# Raf Epstein on a week that’s left him ‘punch drunk’

An episode of [7am](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1461999702), 23 Oct 2026, 18 min.

Audio: https://p.podderapp.com/2544644999/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/2fb3740d-3436-44af-8cc0-a91900716aa5/62723a1f-3e96-4fc4-882c-b25e0181da4d/ae4788f9-4a61-4b3a-9b95-b4ec00364e8d/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=70f29d90-2a63-48aa-bf8f-b25e0181da70

It’s been a week of shock and grief. The attack on Helen Haines has left her family and the community she represents confronting a trauma that has reverberated across the country and whose consequences will endure long after the headlines have moved on. In Canberra, there have been calls for restraint, for care with words and for an end to the cruelty that has become so familiar in our public life. Those calls ask politicians and the media to recognise the weight of our words and our collective responsibility for the tone we accept in public debate. Today, ABC Melbourne’s Raf Epstein on a devastating week, the habits we’ve come to accept, and whether this moment will change anything once the political contest resumes. If you enjoy 7am, the best way you can support us is by making a contribution at 7ampodcast.com.au/support. Socials: Stay in touch with us on Instagram Guest: ABC Melbourne host Raf Epstein Photo: AAP Image/James Ross See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:01] Speaker 1: I'm Daniel James, and you're listening to 7am. It's been
[0:08] Speaker 1: a week of shock and grief. The attack on Helen
[0:11] Speaker 1: Haynes has left her family and the community she represents
[0:14] Speaker 1: confronting a trauma that has reverberated across the country, and
[0:18] Speaker 1: whose consequences will endure long after the headlines have moved on.
[0:22] Speaker 1: In Canberra, there have been calls for restraint, for care
[0:25] Speaker 1: with words, and for an end to the cruelty that
[0:28] Speaker 1: has become so familiar in our public life. Those calls
[0:31] Speaker 1: ask politicians and the media to recognise the weight of
[0:34] Speaker 1: our words and our collective responsibility for the tone we
[0:38] Speaker 1: accept in public debate. Today, ABC Melbourne's Raf Epstein, on
[0:43] Speaker 1: a devastating week, the habits we've come to accept and
[0:46] Speaker 1: whether this moment will change anything once the political contest resumes.
[0:53] Speaker 1: It's Saturday, October 24th. Raph, it's been a brutal week
[1:03] Speaker 1: for Helen Haynes and her family, first and foremost, but
[1:06] Speaker 1: also for the country as we come to grips with
[1:09] Speaker 1: this tragedy. This happened in your home state. You're talking
[1:12] Speaker 1: to people every day on the radio. How are you
[1:15] Speaker 1: and how are they reflecting on this?
[1:17] Speaker 2: I'm going to use a phrase that probably I shouldn't use,
[1:20] Speaker 2: but I feel punch drunk after this week.
[1:23] Speaker 3: I don't have a better way to describe it.
[1:25] Speaker 2: There's something about when violence lands in our political system,
[1:28] Speaker 2: no matter what the motive.
[1:29] Speaker 3: I think we all feel it.
[1:31] Speaker 2: I especially felt it on the Tuesday after being on
[1:34] Speaker 2: the radio and hearing from people. I felt it especially
[1:37] Speaker 2: with a few of the politicians who came to the
[1:39] Speaker 2: studio yesterday.
[1:41] Speaker 3: They looked white as sheets.
[1:42] Speaker 2: They looked devastated by something they all felt viscerally and personally.
[1:47] Speaker 3: And then when people rang in, the shock feels real
[1:53] Speaker 3: and personal.
[1:54] Speaker 2: My own personal opinion is that any violence that happens
[1:58] Speaker 2: within our political system is scary. Because the motives, as
[2:04] Speaker 2: important as they are, and this is violence against a woman,
[2:07] Speaker 2: this is violence in the workplace, those things are drastically underreported.
[2:11] Speaker 2: But violence in our politics is a little bit terrifying
[2:16] Speaker 2: because it makes everything in our politics worse. Everything that
[2:20] Speaker 2: gets weaponised, everything we disagree about, just gets worse. And
[2:24] Speaker 2: I think that's how a tonne of people felt this week.
[2:28] Speaker 1: There's still so much we don't know about what happened.
[2:30] Speaker 1: It looks like there might be a mental health aspect
[2:33] Speaker 1: to this. There might be some political motivation around it.
[2:37] Speaker 1: But regardless of the motivation and how this played out,
[2:41] Speaker 1: it did get us talking about political threats and violence
[2:45] Speaker 1: and about some of the toxic rhetoric on social media
[2:48] Speaker 1: and in Canberra. Is that perhaps a silver lining to this,
[2:53] Speaker 1: the fact that we're having that conversation as a country?
[2:55] Speaker 3: I hope so. I hope so.
[2:58] Speaker 2: That's a lovely way to frame it. I mean, there's
[3:01] Speaker 2: two things to say about whether or not it's a
[3:03] Speaker 2: silver lining. Firstly, one of the reasons I think journos
[3:07] Speaker 2: and politicians have reacted so strongly is we're all waiting
[3:10] Speaker 2: for this. Not that motives aren't important. Not that many
[3:14] Speaker 2: people were surprised. Like I'm sitting in a studio where
[3:17] Speaker 2: I have a, you know, raw access to the text
[3:20] Speaker 2: message feed when I'm on air and People who broadcast
[3:24] Speaker 2: from the studio, Patricia Carvellis, Virginia Trioli, they get much
[3:28] Speaker 2: worse than I get.
[3:29] Speaker 3: Much worse.
[3:29] Speaker 2: That's not saying I don't get nasty stuff, but Jesus,
[3:32] Speaker 2: it's terrible for women in public life. It's just horrific.
[3:36] Speaker 2: Is there a silver lining in the fact that we're
[3:38] Speaker 2: talking about it? There's only one answer to that.
[3:42] Speaker 3: Yes.
[3:43] Speaker 2: Because if the answer is no, then we're in so
[3:46] Speaker 2: much trouble. What I've really struggled with this week is,
[3:50] Speaker 2: I don't think there is a silver lining. It only
[3:52] Speaker 2: feels like it's getting worse. But you can't leave it there.
[3:55] Speaker 2: Like you can't, even if you're in your heart and
[3:58] Speaker 2: your guts, you feel, oh, geez, it's.
[4:00] Speaker 3: Just getting worse. Like democracy is a participation sport, isn't it?
[4:05] Speaker 3: You know, hope's a verb.
[4:06] Speaker 2: Whatever cliche I can come up with, like we've got
[4:09] Speaker 2: to try. We've got to make it better. So is
[4:11] Speaker 2: there a silver lining? Sure, yeah, there is because hopefully.
[4:15] Speaker 3: Our politics.
[4:18] Speaker 2: Maybe we'll all think a bit harder about how we participate.
[4:23] Speaker 1: You've spoken to a number of politicians this week and
[4:25] Speaker 1: you've mentioned how viscerally they're feeling this moment. But do
[4:30] Speaker 1: you think anything will change in Parliament, though? Because just
[4:33] Speaker 1: last week we saw the most horrendous One Nation video
[4:36] Speaker 1: making fun of Jackie Lambie's deep personal health condition.
[4:40] Speaker 4: The cartoon, which has now been taken down, mocked the senator...
[4:44] Speaker 4: who recently revealed she'd had a vaginal and bladder prolapse.
[4:47] Speaker 2: And I do apologise for that, and I've already spoken
[4:50] Speaker 2: to them about it.
[4:51] Speaker 3: It does bear my name.
[4:53] Speaker 2: And I've got to take responsibility for that, and I
[4:55] Speaker 2: accept that.
[4:57] Speaker 1: A couple of weeks ago, we had a Liberal MP
[4:59] Speaker 1: saying that the PM and a small business minister, Anne Arleigh,
[5:01] Speaker 1: should be shamed and stoned.
[5:03] Speaker 4: This Prime Minister should be absolutely shamed and stoned in
[5:08] Speaker 4: the square.
[5:09] Speaker 1: Is this a turning point? at least for that type
[5:12] Speaker 1: of rhetoric, or is it just a temporary truce?
[5:15] Speaker 3: It's such a hard question to answer, Daniel.
[5:18] Speaker 2: So firstly, your examples there, the One Nation video and
[5:22] Speaker 2: the Liberal MP saying people in Labor should be publicly stoned,
[5:25] Speaker 2: the people in those parties, in One Nation and the
[5:28] Speaker 2: Liberal Party, they've got their own examples.
[5:31] Speaker 3: Anthony Albanese's dirt file.
[5:33] Speaker 2: Everyone's got an example of how the other side are worse.
[5:39] Speaker 2: Every media organisation says the other media organisation's worse. That's
[5:44] Speaker 2: why this is so scary. Everyone knows it's like pouring
[5:48] Speaker 2: petrol on the divisions we've got and everyone says, oh, yeah,
[5:52] Speaker 2: I could have done better.
[5:53] Speaker 3: And I should do better.
[5:54] Speaker 2: Actually, one of the things I asked the PM this
[5:56] Speaker 2: week was, I said something along the lines of, you
[6:00] Speaker 2: think in your heart of hearts you're not the biggest
[6:02] Speaker 2: part of the problem.
[6:03] Speaker 3: The other guys are the biggest part of the problem.
[6:05] Speaker 5: Countless occasions.
[6:06] Speaker 3: But you don't think your side's the real problem, do you?
[6:12] Speaker 5: I don't think anyone is immune from that message. My side,
[6:19] Speaker 5: every side included. We all have to recognise that politics
[6:27] Speaker 5: has got more aggressive.
[6:31] Speaker 2: The Prime Minister did a decent job of saying, yes,
[6:36] Speaker 2: it's up to me and But I, you know, what
[6:40] Speaker 2: he appears in public is the same in private. He
[6:44] Speaker 2: hates some of the media. I hate some of the media.
[6:47] Speaker 2: Everyone hates some of the media. Everyone thinks, actually, the
[6:51] Speaker 2: real problem is over there. That's why this is just difficult.
[6:55] Speaker 2: And we've all got examples. You saw as soon as
[6:58] Speaker 2: Helen Haynes got attacked, everyone's out of the gate. Out
[7:01] Speaker 2: of the gate straight away. I had the Premier Ben
[7:03] Speaker 2: Carroll on, the Victorian Premier, and he was saying, one
[7:05] Speaker 2: nation's rhetoric around all politicians are corrupt.
[7:08] Speaker 3: That's the problem. That's what we've got to stop.
[7:11] Speaker 4: We do need to be mindful of any rhetoric that
[7:16] Speaker 4: is broadcasting that governments are failure, the system's rigged against you.
[7:22] Speaker 4: You're never going to get ahead. Any rhetoric that is
[7:25] Speaker 4: all about despair and nothing about positivity, we need to
[7:31] Speaker 4: call out.
[7:32] Speaker 2: We can't even have a conversation about what are the causes,
[7:35] Speaker 2: who's at fault. As soon as Ben Carroll says all
[7:38] Speaker 2: politicians are corrupt or the whole uniparty, that jargon, that's wrong,
[7:43] Speaker 2: that's bad. You can't say Labor and Liberal are the same.
[7:46] Speaker 2: But then all the One Nation and the Green supporters go, no,
[7:48] Speaker 2: that's exactly the problem. You guys are the same. So
[7:53] Speaker 2: everyone goes, let's lower the temperature.
[7:54] Speaker 3: Sure. Everyone says, yep, it's my fault too.
[7:58] Speaker 2: And the very next conversation is, no, no, the very
[8:01] Speaker 2: thing you think is the problem is the thing I
[8:04] Speaker 2: see as the truth.
[8:06] Speaker 3: And you add violence to.
[8:07] Speaker 2: That, that's why it's destabilising and feels quite, it kind
[8:11] Speaker 2: of hits you in your guts and in your heart
[8:13] Speaker 2: in a way a lot of other political events don't.
[8:19] Speaker 1: Coming up, the shifting sands of division. And Raf, you
[8:33] Speaker 1: mentioned the media's role in all of this. The Prime
[8:36] Speaker 1: Minister has been everywhere saying that we need to turn
[8:40] Speaker 1: the temperature down.
[8:40] Speaker 5: It is the case, I think, across the board that
[8:45] Speaker 5: we all have a responsibility to turn the temperature down.
[8:49] Speaker 3: It is something that.
[8:51] Speaker 1: But we've seen some really divisive reactions from some corners
[8:54] Speaker 1: of the media. Perhaps the most jarring was a headline
[8:57] Speaker 1: in The Australian, plant person and pro-Gaza radical Brendan Nugent
[9:00] Speaker 1: arrested over Helen Haynes. What have you made of the
[9:04] Speaker 1: coverage from some aspects of the media? I could fill books, Daniel,
[9:09] Speaker 1: with the media, I think, that get it wrong. But
[9:14] Speaker 1: in the interest of trying to bring the temperature down...
[9:18] Speaker 1: Clearly that headline, I'm not sure it helps us. The
[9:21] Speaker 1: day after it happened, I mentioned that interview with Ben Carroll.
[9:25] Speaker 2: I was accused and I got mentioned by a columnist
[9:29] Speaker 2: in the Herald Sun who's well known around the country.
[9:31] Speaker 2: I was part of the problem because I was introducing
[9:34] Speaker 2: the idea that some of our nation's rhetoric is part
[9:37] Speaker 2: of the problem.
[9:39] Speaker 3: We're so at odds.
[9:40] Speaker 2: You see that headline and you think, oh, hang on,
[9:43] Speaker 2: that's the very thing that's part of the problem, isn't it?
[9:47] Speaker 2: And then people listening to my show are like, oh,
[9:49] Speaker 2: Raf's talking about One Nation's rhetoric. I ask politicians from
[9:53] Speaker 2: time to time, hold on, when Pauline Hanson says the
[9:55] Speaker 2: things she says about Muslims, is that racist? I think
[9:59] Speaker 2: that's a reasonable question. Not everyone does. A ton of
[10:02] Speaker 2: people think, no, no, RAF's the problem. You can't say
[10:06] Speaker 2: these people are racist. Now, there's a whole lot of
[10:09] Speaker 2: rights and wrongs in that debate, but we don't agree
[10:12] Speaker 2: on that stuff.
[10:13] Speaker 3: That's what's changed.
[10:15] Speaker 2: One of the phrases Ben Carroll used this week is
[10:17] Speaker 2: we're in a post-fact information age. I'm not sure that's
[10:20] Speaker 2: going to get much of a run on the hustings
[10:22] Speaker 2: in the election, but we are post-fact and post-truth in
[10:25] Speaker 2: some ways. I don't believe the world is without facts
[10:29] Speaker 2: and truth, but we all know we're all in our
[10:33] Speaker 2: own little echo chambers. We struggle to talk to people
[10:37] Speaker 2: in their echo chambers.
[10:39] Speaker 3: That's why this is so scary.
[10:43] Speaker 1: There's been a lot of finger pointing at social media,
[10:46] Speaker 1: pointing at parliament, pointing at the left and the right
[10:49] Speaker 1: and pointing at each other. But what about the news media?
[10:52] Speaker 1: Have they slash we turned a magnifying glass on ourselves
[10:57] Speaker 1: and acknowledged the role that we have in the tone
[10:59] Speaker 1: of this national discussion?
[11:01] Speaker 2: We are unlicensed, unregulated. You don't need permission. You don't
[11:08] Speaker 2: need any training before you are unleashed. on the public
[11:14] Speaker 2: and that's just the mainstream media, let alone social media.
[11:16] Speaker 2: Have we turned a good lens on ourselves?
[11:19] Speaker 3: Nah, not really. Well, we all.
[11:23] Speaker 2: Tell ourselves every day that's what we're doing. That's what
[11:25] Speaker 2: we do every day. We fact check and we bring
[11:28] Speaker 2: context and we weigh up our values and our editorial
[11:33] Speaker 2: mission and we seek to illuminate public affairs and we
[11:37] Speaker 2: do that and we're just as good at turning that
[11:39] Speaker 2: scrutiny on ourselves. But everyone who hates what we do
[11:43] Speaker 2: doesn't think we're doing anything differently. That's the world we're in.
[11:48] Speaker 2: Violence in politics terrifies me. I mean that genuinely. And
[11:55] Speaker 2: I don't want to shut down anybody. But it just,
[12:00] Speaker 2: the experience overseas is that violence leads to more polarisation
[12:05] Speaker 2: because that is what violence does. Politics is all we've got, right?
[12:10] Speaker 2: Politics is all we've got to grapple with the irrational.
[12:12] Speaker 2: We kid ourselves, I think, that politics is about the rational.
[12:16] Speaker 2: Politics actually isn't about that. Human beings have irrational disagreements
[12:21] Speaker 2: and we need a system to resolve that That's what
[12:25] Speaker 2: politics tries to do. But once you have violence within that,
[12:30] Speaker 2: it's all emotion and no rationality. And that's why this
[12:36] Speaker 2: is difficult. And that's why I'm finding it, I don't
[12:38] Speaker 2: know how familiar people are with me, I'm quite good
[12:41] Speaker 2: at coming up with answers. You know, I can come
[12:43] Speaker 2: up with quite a few plausible things. I'm finding your
[12:46] Speaker 2: questions really difficult to answer because when there's no common
[12:51] Speaker 2: ground and there isn't common ground and there's such a
[12:54] Speaker 2: volume of information within which there is no common ground,
[12:58] Speaker 2: where do you stand? What's your opinion? Like what do
[13:01] Speaker 2: you think of the media and the media's performance?
[13:04] Speaker 1: I think we live in an age where the media's
[13:06] Speaker 1: performance feeds directly into people's algorithms and those algorithms become
[13:10] Speaker 1: echo chambers and that's what leads to a lot of
[13:13] Speaker 1: the division that we're suffering at the moment. I think
[13:16] Speaker 1: that mainstream media has geared itself around the algorithms of
[13:20] Speaker 1: social media to amplify their message but also their revenue
[13:24] Speaker 1: and that's part of the problem as well.
[13:26] Speaker 3: They're all good points. They're better answers than mine.
[13:29] Speaker 1: Finally, Raf, as you've been describing, we live in extremely
[13:32] Speaker 1: tumultuous times. I will venture to say that you are
[13:36] Speaker 1: a veteran journalist. You've been around a lot of big stories,
[13:39] Speaker 1: but can you think of another domestic story that has
[13:42] Speaker 1: raised so many questions for us as a society, a polity,
[13:47] Speaker 1: and for us as individuals?
[13:50] Speaker 3: That's a big question.
[13:51] Speaker 2: I mean, I have been doing this for more than
[13:54] Speaker 2: 30 years, so you never want to say one story
[13:57] Speaker 2: is bigger than another. You know, like Port Arthur, 9-11 incident, COVID,
[14:04] Speaker 2: the revolving prime ministers. I mean, when you look back
[14:08] Speaker 2: on the 31 years, you can see some commonalities.
[14:12] Speaker 3: War on terror.
[14:14] Speaker 2: There's a lot of markers on the road to where
[14:17] Speaker 2: we are now.
[14:19] Speaker 3: Have there been other stories that are bigger?
[14:21] Speaker 2: Yeah, sure.
[14:22] Speaker 3: There's always bigger stories. But I think the reason this story.
[14:26] Speaker 2: Is a little bit different is A, it's violence and
[14:29] Speaker 2: we don't normally have violence in our politics, on our streets,
[14:32] Speaker 2: aimed at our politicians for whatever reasons and we let
[14:35] Speaker 2: the courts decide what those reasons are. But there's something
[14:39] Speaker 2: else that I guess we haven't spoken about and maybe
[14:41] Speaker 2: this again is the problem with the media, that it
[14:44] Speaker 2: happened to Helen Haynes. Two things about Helen Haynes. Number one,
[14:49] Speaker 2: I've interviewed her, I haven't met her. Everyone says she's
[14:53] Speaker 2: just a thoroughly nice, decent, in the connection she has
[14:59] Speaker 2: with her community. Like she is the epitome of what
[15:02] Speaker 2: we want our politics to be. She is deeply committed
[15:06] Speaker 2: and connected to the people who voted for her and
[15:10] Speaker 2: to the people who did not vote for her in
[15:13] Speaker 2: her community.
[15:14] Speaker 3: Which is a pretty amazing thing in the age that
[15:16] Speaker 3: we live in.
[15:17] Speaker 2: Secondly, she's voted in on a ticket and she is
[15:21] Speaker 2: the first independent to take over from another independent in
[15:24] Speaker 2: our parliament. The whole point of Helen Haynes' political project
[15:28] Speaker 2: is integrity in politics, the opposite of all of the difficult,
[15:34] Speaker 2: painful things I've been raising with you. She's the epitome
[15:37] Speaker 2: of trying to fight against that. all say that she
[15:44] Speaker 2: is that. So that's why this, I won't say it's bigger,
[15:47] Speaker 2: but that's why it feels so unique. I think that
[15:50] Speaker 2: they're really important parts of this because she's supposed to
[15:54] Speaker 2: be the antidote. She's supposed to be the tonic, the medicine,
[16:00] Speaker 2: and yet the violence happened to her. And I'm sure
[16:02] Speaker 2: there are people listening to this going, but it wasn't political.
[16:04] Speaker 2: We don't know. I want to return to a point
[16:08] Speaker 2: I made before. Politics, it's all about us. They are
[16:12] Speaker 2: our representatives. It's how we sort. It's how we say
[16:16] Speaker 2: what we value. It's how we make decisions collectively. So
[16:19] Speaker 2: when the violence drops in that pond, the motive doesn't matter.
[16:25] Speaker 3: So I think that's why it resonates. That's why it
[16:29] Speaker 3: feels so disturbing for so many of us.
[16:35] Speaker 1: Well, Raph, it's always a pleasure having you on the show.
[16:37] Speaker 1: Enjoy the rest of your weekend.
[16:39] Speaker 3: Have a great weekend, everybody. Onwards and upwards to all
[16:43] Speaker 3: of us.
[17:00] Speaker 1: 7am is a daily show from Solstice Media. It's made
[17:03] Speaker 1: by Atticus Bastow, Chris Dengate, Crystal Keller, Renee Auckland, Ruby Jones,
[17:08] Speaker 1: Travis Evans, Yo Chung, Zoltan Fecho Jr. and me, Daniel James.
[17:15] Speaker 1: Our theme music is by Ned Beckley and Josh Hogan
[17:17] Speaker 1: of Envelope Audio. And if you would like to support
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[17:34] Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to 7am this week. Take care and
[17:37] Speaker 1: have a great weekend.

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