Julie Szego is a Melbourne-based author and journalist.

Career

Szego started working as a lawyer before switching to writing. She wrote for ''

The Age ''The Age'' is a daily newspaper in Melbourne, Australia, that has been published since 1854. Owned and published by Nine Entertainment, ''The Age'' primarily serves Victoria (Australia), Victoria, but copies also sell in Tasmania, the Austral ...

'' on and off for more than two decades as a social affairs reporter, senior writer, leader writer and most recently as a weekly columnist before being sacked by the paper in June 2023. She was sacked as a columnist after calling out the newspaper over its refusal to run her commissioned article on youth

gender transition Gender transition is the process of changing one's gender presentation or sex characteristics to accord with one's internal sense of gender identity – the idea of what it means to be a man or a woman,Brown, M. L. & Rounsley, C. A. (1996) ''True ...

. She self-published the piece on

Substack Substack is an American online platform that provides publishing, payment, analytics, and design infrastructure to support subscription newsletters. It allows writers to send digital newsletters directly to subscribers. Founded in 2017, Substack ...

. The controversy was covered by the ABC's Media Watch program in a segment that generated controversy of its own. Szego wrote a monthly column for ''

The Australian Jewish News ''The Australian Jewish News'' (''AJN'') is a newspaper published in Darlinghurst, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Since 2019 it has been a local partner of ''The Times of Israel''. History The ''AJN'' is descended from ''The Hebrew Standa ...

'' for seven years and edited her father's 2001 memoir, ''Two Prayers to One God''. She also wrote for ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

''. She has taught journalism and creative non-fiction at

RMIT RMIT University, officially the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology,, section 4(b) is a public research university in Melbourne, Australia. Founded in 1887 by Francis Ormond, RMIT began as a night school offering classes in art, scienc ...

, Monash, and other Melbourne-area universities. Szego is the author of non-fiction book ''The Tainted Trial of Farah Jama'', which was shortlisted for the Victorian and NSW Premiers’ Literary Awards for 2015. She is planning to write a book about gender ideology in Australia. In November 2023, Szego resigned from the

Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance The Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance (MEAA), also sometimes referred to as the Alliance, is the Australian trade union and professional organisation which covers the media, entertainment, sports and arts industries. Its Musicians section c ...

(MEAA) because of that union's endorsement of an open letter to Australian media outlets, which condemned the Australian Government for "Israel's genocidal assault on Gaza", stated that "

the conflict ''The Conflict'' is a 1916 American silent drama film directed by Ralph Ince and starring Lucille Lee Stewart, Huntley Gordon and Wilfred Lytell.Connelly p.51 Cast * Lucille Lee Stewart as Madeleine Turner * Jessie Miller as Jeanette Harcour ...

did not start on October 7", and demanded that media companies should respect the right of journalists to "publicly and openly express personal solidarity with the Palestinian cause without penalty in their professional lives". Szego called the letter "an

Orwellian "Orwellian" is an adjective describing a situation, idea, or societal condition that George Orwell identified as being destructive to the welfare of a free and open society. It denotes an attitude and a brutal policy of draconian control by pr ...

exercise in calling for 'truth' while peddling gross distortions thereof".

Personal

Szego is the partner of Tony Lupton. Tony and Julie have two daughters.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Szego, Julie Living people Year of birth missing (living people) Place of birth missing (living people) Australian journalists 20th-century Australian journalists 20th-century Australian women writers 20th-century Australian non-fiction writers 21st-century Australian journalists 21st-century Australian women writers 21st-century Australian non-fiction writers