Left alone: a woman who courted no one
MCP
September 22, 2005
THE nation's foremost feminists have been caught out and left uncharacteristically speechless by the appointment of Susan Crennan to
the High Court.
Their problem is there is no evidence to suggest Justice Crennan's appointment was made on anything other than merit. She wasn't an
equal opportunity appointee or an affirmative action quota queen. She got the job because she was deemed to be the best person for
the job.
The Howard Government had been under pressure from a gaggle of feminist groups to name another woman to replace the High Court's
first female justice, Mary Gaudron, after she retired in February 2003.
To their credit, then attorney-general Daryl Williams and his successor Philip Ruddock didn't pander to the clamour of the feminist
lobby and make an appointment based on gender.
"It has been my view over a period of time that I should appoint the best person for the job, and sometimes the best person happens
to be a woman," Mr Ruddock said when he announced that Justice Crennan would replace judge Michael McHugh on the High Court bench.
"Cabinet has decided to recommend a new judge ... based upon one criteria and one criteria alone, and that is merit," Mr Ruddock
said.
"Merit, of course, means legal excellence; a capacity for industry; a temperament suited to performance of the judicial function.
And it was the view of Cabinet that the person who has been recommended personifies all of these qualities."
Without belabouring the point, the Labor Party, federally and in most states, has long and disastrously committed itself to filling
such important positions on the basis of political considerations - just as it has enshrined the absurd notion of gender preference
in its pre-selection practices.
The party's machine men are quick to jettison the gender bias guidelines whenever it suits them but there is no doubt that the
misguided practice of positive discrimination in favour of lacklustre minority candidates, both women and members of ethnic groups,
in the faint hope of currying factional favour, has been disastrous for the nation.
The lack of an enthusiastic response from the usual feminist suspects to Justice Crennan's appointment is entirely understandable.
She was not, for example, a strident member of the bra-burning brigade. She has not marked herself as a political spear carrier for
any particular party, and to top it all, she has managed to raise her three children while juggling the demands of a very busy
career without insisting that her husband, senior counsel Michael Crennan, abandon his career to become a house husband.
As a barrister in Melbourne in the early 1990s, she distinguished herself with her tough cross-examination of the principals
involved in the collapse of companies investigated during the royal commission into Tricontinental, and a sound understanding of
corporate and intellectual property law. She also has an arts degree in language and literature, as well as a postgraduate degree in
history and a law degree.
It is her commonsense that will make her appointment so attractive to mainstream Australians - and further marginalise negative
feminists.
In an interview with The Age in 1992, Justice Crennan rejected affirmative action and said feminists should resist the temptation to
see discrimination where it didn't exist.
"They (feminists) want to be compensated for the fact that women have come to the (law) profession late by having an accelerated
rite of passage to the top echelons, I think that's wrong," she said.
"Until you had the Pill, until you could control fertility, how could people plan a law career or a career as a surgeon? The
feminists tend to want to blame somebody, but there were imperatives there that governed life, which mean that it was a natural
structure to have men earning money and women looking after the six children."
Justice Crennan's appointment should force the feminist forces and those on the Left to ask themselves what they actually stand for?
As Labor front-bencher Lindsay Tanner said this week, when launching David McKnight's book Beyond Right and Left: "We (the Left)
need to ask ourselves some pretty hard questions ... what's our strategy ... what's our solution?"
"We're often critical of the family as a social institution, so why do we campaign for workers to spend more time with their
families? A huge amount of rethinking needs to occur among those of us who adhere to values traditionally associated with the left
of politics."
That a conservative government has found the best person for the High Court vacancy who also happens to be a woman is a major blow
to the ALP and its acolytes among the High Priestesses of the Sisterhood, who apparently believe women will only be promoted if they
are in thrall to sexist campaign slush funds like Emily's List, founded by possibly the least successful person never elected to the
office of state premier, Victoria's Joan Kirner, or given safe seats courtesy of ALP reforms supported by the next least successful
never elected premier, sometime ALP federal president Carmen Lawrence.
It may be a minor point, but the new High Court judge designate also rejected the clumsy feminist contrivance of the use of chair,
chairperson or chairwoman, insisting that the position was chairman, plain and simple with no gender claptrap attached, when she was
chairman of the Victorian Bar.
It's a big defeat for the politically correct who abuse the language in the name of feminism and a major blow to the dopes who think
mankind only refers to blokes.
The best candidate has the job. She happens to be a woman. In a less weird world this appointment would not raise an eyebrow.
aker...@dailytelegraph.co-m.au
--
Men are everywhere that matters!
"Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens."
- Jimi Hendrix
Heidi Graw
>"MCP" <gf010...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote in message
>news:xWxYe.3069$WV1....@fe2.news.blueyonder.co.uk...
> http://dailytelegraph.news.com.au/story/0,20281,16678555-5001032,00.html
>
> September 22, 2005
>
> THE nation's foremost feminists have been caught out and left
> uncharacteristically speechless by the appointment of Susan Crennan to
> the High Court.
>
> Their problem is there is no evidence to suggest Justice Crennan's
> appointment was made on anything other than merit. She wasn't an
> equal opportunity appointee or an affirmative action quota queen. She got
> the job because she was deemed to be the best person for
> the job.
Right on! This is exactly how it should be: appointment by merit!
Anything less degrades the profession.
(snip)
> It may be a minor point, but the new High Court judge designate also
> rejected the clumsy feminist contrivance of the use of chair,
> chairperson or chairwoman, insisting that the position was chairman, plain
> and simple with no gender claptrap attached, when she was
> chairman of the Victorian Bar.
<chuckle> ....and I certainly did not mind being called, "Madame Chairman!"
Such a title I considered quaint and amusing...an old relic from a time long
ago. The man who insisted I be called Madame Chairman meant it in a
respectful way. However, I felt more comfortable using the title
"Chairperson." ... "I am chairperson of this committee."
>
> It's a big defeat for the politically correct who abuse the language in
> the name of feminism
Chairperson is a perfectly legitimate title. Language is a living thing.
It changes, evolves and develops over time in response to new ideas,
inventions, conventions, etc. The evolution from chairman to chairperson is
not an abuse! There's no need to get so hysterical over new words! Sheez!
Heidi