(Sorry folks, couldn't find any pics with her legs in, but there you go...there may be some on Chickipedia, but if they're there at all, they're taking one heck of a long time to appear on the screen...Chikipedia - nice one; why didn't I think of that?) Of course, the woman talks out of her arse most of the time, but you can't have everything, can you? One could try muzzling her, I suppose - but not only would that be deeply offensive to both of us - yes, believe it or not, she's a stonewall feminist, despite the brown shirt - but would also take a lot of the fun out of the contest. (You feel that everything would be turned into a contest with Jane, don't you?; even champagne-enhanced, languid all-day love-making in her sumptuously satin-sheeted Essex fourposter beneath a ceiling mirror (she *must* live in Essex and have a mirrored ceiling, right?) And she'd find, you know in your heart of hearts, some way to spoil even the most romantic of shared fag post-coital moments of intimacy with an ill-advised rant about bogus asylum-seeking gypsies being waved to the top of the council house waiting list by politically correct zealots or such like bile-fuelled xenophobic rhetoric.
I suppose that's part of the appeal, isn't it - opposites attract and all that. (Although, for the record, I'm with her on the bogus asylum-seeking gypsies being waved to the top of the council house waiting list by politically correct zealots or such like bile-fuelled xenophobic rhetoric. And bring back flogging while you're at it. Bendy buses? Don't get me started...) Or maybe there's a secret and irresistable urge buried deep within all but the most neutered of 'liberal-with-a-small-L' Guardian reading new men to get deep down and personal with the Queen the of filthy red top enemy. Preferably in a break between coursing hares on our 500 acre estate. Wearing nothing more than a black latex boob tube and a pair of stirrups. (Jane'll probably be in slacks though, I should imagine...)
Sexist nonsense - I hope you've all been able to see the above as such. All of which casual misogyny leads me to my main (if you'll excuse the phallocentric word choice) *thrust*. I sense a change in the political climate. Perhaps it's the recession, or maybe they're just getting fed up with having to ponce around in ridiculously perpendicular high heeled shoes looking vacant all day, but there seems to be an austere new zippin'-up-our-boots-going-back-to-our-roots feminism abroad and I for one say "about time too girls!"
A while back, I read this article by former Burchill squeeze Charlotte Raven. Putting aside any reservations about the rather Radcliffe-Hall hairdo she seems to be wearing, I think she has a point about the "have-it-all" school of wimmin's libbers who feel that they can have their lipgloss and eat it. I wonder how representative her views are? As my readership divides pretty much straight down the middle along gender lines (2 male, 2 women, 1 not sure) I thought we had a fairly good sample. So, is it off with the skimpy see-through all-in-one and suspenders and on with the brogues, Fred Perry and designer stubble? I await your comments with interest bordering that of one of Pavlov's mutts.
Speaking personally, I'm ambivalent. As someone who's spent large amounts of time trying (with varying degrees of success) to pass himself off as a woman, I've been on the end of a fair amount of unrestrained male chauvanist piggery myself. I've also been treated with considerable respect - insert your own Monty Python-style "and what's more, he knew how to treat a female impersonator.." gag of choice...) As many modern women do, I've objectified myself and been viewed as an object - I am after all, as we all are, an object in the strictest sense, I suppose. But curiously, this objectification has not by any means been the preserve of the males of the species. Women can and do collude in the This would suggest that the truth is perhaps a little less clearcut than Raven suggests. Or maybe the imprisoning male gaze is now so universal and we've grown so used to the chains it binds us in that we can no longer see them.
L.U.V. on ya,
Bob
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