Prime Minister Julia Gillard.

Former prime minister Julia Gillard says gender issues are more easily glossed over than racism. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen

Former prime minister Julia Gillard says Australians would have been more outraged at her treatment as a woman if she were black.

In a lengthy interview conducted while Ms Gillard was still Labor leader and published in the latest The Monthly, Ms Gillard said politics had become more combative, particularly in recent years under minority government in Australia.

''Is the stuff against Barack Obama because he's African American? ... Or would they have played as hard as that against any successful Democrat? Well, I suspect it's a bit of both,'' she said.

''I think some of the stuff about me, because it is about gender, gets glossed over more easily.''

In March 2011, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott stood at a rally against the carbon tax beside signs that read, ''Juliar: Bob Browns [sic] Bitch'' and ''Ditch the Witch''.


''And it's not less because it's gender. But it's been treated as less.''

She also revealed that she ''didn't have any sense'' of the force of her famous misogyny speech.

Ms Gillard said that before the speech, expecting Mr Abbott would pursue her over former speaker Peter Slipper's recently-revealed text messages likening female genitalia to ''shell-less mussels'', she had made ''a quick compilation'' of Mr Abbott's ''worst clanger quotes''.

Among them was Mr Abbott's quote, ''If it's true that men have more power generally speaking than women, is that a bad thing?''

Ms Gillard told The Monthly: ''I'll think of a more polite way of putting it, but the only way I can think is, 'For f---'s sake, after everything I've listened to, I have to listen to this? That you're somehow on a bandwagon to crusade about sexism? Oh, God, give me strength!'''

Since she was dumped from the Labor leadership, Ms Gillard has kept a low profile and has not given any interviews.  She will retire from politics at this year's election.

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