‘The Project’ Slams Steve Price For His ‘Q&A’ Comments, Keeps Giving Him A Platform Anyway
"I won't be verballed by an aggressive woman."
Much of last night’s episode of The Project was dedicated to a grilling of Steve Price, the 2GB presenter and frequent Project co-host who caused controversy on Monday night’s Q&A after labelling feminist columnist Van Badham “hysterical” during a discussion about violence against women.
Hosts Waleed Aly and Carrie Bickmore took Price to task for his comments. Bickmore said she was “surprised” that Price “didn’t immediately want to show compassion” to a questioner in the audience who had lost his sister to family violence. Aly, meanwhile, filled Price in on the gendered history of the word “hysterical”, pointing out that “for 4000 years women were described as ‘hysterical’ as a way of trying to say they were irrational, incapable of being reasonable because they had ovaries”.
Price, for his part, claimed he was “ambushed” by Q&A‘s producer, who didn’t inform him that the Q&A questioner was a victim of family violence, and that Badham made the discussion “all about me”.
“I will describe things as I see them,” Price said. “I won’t be verballed by an aggressive woman.”
“I’m just disappointed that this story today has become about me. I think all the energy that has been put into this discussion today should be put into solving the problem as opposed to just piling in on top of me. I don’t think that achieves anything.”
.@StevePriceMedia faces criticism for his comments on #qanda. #TheProjectTV https://t.co/zyN0X2kSiB
— #TheProjectTV (@theprojecttv) July 12, 2016
The unspoken strangeness at the heart of that exchange is that The Project regularly gives Price a platform, where he serves as the show’s go-to grumpy old conservative bloke to offset the rest of the panel’s shiny progressive leanings. Despite his latest foray into full-blown gronkdom, it’s unlikely that platform’s going to be taken away from him.