In spite of my best efforts to avoid it I have heard quite a bit of talk lately about the fact that Gary Lyon slept with Billy Brownless’ ex-wife, Nicky some-one-or-other. Most recently I understand Billy appeared on the Footy show to talk about what had happened and compared his wife to a wallet. Which explains why I have now heard more about this story than I ever wanted to. My Facebook timeline been overtaken by outrage about the outdated, sexist, patriarchal attitude reflected in the wallet comment.
I discussed this with my partner and we argued. He doesn’t support the notion that a wife is somehow like a wallet (either literally, in the sense of being full of money, or figuratively, in the sense of being a man’s possession). However he feels that a person who is so palpably sad as Billy appeared to be on the Footy Show ought to be cut a little slack by the outrage brigade. Perhaps it was a throwaway comment in the heat of the moment and it doesn’t actually mean Billy thinks he owns his wife or, more accurately, his ex-wife.
I agree maybe we could cut him some slack. I don’t like seeing people kicked when they’re down. But he went on the Footy Show. He exposed himself to the judgement of the great unwashed. And he’s worked with Sam Newman all these years – he ought to know it doesn’t always work out the way you planned. Or maybe it does. In any case if he didn’t want to be that exposed he could have avoided it easily.
And then there’s the wallet comment. Recently in my day job I’ve been examining the existence of unconscious bias in recruitment and promotion. Essentially unconscious bias is at work when even though you say you think a woman would be equally capable of filling a senior role, and your organisation has policies to promote senior women, somehow only a tiny percentage of these positions are even actually taken up by women. Unconscious bias can also reveal itself in throwaway comments. And that’s what I believe has happened to Billy. I’m sure, if pressed, Billy would acknowledge that he cannot own women in the same way that he owns his wallet, or his car. But what he would acknowledge and what he feels are two different things. Deep down Billy has subscribed to the unwritten lad code which says that once a man has possessed a women (in this case by marrying her) no other man familiar to the first man should also seek to possess that woman.
And he’s not the only one. A great deal of the talk about this issue has been based on this premise, and there has been little challenge to it in the mainstream media. You’ll notice that I wasn’t able to recall Billy’s ex-wife’s name at the top of this post. I could have looked online and maybe found it somewhere. But I wanted to illustrate the fact that much of the public discussion of the issue has focused on the relationship between the two men, and how Gary Lyon should or should not have behaved in relation to Billy’s ex-wife – as though she were a wallet, or a car, or some other inanimate possession incapable of independent thought and action.
In essence I guess what I’m arguing for is Nicky Whatsername’s right to accountability for her own actions. If we are discussing what Gary should or should not have done, we should be talking about her as well. Because not to talk about her means we think she was somehow compelled to have sex with any man that came along. A lifelike sex toy, incapable of thought and entirely possess-able.
Actually I wish this wasn’t a story at all. Attention paid to the tawdry machinations of relationships between such b-grade celebrities is what keeps much of the population from thinking about anything that actually matters. But being as it is, I wish the conversation was about the human cost which must always be paid when people (including women as well as men!) make decisions they know will hurt all the people around them. It would be a much more interesting conversation than the current dribble about not cutting a man’s lunch, or touching his wallet.
