Blokey jokes vs festival high

Lowlight: Back last century when I was a young mother with a baby son I was at a party with my husband, and a family friend launched into some unsolicited advice about how we could have a girl next time around.

He was getting to the graphic bit about how it had worked for him, he’d had two girls followed by a boy, when his wife dug him in the ribs and told him bluntly to shut up. He looked surprised at the intervention; I think he really thought he was doing us a favour.

But he took his wife’s excellent advice and he shut up.

This was the 1970s, and blokey jokes and ill-considered conversations were standard back then. But help was at hand: around that time, the second wave of feminism rolled onto these shores from the US and the growth of the women’s movement quickly began to influence the thinking about what was appropriate and inappropriate in men’s and women’s behaviour towards each other.

The influence was also crucially felt in the wider context of employment, education, politics, family life and more.

New Zealand society was changed forever, in a positive way.

So it was disheartening to learn last week, well into the 21st Century, that the tacky old chestnut of how to get the baby of your choice had been aired at Premier House in Wellington by Tauranga MP Simon Bridges. He was in conversation at the time (about five years ago) with some National Party colleagues, including Waitaki MP Jacqui Dean, who was upset and offended by his remarks.

No wonder. Bridges’ Premier House comments on sexual techniques to better his chances of having a daughter after two sons were reported by Newshub last week (and possibly other media). The comments were startlingly explicit, crude and unfunny.

To recap quickly, Judith Collins, then National Party leader, reprised this incident in an ill-fated attempt to sideline Bridges. She demoted him, stripped him of his shadow portfolios, and she was subsequently rolled by angry National caucus members who were blindsided by her actions. Botany MP Christopher Luxon became National’s new leader on Tuesday; Bridges withdrew from the contest and Luxon has since given him the key finance and infrastructure portfolios.

Bridges’ contrition and regret over his explicit conversation has been widely reported. He apologised profusely to Dean at the time, and he did it again last week.

He cannot be faulted on this. The apologies have been accepted by Dean. She says she has no doubts about their sincerity.

Some will say it’s been dealt with – twice – and that’s true. But there are a couple of things to ponder: Bridges says he’s an older and possibly wiser man than he was a few years ago, and he’s learned a valuable lesson from all of this. He was 40, or thereabouts, at the time of his poorly judged remarks. He was a highly educated senior politician, a husband and father, and there have been decades of debate on why such talk is not okay.

So it’s truly hard to fathom how he didn’t know that what he said was inappropriate. Or why he even thought his audience would want to hear about such intimate family matters. It has been a cringe-worthy insight into a curious culture in the corridors of power.

Bridges might also like to think more about the term ‘‘old wives’ tales’’ which he used at a press conference last week to describe the source of the techniques he’d told his colleagues about. He was clearly unaware that the old wives’ phrase was largely discredited and ditched last century, playing as it does on ancient stereotypes of gullible, uneducated women peddling spurious, error-ridden advice and information.

Dictionaries describe the phrase as a traditional belief based more on superstition than fact.

Using it in 2021 perpetrates myths about women that we’ve long moved on from. Most of us do a big eye-roll when we hear it.

None of the above took place at a 1970s party, in more unenlightened times. I can’t help thinking it was a pity that someone at Premier House that day didn’t simply, bluntly, shut Bridges down.

Highlight: So this is the launch of the programme for the Hamilton Gardens Arts Festival 2022, with a stunning lineup of music, dance, comedy and drama. The launch was held at the Gardens on

Wednesday, December 1, officially and fittingly the first day of summer. There was bubbly and canape´ s, and a lot of happy people, on a sultry night with a dark sky that threatened a deluge it didn’t deliver.

The festival almost didn’t deliver either. Festival chair, Chris Williams, described how in September-October, in Covid level 3 lockdown, the team had a funding shortfall of $150,000 to stage the event. It was a crisis and a challenge. Williams said they hit the phones for a rescue mission, they found more generous sponsors and backers, Hamilton City Council kicked in an extra $40,000, and a crowdfunding drive netted $25,000 from the wider community.

Williams said the festival – the 25th – could not have been staged without this 11th hour support. Now it will run February 18-27. He’s incredibly grateful; he says he needs to buy a few people a beer.

Festivals, theatre and similar arts gatherings have been among the casualties of the Covid pandemic, with untold events cancelled or postponed nationwide. The Hamilton team has moved mountains for this one. A round of applause, please.

Bridges apologised profusely to Dean at the time, and he did it again last week. He cannot be faulted on this. The apologies have been accepted by Dean. She says she has no doubts about their sincerity.