lies. Australia does not treat women poorly. That is a truly appalling statement.
Are you happy with the rate of death due to domestic violence in Australia, Clogs? Do you think that's ok? Do you think that the overall rate of sexual assault and abuse that women suffer is ok as well? Are you happy with the notion that most of the women you know probably don't feel safe walking down a street at night,
or even just going out in everyday life? That most of them will admit to always being on watch for threats, to always being careful not to say anything that will be interpreted as permission for unwanted attention?
Are thse concepts in line with women not being treated poorly, to you?
Erm, you seem happy to make a gross generalisation (women are treated poorly in Australia), and then quickly try and narrow your argument down to prove your point with a bit of virtue signalling. If you want to generalise then here are some useful stats. The Australian homicide rate is extremely low. 1 in 100 000. This points to Australia being a remarkably safe place to live. For all citizens. Men and women.
Domestic violence is appalling. Statistics show that some 16% of all women (over 15 years old) have experienced physical or sexual violence. 16 out of every 100. That number is still crazy high, but guy, it is a long long way off your claim that women are treated poorly in Australia. Only 6% of men (over 15 years old) have suffered physical or sexual violence.
This is sourced from the Australian government:
https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/domesti ... ts/summary
Remarkably however, when you look at all physical assaults, 2.4 in 100 000 against men, and 2.3 in 100 000 against women.
Yet even with the domestic violence at an unacceptable level, more men are killed than women. I think it is as high as 70% of all homicide victims are men. So in general terms, women are far more at risk of domestic violence, men and women suffer equally with physical violence and men are far more at risk of being killed than women. Does that mean men and women are treated poorly in Australia? No it does not. Men and women are treated exceptionally well in Australia. Men and women in Australia have access to some of the best education and healthcare anywhere on the planet.
I say again, women are not treated poorly in Australia. Certainly some women suffer terribly. So do some men. But in general? Men and women have fantastic lives in Australia.