Words as Weapons

"What the housewives of Australia need to understand as they do the ironing is that if they get it done commercially it's going to go up in price, and their own power bills when they switch the iron on are going to go up."

- Tony Abbott (February 08, 2010) (full story)

"I think I would say to my daughters if they were to ask me this question ... [virginity] is the greatest gift that you can give someone, the ultimate gift of giving, and don't give it to someone lightly."

- Tony Abbott (January 27, 2010) (full story)

In the last few weeks opposition leader Tony Abbott has managed to draw a generous number of headlines not through anything he's done, but through a couple of things he's said (see above). It's been a fascinating thing to watch from the sidelines, in large part because under very close analysis there's actually very little wrong with the content of what he says.

Think about it: Australia has housewives, housewives are known to do ironing. Nothing wrong with pointing that out surely? Furthermore, if asked, most parents would probably admit that they'd rather their children didn't throw away their viriginity on some meaningless encounter. Still okay?

Right, time for a bit of a disclaimer. I think Tony Abbott is a loathsome toad of a politician. If I honestly thought he stood a chance of getting into power I'd lose considerable sleep over the prospect. I actually celebrated when he won leadership of the opposition because I figured it guaranteed Kevin Rudd a second term (my enthusiasm for Rudd diminishes each week, but he's still, by far, the lesser of two evils).

However, this article is not intended in any way to be about politics. It's about words. What I want to do here is to analyse why Tony Abbott's words have struck such a nerve, the ways in which they've been used against him, the ways in which he's used them to his advantage, and whether or not they expose him to be the morally withered homunculus that I believe him to be.

Let's try that again

"What the people of Australia need to understand as they do the ironing is that if they get it done commercially it's going to go up in price, and their own power bills when they switch the iron on are going to go up."

- (not) Tony Abbott (February 08, 2010)

"I think I would say to my children if they were to ask me this question ... [virginity] is the greatest gift that you can give someone, the ultimate gift of giving, and don't give it to someone lightly."

- (not) Tony Abbott (January 27, 2010)

Ok - read the above again. I've changed precisely one word in each statement. Ignoring the context (particularly for the second one) tell me if you think there's anything offensive in there now? Either way, let's carry on.

No such thing as bad publicity

Let's assume that Abbott is fully aware of what he's saying and equally aware of the publicity it generates. He says something outrageous, people start attacking him, other people start defending him, yet more people get drawn into the debate, and so on.

This is a huge success for Abbott. The more time people spend talking about him, the less time they spend talking about Kevin Rudd. In short, Abbott has used mere words as an indirect weapon against the opposition. In the ideal world this would be entirely counter-productive: any politician who said something culturally or morally offensive would simply not gain any votes. Unfortunately there are definitely voters out there with sufficiently narrow-minded sensibilities to read Abbott's words and view him as a fine choice to lead the country.

... alternatively: there are definitely voters out there who are sufficiently broad-minded to look beyond Abbott's words and make their own decision about whether he's the right choice to lead the country.

... or even: the smart voters out there would see that such an outspoken and honest man as Tony Abbott would be a fine choice to lead the country.

Do you see how I can rewrite essentially the same sentence three times to mean three entirely different things? More precisely, I can rewrite the same sentence to provoke three different reactions from you. Sometimes it's not about what's said, but the way that it's said.

A witless victim?

In both of the remarks we're discussing Abbott's defense has comprised a slightly baffled rationalisation that people either over-reacted, or quoted him out of context. He generally goes on, pretty successfully, to deconstruct his own statements in order to explain why they're not offensive, while at the same time ensuring that the discussion surrounding them continues.

It's a convincing portrayal, and one that could even be genuine. Were his remarks to come across as any more calculated then he wouldn't be able to get away with the political defense that he is simply being honest (a character trait famously lacking in most politicians). Equally, if he was to choose his words more carefully there would be far less scope for misinterpretation, outrage and, consequently, discussion and publicity.

So now we have something of a semantic tangle. If he's saying all these things by accident then he's hardly the canny politician that a party leader inherently claims to be. If you can't control your words how can you control a country? (Of course, we've seen with George W Bush that a command of words, or even basic intelligence, is not required for power, but my explanation is that Bush was quite literally a tool, in this instance an empty vessel for the Republican party. I don't think Abbott fits that profile.) Conversely, if he's saying these things deliberately then he's not quite the straight-talking man he claims to be. If you're merely pretending to be honest then how honest can you actually be?

There's a third option: he genuinely means what he says and says what he means. However, for reasons that I will go into further down, I simply see this as an extension of the first option - which leaves us with someone who is either witlessly honest or deceptively calculating.

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He said WHAT??!

As I've hopefully suggested already, anyone's words can be used against them. While Abbott's quotes are inflammatory enough on their own merits, some of the reporting of Abbott's remarks (and his defenses) is just as guilty of stoking the fires. Take this example:

TONY Abbott says people are being "hypersensitive" about his comments on housewives doing the ironing. (full story)

So, if we find his remarks offensive we're just being 'hypersensitive'? I if I find his remarks sexist and outdated then I'm just being 'hypersensitive'??! That sounds pretty dismissive to me. Way to drive that nail in even further!

But, wait a moment, what did he actually say?

"We've become so hypersensitive about all this stuff," he said. (full story)

Now it's not quite so easy to get offended. He's not talking about you or I, he's talking about 'we'. He's not talking specifically about women doing the ironing, he's talking about 'all this stuff'. Sure, you can still feel dismissed and offended if you want to but, without even being overly generous, you could just as easily read his response as a a weary acknowledgement that the spectre of political correctness is always looming.

Women as 'other'

Here we get to the meat of why Tony Abbot was wrong to say what he said. Now, even though I touched on it above, I want to dismiss any prospect of Abbott simply falling foul of political correctness. You see, political correctness is a scourge upon the written and spoken word that makes anything but the most sanitized language a potential minefield of offensive terminology. Its one benefit is that it's made us more aware of the language we use, but we're now so busy ensuring that we choose the right words that we've completely lost sight of why we're doing it in the first place.

No, I believe there's a simple reason why Abbott's specific words have offended and that's down to the two words I removed in my revised quotes earlier on: women, daughters. In his original quotes he's specifically referring to the opposite sex. Perhaps if he had less of a reputation he might have gotten away unscathed, but I suspect that almost anyone would have caused offence with that choice of words. Abbott's not talking about just anyone, he's talking about women and however easy it is to justify the sentiment or factual basis of his statements, the raw truth is that he's compartmentalizing women: he's reducing them to the status of 'other'.

Most (what I would certainly term) reasonable people these days see no social or cultural division between men and women any more. There's been enough progress in the last century that to even propose that women or men have prescribed roles comes across as rather tasteless. What Abbott is emphasising in his language on is the idea of women as a separate group, and by separating a group you automatically marginalize. Essentially you make them 'other'.

You might also argue that Abbott shouldn't really have any business telling his daughters how to conduct their sex lives. He doesn't, but he was answering a very specific question at the time and I have to wonder if there would be the same fuss if he had three sons instead. His fault (or, perhaps, his trick) was to specifically refer to his daughters and thereby open up the debate about whether a man should be able to tell women what to do with their bodies.

I would propose that the ironing quote is even more damaging and disturbing. At once he's suggesting that only women are responsible for general domestic duties, and automatically implying that women should only perform domestic duties, and also suggesting that the most significant duty these housewives perform is the ironing. Christ - what fucking century are we living in anyway? It could very well be true that the majority of ironing in the majority of households is still done by women, but Abbott's choice of language, quite aside from succinctly perpetuating women as 'other', exposes him not as a potential leader of tomorrow who should be looking forward, but as someone who's still harking back to a social model that belongs very much in the past.

The last word

I worry in part that I'm giving Tony Abbott too much credit here. Personally I think he's an arse who freely gives voice to the obnoxious thoughts in his head because he genuinely believes there's nothing wrong with those thoughts. He doesn't strike me as someone smart enough to even work his way out of the house each morning (at least not without the help of his wife), but then again he's worked his way up to the leadership of the opposition so perhaps he does know a thing or two about what to say. I guess we'll just have to wait and see who has the last word.

* probably

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