I know, I don’t like typing those words, or evoking those thoughts, but this is what the former deputy prime minister of this country has invited us to do. The women in Joyce’s immediate orbit, in this sorry and sadly on-going saga, have been humiliated, trashed, exposed, maligned and put on trial all in the name of – what? Joyce said that because the media were still asking questions, "we felt we had no choice but to tell the story." But he - they - did. He is on the backbench now, and the pressing questions are now primarily to do with allegations of sexual misconduct or harassment. Let’s unpack two salient parts of this story. First, Joyce claimed that no journalists – notably The Daily Telegraph – actually asked him if the child was his. This is incorrect. Sharri Markson, who broke the story, tweeted yesterday that she asked Joyce if the baby was his and only proceeded with the story when they were “satisfied he was treating the unborn child as his own”. Then, we were reminded that the first question Leigh Sales asked him on 7.30 was this: “You have not commented yet on front page newspaper reports today that you are in a relationship with one of your former staffers, who is expecting your child. Is that accurate?”

An opportunity, right there, to be honest. His answer? “Well, Leigh, what I want to do is make sure that private matters remain private.”

Loading Which leads to my second point: the utter hypocrisy regarding the protection of one’s private life. On February 7, when Sales was interviewing Joyce, he swatted away any questions about the affair that roiled his political career, with words to the effect of: “Private matters private. It's private. Also private and very private, how very dare you.” On March 3, he was instead saying words to the effect of: “You should have asked for the actual dates and times we had sex and about her menstrual cycle, idiots.” He said journalists should have checked the dates of conception against travel dates to see if he and Campion could have hooked up at that time. Mate. What is troubling is that he says his partner and former media adviser was “fine” with him raising the question of paternity. Fairfax Media’s Mark Kenny says he directly asked Joyce last week if Campion knew what he was saying about her, and he responded words to the effect of "yes, and she’s fine with it”. Can some of Campion’s friends stage an intervention? This is not fine. Vikki Campion, right, at Parliament House in 2017. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

Could a former media adviser really think this is a good story to run now, let alone one about her own sex life? And for what end, especially given he says he isn’t even planning to get a paternity test? "It’s mine, on the record, there it is,” he said. "And can I say, even if it wasn’t, I wouldn’t care, I’d still go through this, I’d still love him.” This is not honour. It might – perhaps - have been if vowed in private. Possibly the worst thing is the unborn child is caught up in all of this too; now he will grow up not just with knowledge of all of this political scandal, but that, at the time of his birth, his mother’s “sporadic” sexual activity was the subject of national discussion. And yet Joyce slams the “outrageous” media for taking photos of a pregnant Campion before ushering us into her bedroom for further speculation, lifting the covers and inviting us to discern shapes in shadows. Julia Baird is the author of Media Tarts: How the Australian Press Frames Female Politicians.