Speaker 1: there's a lot, you don't know about lee sales sure.
Speaker 1: You know that she's possibly the most outstanding journalist of
Speaker 1: her generation, but she's been hosting the abc's flagship news
Speaker 1: and current affairs program 7 30 for 12 years where
Speaker 1: she's interviewed five sitting prime ministers, several ex prime ministers
Speaker 1: and every celebrity and sports person you've ever heard of.
Speaker 1: You also probably know that she's Australia's most famous redhead
Speaker 1: and that she's a podcast icon. Thanks to the show
Speaker 1: that she co hosts with her friend Annabelle crab called
Speaker 1: chat 10 Looks Three. You might also know that she's
Speaker 1: written several best selling books, including any ordinary day. I
Speaker 1: bought at least a dozen copies of that book to
Speaker 1: give to people after they've experienced sudden tragedies because it
Speaker 1: is one of the most brilliant and helpful books that
Speaker 1: I've ever read. All that stuff. It's well and truly
Speaker 1: on the public record.
Speaker 1: But do you know that she's a single mother, that
Speaker 1: she nearly died during childbirth, that she knows virtually nothing
Speaker 1: about sport, but has had amusing text banter with everyone
Speaker 1: from Shane warne to Justin Langer after she interviewed them
Speaker 1: or that she nearly lost her mind with excitement when
Speaker 1: she got to interview paul McCartney because you also probably
Speaker 1: didn't know that she is a massive music nerd and
Speaker 1: she loves nothing more than to open her piano at
Speaker 1: home and bang out a show tune.
Speaker 1: You probably didn't know that both john howard and Malcolm
Speaker 1: Turnbull both called her to express their condolences after her
Speaker 1: father died very suddenly a few years ago
Speaker 1: And did you know that she didn't use serums until
Speaker 1: a couple of weeks ago when I shamed her into
Speaker 1: taking better care of her skin at age 48 and
Speaker 1: demanded that she started using both vitamin C and retinol.
Speaker 1: I know a lot about lee sales because after meeting
Speaker 1: on twitter around a decade ago, she has become one
Speaker 1: of my closest and most beloved friends. This is the
Speaker 1: fourth time she's been a guest on no filter and
Speaker 1: not even Glennon Doyle or Liz Gilbert has been on
Speaker 1: that many times, which says a lot about how interestingly
Speaker 1: sales is. So why again,
Speaker 1: What everyone wants to know most about Lee sales right
Speaker 1: now is why she's leaving the most high profile and
Speaker 1: prestigious job in Australian journalism. Why is she walking away
Speaker 1: from hosting 730 when she is in arguably on top
Speaker 1: of her game. Is it the trolls, is it work
Speaker 1: life balance? Was she canceled?
Speaker 1: Is she in fact having extensive plastic surgery so that
Speaker 1: she can retreat from the public eye for a life
Speaker 1: of anonymity,
Speaker 1: lee sales. The people have questions and I'm here to
Speaker 1: ask them.
Speaker 1: When did you find out that you were going to
Speaker 1: be the host of 7 30? Do you remember the
Speaker 1: day
Speaker 2: I do? It was late 2010, I think it was
Speaker 2: maybe late November 2010
Speaker 2: and I had some talks with Mark's got the head
Speaker 2: of the abc at the time and kate Tony who
Speaker 2: was the head of news at the time and I
Speaker 2: wasn't 100% sure that they wanted me to do it.
Speaker 2: And then kate rang me to say we'd like you
Speaker 2: to do it and we'd like to be the political editor.
Speaker 2: So it was kind of a new broom coming through
Speaker 2: and it was thrilling because you know, it's such a
Speaker 2: big and key job, but it was also scary because
Speaker 2: I was coming in behind Kerry O'brien who had been
Speaker 2: doing it for a really, really long time and I
Speaker 2: have such a different kind of vibe to carry. It
Speaker 2: was like, okay, this is going to be hard. And
Speaker 2: I remember saying to Mark and kate,
Speaker 2: I need you to agree that you'll back me in
Speaker 2: for three years because I think the audience will need
Speaker 2: three years to adapt to having a new person there
Speaker 2: because even, you know, when someone good is replaced by
Speaker 2: somebody good change is hard for television audiences and so
Speaker 2: they were great. So I started out with a three
Speaker 2: year contract so that I had that assurance and it
Speaker 2: was really good.
Speaker 1: But what if you'd been a bit shit
Speaker 2: then, I guess they would have found a way out
Speaker 2: of
Speaker 1: it.
Speaker 1: Was it something that you had to audition for? Were
Speaker 1: there a few people in the running for it? What
Speaker 1: were you doing before you took that role?
Speaker 2: So before I was doing it, I was hosting Late
Speaker 2: Line and this was a show that used to go
Speaker 2: to air at 10 30 at night and it was
Speaker 2: shared between myself and Tony jones. He hosted Late Line
Speaker 2: and Q and A. And I did the other days
Speaker 2: of Late Line. And it was a program not dissimilar
Speaker 2: to 7 30 but longer and it had longer interviews.
Speaker 2: So the interviews would always be about 15 minutes,
Speaker 2: which for 7 30 15 minutes is usually something really major.
Speaker 2: Like I had the head of the reserve bank the
Speaker 2: other day and that was 15 minutes late line, everyone,
Speaker 2: 15 minutes. So I was having a lot of practice
Speaker 2: of doing the kinds of things that you do on
Speaker 2: 7 30 on late line. So I guess that was
Speaker 2: just an on air, maybe an off broadway kind of audition.
Speaker 2: They knew my work, so I didn't have to audition.
Speaker 2: And usually I think when you get to this level,
Speaker 2: you're only being looked at if you work very well
Speaker 2: known already. And so it was just a case of
Speaker 2: us talking through what I thought of the show at
Speaker 2: the time and what I would like to do. And yeah,
Speaker 2: it kind of went from there. So it was just
Speaker 2: a conversation really.
Speaker 1: It was obviously a big commitment in terms of four
Speaker 1: days a week. What are the hours of 7:30?
Speaker 2: So it's kind of,
Speaker 2: You know, like a lot of media jobs, it's 24/7 really?
Speaker 2: So I wake up in the morning and I immediately
Speaker 2: have to check what's in the news because the mornings
Speaker 2: when you set up the day. So if you need
Speaker 2: reporters on stories straight away or if you need to
Speaker 2: get bids in for people, that's when you're doing.
Speaker 2: So that's quite a busy time from about 66 30.
Speaker 2: I'm looking at a lot of newspapers and making calls
Speaker 2: and juggling that now with my kids. And then nine
Speaker 2: am we have an editorial conference call where we're talking
Speaker 2: about what might be on the show and what our
Speaker 2: options are. And then between usually about 9 15 and
Speaker 2: 11 o'clock or so. And that's my kind of quiet
Speaker 2: time where I can usually go to the GM or
Speaker 2: do something, depends what I've got going on
Speaker 2: and then things start changing. So, for example, I kept
Speaker 2: you waiting because I was on the phone to the
Speaker 2: executive producer because we just got word that one interview
Speaker 2: we were going for is not happening. But another one is.
Speaker 2: And so Clay, who's acting at the moment, wanted to
Speaker 2: have a quick chat to me about what he thought
Speaker 2: we should touch on the interview. And I was talking
Speaker 2: about what I thought, so now that I know that
Speaker 2: that's my interview, it'll be okay. Now I prep for
Speaker 2: that and then I'm simultaneously prepping for an interview tomorrow
Speaker 2: with Dylan Alcott? So trying to get that out of
Speaker 2: the way
Speaker 2: and then juggling whatever else is on the show and
Speaker 2: then I'll have to make up about four my interviews
Speaker 2: at 5 15 today. And then once I've done that interview,
Speaker 2: then I have a look at the leads for the
Speaker 2: other stories and any other content and we talk about
Speaker 2: any other issues. You might have a quick chat about
Speaker 2: what's coming up tomorrow and then you do the show
Speaker 2: live and then off you go. But between now, 11
Speaker 2: 37 30 tonight, all of that could be completely out
Speaker 2: the window because it's dictated by news events. So it's
Speaker 2: a rolling, movable face, basically
Speaker 1: when I prepped for our conversation today, my prep involved
Speaker 1: asking in a group chat with you and two other
Speaker 1: of our friends who are journalists, what should my first
Speaker 1: question be?
Speaker 1: How is that different to your process when you're say
Speaker 1: interviewing anyone?
Speaker 2: Do you know what I actually think what you did.
Speaker 2: That is a great process because particularly if you talk
Speaker 2: to people who, like, let's say for you, maybe what's
Speaker 2: that group, you think, okay, women like that? That's the
Speaker 2: audience for this podcast. So what they're interested in knowing
Speaker 2: from lee is what my audience would be interested in knowing.
Speaker 2: So I'm doing this.
Speaker 2: It's a very similar thing for 7 30 which is
Speaker 2: I'm thinking, what would the average person sitting at home
Speaker 2: who watches my show like me to ask if they're
Speaker 2: in my position. So I say for example, I mentioned
Speaker 2: earlier that I interviewed last week, the Governor of the
Speaker 2: Reserve Bank feel though it's unprecedented basically for him to
Speaker 2: do a Tv interview like that. So I was thinking okay,
Speaker 2: what are people thinking about and how I inform myself
Speaker 2: for that is I talk to my friends who are
Speaker 2: in politics and the media, I have lots of conversations
Speaker 2: with if I'm at the local cafe, the guy who's
Speaker 2: working behind there are asking, how is business going? And
Speaker 2: is he worried about interest rates or if I'm sitting
Speaker 2: in a doctor's surgery or if I'm in a cab
Speaker 2: or what,
Speaker 2: I just talked to people all the time so that
Speaker 2: I have a sense of what regular people think about,
Speaker 2: not people like me who consume media all day every day.
Speaker 2: So I guess it's the equivalent of like a WhatsApp
Speaker 2: group chat, but just on a bigger kind of real
Speaker 2: life scale,
Speaker 1: you interview everyone from Prime Ministers to sports people to
Speaker 1: the Beatles. You know, paul McCartney, there are some of
Speaker 1: those topics that you know more about and some of
Speaker 1: those that you know less about the sport. How do
Speaker 1: you prep like, you know, on the day of the
Speaker 1: Melbourne Cup, you usually have to interview the winner. How
Speaker 1: do you prep for that? You know nothing about horse racing.
Speaker 2: You know what's really embarrassing?
Speaker 2: I reckon if you went back and watched all my
Speaker 2: Melbourne Cup interviews over the years, it's probably about the
Speaker 2: same four questions. It'll be like, what was going through
Speaker 2: your mind in that final 100 m and? Well, it's
Speaker 2: just such an amazing thing to win. I mean, you
Speaker 2: must be so thrilled, but it's kind of like prepping
Speaker 2: for anything in that everyone always has their own individual story. So,
Speaker 2: with Melbourne Cup, it's always a real relief if you
Speaker 2: discover that
Speaker 2: the jockeys just come back from an accident or Michelle
Speaker 2: Payne was the best ever because it was a female
Speaker 2: jockey and her brother was this trapper and their dad
Speaker 2: and their mom had died was a great story. So
Speaker 2: you had a lot to work with where it's sport
Speaker 2: is harder for me, if it's more technical about what
Speaker 2: was involved in the race rather than the person's human story.
Speaker 2: And usually I'm trying to pull it onto the human
Speaker 2: terrain
Speaker 2: and not everyone at home knows about the intricacies of
Speaker 2: horse racing, they want to connect with the story as
Speaker 2: a human being. And I think, you know, whether it's
Speaker 2: the governor of the Reserve bank or the person who
Speaker 2: run the Melbourne Cup, if you can find a way
Speaker 2: to talk on a level that everyone else who's not
Speaker 2: an expert in that field can relate to, then you're
Speaker 2: on much better terrain. So for example, sometimes I'll send
Speaker 2: back when I was more in news and occasionally I'm
Speaker 2: feeling as a news reader,
Speaker 2: I sometimes send back a lead to people in support
Speaker 2: because I go, I can't even tell what sport this
Speaker 2: is about because it would be the boomers smashed the
Speaker 2: opals in a thrilling touchdown. What sport is this and
Speaker 2: say there's so much jargon in sport and so much
Speaker 2: knowledge and same with finance, like the footsie and hung
Speaker 2: what like I don't know what that means.
Speaker 1: So it's always about walking in the shoes of the
Speaker 1: audience and not bringing assumed knowledge.
Speaker 2: I think so or some things you can kind of
Speaker 2: assume I guess like you can assume that people know
Speaker 2: who Shane warne is maybe, but maybe you want to
Speaker 2: try to explain why is Shane warne such a famous cricketer,
Speaker 2: Like people who
Speaker 2: I don't know about cricket, they might not quite understand
Speaker 2: what made him different to a regular cricketer. So I
Speaker 2: try really hard, particularly with subjects I know really well,
Speaker 2: like say foreign policy or trashy television, try not assume
Speaker 2: that everybody else knows. What do I know about it
Speaker 1: when you're interviewing those people,
Speaker 1: it's only politicians who are the ones that usually push back.
Speaker 1: Although that's maybe not true. You've had to do some,
Speaker 1: I won't say antagonistic, but usually when you're interviewing someone
Speaker 1: they won't try and deliberately mislead, you divert you filibuster
Speaker 1: you what are the specific approaches that you need to
Speaker 1: take when you're interviewing a politician.
Speaker 2: So a politician usually defers to a regular interviewee in that,
Speaker 2: you know, that they're not going to engage in an
Speaker 2: open kind of way, you know, they're not going to
Speaker 2: let you in on everything that's going on behind the scenes,
Speaker 2: they're going to have a message that they're going to
Speaker 2: want to try to get out. And sometimes it's interesting
Speaker 2: to know what their message is. So safe for exam,
Speaker 2: Anthony Albanese is due to come on 7 30 next
Speaker 2: week for his first interview as Prime Minister. And so
Speaker 2: I haven't interviewed him before. He hasn't been in the
Speaker 2: job long, so he doesn't have a record. So it
Speaker 2: won't be an interview where it's not an accountability interview,
Speaker 2: where he's not going to be under pressure. Like a
Speaker 2: regular political interview, it'll be an interview where I'm trying
Speaker 2: to actually hear what Anthony Albanese
Speaker 2: messages and what his ambitions are for his term, because
Speaker 2: if I were remaining as anchor of 7 30 I'd
Speaker 2: be using that interview for the next three years as
Speaker 2: my kind of flag poles in the ground interview to see, Well,
Speaker 2: right at the start, you said that this is what
Speaker 2: you wanted to do and what you wanted to achieve.
Speaker 2: You are at point A and now we're at point
Speaker 2: z how did you get so far off what you
Speaker 2: said you were going to do, kind of thing.
Speaker 2: So sometimes you do want to hear what their message
Speaker 2: is and what they're saying and then other times you
Speaker 2: want to get to the bottom of a change in
Speaker 2: policy or something that they've done wrong and so I'll
Speaker 2: try to arm myself with facts to then rebut what
Speaker 2: I think there's been, you know, might be, whereas with
Speaker 2: a normal person say preferred politicians is not normal,
Speaker 2: but like Dylan Alcott for example, I mentioned before that
Speaker 2: I'm prepping for an interview tomorrow. Now Dylan Alcott is
Speaker 2: a really great talker. He's very charismatic and charming. And
Speaker 2: so I assume if I ask interesting, engaging questions that
Speaker 2: perk up Dylan's interest and if we have nice rapport
Speaker 2: that I'm not going to have to work very hard
Speaker 2: as an interviewer, I'm just going to
Speaker 2: have to give him a gentle steer in the right direction.
Speaker 2: Listen to what he's saying and respond so that it
Speaker 2: feels like a natural kind of conversation. So every interview
Speaker 2: that I go into, I'm thinking, okay, what's the tone
Speaker 2: I need with this? How do I make this person
Speaker 2: feel at ease or how do I achieve? You know, again,
Speaker 2: what the average person at home might want to see
Speaker 2: out of this interview
Speaker 1: when you went from being I guess a working journalist
Speaker 1: to being more of a star journalist when you started
Speaker 1: hosting 7 30 you were in people's lounge rooms four
Speaker 1: nights a week plus on all the promo s plus
Speaker 1: in the media everywhere and ads and all of those things,
Speaker 1: When did you notice the transition between people? I mean,
Speaker 1: I imagine you had a little bit of it when
Speaker 1: you were hosting Late line, but it was really like
Speaker 1: prime time a list. How did you notice the transition
Speaker 1: about how you were perceived, how people interacted with you
Speaker 1: becoming a famous person?
Speaker 2: So the longer I've done it, the more this has
Speaker 2: become notable to me. So now I would rarely leave
Speaker 2: the house and not have somebody come up to me
Speaker 2: and want to chat to me, I want to have
Speaker 2: a selfie or whatever. So whereas the first few years
Speaker 2: I felt kind of like I still could go out
Speaker 2: and not be noticed, maybe I was kidding myself, because
Speaker 2: sometimes what happens is I'll sit in a cafe and
Speaker 2: no one will say something, and then on social media
Speaker 2: later someone might go, oh I just saw you sitting
Speaker 2: in a cafe and I didn't want to say anything,
Speaker 2: but you know, blah blah blah.
Speaker 2: So maybe I was more noticed than I thought, but
Speaker 2: I have become very conscious of it and it might
Speaker 2: also be because I'm leaving. So now people are just
Speaker 2: so lovely because they want to come up and they
Speaker 2: want to go, I just want to say thank you
Speaker 2: very much and you know that kind of thing, and
Speaker 2: also just the range of people now who come up
Speaker 2: to me like it can be quite young people in
Speaker 2: their late teens or early twenties, it can be older
Speaker 2: people that you perceive as more traditional abc viewers was
Speaker 2: walking down George Street the other night on a friday
Speaker 2: night at about 10 30
Speaker 2: and there was this group of young guys, I would
Speaker 2: have never thought they knew who I was, and one
Speaker 2: of them yelled out, oh my God, lisa, I love you,
Speaker 2: it was just like, wow, I so did not receive
Speaker 2: you guys as my demographic at the low, jeez, it's
Speaker 2: often really weird because you're mixing with all these other
Speaker 2: famous people from other networks and so the people who
Speaker 2: sometimes out themselves as major fans is really surprising to me.
Speaker 2: So one leg is a few years ago I was
Speaker 2: going to the toilet and I bumped into Gary sweet
Speaker 2: and he stopped him
Speaker 2: like oh my God, I am, I cannot believe I
Speaker 2: bumped into you, oh my God, I'm your biggest fan
Speaker 2: and he was really awkward. And then this loge, do
Speaker 2: you know the actor James Stewart who is on the way?
Speaker 2: So georgie parker, like Australian television royalty came up to
Speaker 2: me and went, I'm really sorry to disturb you but
Speaker 2: James is your biggest fan and could he please get
Speaker 2: a photo with you, I'll take it,
Speaker 2: that's just like that's completely fine, no problem. And so
Speaker 2: we got lee, oh my God, it's so great to
Speaker 2: meet you, it's embarrassing. So he was just like, awkward
Speaker 2: fan going and then we kind of moved through and
Speaker 2: ended up colliding again at the other end and I
Speaker 2: said to him, I'm just always amazed that somebody like
Speaker 2: you would even know who I am.
Speaker 2: And so he was like, mom raised us, right? We
Speaker 2: watched 7 30 so yeah, so that was a classic.
Speaker 2: So sometimes you kind of surprised by it was a
Speaker 2: big fan. I remember interviewing Guy Pearce in 2011 when
Speaker 2: I was first in the show and because you know,
Speaker 2: I grew up in that neighbors era, you know, he
Speaker 2: was such a heartthrob when we were kids. And when
Speaker 2: I walked in, he clearly was a massive viewer and
Speaker 2: fan of Late line and to the degree where he
Speaker 2: was like, he was still married at the time he
Speaker 2: was saying,
Speaker 2: okay. And I noticed that you've changed your hair and
Speaker 2: you used to have the short bob on late line,
Speaker 2: They've grown longer and we're wondering why, because I looked
Speaker 2: too much like Julia Gillard with the short red bob.
Speaker 2: We sat around yapping for ages after the interview. And
Speaker 2: then we caught up again in 2018, he's just a
Speaker 2: religious viewer, 7 30
Speaker 2: and then we stayed friends because we just hit it
Speaker 2: off and we were buddies. So my mind, I'm like,
Speaker 2: oh my God, Guy Pearce is sitting on film sets
Speaker 2: around the world watching, you know, 7 30 every opportunity candle.
Speaker 2: Ben Mendelson is another person who one time we had
Speaker 2: a story and this is lovely when this kind of
Speaker 2: thing happens. Ben Mendelson was in the U. S. Shooting,
Speaker 2: what was the show? Whether it was in the luxury
Speaker 2: kind of hotel that the family runs and
Speaker 2: oh the guy from friday night lights
Speaker 1: and it's like swampy,
Speaker 2: swampy, it's in florida blood,
Speaker 1: something something blood
Speaker 2: exactly bloodlines. And Ben Mendelsohn's the kind of way with Brother. Anyway,
Speaker 2: we had this gorgeous story on the show about this
Speaker 2: kind of disco that was being held for teenagers who
Speaker 2: had disabilities, like all different kind of disabilities and it
Speaker 2: was organized by one of the moms because she said
Speaker 2: they're still teenagers, they still wanna meet somebody that they
Speaker 2: might fancy and have a bit of romance in their
Speaker 2: life but we can't let them go out like normal
Speaker 2: teenagers to easily get taken advantage of and it's just
Speaker 2: not safe. And so we created this disco for them,
Speaker 2: it's a safe kind of space. And so they've got
Speaker 2: a pager and a DJ and stuff. And the kids,
Speaker 2: we had one of our producers Leslie Robinson follow these
Speaker 2: kids through and it was just the most gorgeous story
Speaker 2: and the kids were just so excited, it was just
Speaker 2: absolutely adorable
Speaker 2: and the mom, you know she only had money to
Speaker 2: do one and then Ben Mendelson saw it watching in L. A.
Speaker 2: And he got in contact with us and said I'll
Speaker 2: pay for another one like just get it organized and
Speaker 2: I'll pay for the whole thing. So they then have
Speaker 2: a second one that Ben shouted, he did an interview
Speaker 2: a few
Speaker 2: years later about something and I actually asked him before
Speaker 2: the interview can I ask you about that on camera?
Speaker 2: Because I think it's a great message to send to
Speaker 2: people of means if you see something on our show
Speaker 2: and you can make a difference we'll just ring us
Speaker 2: and you know you can. And so Ben talked about
Speaker 2: how he watched it and he was really touched by
Speaker 2: it and he just thought
Speaker 2: I can spare 5000 bucks to do that. And he
Speaker 2: said to other people they should, I won't name them
Speaker 2: because I don't want to embarrass them. But there's a
Speaker 2: well known quite well loved Australian businessman who often gets
Speaker 2: in touch to say you know families who have lost
Speaker 2: their homes or whatever, he'll pay their rent for six months.
Speaker 2: And so that's really heartening when that kind of thing happens.
Speaker 1: Was there anyone at the luggage that you were fan
Speaker 1: girling
Speaker 2: over? Um
Speaker 2: Often it's the kids people that kids entertained because it
Speaker 2: thrills my kids if they see me with. So I
Speaker 2: had with him a legal and I was chatting to
Speaker 2: Hamish blake, I didn't take a photo with Hamish but
Speaker 2: they love lego masters. So I've said to Hamish you
Speaker 2: know you have to come over for dinner sometime didn't
Speaker 2: want the kids are going to basically monopolizing and hide
Speaker 2: him in the bedroom the entire period to build, but
Speaker 2: it probably would be fine with that.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So it's usually the kids, people jimmy giggle. I've
Speaker 2: got one here and I just text the photos for
Speaker 2: the kids
Speaker 1: when obviously people recognizing you in public, you're in a
Speaker 1: cafe or whatever, it's fine. There's been some times when
Speaker 1: you've been in very vulnerable situations like when you nearly
Speaker 1: died giving birth,
Speaker 1: what's that? Like? Do you have an awareness in situations
Speaker 1: where you are really powerless or vulnerable or in a
Speaker 1: really private situation that happens to be public is your
Speaker 1: celebrity in the room?
Speaker 2: Yeah. And because I never assume that people know who
Speaker 2: I am because I think that would just be up myself.
Speaker 2: So I don't want to say things like, oh look,
Speaker 2: I need an extra level of privacy because you know,
Speaker 2: I'm famous. So I usually am hoping that someone else
Speaker 2: might intervene on my behalf and say, you know, we
Speaker 2: might prefer to be, you know, blah, blah, blah.
Speaker 2: And people normally are very respectful. Like I was in
Speaker 2: hospital one time with my son who was in hospital,
Speaker 2: there was a family in the bed next to us,
Speaker 2: a little boy who had a tumor and
Speaker 2: the mother recognized me, but she didn't raise it with me.
Speaker 2: She raised it with my son's father and she clearly
Speaker 2: didn't want to kind of raise it. It kind of
Speaker 2: made me feel a little bit awkward, but it also
Speaker 2: made me feel good because she knew who I was,
Speaker 2: because she was a fan of chat town, looks through
Speaker 2: the podcast I do with Annabelle and she listened to that.
Speaker 2: And so I got on the phone to Gwen, who
Speaker 2: does our merchandise and said, oh there's this because you know,
Speaker 2: I've been hearing like a little boy was in a
Speaker 2: lot of pain,
Speaker 2: I said to Gwen, can you just quickly like bang
Speaker 2: together a merchandise pack of chat 10 Kia that I
Speaker 2: can give to the mom and say my ex husband
Speaker 2: actually took it in and gave it to her and
Speaker 2: I don't think I actually spoke to her after she
Speaker 2: knew who I was, he said, oh she nearly cried,
Speaker 2: like she was so happy about it. And so that
Speaker 2: this stuff is really nice if you feel like, because
Speaker 2: you just know that someone's having the bloody worst few
Speaker 2: days of their life and so if you can sling
Speaker 2: them a stupid apron with my ugly mug on it,
Speaker 2: like that makes you feel kind of good. But then
Speaker 2: other times, I remember once in the street, a woman
Speaker 2: stopped me and she said,
Speaker 2: oh it was a nurse and you know when you're
Speaker 2: in intensive care and I remember, you know, you're asleep
Speaker 2: and I said to another nurse, oh my God, it's
Speaker 2: the sales and it was like, I felt like actually
Speaker 2: kind of, but it was gigantically inappropriate,
Speaker 1: you
Speaker 2: Know, times out of 100 people are just really awesome
Speaker 2: to me and they are very respectful and you know,
Speaker 2: it's fine.
Speaker 1: You're not someone who pops up in the Gossip columns.
Speaker 1: A million people watch 7, 34 nights a week, millions
Speaker 1: of people watch you on big ticket items like the
Speaker 1: election coverage.
Speaker 1: You are one of the most recognizable faces in Australia
Speaker 1: and yet you're not in the gossip columns.
Speaker 1: Why not?
Speaker 2: I think because I'm pretty boring and also I just
Speaker 2: try to keep myself under the radar. So I do
Speaker 2: go to, you know, the occasional opening night of things,
Speaker 2: but I don't like for example, I don't go out
Speaker 2: to cool places with dates, you know, like I go
Speaker 2: to daddy suburban pubs and you know, things like that.
Speaker 2: So I think that the kind of life I live
Speaker 2: doesn't really invite, you know, I don't live in Bondi
Speaker 2: for example. I don't, I'm not eating out at Potts
Speaker 2: point all the time. Like I'm not in places very
Speaker 2: often where you be seen.
Speaker 2: I mean I do go to pains to not have
Speaker 2: details about my family and private life out there because
Speaker 2: I think it's not fair on the people around me.
Speaker 2: So I do work pretty hard to not be saying
Speaker 2: with people and you know, to be honest, not that
Speaker 2: I date an endless parade
Speaker 2: of people, but I don't want my kids ever googling
Speaker 2: oh there's one with that guy and there's one with
Speaker 2: that guy, there's one with that guy, like I just
Speaker 2: would rather keep all of my private business private. So yeah,
Speaker 2: I think I just keep it under the radar.
Speaker 1: You got quietly divorced a few years ago,
Speaker 1: no meal dramas there. How does someone date lee sales
Speaker 1: like what sort of guy has the confidence to ask
Speaker 1: you out?
Speaker 2: I think you've got to be reasonably confident to actually
Speaker 2: do that. But I also think that most people, once
Speaker 2: they meet me and kind of get to know me,
Speaker 2: I think fairly rapidly, I'm not very intimidating. I think
Speaker 2: what people find hard sometimes is the way other people
Speaker 2: interact with them. So for example, I've been out with
Speaker 2: men where people have said to them, wow, you must
Speaker 2: have felt intimidated at asking lee out and so
Speaker 2: the message that they're getting is you're punching above your
Speaker 2: weight and I think that's a hard message for men
Speaker 2: to get and so, you know, that's not the message
Speaker 2: I give people that I'm in relationships with or dating,
Speaker 2: but I think that they sometimes feel very heavily scrutinized
Speaker 2: and I know even my husband things like checking somewhere
Speaker 2: to be
Speaker 2: Mr and mrs sales or whatever, which isn't his name.
Speaker 2: So just this assumption that the person is kind of
Speaker 2: just your add on and sometimes they're treated a little
Speaker 2: bit like that. I think that can be kind of
Speaker 2: confronting for people and just the level of people looking
Speaker 2: you up. Like literally looking you up and down, like
Speaker 2: spotting me and then looking the purse
Speaker 2: up and down again. There's nothing you can really do
Speaker 2: about its natural kind of human curiosity. But I often
Speaker 2: feel sorry for people that I'm with in that situation.
Speaker 2: And so for example, say red carpet events, I generally
Speaker 2: would prefer to take a friend because I don't want
Speaker 2: to subject some poor bugger to that level of scrutiny.
Speaker 1: Did you take a date to the Oscars?
Speaker 2: No, you don't. You don't get to take a partner
Speaker 2: to the ladies unless you're
Speaker 1: I'm Mia Freedman and you're listening to no filter with
Speaker 1: Leigh sales.
Speaker 1: So the time that you've been hosting on 7:30, the
Speaker 1: world's changed in terms of social media
Speaker 1: and as a journalist and a working journalist,
Speaker 1: how have you seen that change? How have you experienced
Speaker 1: that change? Because back in the day it used to be,
Speaker 1: if someone had a problem, they would, I don't know,
Speaker 1: ring the abc or they would write a letter which
Speaker 1: they would have to get a stamp for. And then
Speaker 1: of course there was email. Now the whole performative side
Speaker 1: of things has come in with social media, How have
Speaker 1: you experienced that shift? Like when do you remember thinking,
Speaker 1: oh this is different.
Speaker 2: I definitely remember this is a long time ago back
Speaker 2: in 2005 being just blown away by changing technology, I
Speaker 2: was covering Hurricane Katrina and my producer at the time
Speaker 2: was an American guy called Jason Rocky.
Speaker 2: And we were at New Orleans airport and we went
Speaker 2: outside onto like a kind of grassy area outside the
Speaker 2: airport and he had you know what we would now
Speaker 2: think it's just like a wireless total that he shoved
Speaker 2: into the USB on the side of laptop and we
Speaker 2: filed voice reports and we sent them from the field.
Speaker 2: Now that was the first time ever that I hadn't
Speaker 2: had to go back to find a phone line to
Speaker 2: plug into to send audio material back.
Speaker 2: And I remember thinking this is unbelievable, this is a
Speaker 2: complete game changer.
Speaker 2: And so that for me was a real moment of
Speaker 2: thinking how much things changed I think then technology moved
Speaker 2: really fast. But then of course during the pandemic when
Speaker 2: we all had to adapt to using technology differently, even
Speaker 2: the way you and I are doing this podcast now,
Speaker 2: I'm sitting at my house, you're in your office, it's
Speaker 2: all professionally recorded. Like we've all had to learn to
Speaker 2: do that. I did 730 out of my bedroom down
Speaker 2: the hallway. So that was another moment of thinking, wow,
Speaker 2: this is an incredible update.
Speaker 2: And then also of course there's been the rise of
Speaker 2: social media and I think probably around it's definitely been
Speaker 2: since my colleague Mark Coleman died, which was in 2017
Speaker 2: because I remember when mark was alive, we were never
Speaker 2: talking about Twitter being a nasty vicious kind of place
Speaker 2: and that it wasn't hyper partisan and mark was like
Speaker 2: a very very voracious user of Twitter.
Speaker 2: And so it's definitely happened since then. So in my
Speaker 2: head I think something's changed marc died where that platform
Speaker 2: in particular has become just a kind of hate fueled
Speaker 2: hyper partisan sort of place.
Speaker 2: And so I think that what's happened is that platform
Speaker 2: which really I don't know anyone on it other than
Speaker 2: journals like in my world say for example, you know
Speaker 2: I come from Brisbane, my friends range from teachers to
Speaker 2: police officers, secretaries, university workers and so on. None of
Speaker 2: them are on twitter and none of them were aware
Speaker 2: for example, of the level of abuse that gets meted
Speaker 2: out at female journalists on twitter just for doing their job.
Speaker 2: And so the only people who ever raised with me
Speaker 2: twitter or abuse on twitter, social media abuse are actually
Speaker 2: other journals because so many journals are on twitter and
Speaker 2: so their assumption is oh this represents the world, everyone's
Speaker 2: on twitter. Whereas the abc actually we did some research
Speaker 2: last year and I think we've
Speaker 2: found something like nine out of 100 people used twitter regularly,
Speaker 2: hardly anybody is on their, when you think about it
Speaker 2: as well that people who are particularly active who can
Speaker 2: sit on a social media platform all day and commentate
Speaker 2: on what's on abc news breakfast or commentate all day
Speaker 2: on somebody's newspaper column. I mean what do you do
Speaker 2: for a job or what's going on in your life
Speaker 2: that actually you have that much time that you can
Speaker 2: devote to that? So by its nature it can't possibly
Speaker 2: be representative.
Speaker 2: A lot of that stuff that I think preoccupies journalists
Speaker 2: around the importance of twitter and what's trending on twitter
Speaker 2: and what people are saying on twitter is actually not
Speaker 2: very important and it's afforded way too much power and
Speaker 2: influence in the media in my view based on how
Speaker 2: much real people actually use it.
Speaker 1: There's been a lot of erroneous reports around the fact
Speaker 1: that you're leaving 7 30 because of twitter trolling. It's
Speaker 1: a pretty easy story, I've actually never heard you complain
Speaker 1: or be worried or do anything other than eye roll
Speaker 1: about twitter trolls. How do you think this has sort
Speaker 1: of become the narrative?
Speaker 2: Well, I just think that again, because Jonah is on
Speaker 2: twitter all the time and they would see, you know
Speaker 2: the level of abuse that I get, they think that
Speaker 2: oh it must be because you know, she's getting abused,
Speaker 2: Hamish blake when I announced I was leaving, sent me
Speaker 2: this really interesting and lovely text message and he said,
Speaker 2: people often have a really hard time understanding when somebody's
Speaker 2: choosing to leave a great job at the top of
Speaker 2: their game of their own choosing. And he said, they
Speaker 2: assume that there must be a secret reason, like you
Speaker 2: must have a new job or a secret thing lined
Speaker 2: up or there must be something secretly
Speaker 2: going on in your life that nobody knows about or
Speaker 2: you must be getting pushed. And he said, but when
Speaker 2: I see someone announced what you've just announced, I feel
Speaker 2: nothing but excitement for them, that they have taken control
Speaker 2: of that situation, they've made an empowered decision. And now
Speaker 2: there's fresh fields ahead and something to do.
Speaker 2: And when I got it, I thought because my text
Speaker 2: messages were just full of people going, oh my God, wow,
Speaker 2: that's huge. And Hamish actually, I thought, yes, he 100%
Speaker 2: gets it. He totally gets why I'm going. And so
Speaker 2: I think a lot of people have been casting around
Speaker 2: looking for what's the real reason because who could possibly
Speaker 2: give up this job in the position she's in now,
Speaker 2: but the reality is that I do
Speaker 2: enjoy the job and I do really like it. But
Speaker 2: I said to kate and Mark right at the start,
Speaker 2: but I thought it was about a 10 year job
Speaker 2: and I've been doing it now for coming up to
Speaker 2: 12 11.5. And so I never have wanted to be
Speaker 2: somebody who waits till they're kind of stale and people
Speaker 2: want them to go, I wanted to go when I
Speaker 2: felt like I was at a really good position
Speaker 2: and you know, I was incredibly grateful when I told
Speaker 2: the head of the abc David Anderson and Justin Stephens
Speaker 2: who was at the time that 7:30 p.m. Is now
Speaker 2: the head of news and Gavin Fang, who was the
Speaker 2: acting head of news, they all said variations of
Speaker 2: is there anything we can say to change your mind? Like,
Speaker 2: you know, we would love you to keep doing it,
Speaker 2: but we assume that you've thought it through a lot
Speaker 2: if you've come to us. And I really, really appreciated
Speaker 2: that that was the response that I got. And that
Speaker 2: actually helped me understand I've judged this right because what
Speaker 2: I didn't want to ever go and then to go, great,
Speaker 2: thank you so much because you know, they've wanted me
Speaker 2: to disappear. And so honestly people keep asking me all
Speaker 2: the time, you know,
Speaker 2: what are you going to, what do you want to do?
Speaker 2: And when I say, I don't know, I want to
Speaker 2: have a break. I want to have a rest and
Speaker 2: see what grows up. People have a hard time believing that.
Speaker 2: So I keep reading this erroneous speculation as well about
Speaker 2: what I'm going to do that. I'm going to do
Speaker 2: a talk show. I've never pitched that the abc has
Speaker 2: never offered it. There's been no discussion about it. I
Speaker 2: actually think a show of that nature would not work
Speaker 2: in Australia. So I'm not doing that the twitter stuff
Speaker 2: like you know the Daily Telegraph on the weekend and
Speaker 2: the herald sun
Speaker 2: ran this story that was with a headline that was
Speaker 2: an utter fabrication and it was in direct quotes saying
Speaker 2: trolls forced me out of the job. I love it
Speaker 2: is the literal exact opposite to what I said in
Speaker 2: the actual interview to Sarah Lamarche
Speaker 2: in Stella, which is that I ignore trolls. They don't
Speaker 2: have any bearing on my real life. I care about
Speaker 2: the opinions of people who matter to me and who
Speaker 2: are important when I say that again, people find a
Speaker 2: hard time believing that I get the level of abuse
Speaker 2: I do and not care about. I really don't give
Speaker 2: a stuff what some anonymous moron thinks about me online.
Speaker 2: I just don't actually care and I'm not saying that
Speaker 2: to try to put a
Speaker 2: nice blush on it. However, I literally don't actually care.
Speaker 2: So I think sometimes people have a hard time kind
Speaker 2: of processing all of that. But the reality is I
Speaker 2: am leaving because time's limited in life, right? I'm 49.
Speaker 2: I have so many ideas all the time about things
Speaker 2: I'd like to do. 7 30 is a massive job.
Speaker 2: There's limited time to do those things and I mean
Speaker 2: personal life things as well as work things
Speaker 2: and so you know the clocks tick tick tick tick
Speaker 2: ticking away all the time and I'm going to run
Speaker 2: out of time to do everything I want to do.
Speaker 2: And so it just feels like at the end of
Speaker 2: an election cycle and after I've been doing it so
Speaker 2: long and where I'm in this position where people still
Speaker 2: respect me doing it, it feels like a great moment
Speaker 2: to go, yes, I've done everything I can do there
Speaker 2: and it's time to move on to a new challenge
Speaker 2: and it literally is as simple as that.
Speaker 1: The other narrative that people like whenever a powerful and
Speaker 1: successful woman
Speaker 2: decides
Speaker 1: to make a change in her career is that you
Speaker 1: can't have it all, feminism's failed
Speaker 2: and
Speaker 1: that it's not compatible having a high powered job with
Speaker 1: a young family, can you speak to that?
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're so right, that is the other thing that
Speaker 2: people immediately reach for. It is hard to have a
Speaker 2: high powered career and a family, it is difficult and
Speaker 2: I think, you know, when people say you can have
Speaker 2: it all, but you can't have it all at once,
Speaker 2: you can, it just takes an enormous amount of juggling
Speaker 2: and it takes an enormous amount of assistance and other
Speaker 2: p
Speaker 2: people kind of chipping in to help. So, for example,
Speaker 2: my boy's father is really good at chipping in and
Speaker 2: doing what's needed to help care for the boys or
Speaker 2: suddenly being called on to have to change his plans
Speaker 2: because a major story is broken and I have to
Speaker 2: go to work, I've had the same nanny for almost
Speaker 2: their entire lives who is just the most extraordinary person
Speaker 2: and you know, I can leave the kids with her
Speaker 2: and I feel as assured as if they're with me,
Speaker 2: my great close friends, Annabelle crab and Gwen and Miranda
Speaker 2: Murphy and
Speaker 2: people like that who have been around to help me
Speaker 2: when something unexpected happens and I can't keep all of
Speaker 2: the balls in the air and they swoop in to
Speaker 2: assist with a kid or do whatever. Or my friend
Speaker 2: Nick who drove around on short notice the other day
Speaker 2: because my car wouldn't start, the battery was flat and
Speaker 2: you know, whatever he was doing, he just put aside
Speaker 2: to replace my car battery two days after the bloody
Speaker 2: federal election.
Speaker 2: So it takes all of that you have to have,
Speaker 2: you can't just have plan a, you've got to have
Speaker 2: three or that plan h especially when you're a single
Speaker 2: mother and so you know, that is difficult, but you
Speaker 2: can do it. But I think what you have to
Speaker 2: think about is and I've spent a lot of time
Speaker 2: in the past 18 months thinking about is what do
Speaker 2: you want your life to look like? And
Speaker 2: what I don't want my life to look like is
Speaker 2: the level of stress that it's had for the past
Speaker 2: decade really, while I've had the kids, which is I
Speaker 2: wake up every morning. I feel like I'm in a
Speaker 2: hurry constantly. I wonder what I'm forgetting stuff falls out
Speaker 2: of my brain all the time. I'm not fast at
Speaker 2: responding to my friends text messages. I don't see enough
Speaker 2: of my friends. I want to, I get home from work,
Speaker 2: I'm tired. The kids are now at an age where
Speaker 2: they want to talk when I get home from work,
Speaker 2: they get the dregs of me because I get home
Speaker 2: late and so I'm knackered and so I don't want
Speaker 2: to operate like that anymore. I've been able to do
Speaker 2: it and I could keep doing it, but I actually
Speaker 2: don't want to do that anymore. So it's that thing
Speaker 2: of identifying, you know, what's important to you, what do
Speaker 2: you want your life to look like? This is of
Speaker 2: course a luxurious position to be in because some people
Speaker 2: I need to earn this amount of,
Speaker 2: because I have to put food on the table for
Speaker 2: my kids and those are calculations, I have to make
Speaker 2: two again because I'm a single mother, I can't just go, oh,
Speaker 2: I'd like to just step away and have a suite
Speaker 2: of projects. Like I kind of need a salary job.
Speaker 2: So I know what I'm doing. I can't take huge risks.
Speaker 2: You know, I can't kind of go out and just
Speaker 2: make look three my thing. The other point I make around,
Speaker 2: they're having it all kind of thing is that
Speaker 2: most women, I know we have conversations a lot about
Speaker 2: getting women into more senior roles in workplaces. Most women
Speaker 2: I know feel like we barely have our heads above
Speaker 2: water juggling all of our existing responsibilities. And so the
Speaker 2: last thing we want is to take on more responsibility
Speaker 2: at work and that's because it's really
Speaker 2: hard to juggle that with our home responsibilities. There was
Speaker 2: an amazing piece last week in the paper that had
Speaker 2: some research around the way that home responsibilities have altered
Speaker 2: and when you looked at was broken down into two things,
Speaker 2: one was caring for the Children and amazingly that had
Speaker 2: almost equalized between men and women.
Speaker 2: What was still unbelievably disproportionate on women was mental load
Speaker 2: of running the house and organizing children's activities. So, and
Speaker 2: you know, I think a lot of people would relate
Speaker 2: to this that your partner or your husband will be
Speaker 2: awesome at taking the kids to network or whatever as
Speaker 2: long as you tell them and you have enrolled the
Speaker 2: kids in netball, so you just have to still run everything.
Speaker 2: And so that was, I think it was something like 80%
Speaker 2: of the
Speaker 2: shitloads still fell predominantly on two and any women listening
Speaker 2: to this will know how full on and draining and
Speaker 2: exhausting that is like I was sitting at the logistics
Speaker 2: and I actually mentioned it to Justin my boss was
Speaker 2: sitting next to me, I was sitting at my table
Speaker 2: at the logistics, texting my nanny to the grocery list
Speaker 2: of what could I get to pick up the next
Speaker 2: day and giving her the plan for the morning for
Speaker 2: school drop
Speaker 2: as I'm sitting at the login because that was the
Speaker 2: first window I had to actually do that. I think
Speaker 2: that's you know the kind of thing that women relate
Speaker 2: to that that's your brain is ticking the entire time
Speaker 2: about okay what have I got to do to do that?
Speaker 2: And it's really exhausting.
Speaker 1: My favorite stories from women are the ones where worlds collide.
Speaker 1: I know there's a story about when you were pregnant
Speaker 1: and interviewing Penny wong.
Speaker 2: Oh
Speaker 2: so actually I had two funny things with Penny both
Speaker 2: times when I've been pregnant. So the first time I
Speaker 2: was pregnant I was at the midwinter ball in camera.
Speaker 2: Parliament House hadn't announced it publicly yet. And I was
Speaker 2: sitting next to Penny and her partner was sitting on
Speaker 2: her other side.
Speaker 2: And when I announced a few weeks later that I
Speaker 2: was pregnant, Penny rang me and she said I knew
Speaker 2: that you were pregnant because you and Sophie were pushing
Speaker 2: away identical food on your plate and she was expecting
Speaker 2: her first child as well. And she said I looked
Speaker 2: at what Sophie and it was also a secret. So
Speaker 2: I looked at Sophie was doing what you were doing
Speaker 2: and I thought she's pregnant and she said I didn't
Speaker 2: say anything because I didn't want to breach your privacy
Speaker 2: but I knew it. Anyway then when I was pregnant
Speaker 2: with James. So a couple of years later,
Speaker 2: I interviewed Penny and I forget who her counterpart was
Speaker 2: at the time, she was in government at the time,
Speaker 2: and the start of the interview slightly delayed because I
Speaker 2: felt sick and then I had to do the interview
Speaker 2: with a bucket in the studio next to me, I
Speaker 2: felt like I was going to be sick, and Penny
Speaker 2: rang me afterwards and she said, you know, and I
Speaker 2: know that you're pregnant again.
Speaker 2: I was catching myself, I was going, Penny literally both
Speaker 2: times that I've been pregnant mother because
Speaker 1: didn't you have to say to Penny, look if the
Speaker 1: vision cuts out, keep talking,
Speaker 1: I'm just having to have a little vomit.
Speaker 2: I was like you guys have to just keep it
Speaker 2: going and you'll see me disappear, they'll kill my mic
Speaker 2: and then I'll come back in that you're going to
Speaker 2: have to just keep it kind of going, you know,
Speaker 2: the perils of live television,
Speaker 1: Did you ever have to do that?
Speaker 2: No, I haven't ever thrown up on air. It's a
Speaker 2: constant terror actually with
Speaker 2: the kids because you know, young kids always have gastro
Speaker 2: and stuff. I remember one time, you know how many
Speaker 2: kids are young and they have gastro, I hope I'm
Speaker 2: not the only evil person that thinks this, but I'll
Speaker 2: often think when they're being sick, I'll be like feeling
Speaker 2: the pits of despair thinking God I'm going to have
Speaker 2: this in 12 hours and it's just
Speaker 1: like you know you're
Speaker 2: Getting it definitely. So I remember one
Speaker 2: the kids both had gastro and so I was like
Speaker 2: well this is going to be striking any moment, right?
Speaker 2: So you're always worried live television if you know there's
Speaker 2: about a gastro looming. Anyway, I got home at about
Speaker 2: 9 15, I started feeling really sick and then I
Speaker 2: was really crook. I remembered I texted Justin and said
Speaker 2: yeah I've got it but it's 9 15
Speaker 1: I'm out the other
Speaker 2: side, so to speak. It's going to be such a
Speaker 2: pleasure to kind of be able to live my life
Speaker 2: and not be worried that I'm going to throw up
Speaker 2: on live tv it's going to be good in
Speaker 1: terms of the demands of the way things have changed,
Speaker 1: not just with twitter but with people not tolerating other
Speaker 1: points of view because that's a new thing
Speaker 1: it used to be, I disagree with you now I
Speaker 1: disagree with you, you must apologize and take it down
Speaker 1: or delete it from the public record.
Speaker 1: Have you noticed a big shift in that we're just
Speaker 1: not able to tolerate opinions, we don't agree with any more.
Speaker 2: Yeah and I find it fundamentally disturbing and because I
Speaker 2: believe in free speech, I think it's really, really concerning
Speaker 2: that you can't just go well I disagree with that
Speaker 2: but whatever or even hateful opinions that you wouldn't just
Speaker 2: go well I disagree with that and
Speaker 2: your head, but you're right to believe whatever nonsense you
Speaker 2: want to believe. The other thing I find really disturbing
Speaker 2: is so we have a very, when I say we
Speaker 2: really what we're talking about again is the kind of
Speaker 2: cancel culture mob on twitter. There's a very low bar
Speaker 2: for mistakes. So you misspeak you word something awkwardly, you
Speaker 2: can find yourself at the end of a gigantic pile
Speaker 2: on
Speaker 2: and that can happen like that. There can be real
Speaker 2: world consequences for that. We've seen it over and over again.
Speaker 2: Universities accept people or magazines have sacked people. It doesn't
Speaker 2: matter what their record is, they could have an immaculate record,
Speaker 2: but one misstep you're out the door. So
Speaker 2: even when people apologize now we don't, forgiveness is very
Speaker 2: hard one. So it's a low bar for being canceled.
Speaker 2: It's a high bar to be forgiven. And for people
Speaker 2: to give like I sometimes wonder whatever happened that's saying
Speaker 2: the benefit of the doubt. Like, oh yes, you know me,
Speaker 2: you said something a bit clumsy or lee said something
Speaker 2: a bit clumsy. Generally speaking, we know her to be
Speaker 2: a person of good character who's done a lot of
Speaker 2: good in the world and so therefore we give her
Speaker 2: the
Speaker 2: benefit of the doubt, whereas now it's like, no, sorry
Speaker 2: you are a sexist or you are a racist or
Speaker 2: you are a bigot or whatever it is that gets
Speaker 2: directed at you. So I feel like if we're going
Speaker 2: to have these very stringent standards that we hold people to,
Speaker 2: surely we have to have a willingness to forgive people
Speaker 2: and give people space to be human. Because what it's
Speaker 2: going to do is it's going to discourage people from
Speaker 2: doing jobs like mine because
Speaker 2: when you're on live television or even doing an interview
Speaker 2: like this, you and I have been talking off the
Speaker 2: top of our head for the best part of 45
Speaker 2: minutes as a human being, you can't be certain in
Speaker 2: that period of time that you're not going to say
Speaker 2: something that offends somebody or that you're not actually going
Speaker 2: to say something offensive, you might actually make a mistake
Speaker 2: and say something wrong. So if we get to the
Speaker 2: point where society is so censorious of people that were
Speaker 2: we're all scared to even say a word for fear
Speaker 2: of offending somebody, we're going to be in a very
Speaker 2: bad place. And so I'm hoping somehow that we're going
Speaker 2: to have some kind of correction to some of the
Speaker 2: stuff we've seen happen of course some of the stuff
Speaker 2: we've seen happen is valuable because you want to call
Speaker 2: out sexism and racism and all kinds of stuff, what
Speaker 2: we don't want to do is
Speaker 2: have these just gigantic bullying episodes of people that do
Speaker 2: incredible harm. I recommend everyone read Jon ronson's book. So
Speaker 2: you've been publicly shamed, which talks about the consequences on
Speaker 2: people who even when they've done stupid things. Find themselves
Speaker 2: with lynch mobs after online. It's really disturbing and it's
Speaker 2: a sad trend
Speaker 1: just finally because I know you have to go and
Speaker 1: do your day job, I know you're working on a
Speaker 1: speech about the things you've learned about human nature, off
Speaker 1: the top of your head. What have been some of
Speaker 1: the more unexpected things that you've learned?
Speaker 2: I think that humans are unbelievably adaptable and the things
Speaker 2: that you think if that happened to me, I'd never
Speaker 2: survive that I wouldn't be I'd rather be dead than
Speaker 2: that happened to me. Almost everyone that you talked to
Speaker 2: who's experienced something that you yourself in your head would
Speaker 2: think that that's not how people feel when it actually
Speaker 2: happens to them. Humans are unbelievably adaptable and resilient.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of truisms that actually aren't true, like
Speaker 2: for example, hard work pays off. There's many examples in
Speaker 2: life where people have worked incredibly hard and just because
Speaker 2: of luck or happenstance or wrong timing, the hard work
Speaker 2: hasn't paid off. So the thing that's coming to my
Speaker 2: mind is Hillary Clinton, she runs in o a it's
Speaker 2: Barack Obama once in a lifetime amazing candidates. So she's
Speaker 2: an amazing candidate. She's worked really hard, it just didn't
Speaker 2: pay off happens all the time in politics as well,
Speaker 2: where you might have,
Speaker 2: you know, everyone on both sides, the winning and the
Speaker 2: losing side is working incredibly hard, but one side is
Speaker 2: still going to be the losing side and then Hillary
Speaker 2: clinton again of course with donald trump. So
Speaker 2: there's that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger? I
Speaker 2: don't actually necessarily believe that to be true. I think
Speaker 2: sometimes people are permanently weakened by things that happen to
Speaker 2: them and just profoundly changed by the burdens that life
Speaker 2: kind of puts on them. I think it makes you
Speaker 2: different I think rather than stronger. So I think they
Speaker 2: would be the probably most unexpected things. There's probably
Speaker 2: some, I mean I don't know that this is unexpected,
Speaker 2: but just things like if you want to achieve highly
Speaker 2: and reach goals, we all know that that's going to
Speaker 2: involve probably failure. Like you have to be prepared to
Speaker 2: embrace failure.
Speaker 2: But I also think working at your capacity means you
Speaker 2: have to be prepared that most of the time you're
Speaker 2: going to be operating in a space that makes you
Speaker 2: uncomfortable because you're always at the limits of what you're
Speaker 2: capable of doing and that's not a very comfortable place
Speaker 2: to operate so many times in my job, I feel uncomfortable,
Speaker 2: like anxious, scared, fearful because I'm operating right at the
Speaker 2: limits of what I'm
Speaker 2: capable of doing and so I think you have to
Speaker 2: be prepared to embrace that and understand that this is
Speaker 2: going to come with feeling uncomfortable, but the feeling at
Speaker 2: the other side of having done it is great because
Speaker 2: partly relief because you get away from the feeling of discomfort,
Speaker 2: but it's also that sense of accomplishment that I pushed
Speaker 2: through those kind of hard feelings.
Speaker 1: Did you have a catheter in on election night?
Speaker 2: I did not have a catheter in but I wasn't
Speaker 2: drinking water from about 1:00. The only way to get
Speaker 2: through it, I'm afraid
Speaker 2: because you're on for so long, you know, it was
Speaker 2: about six hours this time. It's been six hours every
Speaker 2: time I've hosted it and it just seems we can't
Speaker 2: have a quick election these days. And so Annabelle and
Speaker 2: I often talk about limiting, literally limiting our fluid intake
Speaker 1: like bodybuilders,
Speaker 2: Bodybuilders. Exactly, We look really buff by the end of
Speaker 2: election night, me and Annabelle
Speaker 1: really good muscle definition, that's why you do it.
Speaker 1: I love you, I thank you. And if twitter's done
Speaker 1: one thing in its life, it's introduced me to you,
Speaker 1: that's how we became friends. So
Speaker 2: Exactly, yeah. And you know, it did in the early days, twitter,
Speaker 2: it was wonderful for all the kind of eclectic people
Speaker 2: that you met that you wouldn't have come across, you know,
Speaker 2: and so yeah, I'll always be grateful for that too.
Speaker 2: I made some beautiful friends out of twitter. You chief
Speaker 2: among
Speaker 1: them. I love you, I
Speaker 2: love you.
Speaker 1: Did you love that? That's lee sales. Ladies and gentlemen,
Speaker 1: one of my favorite lee stories is that after she
Speaker 1: interviewed Shane warne, I don't know if you saw that interview.
Speaker 1: It was replayed just after he died recently and she
Speaker 1: knows nothing about sports. But still she really found him
Speaker 1: to be so engaging. They got on really, really well.
Speaker 1: And you can see that through the interview. Like he's
Speaker 1: a bit
Speaker 1: reticent at first, like he's kind of like, what does
Speaker 1: she want to talk to me about? But part of
Speaker 1: her skill as an interviewer is immediately putting people at
Speaker 1: ease whether they're Shane warne or a prime Minister during
Speaker 1: an election campaign or a treasurer on budget night or
Speaker 1: someone who's just experienced an enormous tragedy.
Speaker 1: So this report, she develops with her subjects often carries
Speaker 1: on and she tells the funniest story about how she
Speaker 1: and Shane, I think they were both promoting books at
Speaker 1: the same time. She was promoting any ordinary day and
Speaker 1: Shane was promoting, I don't know, he'd probably written an
Speaker 1: autobiography
Speaker 1: and so they would have these text banters about who
Speaker 1: could sign the most amount of books in the shortest
Speaker 1: amount of time and they have to do these book
Speaker 1: signings and they'd just be like trying to beat each
Speaker 1: other because lee is also very, very competitive. I hope
Speaker 1: you enjoyed that. You know where to find lee she's
Speaker 1: on the television, she's on a podcast. Please buy that
Speaker 1: book if you haven't already. Please buy that book for
Speaker 1: someone who might have suddenly experienced
Speaker 1: a tragedy or a sudden change in their life. I
Speaker 1: was sort of dreading reading it because it sounded really
Speaker 1: grim interviewing people like walter macaque after he lost his
Speaker 1: wife and his Children at Port Arthur or people who
Speaker 1: had suddenly lost loved ones in awful circumstances. But it
Speaker 1: was actually
Speaker 1: I had to read it obviously because she was my friend.
Speaker 1: But then I just loved it. It was so engaging,
Speaker 1: it was so conversational and you saw a side of
Speaker 1: lee that most people don't see. But also she just
Speaker 1: brought such humanity and nuance and context to these stories.
Speaker 1: It was just a beautiful, beautiful book.
Speaker 1: Anyway, no filter is produced by lots of people at
Speaker 1: the moment because Liz Ratliff, who is the executive producer
Speaker 1: is away. So it's been a cast of thousands involved
Speaker 1: in this one and I'm grateful to every single one
Speaker 1: of them.
Speaker 1: This podcast was made by Mama Mia. If you want
Speaker 1: to support women's media, we'd love it If you became
Speaker 1: a Mamma Mia subscriber there is a link in the
Speaker 1: show notes