Gender Doesn't Matter (2016) | Jesse Bering, Raewyn Connell Cordelia Fine & Elizabeth Anne Riley

Gender Doesn't Matter (2016) | Jesse Bering, Raewyn Connell Cordelia Fine & Elizabeth Anne Riley

Author: Festival of Dangerous Ideas July 9, 2021 Duration: 58:16

With more people coming out as gender fluid, transitioning or on a spectrum of gender identity, it's clear the biological constraints of gender today have loosened. But how do we deal with enduring gender-based social inequality and injustice? Will we ever get to a point in society where gender doesn't matter

Jesse Bering is an award-winning science writer, psychologist, and academic. 

Raewyn Connell is one of Australia's leading social scientists. She is best known internationally as a sociologist of gender and a pioneer of research on masculinities and best known in Australia for work on class inequality and social justice in education. 

Cordelia Fine is an Associate Professor at Melbourne Business School, University of Melbourne. Her popular science book, Delusions of Gender: The Real Science of Sex Differences was described "required reading for every neurobiology student, if not every human being." 

Elizabeth Anne Riley, PhD is a Sydney-based counsellor, academic & clinical supervisor specialising in gender diversity. 


For more than a decade, the Festival of Dangerous Ideas has curated a space where provocative thinking isn't just welcomed, it's the entire point. This podcast is a direct line to that stage, offering an archive of talks that deliberately unsettle comfortable opinions and interrogate the stubborn problems we often agree to ignore. Each episode captures a live conversation from Australia's original disruptive ideas festival, presenting arguments that can be exhilarating, uncomfortable, and vitally important. You’ll hear from a compelling roster of festival alumni-including leading experts, intellectual troublemakers, and visionary authors-who share perspectives that conventional discourse frequently sidelines. The discussions here aren't theoretical exercises; they grapple with the pressing and difficult issues shaping our society and culture right now. Tuning in means granting yourself access to a decade-long tradition of intellectual courage, where the core assumption is that some truths are only reached by first entertaining a dangerous idea. It’s a chance to listen as boundaries are pushed, not for shock value, but for clarity. The result is a consistently challenging and refreshing audio experience that complicates simple narratives and expands what feels possible to talk about.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Festival of Dangerous Ideas
Podcast Episodes
Claire G. Coleman (2022) | Words are Weapons [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 57:36
Stories define who we are, our history and they can be weaponised. Stories can erase an entire culture. History is nothing but a story. Noongar woman and author Claire G. Coleman invites you to consider that Australia ha…
Joanna Bourke (2022) | The Last Taboo [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 44:44
Our modern society is dependent on extraordinary levels of abuse and violence towards non-human animals. While we may love animals, we continue to interact with them in thoughtless, violent and cruel ways. We destroy the…
Frances Haugen (2022) | Unmasking Facebook [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 32:31
Former Facebook product manager, Frances Haugen did not set out to be a whistleblower, but when it became a question of saving lives, she knew it was time to tell the truth. On top of her concerns about mental health and…
Sisonke Msimang (2022) | Precious White Lives [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 45:16
Australia is professed to be the most successful multicultural society in the world. However, with our treatment of multicultural communities throughout the pandemic, a selective immigration progress and fraught ongoing…
Kevin Roose (2022) | Caught in a web [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 32:03
In a world where the internet saturates everything, where does the internet stop and our human selves begin? As we're nudged and pushed by an endless stream of alerts, notifications and recommendations, our attention and…