THERE'S a newspaper whose website I frequent. I do this deliberately, not buying it, because I wouldn't wish to increase their profits. You should, of course, buy copies of the newspaper you do love – daily and in bulk, if at all possible – to enable us to keep making them for you. I inspect this one because I've taken to heart the genius advice by Oscar Wilde, to hold friends close and enemies even closer.
I check in to take the temperature of bigotry in Great Britain. There, I'm certain to find stories that raise my hackles sky high, providing a rich seam of inspiration for corrective columns. You know the publication I mean. Its target audience is th
at mythical land known as Middle England. It's xenophobic, reactionary, and above all else, misogynist, finding endless reasons to condemn both working and stay-at-home mums, not to mention those of us who chose not to reproduce at all. Old, young, fit, flabby, whatever your description, those two X chromosomes site you in their firing line.
Sadly, the majority of its readers are women.
The editorial content is inordinately preoccupied with female appearance, reinforcing the notion that what we look like is paramount in life. Female achievement? Unless it involves dropping pregnancy weight in an afternoon, it's conspicuous by its absence. Indeed, if this was your only source of information, you'd barely know that women successfully run businesses, write intelligent books, or perform groundbreaking scientific research, to name just a few ordinary activities. Unless, of course, any of that behaviour played havoc with her appearance, her sex life, or her parenting. Then they'd be all over it like the proverbial rash.
Who'd have reckoned it newsworthy – and who really cares – that "heavily pregnant" Kate Garraway … wait for it … changed her dress? No kidding. With a baby due any day she "swapped" her "comfy", "baggy" maternity wear for a clinging black dress and applied some make-up. The story goes on in approving tones to note that as the mum of a three-year-old, she's "already aware of the commitments that a new baby brings".
Barring the unfortunate teenager so clueless she's not even sure how she got pregnant in the first place, who among us isn't aware of the responsibilities having a baby entails? I'm so acutely aware that it's the main reason I don't have one!
In the same issue there's a story taking a pop at Mel B for wearing "yet another barely there bikini" to her birthday party. It was, ahem, a pool party. What the heck was she supposed to wear? This paper has a thing about swimwear. They'll seize on any excuse to showcase the stuff (and the bodies it encases), while sneering at women who own more than two swimming costumes. Colleen Rooney was a recent target of their brickbats, which were especially spikey because she, too, is with child.
Meanwhile, they're quick to point the finger at women venturing forth in outfits we've seen before. Whereas I might (and do) applaud the Duchess of Cornwall for wardrobe re-deployment, they carp. And carp again when she does dress to the nines because she's flashing the cash – and is also too old and too frumpy and too not-Diana, so who's she trying to kid?
The most positive story I can find today is about a 28-year-old dynamo who aced exams to secure a first class honours degree in the morning and gave birth not 12 hours later.
The contents of the newspaper would be infuriating enough on their own, but thanks to the internet, any idiot (and they are) can weigh in with additional anti-female vitriol via the comments section. As long as it's not technically obscene, it'll get an airing. I find some of it philosophically obscene, but I'm not their webmaster. More's the pity.
Ladies, don't accept this kind of treatment. Fight back. Don't buy into their misogyny and if you have time, post a few comments of your own that applaud and celebrate all things female. Nobody can make us feel bad about ourselves unless we allow it. Don't.
The full article contains 703 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
