Julia Baird
Julia Baird is an author, broadcaster and journalist.
Her writing has appeared in a range of publications including the Daily Beast, Harpers Bazaar, the Guardian, the Good Weekend, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Monthly, Newsweek, the New York Times, and the Sydney Morning Herald.
In 2011, she returned from the United States, where she worked as a columnist and deputy editor of Newsweek. In 2005, she was a fellow at the Joan Shorenstein Center of Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard, where she wrote a paper on the export of American opinion to allied countries in the lead up to the war in Iraq.
Before then, she worked at the Sydney Morning Herald as a columnist, education and political reporter, election editor and oped editor. Her first book, drawn from her PhD in history, was Media Tarts: How the Australian Media Frames Female Politicians. She wrote a biography of Queen Victoria published in 2013.
Latest by Julia Baird
Analysis
analysis:I've been ocean swimming for years, I know how to spot a rip. Last weekend, I almost drowned in one
Last weekend, whilst swimming in what looked like a protected natural rock pool, I was pulled into a dangerous rip that was dumping onto a reef. My mind cleared as I slowed down and I thought: "So this is it. This is how people drown."
Analysis
analysis:Ozempic 'oops babies' should make women think twice about weight loss drugs
Yet again, the manufacturers of a wildly popular drug, taken by millions of women globally, have not collected data on what this drug might do to a woman's reproductive organs or offspring.
Pastor Jon Owen needs six things to keep his mental health in check. Number one is NOT yoga
Jon Owen, the pastor of Sydney's Wayside Chapel, has spent decades caring for the broken, eschewing a comfortable life for one of radical compassion. He's learned he needs to commit to certain regular habits in order to protect his own mental health, writes Julia Baird.
If the Hallmark version of Mother's Day feels like a punch in the gut, you're not alone
For many of us, Mother's Day is a time when our hearts are a bit sore. I miss my own mother so much. I miss her humour, her levity, her wisdom, and the way she made everything seem better. So how should we think about this day when grief is still fresh?
His disappointing affirmations make millions laugh, but Dave Tarnowksi has serious stuff to say about mental illness
Dave Tarnowski's disappointing affirmations are making millions on Instagram laugh. But his point is serious: As a man who has lived with depression and anxiety his entire life, he wants to strip stigma from mental illness and make people feel seen.
After a gruelling, traumatic sexual assault trial, Saxon Mullins says a pop song saved her life
It's been more than a decade since Saxon Mullins accused a man of raping her behind his father's nightclub in Kings Cross. Since then she's learned a lot about endurance — and the life-saving power of pop music.
Analysis
analysis:How rape can be turned into a culture war boggles the mind. But this case was politicised at the starting gate
Now might be a good time to reflect on how devotedly and brutally mastheads and prominent commentators seek to undermine, discredit and destroy women who allege sexual assault, or report on it.
Crochet is more than craft — these women know the innate stillness and healing power that knitting can bring
The steady click of needles and hooks on couches around Australia tells us that knitters have been onto the very real therapeutic benefits of crochet for a long time, writes Julia Baird.
Analysis
analysis:Jamila Rizvi on how to keep going in the face of illness
After being diagnosed with a rare brain tumour in 2017, author and commentator Jamila Rizvi drew on the strength of her support network to stay upright. "Our narratives of illness are, in my view, too focused on stoicism and solitude," she says.
Analysis
analysis:Vyleen White was killed in a freak attack. Two things kept her daughter Cindy afloat
How do you go on when you lose someone you love in a flash, a blink, a moment? When they go to the shops and never return? In the immediate aftermath, is it even possible?
Analysis
analysis:Why are we so consumed by what 'should be' done as a doubtless traumatised 42-year-old mother grapples with her health?
You might hope we'd think for a moment about what it might be like to confront mortality as a baying mob rifles through your medical records, presses their faces up against your window, screaming, demanding you reveal yourself now.
Analysis
analysis:'Seven times down, eight times up': When life is hard, how do we go on?
One of the greatest myths is that by just being positive, or cheerful, we can somehow erase our problems. What I'm more interested in is the simpler question of: how do we go on?
Analysis
analysis:Inside the 'holy war' against Taylor Swift and the men driving it
With the number of eyes fixed on Taylor Swift’s glittering ascension, any political figure who would dismiss her as a woman unaware of her own power — or unprepared to wield it — would be a fool, writes Julia Baird.
Analysis
analysis:Viewers stopped us in the street to talk about The Drum. Two things usually came up
In its final week long-time co-hosts Julia Baird and Ellen Fanning pay tribute to The Drum's legacy of sharing, listening and inclusion.
On dark days, through chronic illness, hunting awe has saved me. It can transform your life, too
For awe hunters, the everyday is often the extraordinary and the smallest wonders can be transformative. Their secrets can be yours, too — you just need to open your eyes.
Analysis
analysis:The five tropes that still plague women in power
Today, women MPs are no longer staying quiet, bending like pretzels to fit into politics as they once did. Patience is wearing out, writes Julia Baird.
Domestic abuse more prevalent amongst Anglicans, 'tragic' new research finds
A landmark report has found the incidence of domestic abuse is greater amongst Anglicans in Australia than the general population.
Liberal Party 'boys' club' culture concerns raised in leaked 2015 report
The confidential report, sent to The Drum, indicates the party was made aware of concerns around bullying and intimidation in 2015, with women reporting being silenced at meetings and men engaging in chauvinistic behaviour.
Investigation into death at Sydney childcare centre leads to charges
Jozef Maragol and Anet Eyvazians were left shattered when their 16-month-old daughter was pronounced dead hours after they dropped her off at day care. Now, charges have been laid and the date set for a coronial inquest, but questions remain about why it has taken so long to investigate Arianna's death.
As people retreat to their homes, concerns grow for women who live in fear
Frontline workers are preparing for "escalating rates" of domestic violence amid the coronavirus crisis as victims are forced to self-isolate with abusers.
Analysis
analysis:How did family violence become entangled in Australian culture wars?
Victim blaming is embedded in our culture, but to stop family violence, the politics has to be stripped away, writes Julia Baird.
Jozef and Anet dropped their daughter off at child care. It was the last time they saw her alive
The Maragols dropped off their smiling little girl at her childcare centre one morning in August last year. When they next saw her that afternoon, she was dead. They are still battling to find out exactly what happened.
'The first time I was very afraid': Inside Sydney's 'lower-end' brothels
Women interviewed by researchers — who spoke to 100 Sydney sex workers over 10 months — said that they had to buy their own condoms and clients asked not to use them.
'You don't know what he has done to me': The brutal truth of 'ladies who stab'
Lawyers call them "ladies who stab": women who, sometimes after decades of abuse, snap and kill a violent spouse. They're not, at first glance, an entirely sympathetic group, but their story goes much deeper.
Analysis
analysis:When Liberals talk about the party's women dilemma, one name repeatedly comes up
Over the past three decades, women have steadily climbed the ranks of centre-left parties around the world, while stalling in the centre-right parties. In Australia, when Liberals discuss the problem, one name keeps coming up.