Pauline Pantsdown

Pauline Pantsdown is an Australian satirist and Australian Senate candidate, best known for parodying Pauline Hanson, a controversial former member of federal parliament. Pantsdown's birth name was Simon Hunt, but he changed his name by deed poll so that he would appear on the electoral ballot as Pauline Pantsdown.

Pantsdown is a drag queen whose taste in fashion parodies Hanson's, and is best known for the songs "Backdoor Man" and "I Don't Like it". The song "Backdoor Man" was a huge hit on the youth radio network Triple J after its release in 1997, being played almost hourly due to a massive number of requests, making it into the 1997 "hottest 100" list at number 5. However, less than a week after its release, Hanson obtained a court injunction against the song, claiming it was defamatory. [http://www.sclqld.org.au/qjudgment/1998/QCA/306] In September 2004, after Hanson launched a campaign for the Australian Senate, the ABC was reported to be planning a challenge to the injunction. However, after public criticism from Hanson, the ABC backed down.

Homebake Appearance

The resulting controversy resulted in Pauline Pantsdown making an appearance at the 1998 Homebake live music festival, complete with apparently gay half naked Asian dancers. He suffered the indignity of being booed and pelted with objects and later claimed "Homophobia is alive and well in Sydney".

Songs

"Backdoor Man" [http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/10296/20010907/www.dot.net.au/_galconv/back%20door%20man.mp3] consists of a series of samples of Hanson's speeches stuck together to form sentences such as "I'm a backdoor man. I'm homosexual. I'm proud of it", and "I'm a backdoor man for the Ku Klux Klan with a very horrendous plan. I'm a very caring potato", parodying Hanson's conservative politics. Hanson vehemently condemned the track, claiming that the song portrayed her as a prostitute and a transsexual.

After the injunction over "Backdoor Man", Pantsdown released the follow up single "I Don't Like It" in response. Once again the song used segments of Hanson's voice to parody her, this time with equally ridiculous but less personal lyrics such as "Why can't my blood be coloured white? I should talk to some medical doctors, coloured blood is just not right". Once again the song was a hit on Triple J and peaked in the ARIA Charts at #10 during the 1998 federal election campaign.

In 2004, on the "Rock Against Howard" compilation, Pauline Pantsdown released the song "I'm Sorry" under the pseudonym "Little Johnny", which had appeared as a download on her website some three years earlier with a video. This song used the same techniques to parody John Howard's refusal to apologise to the Aboriginal people of Australia over the stolen generation.

External links

* [http://www.pantsdown.wild.net.au/ The Unofficial Pauline Pantsdown Fan Club]
* [http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/10296/20010907/www.dot.net.au/_galconv/back%20door%20man.mp3 "Backdoor Man" MP3]
* [http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/30years/video/pantsdownhi.asx ABC television news story on the "Backdoor Man" lawsuit] - contains video footage of Ms Hanson and Ms Pantsdown outside the Supreme Court of Queensland