Andrew Bolt: Michael Clarke slap exposes woke nonsense

So much for being gender-neutral. Former Australian cricket captain Michael Clarke gets smacked in the face by a woman and that woke farce collapses.

So much for being gender-neutral. Former Australian cricket captain Michael Clarke gets smacked in the face by a woman and that woke farce collapses.

Turns out the media Left was kidding about treating men and women as equals. Forget its fake outrage at believing women the weaker sex.

Queensland police never fell for this foolishness. That’s clear from their statement after investigating last week’s bogan barney between Clarke and girlfriend Jade Yarbrough, filmed by a rubberneck and screened on high rotation on TV and online.

Millions of Australians saw and heard Yarbrough scream foul-mouthed insults at Clarke for – she claimed – sleeping with his previous girlfriend, although “sleeping” is not the word she shrieked in front of shocked strangers, including children, at a Noosa park.

The tape also shows an equally potty-mouthed Clarke protest his innocence, while TV host Karl Stefanovic, Yarbrough’s brother-in-law, tries to calm things down.

If Michael Clarke had smacked Jade Yarbrough he would be in lock up. And rightly so. Picture: by Lisa Maree Williams/Getty Images

And then – pow! Yarbrough slaps Clarke in the chops. It’s all on tape. No doubt about it.

Yet police detected in this tornado of screams, f-bombs, c-words and a whack on the face only the minor misdemeanour of creating a “public nuisance”, for which they fined Clarke and Yarbrough each $431.

“No other offences were detected during the investigation,” police declared, with a straight face

No? But we all saw that slap. And wasn’t that, er, the domestic violence for which perpetrators deserve no mercy?

Yet we all know and accept the big difference here, which is why no feminist will this time denounce “gendered policing”.

Woman slaps men – no offence detected.

Man slaps woman – well, all hell would have broken loose had Clarke lashed out. I’d bet he’d have found himself in the lockup.

Of course, there’s no difference in principle whether a man or woman is the slapper. Yet in the real world there sure is, and even Clarke – no great moral guide – knows there should be.

“Go, hit me hit me … do it again,” he told Yarbrough, while keeping his own hands to himself.

But to Stefanovic, a fellow male, Clarke bellowed: “She can punch me, but you, you c**t.”

It’s not the most elegant way to put my point, but even a women’s studies graduate would understand it.

We accept some things from a woman – like a slap – we’d never excuse from a man, because women are the weaker sex. What’s more, most of us still believe men therefore have a special duty to protect women, or at least to control themselves.

Wait. I can already hear the screams. Sexist!

But if I’m wrong, explain why none of our gender warriors want Yarbrough charged with assault, as they would had Clarke lashed out?

Millions of Australians saw and heard Yarbrough scream foul-mouthed insults at Clarke.

In fact, even the most woke media organisations treated the men in this low-rent drama as the villains, even implying the innocent Stefanovic was more guilty than his slappy sister-in-law.

Check the headlines. Mamamia, an ultra-woke website for professional women, billed the event the “Karl Stefanovic and Michael Clarke fight”, although the only person doing the hitting was a woman.

The far-Left Guardian Australia likewise called it the “Michael Clarke and Karl Stefanovic clash”. Mediaweek, the trade publication, went for “Michael Clarke v Karl Stefanovic” and Mumbrella the c-c-catchy “Karl vs Clarke fracas”.

True, the headlines showed that even moral showboaters in the media prefer clicks to fairness. Why headline the little-known Yarbrough when they can drag in click-bait like Stefanovic, the peacemaker?

But there’s more to it than clicks. All of us, I suspect, excuse Yarbrough to a point, and not just because we suspect Clarke had it coming.

The fight was over accusations Michael Clarke had slept with his former partner Pip Edwards.

It’s also because she’s physically weaker than Clarke, which is why we don’t demonise women who hit men as we do men who hit women, and why we train men to think that with their strength comes responsibility – not least to protect women and children.

Sure, that instinct can sometimes be oppressive. The Taliban, for instance, won’t let women go out alone, even to study, for their “protection”.

But I’d still rather have rough men coached into some kind of gallantry, and it takes a culture to do that, through symbolic manners such as men opening doors for women, to the social damnation of men who punch their wives.

The law isn’t great at that. There’s no law that says slapping someone in the face isn’t really a crime if a betrayed woman does the whacking.

That’s where culture counts, and I’m glad Queensland’s police has got some.