Swallowing the bait from Sam Dastyari, the media has latched onto a photo of the Newtown/Sydney Young Liberals hosting Tony Abbott this week.

The critics are up in arms about the apparent lack of women in the photo, mocking the branch with statements like ‘the ladies sat outside, of course’; declaring the Liberals can’t attract women and predictably calling for quotas.

This is awkward because I organised the event. I am a woman. The senior branch executive who signed in the guests was a woman. The official photographer for the evening, another fellow Party member, was a woman. And you can take it from us, there were many other Big-L Liberal women in attendance on Tuesday.

This story is fake news. Those running it have not looked beneath the surface because it fits the narrative that women cannot possibly support the Liberal Party.

Wrong. Now I’ve set the record straight, it would be insincere to continue running these criticisms. Frankly, it takes away from the hard work of the women who made the event happen.

We joined the Liberal Party because we believe in freedom for the individual, opportunity for those who seek it and a democracy we can take pride in. Newtown/Sydney Young Liberals see more socialists than most would care to, and this exposure invigorates us to advocate for our ideas.

Talk of quotas is nonsense. If we wanted to embrace identity politics, we’d join the Labor party. We refuse to jump on the bandwagon of hating white males.

In the end, it’s ideas that make people join a cause. Women join for the same reasons as men do; for the ideas. To think anything else is needed is patronising. Expect to see many more Liberal Party events organised by both the women and men of Newtown/Sydney Young Liberals. For the record, Tony Abbott is welcome back anytime.

Photography: Deyi Wu/Twitter.

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