We’ve started a podcast. This week’s was on the broad subject of powerful men and sex. It has some resonance. Here’s the script:
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Never underestimate the power of sex. Think of what powerful men have put at risk for that briefest of pleasures. Think of Bill Clinton who put his marriage at risk and the presidency of the United States, and so the course of history.
Think of those pathetic scenes in Britain and America (though I think not so often in Australia) where male politicians stood next to the wives they’ve humiliated as he says how much he regrets what happened and how he and his wife - his usually silent, tight-jawed wife - want to mend their marriage.
It is a powerful force on this planet. No doubt of that.
And think now of Barnaby Joyce.
Nobody knows what was going on in his mind as he pursued his relationship outside marriage. Nobody, perhaps not even him. What the mixture of love and lust was only he knows. And it should have been private but now it is not, nor could it ever be with a baby involved.
Shakespeare said of the men and women turning in the turmoil of love from partner to partner: “Oh, what fools these mortals be”, and what he meant was that love and lust confuse even those suffering them. Our minds shift from moment to moment, from certainty to contradictory certainty.
So we can’t judge Mr Joyce in his actions as a human being. Some marriages break up because they’re broken, and who can criticise that, whatever the pain. And some marriages break up because older men get carried away. We men and women are complex mixes of emotions which swirl from moment to moment.
Does that mean Mr Joyce’s predicament should be of no concern to the rest of us? I think it doesn’t. Mr Joyce appeared in public with his family. His party is a party of family values. So the break-up of a family raises issues of judgement. Was his private behaviour consistent with his public posture - that’s a legitimate question for voters.
And for journos. I’ve been talking about it to a lot of his people - people who would never dream of voting anything but for the Nationals. Women usually start by saying it’s nobody’s business but his own, their own - that of his wife and family and of him and his new partner., not to mention a baby.
But as we ruminated, anger emerged in many of the women. They weren’t sure if they’d vote for him again.
There was sympathy for the wife spurned in favour of the younger woman.
Shakespeare wrote: “Oh what fools these mortals be”.
He also wrote: “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned”.
This is an adaptation of our new podcast “A Letter from New England” which you can find online on Fairfaxmedia websites towards the end of each week.