What you wrote yesterday wasn’t just any old bullshit. It was dangerous, hurtful bullshit of the worst kind. It didn’t set women’s rights back by years or decades or even five lousy minutes, because these days women don’t hold their rights at the whim of fools who think assault, harassment and betrayal are no big deal. Women are stronger than that and we are all better for it.
But mate, you set back the cause for the rest us; for every bloke who ever decided to keep his pants on, and his hands to himself; for every bloke who took seriously the admonition that it wasn’t all about him and his one-eyed little friend. That crap you filed yesterday, sure, it insulted women. But it insulted men on a much deeper level. It implied we can never change, we can never get better. And hell, maybe, as a gender, we can’t. But as individuals we can and do every day. And the first step is not making excuses for our bad behaviour or shifting the blame onto women as a whole, or on to some ill-defined political construct.
John Birmingham responds to Bob Ellis’s ignorant bile. A-fucken-men to my new hero. Bob, you’re a first class cunt.