Mind the Gap

And now to carry on the age-old tradition of ranting about the Guardian. Only, they insist on taking feminism’s name in vain, all the time, in increasingly ridiculous contexts. We’ve had Carmen Electra and Geri Halliwell, and now today it’s Trinny and Susannah.

Maybe it’s not surprising no one even knows what the word means anymore, because it’s been used for so many things in so many contexts, it barely has a meaning anymore. To most of the Guardian’s interviewees, it seems to mean that “women get to do what they want”, or “women get to have a career”, without taking anything else at all into context –anything about, say, femininity being a social construct, or women’s situation shaping their lives from the time they’re born. Often, the interviewees come out with “women should be confident and powerful and do whatever the bloody hell they want”, which you can’t exactly blame them for, being put on the spot like that. But that does manage to imply that women’s situation is their own fault and derives from their poor attitude, which just happens to be the view of misogynists and antifeminists everywhere.

Obviously, they’re then so feminist that they go on to say stuff like this:

You’ve got a great arse. You’ve got good legs. You are a cello. What are you, a C or B cup? Turn around, let’s see your bottom. Your bottom is a really great, it’s not too peary.

I’ll reiterate what I said about Geri Halliwell: I don’t care if these women are feminists, it doesn’t make any difference, one way or the other. Often the views they express are the furthest thing from feminism imaginable, and that’s also true of their careers, quite often. This isn’t a criticism. Calling something feminist isn’t a judgement of value. But what the Guardian are doing here is completely destroying the meaning of the word “feminist”. In fact, to use the word in its original sense, they’re raping it: plundering it and completely devaluing it.

It’s also interesting that they only ever ask their female interviewees that question. They wouldn’t ask, say, Ant & Dec, even though it would be equally relevant. And of course, they don’t ask Angela Davis, because that would just be insulting – besides the fact that the reply is obvious. You know, maybe they should get Gary Younge to edit the women’s pages, as at least he doesn’t try to make his articles about himself, and how he’s so radical, young and cutting-edge.

This really has to stop. They’re making themselves and their interviewees look like idiots, and they’re turning feminism into something, for want of a better word, pink and fluffy, to be shared among women at Tupperware parties and knitting marathons, between recommendations of the best brand of chocolate to eat during your period. And what exactly are they trying to prove? That lots of celebrities “aren’t a feminist, but”? That feminism is something cutting-edge that’s too strong for people to take, except, presumably, Guardian journalists?

But then why do they do such a completely insultingly crap job of covering it? In fact, can you imagine asking a high-quality journalist such as Gary Younge or George Monbiot to edit the women’s pages? No. The whole idea is ridiculous. That’s because the women’s pages are basicallya frivolous load of nonsense. They should either accept that and stop covering feminism – or at least stop turning it into a slightly frivolous women’s issue, rather than the human rights issue it is. Or they should just stick to interviewing great feminists, which they’re generally pretty good at.