After the latest political embarrassment to engulf her party, Senator Pauline Hanson went on A Current Affair for what Junkee media aptly called ‘a giant sook’. All of a sudden, the great ‘keepin it real’ and ‘no-one cares about your feelings’ candidate became the very social justice warrior she decries. Whether it was playing the victim, poor me, overly emotional, conspiracy theories you name it; she did it. I want to look at selections from the interview and deconstruct this incoherent woman’s victim complex along with the other crap she spewed.
The Background: The Resignation of Steve Dickson and Other Clowns
Now former One Nation candidate Steve Dickson tendered his resignation after footage of him groping an exotic dancer and making wildly inappropriate comments about women came to light. What is worse, he actually used the excuse that he was drunk when he said and did those vile things. No excuse, genius. Indeed the phrase in vino veritas (truth in wine) comes to mind. At least he had the good sense to resign.
Dickson joins a long list of truly well-vetted candidates, including a homophobe, a conspiracy theorist and one genius who threatened to murder an employee. Clearly, Senator Hanson, who acknowledged that she is the leader of the party and thus the buck stops with her, does not vet her candidates. These candidates are examples of what John Doyle once called ‘any half-baked dickhead who string two sentences together’.
The Interview, Part One: Muh Feels!
The resignation of Mr Dickson seems to have been the last straw for Ms Hanson, who went on the intellectual powerhouse that is A Current Affair to get her rantings out to the base.
Speaking to Tracey Grimshaw, Hanson opened with this gem:
I’m just so upset, Tracey. I’ve worked for this for twenty-three years, since I was first elected to parliament in 1996. I’ve had my ups and downs with this, and I just feel I’m getting kicked in the guts time and time again … this was a sting three years in the making to discredit One Nation and pull us down. This [footage of Steve Dickson]was done last September. Now it comes out now, just on the cusp of an election?
Oh, cry me a river. Getting kicked in the guts? You chose terrible candidates to run for office, seemingly without doing basic research. The fact that people point out what horrible candidates (and human beings) these individuals were is not kicking you in the guts. You are not the victim here. Indeed, your incompetence is on glaring display. Despite the actions of the Liberal Party, we live in the information age. The entirety of human knowledge is in the palm of the average person’s hand. Candidates must, like Caesar’s wife, be above reproach. The fact that your candidates turned out to be violent and bigoted nuts does not make you the victim. Next.
Ms Hanson then proceeded to criticise the fact that Channel Nine played the tape from Al Jazeera without permission. Grimshaw explained that it was a leak, and that is how leaks work. Hanson’s response is quite similar to other politicians’ reactions to leaks that make them look foolish: ignore what is in the source, criticise the fact that it was reported in the first place.
The Interview, Part Two: The Circus Roles On
Hanson then asked:
Why is everyone so frightened of myself? Why is everyone so frightened of One Nation? And it’s quite evident in this election now, because the Lib[eral]s are preferencing One Nation below the Labor Party.
First of all, the pronoun you seek is ‘me’, not myself. The question is ‘why is everyone afraid of me’?, but even that is wrong. What you see Ms Hanson, is not fear, but unrestrained contempt. People are afraid only of the lunatics you inspire with your hateful rhetoric; they are not afraid of you or your party per se.
In perhaps the only true thing that she said, Ms Hanson added:
At the end of the day I am leader of this political party, I don’t care what Steve Dickson goes over there and says. I am the leader of this party.
Correct. As the leader of the party, you, and not Dickson, speak for it. Just how much that helps your party in light of all the crazy nonsense you yourself have said and done is not clear, but I digress. She was quite right to say that she leads the party and not Mr Dickson. A broken clock, as the saying goes, is right twice a day.
The Interview, Part Three: Deflection
Senator Hanson then attempted to throw the audience off when she spoke of other instances of corruption. Specifically, she said:
I cop all this shit all the time, and I’m sick of it. Kevin Rudd goes to a strip joint. You’ve got Craig Thomson using the credit card of the unions in a brothel. You’ve had corruption, you’ve had Eddie Obeid, you’ve had paedophiles, you’ve had everything. But they just sail through it. No, let us give Pauline Hanson a kick in the guts
Ok, in order: Rudd went to a strip club; that is true. Despite the moral outrage bile from the Murdoch press, that is not a crime, even if a Labor politician does it. This is also a false comparison since, unlike Mr Dickson, Mr Rudd did not grope a dancer and say vile things about women! Dickson was not decried because he went to a strip club! He was decried because of what he did in the club! Hanson is known neither for her intellectual rigour nor her grip of the facts, but that was a hard fail even for her.
Next, Craig Thompson resigned! He literally lost his seat in parliament! Thompson did not, as Hanson put it, sail through that affair. He resigned! Wow, this woman is ignorant. Finally, Eddie Obeid is in gaol. He, too, did not sail through his scandal. I would ask you, Senator, not to speak about topics about which you know nothing, but then your entire life would be silence!
Conclusion: The False Victim Narrative
Senator Hanson is, in a supreme irony, attempting to play the victim in order to distract from the fundamental political incompetence that she displayed in selecting her candidates. The media exposing these clowns as unfit for office is not, contrary to your victim narrative, kicking you in the guts. This rant was clearly not thought through (like much else that she says) and is even wrong on simple facts.
Three more years of this? Senate voting changes now!
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