In Australia - Moira Deeming defamation trial now on

[TheSandgroper]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-09-17/moira-deeming-john-pesutto-defamation-trial-day-two/104360100

This is from our very TRA ABC. Please note the comment from “Mr Southwick, a Jewish MP re Angie Jones’ tweet”. Well, Angie Jones is as Jewish as they come but they don’t say that.

Also, for, those who don’t know, see Angie on m.youtube.com/@TERFTalkDownUnder, though she hasn’t posted for a while. Some really good interviews.

And about 'fringe views' not being about sex based rights whilst going on about the meeting being about her attendance at a 'sex based rights' rally.

What is also very apparent from that meeting document linked above is that this was a very important meeting and it seemed to be just Moira with 5 others. None of those 5 other people seemed to be there to support Moira. That would surely be considered intimidatory and again contradicts the ‘handled with kid gloves’ statement.

Five people with the power to make Moira Deeming’s very difficult in a meeting and no one to support, that is not handling with kid gloves in my opinion. Rather the opposite.

Yes.

There seems to be some significant inconsistency in this document.

'The 5 of us men didn't ambush her.'

Erm, mate.

Well. I think one of the five was a female person - Georgie Crozier

But yes… five to one is a significant power imbalance.

This is one of those times when I would love for a recording to have been made by MD during that meeting.

I know which version of the meeting I'm finding more credible and it's not the side with 5 people ganging up on the one who they think is guilty of wrongthink and cavorting with the enemy.

Also there's a lot of can't recall type comments coming from the five, which always makes me suspect they aren't being honest.

Listen to the recording of it. They are very respectful of her I think.

The meeting was more like a work disciplinary fact finding in my opinion. I've been in much tenser meetings than that at work

It's there boiled, I linked it upthread. The whole meeting is recorded and on the website

The most outspoken critic in the meeting imo was the woman who appears to have been mentoring her.

I'm not sure at all Deeming is covering herself in glory. Today she basically admitted doing no due diligence on KJK at all before hosting her in parliament. Either that's untrue, or she's not very bright.

All these suggestions MD is ‘extreme’, should be an independent if she wants to continue to support women’s right, the inference that LWS is dodgy etc on here just go to show the impact of the defamation of her and hopefully will results in a bigger damages payout.

A work disciplinary should always have the option for someone to have a person there to witness at the very least if it is a large enough organization. Five to one would definitely be considered inappropriate in a disciplinary or a fact finding meeting about that person’s actions. Hostile even. Even if words are spoken calmly.

Having another person present allows better recall after too. Again, five against one is a huge burden on recall for the single person. Even note taking means that one person is taking notes while listening to five people and answering to five people. There are reasons this would not be considered good practice for any employment environment.

If this was supposed to be a fair and exploratory meeting, I am surprised that Pesutto, a lawyer, would arrange the meeting in this way. This was a power show regardless of the words to the contrary.

A political mentor does not mean that person supports Moira Deeming. It means that they are more inclined to attempt to shape Moira’s actions to fit the profile considered desirable by the faction of the party that person belongs to.

It does not mean that person is supportive of allowing the person they are mentoring to have feeedom to focus of their own priorities. I would have thought it would mean they would prefer the other person to fit into that profile they want and to not deviate.

You need to listen to it.

Pesutto says multiple times he supports her position on gender and admires her passion.

Some of the attendees there are more frustrated but not him in my opinion.

He basically wants her to distance herself from KJK and Angie Jones due to reputational damage, and she won't, so he's saying that's not compatible with being in the leadership of the party.

None of that is defamatory of Deeming imo and seems he's acting within his rights as leader of the organisation. That's why I'll be interested in the judgement.

It's not a good look for KJK to have her "associations" aired in court anyway. I'm not sure the judge and the public will buy the "she works with anyone" line.

I never said it did

The "mentor" was clearly there to advise Deeming on political strategy after the other 2 events they mentioned (maiden speech and IWD?). It seems Deeming ignored the advice.

In a work context if one was on a performance plan and was not successful in improving performance there would be a next step consequence.

However the trial is about defamation, not whether she was treated fairly at work. So far I personally don't think Deeming has made a case. But obviously there is a long way to go.

“In a work context if one was on a performance plan and was not successful in improving performance there would be a next step consequence.”

Yes. And it would not be appropriate to have meetings with five people to one unsupported person. Hence why your comparison is not strong.

I do think though that how this meeting was set up was a good indication of the judgement that Pesutto displays within this overall situation.

Sure. I don't think that's relevant to defamation though.

I do feel sorry for Deeming if she got herself tangled up in something without realising. But I would have though even a cursory glance at what people say about KJK would have given her some insight into what people on SM would say about her. She was also warned by police and ignored it.

After mess posted yesterday I did some further research and was interested that Deeming is anti-abortion. Also appeared to break lock down rules

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/aug/03/moira-deeming-pictured-alongside-liberal-colleague-at-anti-abortion-zoom-meeting-during-melbourne-lockdown

https://dailydeclaration.org.au/2022/07/27/pro-life-christian-activist-preselected-by-liberals/

As a feminist reproductive rights are very important to me and I can't really take seriously anyone claiming to be "pro women" who is anti abortion

Can you cut and paste the words that you are actually referring to?

Second this @MessinaBloom, please do.

He basically wants her to distance herself from KJK and Angie Jones due to reputational damage, and she won't, so he's saying that's not compatible with being in the leadership of the party.
So he thinks a woman whose main aim is to let women speak is a person we should all run from? Wow. Absolutely fucking wow.

The ‘apology’ (if it’s meant to be one) that’s not an apology. Load of self-serving guff.

“She was also warned by police and ignored it.”

Warned by the police about what though? About Kellie Jay Keen? Or about the protestors? Or about the Neo Nazis?

I do think though that how this meeting was set up was a good indication of the judgement that Pesutto displays within this overall situation.

This. He's an idiot.

Good article here from Edie Wyatt in the Spectator

www.spectator.com.au/2024/09/moira-deeming-v-john-pesutto/

Struggling to understand why a woman’s opinion on reproductive rights makes her fair game for allegations of being Nazi aligned by a group of men or why that means that her opinion of women being given the right to speak about matters related to men identifying as women or children being harmed.

She has her personal views on abortion. There are differing views on abortion amongst women’s rights campaigners. There always has been.

It important to know whether it is part of her campaigning. And it doesn’t look like it is.

The guardian article linked above were from prior to her pre-selection. The article detailed things she did at least 6-8 months before pre-selection if I remember correctly. And the other article also showed that she was pre-selected and elected being very up front about her opinions about gender identity.

Here she states that she at the time, while still in the Liberal Party, had no plans to do any work regarding abortion laws. She respected that other women held different opinions and wanted the option legally supported.

Sky so there is no paywall.

www.skynews.com.au/australia-news/politics/moira-deeming-reveals-the-terms-of-her-liberal-party-suspension-and-why-she-will-continue-fighting-for-womens-rights/news-story/92b78c4d05937f73d0ef34e257645497?amp&nk=4b8ff7284b7411c3b4b350481fcf9131-1726734579

“Ms Deeming said that people trying to paint her as a far-right extremist because of her views on issues like abortion were just "superimposing a stereotype" on her.”

"People who know me know that, yes, I am personally pro-life, but I accept that there's a mandate for abortion laws and that," she said.
Asked whether she wanted to change the abortion laws, Ms Deeming said there was no democratic mandate for that and she respected democracy.”

"I mean, I would love it if nobody wanted to get an abortion. That's what I would love. But that's not the reality. And I do respect the Democratic process. There's no mandate for it.”

"I didn't mention it in my maiden speech. The newspapers all started talking about how I had mentioned it. I didn't even say the word - I've never said the word in Parliament."

I think it is important to add the context here.