At my home there’s a shelf of books three metres long (I kid you not) stuffed with books about feminism, women’s history and related subjects.
I even have the first British edition (1971) of Valerie Solanas’s charming little classic: ‘SCUM (Society for Cutting Up Men) Manifesto. So, I’ve always counted myself a 1960s feminist — with countless articles and public debates to prove it.
What is the reason I’m so worried about all this man-hating that appears to be invading my sex?
It seems you can’t turn on the television without encountering women victimised by men, psychologically as well as physically.
Sunday-night viewing was once a place for family favourites but seems now to be overtaken by domestic dystopia.
Angela Black (pictured), an ITV series about a woman victim to domestic abuse.
Angela Black on ITV is a series about a woman that has been the victim domestic violence.
After watching one episode, my husband and I gave up. There was something about actress Joanne Froggatt’s pinched, victimised face, not to mention the close-up of her tooth on the floor, knocked out by her abusive, gas-lighting husband, that turned us both off. ‘Do I need this on a Sunday night?’ my husband asked, and I agreed.
She’s not the only tortured leading lady leading me ever closer to the ‘off’ button.
Jo, an amnesia patient with severe brain damage (Channel 4), is found lying in bloody pool at the bottom stairs when we meet her for the first time. Is she being pushed along by Christopher Eccleston’s creepy and cheating husband? How can you find out the truth about her memory loss
These shows can feel almost like voyeurism. This is also the main theme of You, another Netflix hit series that centers on a bookshop owner who kills and stalks women.
Alex is the heroine in another Netflix series, Maid. However, she’s the most vulnerable young female protagonist. This series, based upon a bestseller about a young girl who leaves her abusive boyfriend and takes her child. She is then forced to clean the house, which puts Alex through every kind of hardship you could imagine.
Critics have accused it of being ‘poverty porn’ — and there’s some truth in that. Every episode I’ve seen has been powerful, compulsive, moving — and deeply depressing. Because Alex is horrified at every man he meets.
Our lovely young heroine is utterly oppressed by the male sex — her father is a wife-beater and there was a string of odious stepdads.
All men are condemned to eternal damnation when women who watch become their judge and jury.
It is important to consider the subjects covered in these series.
‘Sunday-night viewing, which used to be the home for family friendly favourites, now seems to be dominated by domestic dystopia’, writes BEL MOONEY. Another hit Netflix show is You. It’s about a bookshop owner who kills and stalks female customers.
It is said that one in four women will experience domestic violence during her lifetime. Two women in England and Wales are murdered each week by their current or former partners. Around three suicides per week result from domestic violence.
Of course, there’s a need for good drama depicting tough issues. Every modern drama about cops has a female Chief Inspector who is feisty and aggressive, but also manages a group of unruly men. Programming commissioners seem to enjoy tapping into the new wave of misandry. It is the hatred of men.
For years, I’ve been ‘calling out’ (as the current phrase has it) misogyny — and quite rightly, since hatred and fear of women goes back centuries. After all, if it wasn’t for vain, stupid, bossy Eve, we’d all still be without sin.
Women have plenty of reasons to be angry — but I am not going to pile on statistics here. It suffices to state that real progress is still out of reach, as I stated in a Mail article.
My sex freedom is being repressed like scum on the shore. My experience, knowledge and all the years of learning have convinced me that demonizing men does not benefit women.
These arguments are dangerously biased towards prejudice. It is disgusting to judge someone purely on his/her appearance.
Partly, the #MeToo campaign was a reaction to Donald Trump’s actions and partially to disturbing stories about powerful, sleazy men exploiting women. Women shared their own stories and said: ‘This is how it was for me, too.’
Alex (pictured) is the most vulnerable young female heroine to grab a cult audience. The story is based on the bestselling novel about a young mother who gives her child to an abusive husband and finds herself working as a cleaner.
Around the time Sarah Everard’s murder and abduction last March, that anger turned to something else. Women felt enraged — and rightly so.
But then it became clear on social media that you had to agree Men Are The Enemy — or face anger yourself. You couldn’t suggest ‘not all men are like that’ — which is a statement so obviously true as to be inarguable. It doesn’t matter.
The hashtag ‘Not All Men’ became as totally unacceptable as ‘All Lives Matter’ (with an overlap in that white men are deemed to be the worst in the world).
It was necessary to either accept the opinion of others or express incoherent anger. You could end up getting abused.
It was what happened to my. I was motivated by fairness to not agree with the completely untrue and disreputable dismissal of an entire sex group on Facebook.
Oh dear. It was awful. A patronising 35-year-old woman wrote, ‘All I can do is explain to you the harm you are causing’, and ‘she hoped she could educate me’ about sexism and ghastly men.
Still obviously badly in need of ‘education’, I pointed out that there are plenty of men (such as my husband, son and son-in-law, to cite but three) who are good, kind and gentle, and thoroughly loathe sexism in all forms.
This was however not permitted. This was not allowed. The furious feminist lobby believes that stating ‘Not all men’ is a betrayal. Why should this be true?
Because all men are privileged and even if they seem decent they still possess the potential to exploit women — or stand by while others do it. They are guilty even if they haven’t done anything.
That ‘argument’ takes you down a rabbit hole similar to that of ‘critical race theory’ — which says that white people are innately privileged (yes, even the poorest) and even if they declare themselves anti-racists they are still guilty because of the colour of their skin.
Witch-hunts can make you a criminal. Only if you admit guilt will you be considered an ‘ally.’
I was told: ‘You have to accept that men as a group really are s***.’
What do I actually need?
Were all the males, young and old, who took part in last weekend’s moving Remembrance Sunday parade at the Cenotaph all sexist pigs? How about the men who are decent, hardworking and love their families?
Jo, an amnesia patient with severe brain damage (pictured), is found lying in bloody pool at the bottom stairs when we meet her for the first time in Channel 4’s Close To Me. Did she get pushed down by Christopher Eccleston’s creepy and cheating husband?
Are all our lovely partners somehow ‘responsible’ for domestic violence, rape and murder?
They are considered de facto guilty because they are male, according to prejudice. I was told that my blameless husband ‘must have friends who make sexist or racist jokes’ — and therefore be as guilty as they are, by association.
Listen, sisters — he doesn’t and he damn well isn’t!
I find it shocking that these women, all educated and articulate, choose to see life through the narrow lens of victimhood and oppression. But it’s easy to get why TV show makers seek to capitalise on a fashionable sense of angry vulnerability and outright misandry.
The system feeds itself. This means that there is no potential for male goodness and any prejudice based on identity is used when it comes down to men. Why is it wrong for men to state, ‘All women are b******’ — yet acceptable for women to shout, ‘All men are s****’?
Of course, it’s not acceptable at all. But just as casual misogyny used to be the stock-in-trade of comedians (oh, those dreadful mother-in-law jokes), so casual misandry is a phenomenon I’ve been noticing more and more.
Here’s one. The occasion was the 100th anniversary of the excellent charity Gingerbread — once for the ‘Unmarried Mother and Her Child’ but now for single parents in general. Being a young journalist I was familiar with this charity and so, I traveled to London to join them in celebrating.
The party was held in the fine 18th-century surroundings of London’s Foundling Museum, set up by the great Thomas Coram who was horrified children should be abandoned by mothers too poor or shamed to care for them. The guest speaker was Jane Garvey, then a presenter of Woman’s Hour on Radio 4. She stood on the podium and began with the scornful jibe that there we were, in that room, ‘surrounded by portraits of fat, old, white men in bad wigs’.
Now if Ms Garvey had arrived early enough to explore, she’d have discovered that those mocked men were the brave philanthropists who defied the culture of the time to assist Thomas Coram in 17 hard years of fundraising to help pitiful women and their babies.
Of course, it was just a joke, wasn’t it? There was a lot of banter. Let’s laugh at the old guys in wigs who did good things but obviously ate too many good dinners.
Similarly, we can dismiss and deride television presenters (for example) for being ‘pale, male and stale’ — and that’s perfectly OK. Can you imagine the furore if such prejudiced comments were used about women in this current climate of rapid ‘offence’?
Many women say that sexist comments and man-hating TV storylines are regarded merely as ‘payback’ — another popular term to justify misandry — for all the sexist jokes women have heard over the years. But it doesn’t work that way, does it?
The common-sense idea that ‘two wrongs don’t make a right’ itself dates back to the 18th century, and is a reminder that when two angry people fight a duel they’re both likely to end up wounded or dead.
By all means demand that both men and women ‘call out’ toxic masculinity wherever it occurs, but if you tar all men with that brush it loses any real meaning. You can’t defend women and girls being abused if all you want to do is rage over a slight you hear in a bar.
The phenomenon we call ‘toxic masculinity’ certainly exists and should always be challenged — but these days I’m sensing ‘toxic femininity’, too, and it’s pretty unpleasant.
The belief that everyone is morally equal based only on what they do? Surely writing ‘All men are s****’ might be considered ‘hate speech’?
Teachers (many Left of Centre) treat the boys in their classes like little enemies. Are rapists being trained? According to statistics, young white men are among the most insecure. Men aged between 18 and 49 years are also the most likely to die.
The brilliant political writer David Goodhart believes that ‘the traditional male virtues — strength, physical courage, emotional stoicism’ are undervalued.
We cannot even begin to teach boys respect for girls if they assume we are timebombs full of misogyny that will explode.
In this divided, quarrelsome age, the last thing we need is more division — this rekindling of the old battle of the sexes.
While there are many things in this world which good women and men can be just as angry about, we should not allow harridans or opportunistic TV bosses to encourage us to look at each other through the lines of hateful enemies.