‘Maintain the rage’

Arndt takes aim at ‘virtue signalling’ Senate protest motion

MEN’S rights activist Bettina Arndt has reportedly asked her supporters to maintain the rage and write to senators in “astonishment” after the Upper House backed a call for her to be stripped of her Order of Australia.

Labor and Government senators passed the motion on Tuesday condemning Ms Arndt’s comments about the murders of Queensland mum

Hannah Clarke and her three children.

In an email to supporters after it became clear the Government would support the motion, Ms Arndt asked her followers to “maintain the rage” and “write to your local senators expressing your astonishment at this capitulation to mob rule”, Sky News reported yesterday.

“It is a very sorry day for this country that this key branch of our Government is engaging in virtue signalling at the expense of supporting free speech,” she wrote.

Ms Arndt came under heavy fire last week for congratulating Queensland police for keeping an open mind on the possibility that Ms Clarke’s estranged husband Rowan Baxter might have been driven too far. She was appointed a

Member of the Order of Australia in January for “significant service to the community as a social commentator, and to gender equity through advocacy for men”.

Ms Arndt said it was “totally inappropriate” for politicians to interfere in decisions that are made by the Council for the Order of Australia and authorised by Governor-general David Hurley.

Mr Hurley’s office earlier confirmed it had referred complaints about Ms Arndt’s award to the Council for the Order of Australia, as per standard processes.

The men’s rights activist wrote on her website on Monday that she was experiencing a “vicious media pile-on” but that it had led to her being “absolutely swamped” by new supporters.