Pauline Pantsdown set for a comeback?

  • 04/07/2016
Pauline Hanson's alter-ego, Pauline Pantsdown
Pauline Hanson's alter-ego, Pauline Pantsdown

With the success of controversial One Nation leader Pauline Hanson in Australia's election on Saturday, fans are wondering if parody character Pauline Pantsdown will make a comeback.

After 18 years, Ms Hanson is heading back to the Senate, running on a divisive policy of stopping Muslim immigration, banning Halal certification programmes, "abolishing multiculturalism" and reviewing the residency of 46,000 refugee boat arrivals to Australia.

Simon Hunt, a University of New South Wales media lecturer and LGBT activist, lampooned Hanson's "please explain" and "I don't like it" soundbites in the '90s with Pauline Pantsdown. So will he be bringing the character back from retirement?

"I've had about 75 messages saying, 'We're assuming Pauline Pantsdown will be back,'" Mr Hunt told the ABC.

"I'm not sure yet, but it's what people want. I don't know whether it's useful or not."

Pauline Pantsdown's songs were constructed by rearranging carefully clipped audio from Ms Hanson's interviews and speeches, which Mr Hunt said would be "a lot easier" to create than it was in the '90s.

Ms Hanson sued the ABC for Mr Hunt's single 'Backdoor Man', claiming defamation.

"I always have to go with the idea of whether I am raising her stakes," says Mr Hunt. "Who are her supporters this time around, and am I helping her cause by satirising her?

"Last time, when I had by 15 minutes of fame, it was Aboriginal people and Asian people who came up to me and said, 'Thank you for giving me a conduit to help me through the pain I felt'."

Ms Hanson has made radical proposals, including banning the burqa and niqab in public, installing surveillance cameras in mosques and banning Muslim MPs from being sworn in under the Koran.

She has also suggested having a royal commission into whether Islam is a religion.

Her One Nation party secured enough votes in Queensland for at least one Senate seat.

Newshub.