Media Tarts

By: Julia Baird, Annabel Crabb - foreword

Narrated by: Danielle Carter

Length: 11 hrs and 37 mins

Publisher's summary

A powerful insight into how the media treats female politicians - now revised and updated with a new foreword by Annabel Crabb, from one of our foremost journalists and political commentators, Julia Baird.

'History is crucial. We need to know that treating women as decorations, subordinates and playthings, even and sometimes especially in our houses of power, is not new. We know that from the moment women walked into parliament and took up space alongside men, they have been treated as objects...when men were featured often in the press, they were rising stars. When women were featured often in the press, they were media tarts.'

Based on a series of extensive interviews, this audiobook provides an in-depth analysis of the influence of a generation of prominent female politicians on the Australian political system, exploring the part played by the press in their downfall. Almost two decades later, it is evident how little has changed. Now revisited and updated with a new foreword, Media Tarts is essential listen from one of our foremost journalists and political commentators, providing a powerful, sobering and incisive insight into how deep the currents of misogyny run and how the media continues to treat female politicians.

©2004 Julia Baird (P)2021 Bolinda Publishing Pty Ltd. This audio version produced by arrangement with HarperCollins Publishers Australia Pty Limited.

Critic reviews

"Julia Baird's Media Tarts is a gripping account of how the media have treated women politicians. While the tone of the book is even-handed, reading the history is at times gruesome, like watching a demolition derby.... In Baird's hands, it is a great political story." (Sydney Morning Herald)

"Readable, authoritative and thought-provoking." (The Age)