THE entire Project panel has been left in shocked silence during an uncomfortable interview with a controversial film director.

Cassie Jaye was on the show to discuss her documentary The Red Pill, which explores the men’s rights movement by highlighting suicide rates, sexual assault and custody issues.

It’s received a huge amount of backlash in Australia, with many theatres cancelling screenings.

“We’ve had a lot of success in other countries, so Australia is really the only place we’ve had protests and petitions and banning like this,” Jaye complained on the show.

And it was clear she didn’t understand why.

“I’m curious what is different about Australia that makes this topic so polarising, so fearful to people that they actually want to shut it down and silence it ... I’m not sure why there’s so much resistance in Australia,” she said.

Carrie Bickmore explained that it was largely due to the fact domestic violence is “really on the agenda” here, and pointed to the campaign run by Rosie Batty, whose son Luke was murdered by his own father in 2014.

“And it was his son that passed [away]?” Jaye questioned the hosts.

A confused Aly clarified: “It was her son that was killed by his father.”

“That’s interesting, because it shows that there are male victims of domestic violence,” Jaye replied.

We speak to director Cassie Jaye about her film ‘The Red Pill’ and the discussion surrounding it in Australia. #TheProjectTV pic.twitter.com/J2BSqtnjw8 — #TheProjectTV (@theprojecttv) June 8, 2017

The response left the entire Project panel in a moment of stunned silence, before Aly dived back in.

“Sorry — that’s the lesson you took from that?” he asked incredulously.

“The point I think a lot of people take from that is that the violence was perpetrated by the man in that situation — as it overwhelmingly is — particularly in cases where there’s a fatality.”

But Jaye didn’t budge.

“This is a very touchy subject which can quickly offend people, so I’ll use my words wisely,” she told the hosts.

“It’s something I really thought long and hard about while I was making The Red Pill ... we have to distinguish between victims and perpetrators, or criminals, because a boy who is being abused by a parental figure, that is a boy that deserves care and compassion and resources if he needs to find help.”

Jaye also explained why she’s no longer a feminist.

“I left feminism after making this film, because I see feminism as having blinders on — it only focuses on women’s issues, and girls issues.”