The ANZAC Spirit. Top 100 Hate Comments

Many people say to me ‘You must have a thick skin’ to which I respond, ‘No. I don’t have a thick skin. I’m very sensitive, I just don’t care what morons, dickheads, losers, haters, trolls or fuckwits think.’

And why would I? Why would anyone?

The lion does not lose sleep over the opinion of sheep.

Much of my work is as a professional speaker.  In the questions after my addresses, talks, speeches, panels, debates and keynotes there is always at least one question about how to handle haters. My advice? Block, unfriend, delete, switch stations, change channels, talk to someone else or say ‘speak to the hand Alan Jones.’ 

The recent hate explosion over my ANZAC Day opinions have fascinated, amused and horrified many. And happily for me, proved my point in a more transparent and unequivical way than I ever could. My views, that ANZAC Day does not reflect the inclusiveness of all those affected by war, nor our more sophisticated understanding of the true machinations and motivations behind war (let alone the facts) are neither rare, radical or new. See here, here, here for a start. 

Political commentator Bernard Keane summed it up in this tweet…

The importance of collecting and sharing statistics, particularly from a feminist perspective has led to me putting together a Top 100 Hate Comments from the comments and messages I’ve received over the last fortnight. These comments will be very familiar for women don't happily lie down in the chalk outline drawn for them by the patriarchy.  I hope you find them useful.

Top 100 Hater Comments

(you're welcome)

To flick through click prev | next  above.

It’s crucial to keep in mind the haters in the Top 100 are a tiny bunch of very noisy people, often the same person from different platforms with multiple accounts. Their profiles reveal the majority are men, predominately from Queensland and Perth, almost always declare on their bio they are a ‘proud true blue Aussie’, a passionate supporter of a football team, they frequently use a pseudonym and curiously, more often than you would imagine, are men posing as women. A quick glance through their profiles revealed almost all used their twitter accounts solely for hate, abuse, harassment and bullying. It was very clear the time spent hating me was simply time off hating asylum seekers, gays, Julia Gillard, atheists, environmentalist, Melbourne latte sippers etc.

A staggering amount had a Liberal National Party badge pinned to their avatar.

Hopefully this slide show will help further illuminate the reality that women who color outside the lines cop 100 times as much vitriol and it’s a thousand times more vicious. The Top 100 illustrates the abuse is gender based and sexually violent in nature.  The lack of grammar, punctuation, THE GRATUITOUS CAPS LOCK AND EXLAIMATION MARKS!!!!!, poor spelling and complete absence of rational thought indicates these poor souls are not that bright. Or occupied with their careers, study, relationships or friends. 

More naming and shaming here.

Women who color outside the lines need to know what haters look like, expect it and know it passes. As you take a wander down Hate Street it will be a comfort knowing it’s not just you. We all cop it. It’s unavoidable. These kinds of comments say nothing about the person it’s directed to but everything about the person saying them.

No, it’s not okay. But Illuminating it is a much more useful contribution I can make than anything I could do to stop it. Haters gonna hate. And as much as many of us are calling it out, naming and shaming it and employing anti bullying tactics haters have always been with us and will always be a work hazard for those who don't Pipe Down Princess. And more often than not, proof we’re on the right track and, at times, rock solid evidence proving everything we’ve been saying. 

I was inspired to compile The ANZAC Spirit Top 100 Haters by Anne Summer’s Her Rights At Work a brilliant address exposing the disproportionate gender based abuse of a sexually violent nature directed at Prime Minister  Julia Gillard and Chrys Stevenson’s Defending Deveny which almost broke the internet after an appearance on QandA I made with Arch Bishop Peter Jenson. Despite claims I took over the show and Jensen could not get a word in Stevenson’s research proved I spoke half the time Jenson did,

“Deveny’s contribution of 1,259 words was 13 per cent below the average. Jensen’s, on the other hand, was 78 per cent above the average.”

Enjoy, The ANZAC Spirit. And as you do remember these comments say nothing me but everything about them which can be neatly summed up as misogyny and relevance deprivation (and dare I say ironically Tall Poppy Syndrome) thinly veiled in the Australian flag. 

Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel. Samuel Johnson.

P.S. My Mildura performace of Curvy Crumpet on Friday which the ANZAC trolls encouraged all to boycott and promised '2000 protesters' at was a huge success. Full house, happy audience and not one protester. Not one. Despite me publically letting all interested know via Mildura radio, television and newspapers I would be delighted to answer any quesions at any neutral venue between 3-5pm on the day of my my perfomace there was not one taker. Grand Hotel in Mildura cancelled my booking on the ground I damaged their brand. But they were happy to take a booking from Today Tonight. Today Tonight exists solely to make dumb and hateful people dumber and more hateful. 

Keyboard Warriors, paper tigers and furious impotant misogynists having a tantrum with reality every single one. 

Julian Burnside and me on the illusion of free speech. Watch...

Some people are allowed to say some things some of the time. 

Why Do We Pay Our Cleaners More Than Our Childcare Educators?

Are you okay with the fact that we pay our cleaners more than our childcare educators?

I’m not. And I haven’t been for a long, long time.

Particularly considering the epidemic in helicopter parenting, clipboard holding school shoppers, attachment parenting, after-school cramming classes, co-sleeping, ‘mummy blogs’ and general obsession with providing children with some imaginary perfect life.

The notion of ‘best care’ seems rather selective.

The obsession with the perfect diet, germ free homes, attempted social engineering by selective socialising, harm minimisation through choice of the correct fabrics, risk minimisation with helmets, knee and elbow pads, stranger danger and safe searches.

There has never been more time, energy and thought spent on the raising of babies, toddlers and children, yet we pay our childcare workers such dismal wages it’s leading to 180 childcare educators leaving the sector every week.  That’s not good. For anyone. Kids, parents or childcare educators. Why don’t we care? We should.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE

Teenage girls should be encouraged to say fuck, learn how to fuck themselves and achieve Fuck Off Status. International Women’s Day 2013.

Teenage girls should be encouraged to swear.

No one is forcing them to but encourage them to swear if they want to. The worst thing you can encourage girls to be is nice and the second is pretty.

The idea swearing is ‘wrong’ or ‘nice’ indicates there’s a universal agreement on the definitions of ‘wrong’ and ‘nice’ and a. these traits are desirable and b. you can project yourself as being nice by simply sticking to the rule of not saying certain words.

A linguist once told me the people most likely to swear are working class men and educated women. Which props up my theory the poor and the rich have much more in common than the middle class. Who work out what they think is the done thing by aspiring to what they think the rich do, and doing the opposite of what they think the working class do.

Encouraging teenage girls to swear teaches them to question the people who tell them they've crossed the line or broken the rules. It encourages them to ask “What rules? What line? Says who? Where’s it written, who wrote it and why?”

I tell girls (and boys) to beware of anyone using the words respect, traditional, family values, unacceptable, morality, uncalled for, inappropriate or unnecessary. Particularly to beware of the word ‘offensive’.

It’s code for ‘Pipe down princess, back in your box.‘

Offence is taken not given and more harm is created by taking offence than giving it.

Just because someone is offended does not mean they’re right.

Offence is used as a mode of social control.  Do not be oppressed by feeling you’re supposed to lie down in some chalk outline drawn for you by a society that once upon a time would have burned you at the stake for such unladylike behavior. Now all they can do is accuse you of transgressing some social norm constructed by the patriarchy to put you in your place. And the reason you have to be put or kept in your place is in order to fortify their place. And their place would be the one with disproportionate access to power, control, decisions, leisure, money and the ability to control women’s bodies. AMIRIGHT?

Words reveal much.

Men have opinions, women are opinionated.

Men speak, women are outspoken.

Men are passionate, women rant.

Men have mouths, women are mouthy.

And when was the last time you heard a man called feisty, bitter, sassy, shrill or ‘a piece of work’?

The shibboleth is not that people who swear are uneducated or have small vocabularies; the real shibboleth is that people who assert those who swear are uneducated or have small vocabularies reveal they are insular morons themselves.

 “The sort of twee person who thinks swearing is in any way a sign of a lack of education or a lack of verbal interest or -is just a fucking lunatic.”  Stephen Fry 

Teenage girls should learn to fuck themselves.

Had a discussion with Clementine Ford the other day and she told me about a sex therapist on Oprah who said teenage girls should be encouraged to masturbate. People went crazy. The show was overwhelmed with complaints claiming that ‘encouraging girls to masturbate would make them promiscuous' . Sorry?

(No, it wouldn't. Buy so what if it did?)

Clem and I then had a long discussion about masturbation. She was flicking the bean and getting the magic feeling from 12. I did not work out how to orgasm through masturbation until I was 21.

Yes 21.

Growing up masturbation was talked about as something only men did and that was only if they were perverts, desperate or gay. Hetrosexual intercourse was the only real sex. Anything else is what you did 'if you couldn't get it'.  I don't know when I worked out masturbation was something that women did on their own and with partners. I do know I would have a fiddle every now and then but never manage to climax. Which was why I WAS BOY CRAZY. Jumping the fence to find a boy or a man with the magic wand to make with the abracadabra. My teens were spent in a constant state of distraction and frustration.

If I had been encouraged to masturbate, if it was spoken about in a healthy and positive way and actively encouraged I wouldn't have been so emotionally unstable and boy crazy as a teenager. I could have had a wank and got on with my homework, had better sex in my teens because I knew how things worked and knew how to fuck myself and perhaps give the boys and menI was shagging a bit of a hand as we fumbled about.

Recently I have found myself in two separate situations chatting away with a women with her teenage daughter in earshot. I used the word ‘lube’ in one conversation and ‘virginity’ in the other. The mothers did that ‘cut it out she’s listening’ hand movement.

What? What’s wrong with teenage girls having the words ‘lube’ and ‘virginity’ explained to them? What is it going to turn themselves into some mouth frothing nyphomania?

There is nothing wrong with sex, pleasure or any part of the body. Safe and consentual. They're the rules. 

People don't talk as freely and openly with girls about sex as they do with boys. They have gender defined sexual expectations and aspirations for kids. People are always making jokes about their teenage boys wanking in their rooms, but not girls. 

Buy your thirteen year old a dildo and a bottle of lube. Explain that girls and boys masturbate, women and men masturbate, straight, gay, partnered and single masturbate. Alone and with others. It’s free, fabulous, a great stress release and the best way you can find out how your body works and what you like so you can share your pleasure with others. It may help prevent them jumping the fence and finding themselves in unhealthy and abusive sexual relationships because they haven’t worked out how to abracadabra themselves.  It also may help them concentrate on their homework.

What all women and girls should be encouraged to achieve is F.O.S. Fuck Off Status.

When I was 19 I met a woman called Patricia O’Donnell who I am buddies with today. O‘Donnell is a successful restaurateur, businesswoman and all round brilliant dame. When I was 19, she didn’t know me. But I was sitting at the bar of her establishment The Queenscliff waiting for some of my mates, her staff. She said to me, apropos nothing, ‘You know what you need young lady. You need Fuck Off Status. You need to have your house, and your business and be able to tell anyone you don’t want to deal with to fuck off.’

Best advice I have ever been given.  We need to encourage all women and girls to aim for fuck off status (not to dream of just marrying a footballer) and encourage all men and boys to enable and support it.

Women are 50% of the population, do two thirds of the work, earn 10% of the money and own 1% of the land. What do we want? Fuck Off Status! When do we want it? Fuck off.

'The truth will set you free. But first, it will piss you off'

Gloria Steinem

Why I love Melbourne and Melbourne Comedy Festival. Top 20 must see shows.

I am proudly un-Australian. The whole sport, barbie, tanned, blonde and beachy business was never really me. For a while I identified more with my Irish heritage. It seemed a better fit: loud-mouthed, wide hipped, total disrespect for authority, love a good yarn and a plate of spuds. All with bad teeth.

But these days, I know what I am. I am a Melburnian to the core. If I wasn't born here, I would have moved here.

I love Melbourne. Which doesn't mean I can't love anywhere else. I'm with Samuel Johnson, "patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel". I adore the breathtaking glittering city of Sydney, and Tasmania is one of the most beautiful places that I have ever been. When I was in a plane on my way to Port Douglas a few years back, I spoke to people from Los Angeles who had been travelling for more than 24 hours. I said to them, "I promise, it's worth it." And it was.

The mercurial Melbourne weather allows you to wear all the clothes in your wardrobe and eat all the food you love. Melburnians are informed, opinionated, love a good feed and are always up for a chat. This time of year is particularly intoxicating. Blue skies, cool nights, clothes drying quickly but warm stuff in your belly for dinner and the kids in bed early. I wake up in Melbourne, but feel as if I have died and gone to heaven.

It's the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. I really, really love the Melbourne Comedy Festival. And no, I have not been asked to write something on the festival. I write compelled by love or truth. If I could be bought, I'd be turning tricks for advertising.

When I get my hot little hands on the festival program, my heart starts pumping as I go nuts with the red pen and the Post-It notes. I then sink as much as I can afford on tickets and babysitters. Then it's counting down the sleeps and it's on with the boots, tights, scarf and red lipstick and down to the Melbourne Town Hall. This dull, soulless building is transformed into an exhilarating, vibrant palace brimming with people queueing, blabbing in the bar or hanging round the coffee wagon waiting for their caffe lattes. Listen and you will hear every other person say: "This is amazing. Is it always like this?"

The whole experience is life-affirming and glorious. And the festival is like a drug; maybe it's more like gambling, as I promise myself: "OK, just one more show." People accost friends between shows with "What have you seen? When are they on? You've got to see him/her/them."

The beauty of this festival is that it is accessible and it's cheap. Some shows feel like a fun night out with mates, while others drag you abruptly out of your comfort zone. And others are crap and you slag them off on the way home. Which is all part of the experience. Watching the audience is almost as much fun as the show. You'll see all types: bogans, old folks, ladies from Malvern, Goths, students, pimply teens and suburban mums and dads all hoping for something to make their hearts sing.

I always get asked for suggestions. Because the programme can induce a bit of decision paralysis.  Here are my top ten picks. 

Rhys Nicholson filthy, wrong and insane. Five stars. Must see. Total genius.

Don't Peak At High School Crip comic Stella Young, adopted only child Fiona Scott-Norman, one-time girl Jacq de Vere and a rotating host of other comedy misfits on life after bottoming out at school.

Greg Fleet what a magnificent man and comedian. This year talking about the shame of substance abuse. 

Diana Nguyen in PhiL and Me The Vietnamese iconic sewing machine Mum, Kim Huong is insane and hilarious! Think Wogs Out Of Work. But a Vietmanese woman.

Khaled Khalafalla This guy is going to be famous. Smart accessible ethnic humour. And a spunk. 

Geraldine Hickey  if you like your lesbians, laconic look no further. Equal parts hilarious and warm. 

Harley Breen  Part bogan. Part genius. Solid pair of hands, cracking jokes and brillant physical comedian. 

Jack Dee an utter arsehole, an old hand at comedy. Hates everything and everyone and touring again after six years because 'I want to spend less time with my family’

Aleisha McCormack rising star of Melbourne comedy. How To Get Rich (directed by Julia Zemiro) is Aleisha’s second one woman show and has already had a sell out season at Fringe. 

Joel Creasy is an acid-tongued prince, a foodie, momma's boy and total bitch. See him before you have to go to Rod Laver Arena to do it. 

Margaret Cho if you like your comedy grown up, rude and transgressive, you’ve probably already bought tickets to Margaret Cho. If not. Get cracking.

Sarah Millican sweet and caustic Nominee Barry Award 2009 Melbourne Comedy Festival. Considered “The funniest woman in Britain.” 

Stephen K Amos loves Melbourne and Melbourne loves Stephen. Slick, fast and piss funny.

Felicity Ward Returning to Melbourne for ONE NIGHT ONLY! The Hedgehog Dilemma was nominated for Best Comedy at every major comedy festival across Australia in 2012. As it bloody should have been.

Denise Scott and Judith Lucy Can’t. Go. Wrong. Like spending the evening with your naughtiest aunties.

The List Operators Looking for a family show that’s not childish, patronizing and will have you all fully coughing your lungs up, this is it. 

Here are some wild cards..... Some young up and coming ones to watch Sam Peterson  and Andy Matthews, Headliners, bunch of expert US comics and Best Of British is always good.

I’m also doing a show called Curvy Crumpet, "Brassy... the audience were delighted" The Age. It was also picked in the Time Out Melbourne Comedy Festival Top 20 (see clipping above). Love to see you. I'm thrilled with it and the big noisy audiences are loving it. 8.15pm Trades Hall. 

See something. Anything. Book a night. Do three shows. I'll babysit for you. Don't turn around and say: "I meant to go." There's plenty of time to sleep when you're dead.

Tickets fot Curvy Crumpet ON SALE NOW 

London. A postcard from 2009.

THE first thing I saw as I got off the plane in London was a sign that read, "Do you want to complain?" It was like landing in Germany to "Do you want to engineer something with precision?", the US to "Do you want to be annoyingly cheerful and tell me to 'Have a nice day?', made all the more irritating by the fact that you mean it?", or Australia to "Do you want a beer and is your sister's name Kylie?"

I asked my English friend Dan about the Brits' reputation of complaining. "It's not that we're whingers," he explained. "It's just that we like talking and everything happens to be shit."

I love the English. Their default setting of forming an orderly queue as soon any more than two people are assembled. Their sweetness. "Mind the gap." Their passive racism: "Oh, Catherine, you Australians are so refreshing!" (Really? Then it must be true that 70 per cent of communication is non-verbal because your face just screamed "vulgar, coarse and tactless".)

I love how desserts are all "puddings" and have names like Spotted Dick. And how adorable is their justification - or better still, denial - of the class system despite the existence of second-class stamps, the monarchy, hereditary titles, posh hotels that won't serve you a drink in the bar unless you're a guest with a room number, and the nationality of your nanny being a social marker?

I love the English response to every request as "sorry", like they had forgotten to deal with my request, despite not possibly being able to pre-empt it. "Could you pass me my handbag?" "Oh, sorry." "Could you tell me where the loo is?" "Terribly sorry. First on your right." "Would you be so kind as to take off your pants, hold that chair above your head and do the hokey pokey?" "Frightfully sorry. Yes. Just a moment. How dreadfully rude of me."

I wasn't in Blighty for the weather. Or the food. I was there for the chat. I love how the English speak English. Words like "lodger", "knackered" and "wankered". Terms like "feeling poorly", "she's a right nutter" and "he's a pompous git". The fact children say "bottom" instead of "bum" in an attempt not to appear "common", yet the pubs have names like The Badger's Arse, The Vicar's Cock and The Hairy Snatch.

Over a dessert of Gooseberry Fool with a bunch of people (two named Hector, and all of whom described their ageing parents as "barking", "batty", "bonkers" or "barmy"), a midwife spoke about labouring women. "They always want to know how it's looking 'down there'. I say, 'It's beautiful, like a gently blossoming rose, petals slowly unfurling.' The truth is, it's like looking down a dog's throat." Only an English person could come up with that.

The English are, undeniably, the funniest people on earth. How else can you explain such place names as Clench (Wiltshire), Twatt (Orkney), Dull (Perth & Kinross), Nasty (Hertfordshire) and Cuckoos Knob (North Yorkshire)? 

But what a bunch of wusses. An announcement an Clapham station; “The temperature is expected to be high.  Please take note of information on the platform posters and carry a bottle of water with you at all times.  If you are feeling unwell please approach a member of staff.” It was 23 degrees. How much did I love non-chalantly, putting on a jumper, scarf and mittens and asking if there was anywhere I could buy soup. 

Two complaints. Anything I wanted to buy was double the price plus a bit more than I estimated (then convert that into pounds) made even worse by the English customer service mantra “First world prices. Third world service”.  And that the place was teaming with Australians. At one point I found myself thinking, “Crikey, there are a lot of English people here.” 

I was trying to overhear the natives with their “stark raving mad” “fancy a pint” and “he’s a jumped up little plonker” but instead my ear drums were constantly pierced by screeches of, “Hey, Gaz! Check this out! What a pisser!” 

Catching up with English mates I hadn’t seen for 14 years began with excited ejaculations of “You haven’t changed a bit”. Then the backpacking photos were dug  out to reveal that indeed we had and are now clapped out and middle aged.  So overwhelmed with how beautiful I looked in one photo I said,   “I wished I’d known how good looking I was back then.” My mates then corrected me “That’s not you, Catherine, you’re the fat one at the back with the face like a slapped arse.” And I was. Lie back and think of England?  Don’t mind if Ido.