Hamish Blake winning the Gold Logie exposes a huge double standard

Hamish Blake’s second Gold Logie win last night proves that sexism is still rife in the entertainment industry.

OPINION

Hamish Blake took out the Gold Logie last night, and the win serves as a reminder that men don’t need to work nearly as hard as women do to win or even just be nominated.

Blake beat out Sonia Kruger, Melissa Leong and Julia Morris. All these women are known for being practically everywhere.

Kruger hosts multiple shows for Seven, perhaps most famously The Voice and Big Brother.

Morris hosts Network 10’s I’m A Celebrity … Get Me Out Of Here, was recently a contestant on The Masked Singer and has an active stand-up comedy career. Similarly, Leong is a judge on MasterChef, a very active Instagram influencer, does radio and still works as a food writer.

Tuning in to see if a miracle happens and somehow Melissa Leong wins the gold Logie, it'll probably be a white man. #Logies2022

— Daryl (@xwickedmindx) June 19, 2022

All these women are hustlers, working multiple jobs and juggling multiple balls. They do it all. Why? Because women have to do it all – it’s practically expected.

That’s why there’s a book called, How Does She Do It?

Meanwhile, Blake is hosting Channel 9’s Lego Masters and doing his podcast with long-term comedy partner Andy Lee.

Of course, that is nothing to sniff at. But Kruger is doing practically quadruple his workload, nominated for hosting Big Brother, Holey Moley, Dancing with the Stars; All Stars, The Voice and The Voice Generations on Seven.

She was recently quoted joking: “I did host every show on Channel 7 last year and deserve it more than everyone else.”

Great money saving by Channel 7 with Sonia Kruger hosting every show on the network#logies#Logies2022

— Nez 🇺🇦 (@fraggle73) June 19, 2022

Ironically, my criticism of Blake winning the Gold Logie really isn’t about Blake at all.

Who doesn’t love him? He’s funny, sweet and crazily talented.

This is about the fact that women have to work four times as hard as men to even get mentioned in the same sentence. They also rarely beat the men they do more than.

Kruger has been in the game for over 30 years, and she’s seriously done everything from breakfast television to hosting Big Brother.

Leong made her name as a food writer and has been everywhere since she scored her gig on MasterChef.

Had she won, she also would have been the first woman of colour to win a Gold Logie.

There’s barely a Channel 7 reality show Sonia Kruger doesn’t host.

Beloved foodie Melissa Leong would have made history if she won.

Morris is known for trying her hand at practically everything. Remember when she was on House Husbands?

All these women, with long-spanning careers in the entertainment industry, deserved to be nominated for the Gold Logie. All these women deserved to win. But none of them took home the statue.

In comparison, their male contemporaries are frankly just doing a lot less.

Tom Gleeson hosts Hard Quiz on the ABC and does stand-up.

Karl Stefanovic’s roster is mainly the Today show. Ray Meagher’s fame stems from Home And Away. The kicker? All these men already have Gold Logies.

There’s nothing wrong with these men having lighter workloads; why wouldn’t they?

The point is, men just don’t have to work as hard to reap the rewards.

Julia Morris opened the Logies ceremony last night. Picture: Channel 9

They can comfortably lean into one job and know that the odds are they’ll get to stay there forever.

Women don’t have that kind of job security; they know they have to work even harder to get attention, believe me.

Stefanovic has been a staple on breakfast television for decades; meanwhile, he has had multiple female co-hosts.

Women diversify in hopes to keep their careers alive, men don’t have that kind of pressure.

Blake winning last night was a predictable outcome – even Sportsbet thought he’d take it home. But it speaks volumes of how much easier it is to be a man.

If you are a man you need one hit show to win Gold, if you are a woman you need several under your belt and that’s just to secure the nomination.

Originally published as Hamish Blake winning the Gold Logie exposes a huge double standard