We’ve become a pretty dehumanised lot if we resent the humanisation of actual humans we’ve elected to make decisions on our behalf. Without opportunities to see politicians as real people, it’s easy to forget that democracy is something that involves all of us directly.
Season seven of Annabel Crabb’s Kitchen Cabinet has ignited so intense a Twitterstorm that Crabb had kept a safe distance from the awkwardly renamed social media platform until last weekend, when she emerged briefly to thank viewers and respond to criticism.
By then, the “orgy of outrage/Hitler memes etc” that Crabb predicted in response to her episode featuring Opposition Leader Peter “Not a Monster” Dutton had already come to pass: he must not be “humanised”, roared the people!
But what role should television play in helping us to understand those we elect?
Humans elect humans to make human(e) decisions
Kitchen Cabinet takes us into politicians’ homes, asking them to prepare, serve and enjoy dinner for two while being interviewed by one of Australia’s most curious and prolific political journalists. Presented since 2012, we’re now three episodes into this series; the first was Vietnamese-born former refugee, now independent MP Dai Le; then former immigration minister, now Opposition Leader Peter Dutton; and just last night Indigenous Australians Minister Linda Burney.
We learn a lot about people when they cook for us: how they welcome us into their home, what they have chosen to prepare and why, and how they respond under pressure.
While we find Le very much at home with a broad array of ingredients and utensils, Dutton wields a cooking knife with a distinct lack of ease, peeling and chopping vegetables as though for the first time, before almost burning some crushed garlic from a jar. Burney meets Crabb in a borrowed kitchen, and the two prepare lunch while in consistently deep and revealing discussion.
In his own kitchen, we learn Dutton sees “10% of society” as criminal, and was afraid to let his children go to the park or public toilets for fear of them being “abducted or assaulted or whatever it might be”. And when asked what moves him most about Indigenous culture, he describes a narrow continuum from “functioning society” to “absolute squalor” and “complete breakdown”.
Let’s look more closely at that last point, noting Crabb’s question in full. By this point, she’s confronted him on his “African gangs” comments and encouraged him to think about their impact. Then, in this year of the Voice referendum, Crabb asks: “Politicians, particularly senior ones, get to travel through Indigenous Australia much more than most Australians do. So what is the thing that kind of blows you away most about Indigenous culture in this country?”
Even after needing to have the question repeated and explained, Dutton shows himself incapable of conveying any understanding of the cultures of Australia’s hundreds of First Nations. Instead, he doubles down, suggesting that “the squalor” is what strikes him most, and that the arts “masks an underbelly” in some communities. It’s remarkable viewing — and it’s hard to imagine any straight interview that would have elicited it.
Glamour, celebrity and infamy
In contrast with Kitchen Cabinet, there is no shortage of shows that repackage politicians in ways that should concern us.
In 2004, Pauline Hanson was a contestant on the TV game shows Dancing with the Stars and Who Wants to be a Millionaire? In 2011 she appeared on Celebrity Apprentice, and last year she was announced as a contestant on SAS Australia.
Each promotion of Hanson’s appearance on these shows referred to her racist views as “contentious”, “controversial” or “outrageous”, without venturing any critical lens or analysis. These appearances have benefitted Hanson’s profile — and were lucrative enough to help fight her latest defamation cases.
By contrast, lockdown-era UK health minister Matt Hancock, who resigned after “admitting breaking COVID-19 guidelines by kissing and embracing an aide in his office”, while married, was suspended from the Conservative Party after he announced he’d be starring in I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!.
Beyond any attempt at humanisation, these appearances are merely glamorous: they play up all the positives and none of the negatives of character, presenting politicians as superficially charming and appealing. No tough questions; nothing beyond the performance.
That glamorising effect isn’t limited to the person profiled, either. By celebrating vilification and racism as mere controversy, those shows platform this behaviour as entertainment, normalising it as an attribute of celebrities.
To humanise, on the other hand, is to make someone more approachable, engaging with them in ways that avoid catchphrase talking points and seek instead a relatable authenticity. Unsurprisingly, none of these uncritical shows attracts the vitriol directed at Kitchen Cabinet.
Expanding the civic space
Domestic values inform civic values and ground political convictions; they’re what made it possible for people of one gender to dominate politics. And the way that politicians keep their homes — the ways they partner up, cook and clean, raise their children and extend their hospitality — have long been missing from the Australian conversation.
Unique among Australian political journalists, Crabb has developed a significant body of work grappling with civic values: Ms Represented, a four-part series on the history of Australia’s female politicians; The House, a six-part series on what goes on inside Parliament House; Australia Talks, with Nazeem Hussain, a demographic look at Australians’ political opinions. Her books and essays, such as The Wife Drought and Men at Work: Australia’s Parenthood Trap, actively inscribe a feminism into Australian politics that normalises the domestic as a key civic space.
After watching an episode of Kitchen Cabinet, perhaps you’re left frustrated at unasked questions. Of course, because that’s entirely the point: this is a show about starting conversations. In July, Charlie Lewis summed up some of those frustrating moments where Crabb could have pushed further, especially with Scott Morrison. And he’s right.
On the whole, however, Crabb’s questions are probing and persistent, revealing not just more than the politician imagined but a completely different set of insights. Burney’s experience of disadvantage, for example, puts to shame the superficial take that Michaelia Cash had offered in one of the episodes highlighted by Lewis. Similarly, Dutton’s discomfort in describing the trauma of policing contrasts with Le’s account of traumas she’s found many ways to address and work through.
A well-functioning democracy thrives on sophisticated insights into the people we elect, but while there’s little civic value in glamorising politicians, we do need to see them humanised. Political journalism needs to keep developing new and unexpected approaches that cut through the standard party lines to show us the humans we’ve elected. Kitchen Cabinet is just one of them.
Did you watch Peter Dutton on Kitchen Cabinet? Will you ever watch it? Let us know by writing to letters@crikey.com.au. Please include your full name to be considered for publication. We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity.
