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It seems that lately the male/female divide is stronger than ever. While few would argue that Sarah Palin was fit for office, the venomous anti-Palin briefings from the defeated McCain camp are steeped in misogyny. Their election postmortem chiefly consists of a cost analysis of one of the few star turns of their campaign, which was her wardrobe; and the allegation that she once appeared in a hotel room in front of McCain aides "in nothing but a towel".
I'm not quite sure what the implication is here. Would they prefer to have waited for her for hours? A working woman with five children is definitely used to having brief chats in a towel. Nor, I imagine, was it a come-on, which appears to be the implication of these excitable wonks.
Dressed or not dressed, it seems that Palin couldn't please Republican advisers before she even opened her mouth. So why give her the job? Their tokenism was transparent enough without the need for a backlash.
Which leads me to another crime within a crime, the vicious contempt for women demonstrated by Messrs Ross and Brand. In essence, they punished a woman by publicly humiliating her grandfather for the crime of sleeping with one of them. The justification suggested by her occupation as a dancer in the Satanic Sluts rather reminds one of those miserable old judges who criticised rape victims for wearing provocative clothing.
Then there's Mr Justice Eady, the High Court Judge who found in Max Mosley's favour, supporting Mosley's "right" to wrong his wife. Presumably the Human Rights Act was not invented to protect the rich and depraved from publicity, or to add weight to the fatuous argument that one's sexual behaviour sheds no light on one's character.
Even dead national treasures are fair game these days, as long as they're women. Edward Stourton has a pop at the Queen Mother, RIP, in the book he's currently hawking around town, musing that the woman who famously stuck to London during the Blitz was a "ghastly old bigot". Somehow I don't think he'd have come to the same conclusion if he'd met Churchill talking about the Hun. If men don't know how to gossip without being cruel and dishonourable, they should leave it to the women.
Reader views (6)
Tom, sweetheart, you are quite right - I absolutely don't believe in equality - it has been a bane of my life - I mean - why should I give up my superiority to become a mere equal.
ps - don't know what all the fuss is about Russell is definitely not a 10 in the sack!
- Jc, se1
- Leah, Bath, UK
Leah, men and women can NEVER be equal; they are fundamentally different. Why do people like you refuse to accept things as they are and think they have a right to change nature? Women can give birth and men can't, but men don't harp on about this being unfair. Women excel at certain things as do men, but not always the same things. Some women/men have better brains than others...some are better runners; but we will never be equal, much as you would like to distort the natural process.
- Tom W, London
You just miss the point. The more the PC brigade harp on about equal rights in the workplace etc. the more you alienate male thinking. In my office there are women doing jobs who really shouldn't be (ie there are better qualified men)....but they do the jobs simply because they are the token 'women'. This is just not fair, nor does it make sense.....if it was the other way round it would be called descrimination! And besides, if men want to be misogynists...let them; there are plenty of women around who hate men and make no secret of this and get away with spewing forth their loathing of the opposite sex. Why can't we let people think freely any more? Individuals should be secure enough in their own life to take any criticism that comes their way without always playing the 'victim'. It's called dealing with human nature; but then the mad woman Harman wouldn't understand such a simple fact.
- Tom W, London
Susannah: "If women don't behave like ladies, it's unfair to expect men to be gentlemen. But somehow we do expect that."
That's not what it's about. It's about wanting to be treated as equal human beings. Much has been made of Georgina Baillie's job and the fact that she slept with Russell Brand. By comparison, there has been very little criticism levelled at Brand over his sexuality, and he's not only well-known for his promiscuity, but he revels in it. How is that fair? Why shouldn't women be allowed to acknowledge and enjoy their perfectly natural sexual sides when it's not only permissible, but considered admirable, for men to do likewise?
- Leah, Bath, UK
The gender divide is indeed growing wider and articles like this don't do anything to close it. If men are becoming increasingly vocal in their dislike of, and contempt for, women, it's down in part to the insistence of females that their failures are invariably somehow men's fault. Sarah Palin didn't know that Africa was a continent: that's why I'm glad she wasn't elected. Not because she is a woman, not because of the amount she spent on dresses, not because she gave interviews in a towel.
Unless women see through the full range of ramifications which equality implies - including the necessary disappearance of chivalry (so cut the c**p about being "dishonourable", Ms Ostler) - and learn to take the slings and arrows as men have had to for centuries, then I'll be treating femmy-whinges like this with the scorn they deserve.
- Ortelius, NW3, UK
I agree that the comments about the late Queen Mother were abominable. It used to be considered very bad form to speak ill of the dead; who can't defend themselves. It was in very poor taste.
I also agree about the divide between men and women seeming to be even greater than ever. Witness the Ross/Brand comments re Georgina Baillie. It must be said though that a lot of the behaviour of young women today (and older ones if it comes to that)is hardly conducive to making anyone respect or even like them. If women don't behave like ladies, it's unfair to expect men to be gentlemen. But somehow we do expect that.
- Susannah, London UK
