An Australian mayor who invited ugly women to move to his outback mining town, saying even they would find a man there, has won the top “award” for the most sexist public comment of the year.
Mayor John Moloney of remote Mount Isa was chosen by the volume of boos, jeers and stamping of feet that greeted his nomination at the annual women-only Ernie Awards in the New South Wales parliament on Thursday night.
Moloney won the Golden Ernie for telling a newspaper that his town, where men outnumber women, was a place for “ugly ducklings to flourish into beautiful swans.”
He called on “beauty-disadvantaged” women to flock there, saying he often saw unattractive women in Mount Isa who looked like they were enjoying life in the northwestern Queensland town.
“Quite often you will see walking down the street a lass who is not so attractive with a wide smile on her face,” he said. “Whether it is recollection of something previous or anticipation for the next evening, there is a degree of happiness.”
He later told national radio that obese women could even lose weight under the gaze of Mount Isa males.
“There’s a great incentive because there’s that much attention focused on them and they become interested in looking better — and in no time they just shed it,” he said.
Confronted by a protest by scores of insulted Mount Isa women, he said: “The protesters are blaming me for their looks.”
An unrepentant Moloney told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation yesterday that news of his remarks had sparked interest in Mount Isa among women internationally.
“I had a lot of e-mail responses from women around the world who wanted to come to Mount Isa and no doubt some of those people have come to Mount Isa and found the happiness they sought,” he said.
Western Australia’s state Treasurer Troy Buswell won the Political Ernie for sniffing the chair a female staffer had been sitting on and snapping the bra of another.
Nine Network television’s news chief John Westacott won the Media Ernie for saying “Sheilas do health and consumer stories — you want your blokes, your main guns, doing the real news stories.”
The awards, now in their 16th year, aim to shame men for outrageous sexism.
The Ernies’ chief organizer, former state parliamentarian Meredith Burgmann, read out the nominees and judges decreed the winners based on the volume of jeering.
“I think the message is ever vigilant, ever watchful, keeping people, keeping blokes on their toes and making sure that we name and shame them,” she said.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS