A common sense voice, that is very much akin to the opinions of most women of my acquaintance. Perhaps a self-selecting sample, what with my lack of time for ‘wimmin’, but there we are.
…
Gordon Brown, bless him, can’t see a supposed inequality without passing a law. It’s sweet, in a way, that he’s so concerned with protecting everyone who is not a white, middle-aged Scottish bloke. He could, hand in hand with Harriet Harman, skip all the way to Edinburgh if Labour’s equality measures were laid end to end from Westminster to Holyrood.
But enough. No more laws. No more quangos, or panels, or equality drives. Women are doing OK. We do not need the patronising wing of the State to shelter us from the nasty men any more.
Harriet Harman and her brand of 1970s feminists continue to dominate the debate. Look, Harriet, we’re very, very grateful for everything your generation did for us, but it’s our turn now. Renounce the title Minister for Women — I do not need special pleading, and you do not speak for me.
Yet she keeps speaking for me; foisting equality on me like unwelcome warts.
And therein lies the problem. If the government’s words and deeds communicate to whatsoever sector of society that they are victims, said sector of society largely accepts the status foisted upon them. It’s effectively the same technique as deployed in denormalisation. Or to put it more simply, if you treat people like victims, they’ll act like victims. Next they’ll demand that you respect them. They have to demand it because no-one would voluntarily respect these shameless celebrants of victimhood.
And that is why Harman’s antics have to stop. See?
Women run countries and boardrooms, even newspapers. How can we possibly term ourselves victims any more?
Only when it suits us to keep playing the victim. The Employment Tribunal Service dealt with 7,280 sex discrimination complaints from women in 1999, compared with 18,637 last year, and 26,907 the year before that. Are men getting more discriminating while we get better at complaining? Or, perhaps, we are just using the complex web of discrimination legislation to take our employers to the cleaners?
Perhaps. Do you think?
The women’s movement once rang with the rhetoric of sisterhood. If there is such a thing any more, it is being betrayed by false claimants and the champions of excessive equality legislation. Women who use sex discrimination laws to excuse their own incompetence, and wring cash out of their employers, are little better than those who falsely cry rape. It belittles the genuine cases and endangers the whole enterprise of women’s liberation. Our equality is hard won and precious. The best way to squander our victory is to make it ever harder to hire women and perpetuate the victim myth.
What? Unintended consequences of well meaning (!!) Labour policies? It could never happen.
AJ
Al Jahom's Final Word 