2021 Australian Parliament Rape Scandal
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  2021 Australian Parliament Rape Scandal
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GoTfan
GoTfan21
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« on: April 05, 2021, 06:36:17 PM »
« edited: April 06, 2021, 07:07:07 AM by GoTfan »

Yes, you read that title right.

It all started on The Project on February 15. Former Liberal party staffer Brittany Higgins alleged she had been raped by a male staffer on the night of March 22, 2019 in the office of Linda Reynolds, then the Defence Industry Minister. There had been a party not long before for the staffers and she was quite drunk. She got onto a taxi with a colleague on the assumption that they were going home. Instead, she was taken to Parliament House and raped while slipping in and out of consciousness. The next morning, she was found half-naked and disoriented in Reynolds's office.

Reynolds proceeded to sack the alleged rapist on the 26th over a security breach. Higgins opened a police complaint, but closed in April for fear that she would lose her job. She then transferred to Employment Minister Michaelia Cash's office before resigning a month before making the allegations.

The spicy part is this: Reynolds knew about the rape within a week of it occurring. Senate President Scott Ryan knew the week after. Speaker of the House Tony Smith learned of it in April. Cash knew of it in late 2019. Peter Dutton had learned of it on the 11th of February this year. For some reason, it never occurred to anyone to alert Scott Morrison to any of this. Morrison claimed he was unaware of the allegations on the 15th of Frebruary, but this was contradicted by his office seemingly knowing about it on the 12th.

As you can probably tell, none of this adds up.

Three more women have since come forward alleging that the man who raped Higgins also sexually assaulted them. Reynolds has referred to Higgins as a 'lying cow'. On the 16th, Morrison publicly slammed her for not alerting him. Reynolds was due to address the National press Club on the 24th, but cancelled at the last second on the advice of her cardiologist for a preexisting condition, and she remains on medical leave.

I don't want to jump to conclusions about her not fronting the NPC because she knew most of the questions would be about the rape, but the timing adds up. I wish i could say that was the end of it, but there's more.

On the 26th of February this year, the ABC published a piece about details of a letter that Labor Senate Leader Penny Wong and Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young had sent to Morrison. It alleged that a 16-year old girl had been raped in 1988 by a senior cabinet minister. The letter was anaonymous. The woman had opened a complaing with NSW police in 2020, and shotly after committed suicide in Adelaide. NSW Police have since said they will not be reopening the investigation.

On the 3rd of March, it was revealed that the minister in question was none other that Christian Porter, the Attorney-General of Australia. Porter outed himself and denied the allegation (seems like a bit of an oxymoron but anyway). Morrison has thus far resisted a call for an independent inquiry and Porter has since filed a defamation suit against the ABC.

But wait, it manages to get even worse than that.

The Labor Party has been accused of something similar, with members of the party raping women. While I do believe this should be taken seriously, the timing of the reveal seems slightly suspicious, as it DID come out while the Liberal Party was being inundated with these stories.

In March, photos emerged of male Libral staffers performing sex acts in Parliament House, including masturbating on the desk of Regional Development and Territories Assistant Minister Nola Marino.

Tasmanian Assembly Speaker Sue Hickey has since exercised parliamentary privilege to claim that Eric Abetz, senor Liberal Senator and conservative fossil, had said to her "As for that Higgins girl, anybody so disgustingly drunk who would sleep with anybody could have slept with one of our spies and put the security of the nation at risk , then in reference to the Porter allegations, "The woman is dead and the law will protect [Porter]". Abetz has since denied the allegation and accused Hickey of trying to destroy the Liberal Party.

Queensland MP Andrew Laming has also been sent on empathy training (whatever the f**k that is) after trolling two women on Facebook and reportedly hiding in bushes and taking photos of women.

A cabinet reshuffle has since removed Porter and Reynolds from the frontbench. No one however has resigned from parliament, and part of me speculates this is because Morrison only has a majority of two seats.
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CumbrianLefty
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« Reply #1 on: April 06, 2021, 06:43:10 AM »

Ugh, even if only partly true it points to a deeply unhealthy underlying culture.
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GoTfan
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« Reply #2 on: April 06, 2021, 10:28:38 PM »

Update: Laming is now under AEC investigation for a series of Facebook pages that promote the LNP under the buise of being community groups.
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President Punxsutawney Phil
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« Reply #3 on: April 07, 2021, 12:51:26 AM »

What a mess.
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CumbrianLefty
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« Reply #4 on: April 07, 2021, 08:51:28 AM »

This is the sort of thing that could have a wider political effect in due course, too.
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GoTfan
GoTfan21
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« Reply #5 on: April 07, 2021, 10:27:11 AM »

This is the sort of thing that could have a wider political effect in due course, too.

It looks like it already is. The Coalition's vote has slipped in the latest Newspoll in both Western Australia and Queensland, the closest things we have to swing states. Here in South Australia, news is also pretty dire for them.

Morrison still leads Albanese as preferred PM, but that's to be expected. Labor leads two-party-preferred 52-48 last I checked.
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Samof94
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« Reply #6 on: April 08, 2021, 05:32:24 AM »

Ugh, even if only partly true it points to a deeply unhealthy underlying culture.
This is highly illegal stuff that hurt many innocent women.
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CumbrianLefty
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« Reply #7 on: April 08, 2021, 06:03:49 AM »

Ugh, even if only partly true it points to a deeply unhealthy underlying culture.
This is highly illegal stuff that hurt many innocent women.

Of course.
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Samof94
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« Reply #8 on: April 09, 2021, 06:13:27 AM »

Ugh, even if only partly true it points to a deeply unhealthy underlying culture.
This is highly illegal stuff that hurt many innocent women.

Of course.
100% agreed
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GoTfan
GoTfan21
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« Reply #9 on: April 12, 2021, 07:55:04 AM »

Another update. Something very, very fishy is going on.

It appears that against the advice of senior detectives and the Sex Crimes Unit, the Deputy Commissioner of NSW Police refused to grant the investigators of the Porter case permission to travel to South Australia to take the alleged victim's statement.
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President Punxsutawney Phil
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« Reply #10 on: April 13, 2021, 10:02:11 PM »

The plot hence thickens.
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