The Un-United Federation of Australia

Posted by Jenni Colwill on 7 December 2009 | 0 Comments

I'm a bit slow at times, I know, but now that I've read Annabel Crabb's most enlightening analysis about Australia's current political leaders, I finally understand why none of them really do it for me.

She describes Rudd as The Nerd and Abbott as The Jock and she is dead right! And of course, Australians love a stoush between jocks and nerds, don't they. Well, some Australians do.

The problem is, neither jocks nor nerds have the leadership qualities of empathy, understanding, compassion, caring or nurturing which are absolutely essential to transforming anything, particularly a country. And this country needs a bit of transformation if you ask most women.

Both nerds and jocks are stereotypes, and male stereotypes at that. The jock is your command and control type of leader, and the nerd can't do anything without having commissioned at least 50 research articles arguing the pros and cons and then commissioning another 50 researchers to analyse the first 50 articles. That is, they usually can't do anything.

It is sort of like having an extremist-to-the-very-far-right who gives a stuff James Kirk on one side (Abbott), and an even more emotionally detached and logical Dr Spock (Rudd) on the other - without any respect or love between them.

I guess that would make us the Most Un-United Federation of Australia, with women playing the part of the aliens.

What hope is there? Beam me up Scotty.