Tattoo-covered stripper turned MP ‘slut shamed’ in parliament office
In explosive scenes inside Victoria’s state parliament, a politician delivered an emotional account of what she said has been years of sexual harassment and smear campaigns against her at work
A stripper-turned-politician said she has been “slut shamed” and sexually harassed in parliament. Animal Justice MP Georgie Purcell told state parliament in Victoria, Australia that she suffered harassing phone calls and texts at work.
Ms Purcell, who once worked as a stripper, revealed the shocking news to her colleagues at Victoria’s Parliament House during a debate on a proposal to restrict non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) in employment settings and called for “reflection”.
The 33-year-old told the upper house on Thursday that she was just 26 when she first faced harassment as a parliamentary staffer. She said: “I know the slut shaming far too well. Members of this place are not beyond it and we need to reflect on that today.”
She told fellow MPs: “Someone came into my office for a discussion and I bent over to get something from the fridge. He remarked to me, in my member of parliament’s office, ‘if you do that again, I won’t be responsible for what happens next’.”
Ms Purcell described a pattern of alleged behaviour from “someone else in this place”, including, “late-night messages, harassing phone calls, harassing texts, bombardment of digital contact, knocks on our doors when you can’t see who is on the other side and demands to meet us under the guise of work”.
The person involved was not named, though it’s understood the individual is a fellow MP and that the incidents occurred some time ago reports news.com.au.
Purcell – who is heavily tattooed and has publicly spoken about her past work as a stripper – said the harassment was only the beginning. Once she reported what had happened, she claimed being the target of vicious whisper campaigns and character attacks.
She said: “The immediate questions were: ‘What did she expect? Look how she dresses. Look at the tattoos. Look at her past. You can’t sexually harass the stripper’.”
The MP said the experience left her devastated, particularly after previously facing harassment in non-political workplaces as a younger woman.
She told the chamber: “One thing I have learned is that men will always see us as up for grabs.” Ms Purcell threw her support behind new laws aimed at restricting the use of NDAs in workplace sexual-harassment cases.
She said that these reforms are vital to ensuring victims can speak out rather than be “silenced into shame”, urging: “We need to create a space in order to allow these conversations to happen and to be willing to be active listeners without the stigma and without the shame and without the questioning.”
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