We are delighted to announce the publication of the latest article by Dr Sean Mulcahy and Prof Kate Seear from the ‘post-human rights’ project entitled ‘Mournful mothers and damaged damsels: Are we really listening to women during parliamentary human rights scrutiny’ and published in the journal Social and Legal Studies.
The article explores scrutiny regimes in some Australian parliaments that require consideration of human rights impacts of proposed legislation, but routinely ignore gendered impacts of legislation, particularly those relating to alcohol and other drugs (AOD). The article argues that, where women’s voices are heard during these scrutiny processes, they are often only listened to according to stereotypes of the ‘mournful mother’ whose child is affected by AOD and needs to be heard and the ‘damaged damsel’ who is themselves affected by AOD and needs to be protected.
Drawing from contemporary critical cultural legal scholarship by Sara Ahmed, Kay Lalor, Sara Ramshaw and others, we contend that this raises a bigger question: are women listened to during legislative scrutiny processes or simply talked about in stereotypical ways? This work was first presented at the Women, Listening and Law Symposium at the University of Wollongong, and we are tremendously grateful for the very constructive engagement and feedback provided by attendees.