International Women's Day ... how very interesting. It is now 100 years to the day since this celebration emerged from the events leading up to the Bolshevik revolution.
And how engagingly old-fashioned it all now seems. A day for a ceremonial rereading of The Female Eunuch? Or even of The Rights of Women?
But perhaps we are forgetting the cottage industry of blurring gender distinctions, of making all things fluid and deliciously 'intersexual'. I wonder how much longer the 'International Day' will be allowed to survive.
I bet it will be Politically Incorrect in a decade's time. Because these fashions are so transient.
When I was young, anti-apartheid demonstrators marched chanting "One Man One Vote". Tut tut.
In the 1970s, Bad Old ICEL mistranslated Deus as Father. Nowadays, at the hands of a Bergoglian Neo-ICEL, Father may be at risk of being mistranslated as God.
Tempora mutantur ...
But Germaine Greer, dear old Ozette, is still immensely readable.
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And the tragic thing about Germaine Greer is that she was recently banned from speaking at the University of Cardiff because of her views about "transgender" people, specifically "male-to-female" ones, whom she rightly said were not real women. It is very much a generational thing. I sometimes wonder if these people wake up one day and realise that their "fighting the good fight" is a waste of time, and that when they do speak their words ring hollow to all but a few old hats. Their time is coming to an end, but their successors' time is limited too.
"The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever." Isaiah 40:8.
Speaking of women, ABS and The Bride were eating some delicious roasted lamb at Maggie Jones's in Kensington, England when he was introduced to and spoke with Lady Felicity Birtwhistle, the daughter of Tilly and Cecil Cripplekick, the rich couple which owns several farms in and around the Tri-Cities of Dorset; dairy farms in the lovely little villages of Puddletown, Tolpuddle, and Affpuddle and she said, The authors of the Lil' Licit Liturgy were a bunch of poofters, right?
Father, is you middle name "Bigot"?
Reading David Harvey's Right to the City, I'm rather compelled to view all these shifting identities as manifestations of the capitalist carve-up of personhood, in pursuit of market multiplication. The poor, soft old man who likes a bit of lace is but the newest market for appropriation.
Since 1998 there has also been an International Men's Day (19 November) although rather than celebrating manliness it panders to the idea of male victimhood.
I would rather let the fair sex have their special day and leave the remaining 364 to us.
I have no sympathy for Greer. Her 'equality' agenda that women are just the same as men leads 'logically' to the assertion by some men that they are just the same as women. Beware when one starts breaking down borders.
“You are remarkably modern, Mabel. A little too modern, perhaps. Nothing is so dangerous as being too modern. One is apt to grow old-fashioned quite suddenly.” -Oscar Wilde in An Ideal Husband
The Russians – who celebrate Womens' Day as an official non-working holiday – consider the Day of the Defender of the Fatherland on February 24th as a kind of Mens' Day, although it originally commemorated the founding of the Red Army.
19th November - the feastday of St Crispin: perhaps an appropriate day for us to celebrate those men who still resist the way of the world: We happy few, we band of brothers...
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