Outrage is fine but keep it impartial

I CAN'T claim to taking a seat in the parliamentary press gallery every sitting day, not even close. But when I have ventured to Canberra to take in the theatrics of question time, the level of abuse - from all sides - in the shape of heckling and cat calling is extraordinary. Most of it isn't picked up by the microphones used with the TV footage. I can only imagine what it's like to sit through question time every day.

Witty banter would be worth listening to, but too often what's said falls well short of wit. And often it descends into downright abuse, including sexism.

Almost every time she rises to ask a question of a government minister, Julie Bishop has been cat called and subjected to sexual innuendo from the other side of the house. When Kelly O'Dwyer asked her first question in question time, she was heckled as a poor man's substitute for the previous member for Higgins, which was followed by an off-commentary remark about how her gender may explain why. If I knew which member of the government hurled the slur, I would certainly name him.

The most sexist slur Labor has thrown across the chamber was reserved for a woman who didn't even have the luxury of parliamentary privilege to reply.

The Australian's conservative columnist Janet Albrechtsen was called a "skanky ho" by former Labor leader Mark Latham. I don't recall too many of Labor's female MPs getting quite as outraged by that attack as they did this week when Liberal senator David Bushby made his offensive cat call at Labor senator Penny Wong.

Disagreeing with what Albrechtsen writes is no excuse for excusing sexist abuse against her. The point is that neither side of politics has a mortgage over virtue when it comes to sexism in parliament. Each side is as bad as the other. If shock and anger is going to be the default response, great. Let's just make sure it doesn't have an unnecessary and inaccurate partisan edge to it.