I have been watching with interest the reaction to Prime Minister Gillard’s comments
Predictably both the Murdoch press and the legal profession weighed in heavily against Julia Gillard.
Now I have no problem with the High Court in relation to this matter, except for a niggling worry over the path it took to reach its conclusions. On the other hand, neither do I see anything wrong with the Prime Minister expressing an opinion on the judgment when questioned by the media.
While in this instance both the legal fraternity and journalists might like to pretend otherwise – the fact remains that judges and magistrates generally are fallible.
They vote in general elections based on both emotion and reason like the rest of the Australia electorate and, are just as prone to push their own political views on friends and family alike.
Even with the best of intentions they bring their own personal world view, unexamined prejudices and sometimes blatant bias to the Bench.
The judiciary doesn’t live in a vacuum - like everyone else they can be influenced by public opinion or cohort gossip. Similarly they can occasionally suffer from selective hearing in the court room.
Unlike the rest of us, those passing judgment can and do hide these human failings behind a cloak of cited legislative clause and legal precedent.
At best certain judges and magistrates are diamonds of clarity and reason.
However in the middle of this continuum, their brethren are also often self-opinionated bores at parties or upper class caricatures.
At worst those sitting in judgment can be functional alcoholics, closet drug abusers or unreported domestic violence perpetrators in the home and sly sadists in the court room.
In some instances in modern times they have been found to be corrupt or suspected of being mentally incapacitated and 'encouraged' to retire.
To pretend otherwise is to deny the reality of Australia’s judicial system, in which certain individuals (on the basis of education, inclusion in one or more powerful dominant groups within society and successful professional networking) are appointed to pass judgment on their fellow citizens.
The many former lawyers who people both sides of federal and state politics are well aware of this reality, as are more than a few in the media. So it’s time to grow up and stop this silly pretence that gods walk amongst us.
