Live And Learn, Don't Mess With Australian Women

By Darryl Mason

Gordon Ramsay doesn't get a lot of lip back from the women he insults in the British media, or the women he rains torrents of verbal abuse down on in his TV shows. You don't often, or ever, see women he's insulted get in his face and tell him to fuck off.

While Tracey Grimshaw and A Current Affair have been quick to capitalise on Ramsay's dickheaded attempt to be a stand-up comedian while in Australia, turning it into a ratings and profile bonanza for Grimshaw, it's been curious to see Ramsay's reaction to having a media shitstorm explode around him.

He's not in control of this, he's not in the bully domain of his kitchen, his kingdom, he's not in charge, and female journalists are now chasing him into hotel foyers shouting, "What do you want to call me, HUH?"

He needed a security guard to step in and stop the women who challenged him yesterday. He looked panicked. Worried. Uneasy.

Ramsay knows what his audience, and potential future audiences, across the world are seeing about him blasted across headlines and leading evening news bulletins. It's not tough Ramsay, or Sweary Ramsay, it's Weird & Creepy Ramsay :

...he showed an audience of several thousand at the Melbourne Good Food and Wine show a doctored photograph of a woman naked on all fours, with multiple breasts and a pig's face, announcing that it depicted Grimshaw, who had interviewed him on the previous night.

Yeah, that's not what anyone could call a whole load of good publicity.

Today, Tracey Grimshaw is soaking up the banner headlines and column inches of UK tabloids with her mostly impressive Go Hard back at Ramsay :

"Obviously Gordon thinks that any woman who doesn't find him attractive must be gay. For the record, I don't. And I'm not."

"Gordon Ramsay made me promise not to ask on Friday about his private life. He then got on stage on Saturday and made some very clear and uninformed insinuations about mine."

"We all know that bullies thrive when no one takes them on, and I'm not going to sit meekly and let some arrogant narcissist bully me."

"The guy's sort of on the ropes in many ways … his marriage must have been put under enormous pressure at the end of last year, his business has clearly been under enormous pressure, and his shows don't rate as well as they used to."

As Ramsay would put it, Fucking Ouch.

Tracey Grimshaw, thanks to Ramsay and A Current Affair quickly moving to make this minor news event into one hell of a big deal, is now enjoying spectacular ratings, and a sudden international profile.

And as sad as it is to say, this is a big story internationally, for this week at least.

So Kevin Rudd is not going to miss out on this action :

"All I could describe his remarks as reflecting is a new form of low life...'

New form of low life isn't bad, a bit over the top, but then that's Rudd, when he wants to hand over some instant headlines, and it sort of sounds like something a detective might have said on Underbelly.

But deputy PM Julia Gillard absolutely nails the moment :

"I think what he should do is confine himself to the kitchen and make nice things for people to eat..."

In other words, get back in the kitchen, food man. It's good advice.

Ramsay can learn a lot about delivering a killer funny line, with true sting and wit, from Julia Gillard.

While the publicity might seem to be a good thing, as in no publicity is bad publicity, for Ramsay's news series on Channel Nine, we may see Channel Nine actually use this opportunity to dump the expensive Ramsay now his ratings are heading for the toilet. Will all this media attention make more people tune into his show? Probably not. And when Channel Nine bails on his show, they will make it look like they smacked down this Jock git in the process.

It's not always a surprise to hear in the media that some famously aggressive man has punched a woman in the face, there has been plenty of that lately. But what Ramsay did in making that huge photo of multi-titted pig woman a part of his show was just downright bizarre, weird and plenty creepy. Forget Grimshaw. Why would he want to expose his audience to that?

And ulimatey it might prove harder for Ramsay to live down. Does he think the pig woman photo is funny? Or does he think it's erotic?

Maybe he should just call the whole bizarre episode A Piece Of Performance Art, instead of trying to make it sound like he has been treated unfairly, and done over.

It must cause Ramsay at least some grief that, yet again, women have again exposed him for the fuckwit that he is.


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