Deborah, Where For Art Thou?

Feature, By Tim D, 9th August, 2007

It must be lonely being a high profile Australian lesbian. You can count them on one hand. There’s Kerryn Phelps, her partner Jackie Stricker and…um…well, does Portia de Rossi really count?

Now television’s everywoman Deborah Hutton has been dragged silently screaming into the picture. The controversy surrounding Hutton’s sexuality exploded recently, with a small gossip item in a weekend newspaper snowballing into the closest thing to an outing the Australian public has seen since Australian Idol singer Anthony Callea came clean in March. You could almost hear the gasps coming from Mosman. Deborah Hutton? Surely not Our Deborah.

If she is indeed attracted to women, Hutton has a rare opportunity to educate the public that gays and lesbians come in all shapes and sizes. Yes, we can look great and cook well and gain the trust of the nation.

For the past decade, former Australian Medical Association President Kerryn Phelps and Jackie Stricker have been valiantly flying the flag as the public face of Australian lesbians, trying to pass it on to the next famous out woman. They are still waiting.

It’s the same situation in sport. When Ian Roberts came out as a gay footballer in 1995, it was heralded as a new era for the gay and lesbian community, proof that high profile Australians could be successful and truthful. Fast forward twelve lonely years, and not one first grade footballer – in any code – has since done the same thing.

This weak track record is hardly surprising given the leadership of the country. John Howard sat by idly last month as a report from Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission was tabled in parliament that showed Australia was in breach of its international human rights obligations in 58 pieces of federal legislation relating to same-sex couples. It’s hard to affect change from the top down, when the top doesn’t even acknowledge it as a problem.

But the real news story is not that Deborah Hutton may like women, it’s how she’s been able to keep it quiet for such a long time.

The answer is Harry M Miller, Hutton’s manager and ex-partner. In an obviously protective move when the story first broke, Miller poured petrol on a log fire and turned it into a bushfire. He called the talk of Hutton’s sexuality “vicious rumour and speculation” in a statement co-signed by Channel Nine and pointed the finger squarely at the media.

This is where Miller is very, very wrong. We live in an age of media scrutiny, YouTube accountability and blogging democracy. As a celebrity you have a social contract with your audience, and you can’t expect to lie to the public and get away with it anymore.

Since when is publishing a photo of a celebrity and their girlfriend “vicious”? The story would have died a quick, natural death if Miller hadn’t tried to turn the tables back onto the media for reporting on Hutton.

So she might be a lesbian? So what? The celebrity closet is starting to get a little overcrowded anyway, and there is plenty of room if you have the courage to step outside.

Take, for example, Lance Bass, a member of US pop group ‘NSync who declared he was gay one year ago last week. It was such a momentous pop culture moment for the American media (he landed the front cover of People Magazine) that the term “to be lanced” was coined as a phrase meaning to out a public person.

Bass posted a message on his Myspace to mark the one-year anniversary. “I swear it has been the most amazing experience,” he wrote. “Scary at times, but in the end the best thing I have ever done I want to thank everyone that has been so supportive and showing that this world has and will continue to change in the right direction…It’s 2007 people, there is no reason we should not be exactly who we want to be.”

And so Deborah Hutton has been pretty ungracefully “lanced”. It would have been better if it was her choice – heck, any time over the past seven years would have been good – but she’s now at a very important crossroads. Hutton can try to quietly tip-toe back inside the closet and pull the door quietly behind her, or she can be strongly encouraged to join Phelps and Stricker, Justice Kirby and Ian Roberts and stand proudly outside in the open.

If she does decide to stay inside, let’s just hope that she hasn’t shut the door so firmly that it’s harder for the next person to prise it back open.

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