Searching out issues

How is it that the federal Coalition has morphed from simple misogyny into a vicious vindictiveness, determined to suppress anything it perceives as likely to threaten its rightful claim to power? Your timely editorial (“Cruel inventions”, February 26–March 4) exposes the parallel universe in which this government is performing like a malevolent Don Quixote, finding ways to eliminate gendered windmills where the rest of us see none. It’s sad that the government’s latest idea of affirmative action is to support a female senator’s move to introduce discrimination against trans women in sport. Genuine efforts to foster wider representation of women in public life, whether by quotas or other means, will fail unless attempts to create artificial barriers to gender diversity are abandoned.

– Jenifer Nicholls, Armadale, Vic fast as the Coalition retreats behind a scorched earth of protective laws. Sadly, there’s been no indication by Labor, from behind their Liberallite bunker, that they wouldn’t feel just as comfortable leaving these safeguards in place. It presents a compelling case to return an independent candidate when next we’re asked to choose our parliamentary representative.

– John Mosig, Kew, Vic