Piers Morgan & The Naked Celebrity Selfie Are Boring But Not Innocuous

This was published in The Huffington Post last week.

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/tess-finchlees/piers-morgan-naked-celebrity-selfies_b_9417356.html

I dedicate this piece to all girls & young women in my life. Never forget that your brain is your greatest asset so don't be afraid to flaunt it!

Whilst possessing a sexist streak wouldn’t be part of his job description, as a columnist for the Mail, it’s unlikely to hurt Piers Morgan’s job prospects. Earlier this month Morgan was so offended by the sight of Susan Sarandon’s cleavage, he took to twitter to give her a public dressing down. Yesterday, his guns were pointed at Kim Kardashian and her naked selfie.

Morgan’s atavistic rants about Madonna’s “age inappropriate” antics are as perfidious as they are pernicious. There’s something inherently unedifying about a middle aged man lecturing women on what they should and should not wear. It’s hard to imagine that Piers Morgan was once a national newspaper editor. As a journalist, words are his craft and there is an expectation that he should employ them to better effect. Rather than articulate a case to illustrate a point, he resorts to the sloppy short hand of prejudice.

Morgan’s personal attacks on women’s appearance, using patronising, value laden adjectives like “tacky”, “inappropriate”, “grotesque”, “embarrassing”, pollute the social media landscape. There’s no basis for his invective except his own disapproval, making his comments seem like old fashioned bullying.

I’m not going to defend Kardashian’s naked selfies. As someone who spent the last 8 years covering lads’ mags with copies of Good Housekeeping every time I went to the shops, it pains me to see women reduced to the sum total of their body parts. Twenty year old actress, Chloe Moretz, made a legitimate point when she tweeted Kardashian, "I truly hope you realize how important setting goals are for young women, teaching them we have so much more to offer than just our bodies”.

As a feminist, journalist and therapist who has worked with women made ill by sexism, I would argue that portraying women as sex objects perpetuates gender inequalities and that objectification is dehumanising. That’s the point. It’s much easier to abuse (or discriminate against) a non-person reduced to mere body parts. The sex industry, which includes lad’s rags, has vested interests in normalising the objectification of women. To them women, and girls, are just commodities.

Last year it was reported that half of school girls were considering plastic surgery to make themselves thinner and prettier, 90% of eating disorders are amongst females, teenage gang rape is on the increase and 1 in 3 girls have reported unwelcome sexual touching at school.

There were so many crucial issues that Morgan could have used his column (which was published on IWD) to highlight.

Yesterday Labour MP, Jess Phillips, stunned parliament into silence when she read out the names of 120 women killed by men they knew in the past year. On average, two women a week are killed each year by a current or former male partner and 25% of young women (aged over 13) experience physical violence.

According to  End Violence Against Women, nearly a quarter of young adults aged 18-24 report having experienced sexual abuse in childhood (31% of young women and 17.4% of young men), 90% are abused by someone they know and 66% are abused by other children or young people under 18. In 2012-2013, 22,654 sexual offences against under-18s were reported to police in England and Wales with four out of five cases involving girls. The UK is a significant site of internal and international child trafficking. The vast majority of trafficked children in the UK are aged 14-17, with many girls trafficked for sexual abuse and exploitation.

The internet has broadened the ways in which women and girls can be sexualised, dehumanised and exploited. Piers Morgan could have used his column to expose these, and any of the above, evils but he didn’t. He chose instead to be part of the problem women face on social media, not the solution.

It Was International Women's Day Yesterday But Most Women Are Too Busy To Give A Flying Feck About Equality

What with pole dancing classes in the morning and mindfulness in the afternoon, I didn’t have time for International Women’s day. Yet every year it finds me. Feminist indignation and “shocking” statistics abound.

But do the stats bear scrutiny? For example, I read that only 1% of titled land in the world is owned by women. Maybe women just don’t fancy owning land. It’s bad enough keeping on top of the housework without having to tend the flipping land too?

Women in part-time jobs in the UK earn on average 42% less than men. Kate Winslet dismissed talk of the gender pay gap as vulgar. I couldn’t agree more, especially when there’s an obvious solution. Work full time where the pay gap is only around 20%. Frankly though, if women had equal pay they wouldn’t know what to do with it. We already buy far too many cosmetics.

Shares in L’Oreal might benefit but then there wouldn’t be as much tax payers’ money left to subsidise the gap in revenue lost to tax havens.

The recession has pushed single mothers into poverty. Apparently 47% borrowed money and/or went without food in order to pay for childcare. Is it just me or is the remedy here a no brainer. Get married. Marrying for love is over-rated. The money I save in tax benefits as a married pays for 6 solarium sessions and a year’s subscription to The Lady.

Yesterday, Bono issued a feckwa against world leaders who have allowed women to plunge into poverty. 70% of the 1.2 billion people living in poverty are women and children. It would be churlish to point out that the amount Bono evades in tax could be enough (possibly) to lift an African country out of poverty or fund a rape crisis support worker in the UK or Ireland for a century. So I won't say that.  

Instead, I’ll blame women themselves. They need to “lean in” a bit more (so what if you get kicked in the teeth), be less complacent, climb that greasy pole and be better role models for children.

The BBC even caved into pressure when it sacrificed merit at the altar of political correctness. Panel shows such as QI and Have I got news for you now all have to have at least one woman. We’re talking about comedy here and everyone knows women are just not funny, let alone quick enough to compete with the likes of the hilarious Jimmy (the gang rape joker) Carr or Frankie (have you heard the one about the disabled child...) Boyle. Sarah Millican, Jo Brand, Gina Yashere, Bridget Christie, Sandi Toksvig, what were you thinking when you chose your career paths?

To end on a more sober note. Over two women per week are killed by current or ex-partners, and one in four women in the UK will experience domestic violence in their lifetime. Apparently there are those in the criminal justice system who still ask the question, “What did she do to provoke him”.

Not dissimilar to the experiences of women and children who report rape. Former newspaper owner Eddy Shah reportedly said under-age girls who engage in “consensual sex” can be "to blame" for the abuse they experience.

That’s International Women’s Day done for another year. The window for  feminist leaning polemic outbursts has now closed. Fret not though ladies, for the Real Housewives of Haringey season has only just begun.

Mother’s Day: Avoid Toxic Talcs, Flammable Nighties and Anything From The Kotex Product Range

The below was published in the  Huffington Post:

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/tess-finchlees/mothers-day-gifts_b_9382156.html

 “Look!”, said the HR manager, brandishing a folder as if it was a WMD, “We have equality policies posted on all the Tampax machines but we’re still haemorrhaging senior women”.

The not so human resource manager wondered if women weren’t their own worst enemy. She was irked that the only female executive had left a high profile meeting the day before, to collect a sick child from school. “Why does the school have her work number for emergencies and not that of her husband”? She was luminescent with rage. “How many of your male senior executives have ever left a meeting to collect a sick child”? I enquired. “None”.

This is just one example of the, one rule for women and another for men, culture that’s so entrenched in organisations that it’s rendered invisible and accepted as normal. As long as HR mangers apply double standards in the execution of equality policies (not encouraging male executives to share parenting duties), women will invariably be left holding the baby. 

A recent study by the Equality and Human Rights Commission estimated that around 54,000 new mothers in Britain lose their jobs every year, that’s twice as many as a decade ago. One in five new mothers experienced harassment or negative comments from colleagues or manager when pregnant or returning from maternity leave, 7% said they were put under pressure to hand in their notice and one in 20 reported receiving a cut in pay or bonus after returning to work. 

The recession is also pushing many single parents, 9 out of 10 of whom are women, into poverty. According to Gingerbread, who carried out a survey of members, 47% borrowed money and/or went without food in order to pay for childcare. In 2015 two thirds of England’s Sure Start children’s centres were hit with crippling cuts. Hundreds have been forced to close in the last 5 years and 130 are currently under threat of closure, thus removing a vital safety net from the most vulnerable children and families in society. So much for “early detection”, “making work pay” and “aspiration”. Hollow soundbites, with more bite than tangible substance.

With cleaning up other peoples’ mess as our USP, we need more women at the helm of UK PLC. Seasoned mothers wouldn’t succumb to corporations’ threats to throw their toys out of the pram if they don’t get what they want (avoiding tax on their toys). They would put them on the naughty step to ponder the maleficence of greed. Followed by a lecture on, “you won’t get anywhere in life without mastering the skill of sharing”.

But women are a long way off calling the shots. Among chief executives and chairs of FTSE 100 companies, there are 17 men called John. That’s more than the total of seven female bosses.

But perhaps the most chilling of all the statistics I’ve come across is that 17 % of people forget Mother’s day and, of the 83% that do remember, 79.9% of them think flowers are an appropriate gift. As if a bunch of Dahlias is commensurate recompense for being banished to a hinterland of societal insignificance, wherein moaning about your DH on Netmums constitutes radical political activism.

It’s not for me to say what an appropriate Mothers Day gift would be, but, as a general rule, I would avoid the following: flammable nighties, toxic talcs and anything from the Kotex product range.