The Chaser Report - Why Grace Tame Loves Comedy | Grace Tame

Episode Date: May 16, 2022

Dom and Charles are graced by the presence of AOTY and total legend Grace Tame for a very special episode of the Election Edition. Grace speaks to why certain people in power would rather start culture wars than make positive change for the better of everyone, and how even the media play into destructive narratives when people don't use critical thinking. Meanwhile Dom and Charles unpack the government's pitch for Australian's to dip into their super to buy a home. Plus John has the latest Sky News news! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In an election that will determine the fate of the entire universe, there's only one podcast holding politicians accountable. Scott Morrison, Anthony Albanese, who will move? Find out on The Chaser Report, election edition. Hello and welcome to the election edition of The Chaser Report. It is Monday the 16th of May, just five days to go. until the election, I'm Dom Knight and Charles Firth, the end is in sight. The end is in sight. We can do this.

Oh, it's exciting. I cannot wait. Do we have to do a wrap-up episode, by the way? I think we probably should, isn't we? I think we probably should. Okay. So, look, there's also policy on the table, Charles, like actual solutions designed to try and fix major problems.

And probably the biggest problem for most of us is not being able to afford a house. So in your case, not being able to afford a second house. That's right. The government's come out with a very interesting policy, which is to allow people access to more money, access to all their super in order to be able to drive up the prices of houses even more so they can afford a house. I think it's 40% of your super.

You're allowed to get out and put directly into the pocket of a baby boomer. Isn't that the way the policy works? It's very sensible for us house owners because you're not actually increasing the supply of houses you're just literally creating more money to go into the same number of houses. Yeah. And so the only possible thing that can happen is it will drive up house prices. It was really encouraging to see a member of the government admitting that the policy would have an inflationary effect.

I was quite surprised to hear that. The other thing is it's being pitched as something that will allow 20-somethings to get into the housing market. Now, I don't know if you know any 20-somethings, Tom, but I can assure you all the 20-somethings I know who work for us, their super sucks. Yeah, so 40% of nothing is nothing, right? Yeah, they get to invest, you know,

40% of their $3,000 that have got saved up in super. I mean, Charles, to be fair to Scott Morrison in this brilliant plan, it wasn't anyone significant who admitted that there was a fault. It was only the Minister for Superannuation, Jane Hume, who said, yes, look, it will increase house prices temporarily, just for a while. Wait a minute, but isn't there a whole point that, because you've got to pay it back into your super when you sell the house, right?

Yes, yes, yes, yes. Isn't the point that, well, everyone's house prices will go up? So they'll easily be able to afford paying a pack. Yeah, but then... But if it's only temporary, doesn't that mean that... Yeah, because there's going to be a recession. Isn't that what... So that means people take all their money out of their super,

put it on the house, the house price goes down. They're not only having any super or a house. Yeah, that's right. It's called personal responsibility, Charles. Now, see, I much prefer Labor's plan. I've got to say, look, I'm going to take a side on this. Labor's plan for the government to own part of your house is absolutely brilliant. As long as you happen to be one of the 10,000 people who gets it,

does anyone explain how of the millions of people who would like to have help buying a house? Why is it 10,000? Is it like a lotto? Well, no, no. Their argument is that it's a pilot scheme. Oh, so they don't necessarily have to do it. So it's just a thing that they might do, that they're not about. No, no, it's the, there's only going to be 10,000.

No, because it's a stupid policy, right? It's a stupid policy. But they can then, but then that means that they only have to budget for 10,000. Oh, and then they can back away from it. And then they can back away from it and say, oh, we tried out the pilot. We tried the pilot. It was stupid. So how do you get to be in the 10,000?

Is there some sort of Game of Thrones death match situation to get public funding for your house? Well, I imagine if it involves millennials and Gen Z, it will be, it'll be broadcast on TV for the entertainment. of boomers. That actually sounds quite good. I mean, we did hear from Adam Bant yesterday on the podcast that the Greens want a million social homes. Well, it does seem to sort of address

because the fundamental problem with housing is that there isn't enough houses, right? I mean, you could. That's true. If there's a scarcity of something tells us, I'm not an economist, but can't you do something about supply? Well, I am an economist,

and the answer is what you do is you, you know, say there's not enough houses. The best solution is to build more houses. So why, why is 90% of the Australian political parties going, we won't do that, we're just going to put up the price of houses? And only the idiots at the Greens, you know nothing about economics, they're the only ones who've actually stumbled upon the economic truth. So they've fixed that supply problem.

There's only just one other supply problem that they have, which is there's not enough supply of green voters or green seats. But for that, it's a brilliant scheme. That's it. It's the purity. The purity of vision that comes from the purity of not having any power. So, I mean, I guess what will happen, no matter which party wins, is that housing prices will continue to go up,

will continue to go up, and wages will continue to stay stagnant and no one will be able to afford a house, yeah? Well, hopefully, yeah, that's the plan. Fantastic. On today's show, John Delmenico has been watching Sky News and actually found a way to bring us all together. I'm excited about this. Oh, that's very good.

And we've got very special, extra special guest. Grace Tame, former Australian of the year, on to talk about, well, everything, really? Everything, really, that's going on. Look, it's a wide-ranging conversation, and we should note that there are some upsetting aspects to the conversation. She mentioned some of the things that happened to her in her life,

and it's really important to hear what she has to say, but just if that's triggering for you, bear that in mind. Before that, though, something I personally find very offensive, which is Charles's daily news wrap. This is the election wrap for Monday the 16th of May. The Liberal Party held its camp. campaign launch yesterday and there was only one topic leading the 6pm bulletins. Australian cricket is once again in mourning following the sudden death of Andrew Simons

in a car accident. Scott Morrison held his budget on the same day Shane Warren died and now his campaign launch on the same day Andrew Simons died. The Australian cricket in community is begging Morrison to stop holding major events. The Liberal Party has launched the new policy which will allow people to buy houses using their super. The policy which will give people more money to buy houses without changing the number of houses available to buy is perfectly designed to drive prices higher, thus solving the problem of house prices not being high enough.

And finally over the weekend, Scott Morrison has vowed to change, should he be re-elected on Saturday. I know there are things that are going to have to change with the way I do things. The Prime Minister said that all their polling had indicated that voters want change and the best way to achieve change. is to stick with the same person as before. That's the wrap for Monday, B 16th of May. Five days to go. Not long now. Back in a sec.

The Chaser Report. Election edition. So last year, we were very, very honoured to have the Australian of the year grace time on our podcast. Surprisingly, Charles, she's agreed to come back and talk to us during the campaign. Yes. No idea why. She's hit an awful lot during the campaign and just about all of its main headlines. So let's get some more headlines happening with Grace's home.

Welcome to the podcast, Grace. Oh, look, it's always a pleasure chatting to you, Legends. Thank you for having me. So Scott Morrison described himself as a bulldozer this morning. I think Australians know I'm a bit of a bulldozer. Does that tell you with your experience at all, Grace? A bulldozer. A bulldozer.

Oh, my gosh. Whatever, at this point. But how have you found this campaign? I mean, you were such a big part of the national conversation when you were Australian of the year. You're not obliged to do this anymore, but you still, every move gets reported and people want to know what you think, Grace. I don't know. That's up to the people to decide, I suppose, you know, I often say, you know, before I say anything, you know, often preface my words with, you know, no one is obliged to listen to what I have to say. That's really the whole point.

I'm just here to present different ideas and mainly ask or invite people, you know, certainly not demand or force, invite people to interrogate the sources from which they're getting their information, you know, the lens that they are looking at a lot of the information that's being presented to them through. Because, you know, when we look at the landscape of our national media at the moment, you know, not all media, of course, you know, people like you guys, you know, thankfully there's there's a there's a small portion at least that that's retaining some independence but when we look at the the grand landscape of our national media we've got you know 59% of the readership share of print media you know metropolitan and nationally is murdoch and then you got

next after that 23% is is nine and and peter costello who was a former liberal treasurer um in howards time is is you know it's 23% like It's right-leaning, and we're trying to say that there's bias. It's just not true. That's 82% right there. Well, actually, we calculate, I added it all up, because if you include 7 and 10, 97% of the commercial news media is this right-leaning sort of thing. It's extraordinary.

Like, the Guardian, if you include the Guardian and the Saturday paper is not right-leaning, they make up essentially 3% of the commercial news media, not including the ABC, of course. Yeah. Which is neutral. Yeah, it's interesting watching it all play out because I guess I'm inspired by seeing how you use your voice still to this day because a couple of days ago you had some thoughts on Anthony Albanese going on the Alan Jones show,

which I think has fewer viewers than this conversation now as listeners. You were disappointed by that, weren't you? Of course I was disappointed by that. I mean, Alan Jones even said in his own book he talked about the letters that he wrote to his underage students, which constitutes grooming. And, you know, Anthony Albanese is a powerful man and he has choices, you know, of who he aligns himself with. And it was interesting because a lot of the people who were sort of and trying to sort of reason with me and I understand that they're well-intentioned were a part of a demographic who haven't been the victims of child sexual abuse. who haven't experienced what's like to be victimized by a person who has a lot of power and knowledge over you. And they're saying, oh, it's just, you know, it's unity. It's about

forgiveness and all those sorts of things. And I was like, I understand the concept of forgiveness is actually, in many ways, part of the mechanism that drives and perpetuates abuse. It's something that shields perpetrators because they just actually weaponize those sorts of institutions that are actually just man-made constructs to hide beneath. And people like Alan Jones, they don't need powerful white man to legitimize him. They don't need to be platformed. They don't need to be given the seal of approval. You know, they don't need handshakes. They don't need photographs on Twitter to boost their cause at all. And it has a really disempowering effect on survivors who see that. Like, what does it take for our message to be

heard? For these people to actually incur some kind of consequence, it just, we need circuit breaker moments in society for actually these cultures to stop. I often find during election campaigns, there's this notion that you can't possibly criticize the Labor Party because you can't publicly do that because what if you stuff it all up and suddenly everyone votes for the Libs because you said something critical about the Labor Party. It's so rubbish.

I mean, like I'm not, again, this is the whole thing. People going, oh, you know, you're a Labor hack. No, I'm actually like, it's not about party politics. very clear. You know, we're not even talking about two people who are even remotely similar if we're looking at Anthony and Scott. We're talking about one person who's a decent human being and we're talking about an egocentric ideologue who is just totally in it for himself. We're not even talking about a good or like a bad politician. We're talking about somebody who has deliberately abandoned the people or his own gain and is prepared

to sacrifice any group for the sake of politics. I made a list this morning on Twitter and, like, I'd have to pull out my phone, but the list is huge throughout his tenure as Prime Minister for the sake of politics. I mean, it just goes on and on and on. Does he not forget that, like, people, like, real people have memories and they, like, on paper, like, for his campaigning purposes, it might be tactical and work strategically in the moment, but like we have real lives and, you know, jobs and families and our families remember too.

Well, his colleagues remember, this has been one of the strange things about the campaign. So many of his colleagues have had critical things to say. And again, it's not about, it's not about party politics. You know, I could care less. I actually have, you know, friends who are in the Liberal Party. And, you know, the New South Wales Treasurer came out, and rightly so. He said there's no place for bigotry in the modern Liberal Party today. he's right and I support that, you know, it's, again, it's not about being liberal.

It's not about any of that. It's about human decency and authenticity and all those other values. And the principle of truth, too, you know, if we want to look at that, number one, I mean, this is a man who just, there are all these videos, too, and, you know, photographs and quotes that you can, you know, put side by side where he says one thing and then he says another, you know, and it could be like on the same day, too. And you're just like, that is just, that is textbook narcissism. But isn't that why Scott Morrison wants you to listen to Catherine Deaves and focus on sort of transgender scare campaign that they've tried to sort of ignite in this election?

Because, you know, part of this campaign is the great forgetting project. Like, he can't run on, well, you remember what I've done for the last three years. He has to have something shiny and new for everyone to look at and go, hey, look over here, be scared of these people, be scared of these people. It is incredibly desperate. It's a distraction. It's a distraction technique, first of all, because he's got really nothing else. You know, he doesn't want to talk. It doesn't want to really talk about climate change because there's nothing there's a plan. And, you know, there's, again, there's really, really nothing much else to go on. And, you know, as Ronnie Salt, I don't know if you're familiar with her Twitter, she's been pointing out for a while. It's not just about Waringa. And like you said, it's about appealing to the nation and dog whistling to certain ideologies. that go beyond her electorate. It has a much grander design, and it's being, it is, it's being, it's, it's his priority now that's running directly out of his office, again, as Ronnie Salt has been pointing out for quite a while. And the media are a part of this mechanism. And as you said, it's, I mean,

pretty much 97%. And they're all complicit in it and using this dubious language that's softening it. They're saying that she's just controversial. No, she's not. She's a flat out liar. She's a lawyer. She knows that mutilation is not something that can happen to transgender children because children cannot get the operation to have gender affirming surgery because it's something you can only get when you're 18. She knows all of these things. And yet, again, the media are all complicit in softening this narrative again.

And the average reader who does not use their critical thinking, who just sees, and again, this is not the fault of the average reader. It is just, you know, it's not fair to expect people to just walk past, you know, the shop front and see, you know, the front page, you know, and go, oh, well, I must examine this. They just see the headlines that go, oh, poor Catherine, you know, she's in tears, she just wants to defend her right to say what she wants. we, the average person sympathizes with that, with that and the imagery that they use, it's all very clever. Like, it's so insidious, this subliminal messaging, and it is all emanating from his office. It rots from the top. It is so masterful.

And I guess it's based around a perception, a strategy of the kind of things that would make people reelect the government, right, if this is all part of a big master plan. He is a marketing man. He was before he was prime. Minister and that is what he is holding on to. Given your experience of travelling around the country, talking to a lot of people and being a very prominent advocate, do you believe he's right that that argument is going to help him? Or have you seen a different side of Australia and your interaction with ordinary Australians? I am yet to encounter anybody who isn't

incensed by this because, you know, it is really just the lowest of the low. I mean, I don't know. I'm not a politician and I never, I never want to step into an environment where I become so entrapped in a hive mind wherein I become in any way detached from realities because it's so important to be able to admit fault. And I think that that's the downfall with people who believe that they are entitled to take advantage of and persecute people they perceive to be beneath them. That is where they go wrong. You see, they don't actually think about, they don't, they can't see anything from

anybody else's point of view. No empathy. No empathy because their inauthenticity is their, is their downfall. That's so sort of entrapped in their own ideology that then unable to accept responsibility and accountability, ding, ding, ding, um, cough. Yes, I don't know who you're talking about. I don't know. But do you think part of it is that actually this will knock off a whole lot of Scott Morrison's

competitors in the Liberal Party? If you take a macro issue, you know, thing like this, this is going to destroy a whole lot of wet libs chances at the election. And, yeah, it seems absurd to us that he would play a game where it's like, I'll get rid of... But actually, you sort of go, if his long-term plan is to sort of have a type of party where it hates on and tells lies about transgender people and whips up culture war campaigns out of nothing, then he's going about it the right way because it's going to lead to a whole lot of seats lost of people who, you know, who believe in telling the truth and being fair within his party.

Who will be able to challenge him after this election, even if he's not in prime minister, he'll be the head of a Liberal Party that looks far more like Catherine Deves than before the election. It's an incredibly selfish thing to do. And if that's what he wants his legacy to be, then again, And then that's an unmasking moment, although, I mean, in my opinion, he unmasked himself to be that a long time ago. It's disturbing but true that there are people who believe that they are entitled to persecute

people who they perceive to be beneath them. I just wanted to ask about your campaign, because when we spoke to you last time, you were talking about trying to get the nation's laws on grooming and coercive control changed and in harmony with each other. And this is the time to talk about policy. This is the time when all good ideas to make Australia better are welcomed, and we've heard heaps from all kinds of people. How is your campaign going after more than a year of talking about this cause?

Indeed. Well, it's funny because the media is a strange beast. It's going really well. So the Harmony campaign is sort of our longer-term umbrella campaign, because you kind of can't bite off more than you can chew, as you know, creating change and especially legal reform is a marathon, not a sprint. and one can only run one step at a time. You can't run 4Ks at once.

Unless you are inspector gadget, and I am not. I certainly can't. You know, I'm a Luddite, and I can barely operate my own phone. So the first of the individual campaigns is called Stop Gaslighting Survivors, and the purpose of that campaign is to remove the word relationship from the crime of persistent child sexual abuse. So in four jurisdictions out of the eight that govern the crime of persistent child sexual abuse of a child or young person under special care, the words, the wording is, you know, slightly different from state to state, but essentially it means the same

thing. It's still described as maintaining a sexual relationship with a young person. And that's not just wrong. It's also something that are perpetrators of child sexual abuse offenses often weaponise to spin the narrative. It sounds creepy. The word sounds creepy in that context, of course. Even actually on Sunday, during the leaders debate online, there was a commercial where they characterized a case of abuse of a minor where the child was groomed as a relationship. It's something that's still, you know, it's a really complex thing because often we are talking about children who are groomed to express what they think in their child mind is affection and love or adult abusers who know exactly what they're doing because they're often, you know, well-practiced offenders. You know, it's talked about repeatedly in academia, in psychiatric medicine, this mechanism of shame that stays with boys and girls, you know, boys speak about the shame they feel

from getting erections in, you know, when they were being abused by their abusers. You know, girls talk about expressing, you know, love, saying I loved you or begging for sex from their abusers. That's certainly something that I, you know, I struggled with because I, um, I, I'd been abused previously, not only as a six-year-old, but I'd been abused by primary caregivers of mine, who I spent a long time with. And it's something, something that's not discussed about very often when we talk about the trauma responses of not only people, but of animals in the animal kingdom, is the fawn response out of the fore. So there's the flight, fright, and freeze,

which we hear about really often. But then there's the fawn response, which is really common in who've been neglected or abused by caregivers, which is characterized by the suppression of needs and identity and the sort of, you know, people pleasing, the want to impress the person who's supposed to be providing you with love, but is, you know, cold or mistreating you. And so you sort of, you know, like you do anything to get affection that you're not being provided with. You know, your needs are not being met. So you end up, in some cases, sort of parenting them or performing for them, you know, and because I was also autistic as well, I mimicked and masked and masked a lot of my own identity anyway. It's really complicated, obviously. There's a lot to take

in there. Yeah, no, I didn't know any of the theory behind that. It's fascinating. But just in terms of the places to focus on, where do we need to change next? Yeah. Well, hopefully by getting this word of relationship out of this offence, that's another piece of narrative manipulations. that we can take away from perpetrators. Because it's still something that I see all the time. I mean, I'm no stranger to going online and seeing the hatred I get, whether it be from strangers or bots or whatever.

We need to keep getting this message across, more so because people still don't understand that the power imbalance between victims of child sexual abuse is not one that is just distilled to an issue. individual level, which is all the more reason we need to fight this. There is a huge overlap between perpetrators and people who are in positions of power. But also, we've got to remember that people who perpetrate these crimes often operate in rings. They don't work alone. One of the members on the advisory board of our foundation is a brilliant

academic by the name of Michael Sauter. He's a professor at the University of New South Wales. Now, he wrote his thesis, his PhD thesis, on escaping pedophile rings. He's been working in this sector for about 15 years. And he's a six-foot-tall man, really, like, you wouldn't want to mess with Michael. On a number of fronts, you wouldn't want to argue with him because he's, you know, he's sharp as attack. But also physically, you know, just you wouldn't. But just because he started doing research in this field and, you know, poking the bear as the phrase goes, he came home one day and found, and he's written about this.

So, you know, I know that I have permission to say this because I've asked to him if I can share this information, you know, for the purposes of making this point that I'm about to make. You know, he came home one day and he found animal organs and blood in his bed. Because, you know, this subculture of humans, again, who feel entitled to abuse people who they think are beneath them, them, you know, vulnerable people, they will go to any lengths to attempt to silence those trying to expose them. And I have been on the end of this physical, like, violent harassment

myself. You know, when I first showed my face on, on television, you know, I had my car crashed into by a white 2000 model Toyota Corolla and then like two or three weeks later I saw the same model of car 200 meters in the distance and I thought that was quite odd. Its hazards were on and then I gave it a wide clearance and then all of a sudden it was up, this was like 10pm at night. It was right up my backside and I sped up to, you know, give it some room. I wasn't speeding or anything like that before that. And then it was chasing me.

We were going like 90 kilometers an hour. and then all of a sudden, like, it had chased me all the way home and I was too shocked to get out of the car and a thug got out and bashed on the window and called me a fucking whore. Oh, my God. These are, these guys don't mess around, you know. Election News, you can't trust.

The Chaser Report. Well, I'm able to understand this now, Grace, because five weeks ago I got my second daughter. So like Scott Morrison, and I'm suddenly able to understand that these things are bad. Oh, yes. You can understand, like, you can understand women as objects relative to you. Well, I've got my wife to explain it to me.

Yeah, yeah. But in all sincerity, and how is this not the top priority, stopping this stuff? And that's what's really frustrating, see, see Charles, like, oh, you're not Charles, your job. I'm done. Charles has sons. Charles has no idea. Yeah, I understand. I was going to say, I was about to call you Dom and then I was like, why does

you, why does Charles have two, why do you have a monopoly? Why do you have a media monopoly? We're white middle-aged guys. We're indistinguishable. Don't worry about it. You are all the one, you know, you are the monolith of white man. That's true. Sadly true.

You are a man eliz. So, yeah, I was saying this yesterday. I spoke to the, I spoke to the Batuta guys. And I was saying how, you know, Max and I. worked out little butts off last year, you know, travelling around the country, you know, speaking about grooming. And, you know, granted, some of the talks that I did had a no media policy where, you know, they couldn't film. But even in the cases where I did film, the stories that did come out of there were always about like, oh, Grace's mental health and all that sort

of thing like that, where I went to great length to explain grooming, the steps of grooming, the things that came out were, you know, Grace slam Scott Morrison. Grace's obsession with Scott Morrison. I reckon, you know, I did like 4,000 word, 5,000 word speeches. I did over 100 speeches and the mainstream media's coverage of what I spoke about. And I did a lot of TV interviews as well. All the policy stuff that I did, the updates, I barely covered that. But they framed me as being this aggressor. You know, I reckon I spoke about Scott Morrison, like 1% of the time relative to the advocacy that I did last year. Yeah, it's always a great. And I know this, I know this because it broke me because I have to put myself back into a space that, you know, like physically, like

it has a chemical effect on you to go into that trauma, you know, to not only talk about child sexual abuse, but to talk about, you know, the domestic violence that I've experienced and and those sorts of things in order to communicate a message to people. And the media, the media that had an opportunity to then transmit that message to the community chose instead to focus on this adversarial thing, which was really only a fraction of the time. It was really disappointing. Here in podcasting, there's unlimited time.

You can speak for yourself. And although if this conversation does get reported, I suspect they'll just choose one tiny little thing that you might have said about a certain Whatever. And that's fine. But people can listen to the whole thing. That's the great thing about it. Yeah. But the thing is, I think it's just unfortunate because often the critical thinkers are the ones

who don't spend their time on social media expressing their anger about things. It's the people who don't critically think who spend their time going ro, ro, ro, right, right. That's pretty good summary with the election campaign, particularly the debates, I think. So it's okay. It's all right. And I understand that. And also the opinions that matter to me ultimately at the end of the day, the opinions of my loved ones, you know, and that's what you've got to remember. That's how you keep yourself grounded. And that's how you keep yourself, that's how you keep your head out of the clouds as well. You've got to not chase, you know, and also like approval ultimately has to come from the inside you have to you have to internally be okay you have to accept yourself

and not need external validation you need to you need to not be chasing that like chasing likes and things like that or or you know media headlines and whatnot you need to you need to be okay with you know the Murdoch press going she's a savage and also like yay if you think I'm a savage because of my comedy set, that is a compliment Daily Mail. Thank you. Good having you in comedy now, Grace too, by the way. What was that like doing the rational fear thing? That was like rocket fuel to me.

I love that stuff. You know, like when I think about the things that I want to do and the things that bring me joy, like laughter is something that, you know, as someone who didn't have a lot of, what, someone who had no stability, let's be honest. Like I was born into a broken home. Comedy is where I found a lot of security in terms of, you know, like I was a big fan of Robin Williams.

I was a big fan of Bill Bailey and that sort of absurdist, you know, silliness. You know, I found a lot of joy there. And as an autistic person, too, it's the most purest ways for me to express myself where I don't actually have to do a lot of hard work because I've got a lot of delays in processing in conversation. when I'm in like a situation, especially if there's more than one person, like one-on-one conversations I can do because it's like, okay, all right, you know, I can focus my attention and go like, let's, I can do this.

It's like, you know, chess. But if there's like multiple people, I'm like, you know, like there's too many things, too many moving parts going on, whereas, you know, comedy, I'm like, okay, it's a one way street. I can do the talking, you know, and it's not, it's not actually about a, attention-seeking at all. It's like I am having, I am communicating with you guys and we are together and it's, it's like the purest form of unity and it is really beautiful. And like, it's like I'm sharing and we are one. And I don't know, I just find it. Because also laughter is so,

it's so pure. You cannot help that laugh. It's involuntary. Yeah, a lot of the time. It's involuntary. And like, it's like, even when you're really sad, if you laugh, like you cannot help that happiness. Yes, yes. And laughing at powerful people is a great way to move their power. It's like you always, you always punch up. You never, like my rule is you never punch down. I'll only make jokes about my own experience.

You know, like regardless of what the outcome of the Depp Heard trial is, mockery of any aspect of it, this is a trial that involves domestic violence and an allegation of graphic rape. The mockery of any aspect of it is completely vile. and I cannot believe it. I just cannot believe it. Like, I haven't been watching it, seeing parts of it, and I'm just like, this is so beyond the pale.

I just can't believe it. I've been sort of looking at social media on that stuff. And do you think that it's actually, Johnny Depp's got a whole team of social media people actually putting out all those memes? Like, it just seems so. Yeah, it does. That's been reported on.

Yeah, because it seems so, That's been going on since 2019. Yeah, it's extraordinary to watch because it's so brutal and such a quick turnaround. And it's, yeah, it's, again, it's another case where people, a lot of people are not using their critical thinking. Again, like just examples where Amber Heard's clearly just blowing her nose and that there's people are saying that she was using cocaine on the stand. That's just like people use your critical thinking. Yeah, I mean, I think there's plenty of basis to laugh at Johnny Depp, and there has been for many, many years.

But no, you're right, that's just that sort of situation. There's just no comedy in it. Yeah, there's no comedy in that. It's a domestic violence trial. It shouldn't be televised. It shouldn't be the basis of entertainment. Yeah, look, it's a fair point. I hope you get to do more comedy, though, Grace,

because you clearly relished that arena. And it must have been such a nice change from all the speeches you had to give. And as you said, having to go through the things, you know, makes all these serious points, even talking to us. It must be exhausting. I really hope you can have a whole year of just getting to not talk about this stuff having to remember all that you went through. And let's hope that happens when we actually fix the laws and make some progress.

There's a grander design to it. And it's like the opposite of what, when I say that's like the opposite of what Scott's doing. You know, like trying to do it for the greater good in that hopefully this doesn't happen to more people. Yeah. You know, there are lots of parts of my story that, again, are really, shameful that they are embarrassing they're parts of my story that a lot of lot of people hear and then they use against me they say oh well that proves you're you know you're guilty or that you were you know you were you were asking for it or you know you are like you oh you love petos and you're

this and that oh you look it just kept happening to you and you know like oh this proves that you were you know there's something wrong with you because you just kept being abused and you just don't know how to set boundaries and blah blah blah blah and it's like well perhaps you You know, like I never was given the proper examples, you know, like there's just lots of the abuse. It's all part of the abuse. And but I also like, I'm really grateful. I'm a lucky person in lots of ways in that like the trajectory that I'm now on and the

position that I'm now in is one that lots of survivors don't get to have. There's lots of things that can be true at once, you know, and that's something, again, a lot of people don't understand and a lot of media don't understand. And, you know, I think also too, like the man who abused me didn't know a lot about my life. Like, he didn't know a lot about those sorts of things, you know, like in exactly what was going on in my home. And like all the background to my life, you know, he just knew certain things and thought he had the whole picture and whatever. But again, I'm really grateful in the whole because it allows me to hopefully, along with a whole host of others and, you know, the giant's shoulders that I'm standing on to hopefully work towards. creating a future that's free from this, this awful criminal behavior.

Yeah, well, I mean, you had to fight so hard in the first place just to be allowed to use your voice under Tassie Law. And God, it's nice to use it on our podcast, Grace. Oh, well, thank you. But also remember, you know, as far as SSA survivors go, like, you know, I'm in a pretty lucky category, though. Like, it's a pretty, like, diverse and intersectional community. You know, like you've got First Nation survivors, people of color,

people with visible disability, you've got refugees, migrants, you know, and the LGBTQIA plus community and other marginalised groups who face even harder, if not impossible, paths to justice. And we've got to keep broadening the platform and remembering that these are underrepresented experiences as well. And part of the struggle is that I can't speak for all survivors. and I'm an advocate of the community and recognize that I'm not always going to say the right thing and can't speak on behalf of those experiences and, you know, like I'm trying to do as best I can

to sit with all of those people and, you know, make space too. So, yeah, I don't know. It's really difficult because we've got a long way to go in breaking down those barriers too. certainly do. Well, let's hope whatever happens the next few years, the change continues and that you and others with the same experience, you know, continue to talk about it and educate us all. So last question. Last question. What is, what's your tip? Who's going to win the election? Oh, gosh. I can only hope. Like your best case scenario.

The best thing that happens is as many of the teal independents get elected as possible, you know, and Greens, some of the Greens get elected to and, you know, and Albo is the Prime Minister. Thank you so much for your time, Grace. Well, basically, just go, no, no. Rigging elections since before it was cool, the Chaser Report. Now, Charles, throughout this campaign, we've inflicted a terrible, terrible fate on Chaser writer John Delmenico.

We've made him watch Sky News around the clock. Yes, and John, you were complaining about it the other day and asking to sort of stop doing it. I mean, yeah, obviously I wanted to stop. Yeah, yeah. But you wanted to stop a few days early because you said, oh, well, you know, maybe if I stop on the Wednesday, we can do the last Sky News wrap and I won't have to watch again.

But I've got a really pleasing piece of news for you, which is that we're going to just keep making you watch Sky News even after the election. Yeah, you've got to start prepping for 2025, John. I want to make sure we don't miss a thing. Oh, great. More Paul Murray and Andrew Bowles. That's what we all love. But look, the reason we got you to do it was just in case there was a little gem,

little nugget somewhere hidden, I don't know, at 3 a.m. on a Tuesday. Yes. That would add something to our coverage. And the great news is you've found something not only that no one else is watching, but that potentially you say bring the nation together. Yeah, so there's been a few times watching Sky News that has made me think that there is hope that maybe the country can come together because there's similar ground. Like the Sky News hosts hate Liberal Party ads as well.

they find the election incredibly boring. Chris Kenny has a DVD of Annabel Krabb on his bookshelf. Wait, what? Yeah, that's something I noticed. On his bookshelf where he has, like, photos of his kids, a photo of John Howard, John Howard's books. He also has a DVD of Annabelle Krabb. Wow.

That's, I want to know more about that. Actually, I don't want to know more about that. Yeah, Chris Kenny, by the way, guys, he's insulted the ABC 61-time selection, and he has an ABC DVD. Has he said anything negative about Annabelle Krab? No, he hasn't. Bit of a crush.

So if Chris Kenny can love the ABC, then I realize there has to be something that can bring us together, but more than just loving out of our crab's content. Okay. But luckily, I found something and I found someone that everyone hates. That we and Sky News feel the same way about. Yeah, that the Chase's official stance on this person and Sky News' official stance of this person is the exact same stance.

Wow. I can't believe such a person. exists. I'm thinking not even Adolf Hitler nowadays. Yeah, he gets a fair hearing on those. So here's a clip of someone from Skyni's introing this exact person.

I'm sorry, Joe Sell LeBrand. Sorry, Joe Hill the brand. Joe Hill. Okay, I can't sign off on the joke, but make fun of Joe Hilda brand. That is a national pastime. Yes, that's a great idea. So what was the joke?

Does anyone understand? I think they're just calling them a sellout is what they're doing. Sell the brand. Yeah. I mean, it's Rowan Dean. So, of course, it was convoluted and didn't make sense. But his heart was in the right place, which is making fun of Joe Hilderban, not respecting him.

Yeah, we can all get on board with that. We would have thought I'd agree with Rowan Dean. We can reach across the aisle. Yes, that was Rowan Dean. And one of the people laughing, the guy that really gladly laughed, is the political editor for the Daily Telegraph, meaning it is literally the guy that is Joe Hilderrand's direct boss and approves his articles, and even he hates him.

That's not the only, like, insult they've had of him. So that's how he's a man behind his back. But this is how they talk about him when it goes on other shows, which is the biggest insult a Skynese person can give someone. Labor spokesperson Joe Hilda Brandt. Oh. Paul Murray, who came during the campaign, and I really appreciate his honesty, just cutting out.

Look, just vote liberal. Yeah. Just do it. Just vote liberal. Did you hear that rant? I didn't hear it. I said that one. Yeah.

We're doing his audience warm up during the pub test. I've just assumed, I didn't realize Paul Murray supported the Liberal Party. I thought he was an actor. I thought he was, it was all the performance. Because it doesn't need to just live in inner city, Sydney, in Ennandale, and sip lattes like the rest of us? That's the whole media, Charles.

That's Chris Ketty as well. Oh, right. Everyone sips lato. Like, the fact that they go on about lardos sippers in the Australian, which is literally located in Surrey Hills in Sydney, which is the latte belt of Sydney, they're massive hypocrites. Anyway, but when it comes to hypocrites as well, that leads into nicely how to.

They talk about him directly to his face on his show when they're appearing on his show. The left have been pretending to be working class for the longest time. You know, that's the first thing they do when they get to universities is lose the private school tie and pretend they come from the people. Did you know Joe in the early day? Was that Parnel McGuinness? Yeah.

Yeah, right. Yeah, she's a regular on his show, which is the worst show on TV. Didn't we know Parnel McGuinness? At university. Let's just leave that one out there. Yeah, so their show has all the elements of a terrible show. First of all, it's Sky News and it's hosted by Joe Hillerbrand, which is bad enough. But then it's an Australian comedy panel show starring, instead of comedians,

a Liberal Party spinster, a Labor Party spinster, and a Sky News contributor. Do you mean spinster in the sense of they spin or that they've just never married? I mean they do political spin. although they're unlikely to get married as well it's interesting to have a game show without any comedians cast yeah and it's great so that means also joe hildebrand is the person who's the poster he brings the funny okay but you mean joe selderbrand watch out but if anyone if any of our listeners aren't sure why we're being so immediate to jump on his hatred

here's some of the things he said on the podcast on his show feels refusing to work. I think we need to get a sensible perspective on this. So we'll go to the straight white man on the panel. A competition between Lydia Thorpe and Kanye West. It's not a race thing. It's just that Kanye was the only person I thought who was as crazy as Lydia Thorpe

to be able to say something that might be confused with her. Yes, that's what the entire show is like. I remember Joe and he used to be like a guy who made interesting TV shows for the ABC. Really? Yeah. Yeah, some good shows. Yeah, that was back.

That was a while ago. Wow. He made, like, documentaries, so quite good. And so do you reckon, just from a craft perspective, are they pre-written quips? Yeah, a lot of his stuff is pre-written. So somebody's actually intentional. It's not just coming out of his brain.

Charles, no, I want to tell you what the craft is. The craft is to write it in advance, but make it sound as though you haven't put any thought into it. Ah, right, that is. Well, that is a weird thing with this show is, like, it's very clear that the Labor spinster finds out, on the spot and he is the best at making his answers funny because he will take a few seconds to think and you can see him thinking on the spot but the other contestants are all like clearly

are told what the questions are beforehand because they were like as soon as Joe Hillerrand stops talking begin their full answer that takes exactly 30 seconds I mean to be fair every panel show tells us the questions in advance they don't even they don't even hide the fact that they're getting told like they all just as soon as Joe Ren stops talking begin a monologue of exactly the right amount of time that you're given to answer. But it is a comedy show and Joe's the host.

So that clip before where they roast them to his face, obviously if you're the host, you would have good banter that would help lift the mood in the room and keep things going. So here's how he responded. The left have been pretending

to be working class for the longest time. You know, that's the first thing they do when they get to universities lose the private school tie and pretend they come from the people. Do you know, Joe, the early day.

That's right. I wasn't working class. I was welfare class. There's a difference. Yeah, so you know you're a good comedian host when you telling a punchline stops everyone from laughing. That is how his entire show goes.

I don't think that's fair, John. I think he just said welfare. And everyone from Scunny's just went, ugh. After watching the first episode of his show, I was like, he flops a few times. I wonder how many times. And then there was a point where I had lost count

by the second episode. I'd say he's hit race amongst even the Sky News audience is like 20% getting some sort of reaction or acknowledgement that he's done a joke. So just for listeners who now want to tune into this game, what is it called? It's called the Blame Game. And so here's some of the amazing comedic styles

of Joe Hill the brand. A few our fathers, and they should just purge those nasty thoughts about whatever those terrible men were doing with the remote control. All women. let's not be sexist in their hotel rooms late at night. When he did the pistol and boo,

I kept waiting for him and Amber heard to hold up a copy of today's newspaper to prove that they were still alive. Although I still don't know what work means when you're an influencer, you've got a camera following you around all day, Joe? My God, that criticism is like so 2012. Makes me feel like arguing about transparency

was what Catherine Deves was all about. Hey! That was awful. No, because this. This is the kid to get out. It was a pun. I think I heard a pun in there somewhere. Man, this is, well, I think we need an intervention with Joe.

I think he needs a laugh track is what he needs. Watching the election, you might think everything is awful and everything sucks and there's no way to bring the nation together. But clearly Joe Hilderbren's the key to bring this nation together. Yes. And it's actually really made me feel great about my career because no matter what happens, I'll never have to be the guy who brings the funny disguise. news.

Can you imagine? Like, it's not even just pushing shit up here. It's pushing shit up here with your mouth. As always, Gary is from Road Microphones. We're part of the Acast, creator network.