Why I'm still a feminist: Part 2

Following on from yesterday's International Women's Day blog post, in which I looked over assorted feminist rants I wrote in 2012 to see how far we've come (Hint: Not far enough in many cases...), I am now casting my beady eye over 2013's blog posts. My International Women's Day reflection for 2013 seems to ring true today, sadly.

"My feminism is better than your feminism" reflected on how women harm each other by turning feminism into a competition. Sometimes some of us will have to agree to disagree on certain issues. This does not mean healthy discussion should be shut down. It does mean that more will be achieved when there is mutual respect.

January 2013 was also about pap smears and cervical cancer - this is an issue very close to my heart, among other parts, as early detection of pre-cancerous cells back in 1997 probably saved my life. This is where Australia is leading the way - pap smears are advised 18 months after you first have sex or once you turn 18, whatever comes first. But the UK lags behind with early detection and, as a result, women under 25 are dying unnecessarily. More still needs to be done here, I am sorry to report.

I joined in the feminist fun of writing the terrible Nadine Dorries a letter from my uterus. I am quite sure she never read it but the good news is that she seems to have piped down, at least on the issue of reproductive rights. She has, however, made a fool of herself in many other ways since then.

Welfare reform and sexism intersected with my piece on the "woman with a womb like a clown car", representing as she does a tiny minority of benefits claimants. It remains to be seen with the General Election looming in May as to whether whatever damn government we end up with examines the benefits system with the right mix of commonsense and compassion.

And I probably alienated myself from some women with my dismissing of Seth McFarlane's "I saw your boobs!" song at the 2013 Oscars as a fauxrage. There is now at least one fauxrage a week as people become more and more determined to find things by which they can be offended and have less and less consideration for what true freedom of speech really means.

Additonally, I mocked Cosmopolitan magazine because its sex tips remain stupid. It is trying very hard at the moment to be the "acceptable" face of feminism. Sometimes it makes good points, sometimes I roll my eyes hard.

There were plenty of stupid things said about rape in 2012 and this has not really changed. As such, we had the unedifying spectacle of Ashley Judd being shot down in flames for daring to discuss rape. This led to idiots quoting her out of context and any intelligent discussion on rape fell by the wayside. I attempted commonsense on the thorny issue of false rape accusations but I am not sure anyone noticed.

April was a weird old month in the feminist rant department. I wasn't exactly tackling the big issues with a piece on marketing chocolate Special K to women (although I remain so tired of food being referred to as "naughty" or "wicked"...) and another piece on why shoe shopping sucks. But then Margaret Thatcher died and while the people who commented on my reflections on Thatcher as a feminist icon, I am quite sure many disagree with me wholeheartedly. Her legacy remains a topic of debate and I expect this to continue for decades.

And then there was another piece on lads' mags and Page 3 which resulted in some interesting comments indeed. I encountered a tiresome woman who used her "I'm a mother, you're not!" reasoning to try and shut down debate on censorship of lads' mags. That is a surefire way to quell any hope of intelligent discussion and it happens all the time. Nuts magazine announced more modest covers, possibly in the wake of the Lose The Lads' Mags campaign but I doubt campaigners will rest until these magazines are eliminated.

A century after Emily Davidson's untimely death elevated her to suffragette martyr status, I shared a few thoughts on things that would probably appall her in 2013. And looking over the points I made, not much has improved for women's voices in Parliamant. There is still tedious Daily Mail slut-shaming, and G4S still getting government contracts despite being inept and unscrupulous.

Nigella Lawson's personal life hit the headlines in 2013 after awful pictures of her now ex-husband throttling her at a London restaurant were published. She seems to have happily moved on. If only the same could be said for everyone who has suffered at the hands of an abusive partner. Domestic violence remains a problem.

I took a look at Australia, my country of birth after Julia Gillard stopped being the Prime Minister. I maintain that a lot of the vitriol directed at her was sexism pure and simple.

2013 also marked the year I could have been released from a UAE prison had I not acted my way out of a farcical adultery trial. It was a shocking and sad story but I do mot regret living in the UAE nor do I think it's the worst place on the planet for women. Indeed, a later rant on the niqab showed that my time in the Middle East led me to views on Islamic dress that may not be popular in certain circles. When it comes to how much flesh a woman should show, she simply cannot win.

Despite being a long-term Cosmo and Grazia magazine snarker, I defended writing about beauty because, basically, lipstick is not the enemy. Hell, some days I wear it myself. More seriously, there was a censorship row at Sydney University over a magazine cover featuring a range of vulvas. It would appear this is just one of many incidents in universities around the world where free speech is being stifled. This has become an alarming trend in recent years and it has to stop. Universities will no longer be bastions of free speech and thought if the rot is not stopped.

Sex workers' rights is always a tricky one. But I don't think anyone can deny that the current laws help anyone, especially women, whether they are brilliantly unrepentant sex workers by choice or whether they are true victims. In any case, a moral panic over women selling sex is never helpful.

And as the sun set on 2013's blogging, I reflected on the role of first ladies. Again, they can't win. It doesn't matter what political stripe they belong to, or what causes they choose to champion, they will be slagged off by someone. It is an awful job and I do wonder how much relief is felt by first ladies when their husbands are no longer in office. Whatever the case, it'd be good to see more bright women leading countries - not that this will be the outcome of the 2013 British General Election...

Photo by Vera Kratochvil

Nigella's business is now everyone's business...

The reaction to the Nigella Lawson-Charles Saatchi assault story reminds me of the armchair heroes who come out of the woodwork every time there is another horrific shooting in America. They are the people who claim with absolute certainty that if only they were on hand in Aurora/Sandy Hook/Santa Monica, they would have saved the day and shot the bad guy dead.

Ever since the jarring pictures of the Lawson-Saatchi argument were released, there has been a similar spate of heroes-after-the-fact. People who were not at the restaurant are sticking their heads over the parapet to claim they would have done something to help Nigella. The claims of "doing something" have ranged from asking if she was OK to calling her a taxi to calling the police to embedding a shattered glass in Saatchi's skull.

Yet the reality is that for those of us who weren't there, we don't know what we would have done. We only know what we like to think we would have done.
 
And now that Nigella has apparently moved out of the marital home, she is being called upon by people who have never met her to speak out about domestic violence. In Australia, the improbably named Dee Dee Dunleavy, a radio DJ, wrote a particularly stupid blog post in which she concluded: "Nigella, like it or not, you're a beacon for women from all walks of life. If you want us to buy your books and watch your shows on how to run our kitchens, then we need you to make a stand on domestic violence."

I've written before on why the idea of celebrity role models is ridiculous and I maintain this is still the case.

Dunleavy hastily issued a ridiculous clarification and claimed she wasn't victim-blaming or calling for a Nigella boycott despite her chronically patronising last sentence. That'd be the sentence where she advocated not helping Lawson to earn a living until she "make[s] a stand on domestic violence". Uh, yeah, because encouraging the reduction of a woman's earning power is, er, so empowering, right?

But Dunleavy is not alone in telling Nigella what she must do now. Globally, she is being ordered to speak out against domestic violence, to press charges against her husband and to divorce him.

In the meantime, Saatchi has accepted a caution from the police telling the media: ""Although Nigella made no complaint I volunteered to go to Charing Cross station and take a police caution after a discussion with my lawyer because I thought it was better than the alternative, of this hanging over all of us for months."

Given the extensive photographic evidence as well as accounts from people who were at the restaurant at the time, it would not have been unexpected if the CPS decided to charge Saatchi, even if Lawson chose not to co-operate. The CPS can prosecute in domestic violence cases without the alleged victim pressing charges, although I have been told by a police officer that this usually only happens if the "injuries are worthy of Section 47 Assault or above" - or in other words, at least an assault under the legal definition of actual bodily harm, which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison.

So what now? Whatever Lawson decides to do next is up to her.  That's the thing about choice - sometimes people will make choices that we might not find acceptable or would not make for ourselves, but that doesn't mean the choices are invalid. Nor does it mean that it is always easy for a woman, even one with all the advantages of Nigella Lawson, to simply leave an abusive man.

In the court of public opinion, an idiotic peanut gallery if ever there was one, she is damned no matter what.

If she speaks out against domestic violence, some will say she is pandering to the busybodies and that private lives should stay private, even if that life spills out onto a public street.

If she stays with Saatchi, she will be portrayed as an object of pity, a middle-class, apron-clad version of Rihanna who can't seem to break up with notorious abuser Chris Brown.

If she breaks up with Saatchi, the likes of Cristina Odone, who seemingly can't bear to see a marriage break up for any reason at all, will blame media pressure. While writing about the marriage in the media.

The media circus has now dragged on for days - Saatchi has been spotted at a restaurant without Lawson and sources are saying they hosted dinner parties after the awful incident and they seemed happy. There seems to be much consternation that Lawson has not confirmed via her spokesperson whether her move out of the marital home is permanent or not.

Seriously, this is getting ridiculous. Nigella Lawson cannot be blamed for lying low for a while and she is under no obligation to tell the media anything about her private life. Can you imagine what it must be like to open pretty much any given newspaper and see photos of yourself as your husband grabs your neck or read opinion pieces by people who presume to know what is best for you and profess to know more about your relationship than you do?

Meanehile, the Evening Standard has run a series of pro-Saatchi pieces every day since the story broke - he is a columnist for the ES after all. Is this their bizarre way of telling the world it's all fine, he is a top bloke, it was just a "playful tiff" (ugh...), and he will continue to write for them.  Still, it's a change from their daily pro-Boris Johnson nonsense, I suppose.

It's one thing to raise awareness of domestic violence via the media, to use the Lawson-Saatchi story as an example of how domestic violence can happen to anyone - but it is quite another to use the media to tell a grown woman how to live her life. Nigella Lawson is an intelligent, successful woman - we can only hope and assume those closest to her are offering her all the support she needs at the moment. And we can only trust that she will make whatever choices are best for her without blaming her, patronising her, talking about her as if she is a stupid child, disapproving of her or judging her.

Instead of stalking Mayfair restaurants and getting columnists to dole out unsolicited marriage guidance counselling, it would behoove the newspapers of Britain to report on some other news. There's plenty of it about at the moment.


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Here is a rare articulate piece of writing on the whole sorry story: http://sarahpinborough.com/2013/06/19/i-dont-know-where-to-put-my-feet/



Image courtesy of Brian Minkoff - London Pixels