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We’ve got that fucking for virginity thing again

Britain still needs all-women shortlists to correct sexist stereotyping

In order to conquer sexism we must be sexist.

But fair play to the picture editors at The Guardian. No, really, this is monstrously magnificent. For the illustration is of Harriet Harman. Who made sure that her husband, Jack Dromey, could be parachuted into a safe seat in spite of the fact that it was supposed to have an all women short list.

Hats off to whoever that was: gonads of steel there.

17 thoughts on “We’ve got that fucking for virginity thing again”

  1. Steel gonads?–when they’re preaching to the same choir of morons day in and day out?.

    Time for a prosecution under their own bullshit anti-discrimination laws–altho’ I’m sure there will be a cute little clause somewhere in the legal bullshit that exempts political pork from the legal burdens they have tried to stick on us.

  2. So Much For Subtlety

    The best way to correct sexist stereotyping would be a much better class of female Labour politicians.

    No, scratch that. Better female politicians.

    And writers at the Guardian. And the Daily Mail. And Tellie. Not to mention smarter commentators on the BBC.

    No wonder they want to silence everyone by law. Changing the status quo is starting to look like a hell of a lot of work.

  3. So I was curious as to why we need to “correct” sexist stereotypes.

    “Even today, women still have an uphill struggle to get into politics at any level. That’s partly because they’re busier than men, with their time tied up looking after children and elderly relatives as well as paid employment”

    Wasn’t it the feminists who demanded more women take up paid employment? What did they expect would happen? Any male wage slave could have warned them it isn’t a magical wonderland of self actualisation.

    “But women are needed in parliament not just because they are good politicians. They usually come into the job with a more rounded experience than their male counterparts ”

    Oh they do, do they? Sounds a bit… what’s the word? Sexist.

    “They tend to feel more grounded in their neighbourhoods, closer to children and parents, wiser about household finance and emotional relationships.”

    So let’s take these in turn.

    Grounded in their neighbourhoods? If she means prone to gossip about Mrs Smith next door’s fling with the milkman or Mrs Jones’ awful botox, then yes.

    Closer to children and parents? Probably, but so what?

    Wiser about household finance? Sorry ladies, but that’s nonsense. In my experience women on average are far worse at handling money than men are. Men don’t tend to run up credit card bills on clothes. And the property bubble? It wasn’t driven by men demanding bigger houses, new kitchens with expensive granite worktops, and more shiny things to put in the home.

    Give a man a budget and he’ll tend to spend as little of it as he needs to. Give a woman a budget and she’ll think “great, how can I spend all this money?”

    And most small businesses run by women are loss making vanity projects funded by husband or Daddy.

    Wiser about emotional relationships? Another feminine conceit with no basis in reality. Women are every bit as crap at emotional relationships as men are, they just rationalise it better.

    If women were better at emotional relationships, you’d expect them to be happier and less neurotic. Does that describe women in general?

    Women are more likely than men to get bored and create drama in a relationship. Most divorces are initiated by the woman. Most pointless petty arguments that aren’t about whatever you’re actually arguing about are driven by women.

    If women were better at emotional relationships, wouldn’t they be better able to say what they want without habitual dissimulation?

    And more to the point, what the flying fox does any of this have to do with holding the executive to account or debating proposed legislation?

  4. Give a man a budget and he’ll tend to spend as little of it as he needs to

    whilst I have a lot of sympathy with your points above, I’m not sure I agree with this one. Or rather, I think you missed off the end:

    Give a man a budget and he’ll tend to spend as little of it as he needs to on essentials, save a bit if he’s careful, and piss the rest up the wall

  5. “They tend to feel more grounded in their neighbourhoods, closer to children and parents, wiser about household finance and emotional relationships.”

    So is the writer conceding the point (not argued by me, I should add) that women are naturally better at these sorts of things? and, presumably, that human happiness is best served by them doing more of it than men?

  6. The Thought Gang – No, she’s saying women are better than you, so we need to make special provisions for them.

  7. Steve (various)

    The larger post is one of the most compelling I have ever read on this blog – absolutely spot on the money, and deserves wider circulation:
    The ‘wiser about household Finance’ argument might have held sway 40 years ago when fewer women worked but increasingly the younger female employees I work with are utterly clueless about money (although a lot of the younger men are equally so)

    I must admit to having a smidgen of sympathy for the author, though – when you look at the likes of Harperson, Creasy, Cooper, Reeves and so on who have been brought in by Women only shortlists, you are looking at some of the worst Parliamentarians in the country’s history, certainly since the Glorious Revolution. With that type of ‘evidence’ is it any wonder she’s clutching at straws?

  8. So Much for Subtlety

    Van_Patten – “The ‘wiser about household Finance’ argument might have held sway 40 years ago when fewer women worked but increasingly the younger female employees I work with are utterly clueless about money (although a lot of the younger men are equally so)”

    I would guess it was always a stupid argument. Except 40 years ago married women often did not work – and yet lived longer than men. So their retirement relied on keeping their husbands working hard and not spending their own money on themselves. This is largely still true, but now a lot of women know they can rely on the State so they do not need to keep their husband’s nose to the grind stone in order that they can live large when he is gone.

    And yes, women are clueless about money:

    http://www.post-gazette.com/businessnews/2010/03/09/Study-finds-median-wealth-for-single-black-women-at-5/stories/201003090163

    Among the most startling revelations in the wealth data is that while single white women in the prime of their working years (ages 36 to 49) have a median wealth of $42,600 (still only 61 percent of their single white male counterparts)
    ….
    Married or cohabitating white women have a median wealth of $167,500.

    So American women, anyway, are still doing an excellent job of keeping their husbands working that mill stone. All the way into an early grave. But given single women are paid the same that single men are, they are doing a poor job of actually saving any of it.

    I must admit to having a smidgen of sympathy for the author, though – when you look at the likes of Harperson, Creasy, Cooper, Reeves and so on who have been brought in by Women only shortlists, you are looking at some of the worst Parliamentarians in the country’s history, certainly since the Glorious Revolution. With that type of ‘evidence’ is it any wonder she’s clutching at straws?

    Indeed. The first step, as I said, is to improve the quality of the harridans they have selected in the first instance. Then we will not need legislation.

  9. So Much For Subtlety

    PaulB – “Here‘s one of those high-quality male ministers banning books in order to encourage prisoners to watch less television.”

    One sentence. 20 words. Two factual errors – that little sh!t is neither banning books nor is he encouraging more TV watching. And one logical fallacy – the fact that all female politicians are crap (bar one) does not mean that male politicians are all competent.

    Well done Paul. Sterling effort.

  10. Van_Patten – thank you!

    Tim Newman – sort of ironical that our greatest postwar leader was a woman, yet not only do most feminists hate her memory, but many of them sought to label her as an honourary man.

  11. The “book ban” is prob an admission that the screws can’t control contraband coming in and are not checking the book sent in properly–for drugs/mobile phones and the like–altho’ how hard can that be?. Even a vile toad like Grayling would be unlikely to ban books just out of spite–I’m sure he is nasty enough to but it would have no advantage for him.

  12. Tim Newman – sort of ironical that our greatest postwar leader was a woman, yet not only do most feminists hate her memory, but many of them sought to label her as an honourary man.

    Indeed. Like Condoleeza Rice, the Wimmin never forgave Thatcher for having the wrong kind of politics.

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