Susie O’Brien: Sam Newman was right — for a few hours, at least

SAM Newman was right to defend the Prime Minister’s right to have a beer while babysitting, but he ruined it by criticising the AFL for backing same-sex marriage, writes Susie O’Brien.

• Newman unloads: ‘This country is rooted’
• Susie O’Brien: Stop trying to be besties with your kid
• Sam Newman appears on Latham’s Outsiders

SAM Newman, I agreed with you for about four and a half hours.

It’s a record.

Then you had to go and ruin it by blabbing on about how the AFL shouldn’t stand up

for same sex marriage or anything overtly political.

Last night I loved the fact that you came out and defended Prime Minister Malcolm

Turnbull for sipping a beer at the footy while cradling his granddaughter.

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Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull drew criticism holding his granddaughter Alice while drinking a beer.

OK, you may have been wearing two cans of beer taped to a hard hat at the time,

but you were spot on.

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That hat almost made me like you. Almost. You looked like all the engineering students I

dated while I was at uni — only with a lot more wrinkles.

I couldn’t agree more with you when you said: “Why would anyone worry about

Malcolm Turnbull having a beer with his granddaughter sitting on his lap?”

Well, at least Turnbull wasn’t doing a Hawkie and sculling the whole glass — or a

Warnie and deep-throating it.

Former Prime Minister Bob Hawke skolling a beer.

Sam Newman, you spoke some sense for once. (That’s a sentence I never thought

I’d write).

So what a pity that you had to go and ruin it all with your ridiculous comments on

Mark Latham’s show.

Although you’d made them earlier in the week, they only became public knowledge late on Friday a few hours later.

Unlike you, I felt proud when a rainbow flag flew at the SCG last weekend. Unlike

you, I don’t think the AFL should keep its nose out of politics.

The gay marriage debate drew attention when a rainbow flag was displayed at the SCG.

You said: “People go (to the football) to get away from the frustrations and barrage of

political content from agenda seekers and that is their outlet and I honestly don’t

know why they (the AFL) do it and I don’t know why there’s not a more strenuous

demand for it to be left alone.”

You are forgetting that the AFL is one of the biggest, most powerful brands in

Australia, and with that comes an enormous opportunity to do good.

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The AFL and many of its clubs have pride rounds and do a lot of work in countering

homophobia, so why not take it one step further and officially endorse the yes vote?

Whether we like it or not, footballers are role models (well, maybe not you, Sam

Newman) and can help many vulnerable young people by taking a positive stand.

You also think an opinion is “neither right or wrong; it’s only an opinion”.

Sam, you are forgetting that some opinions don’t deserve to be listened to because

they are hateful, bigoted and ill-informed. Most of the time this means yours.

From, Susie

@susieob