Image via Instagram/@CharlesWaterstreet
Sydney barrister and accused sexual harasser Charles Waterstreet will feature on Q&A's upcoming #MeToo panel—alongside actress Rachel Griffiths, gender studies expert Professor Catharine Lumby, and employment lawyer Josh Bornstein. The decision by the ABC has prompted outcry online, largely because Waterstreet has recently been accused by law student Tina Huang of sexually harassing her while she was a paralegal in his office.In a piece for New Matilda, Huang accused Waterstreet of showing her "photos of naked women and a video of someone receiving a handjob." The Sydney University student also alleges the veteran lawyer—whose party antics inspired the lead character in the ABC show Rake—also bragged to her about "attending sex parties, having many girlfriends and enjoying threesomes.""This is the part of the story where you think I would have realised that something was wrong, but I didn’t," Huang wrote in October 2017. "He is famous and powerful and a cheeky, but genius man. I had seen his show on Netflix. Read his articles in the newspaper. Seen the paintings of him that they hang in the galleries. So, I went back."
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After the accusations came out, Waterstreet was banned from advertising for staff at the University of Sydney. Meanwhile the Sydney Morning Herald, where Waterstreet has been a columnist, gave the lawyer some 2,200 words for his response to Huang's New Matilda piece, which opens thus…
… and doesn't become much more coherent as it goes on.According to the ABC, there are still more panellists to be announced. Let's just hope Don Burke isn't available.I have more flaws than the Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building in Dubai. One of them is to make a joke of everything if I can. As you can see, I must now reluctantly make a statement, as a ripple has become a tsunami, and it affects the wellbeing of not just myself but those who I serve: my family and my friends. It is time to "man up", if that phrase does not offend the editor of the New Matilda, which is why I always prefer the Old Matilda, or even Waltzing Matilda for that matter.