MAN SMART, WOMAN SMARTER

Good advice for men in this epic tweetstorm from J.K. Rowling in the aftermath of the British election.  I’ve combined her 14 tweets into paragraphs.

“Just unfollowed a man whom I thought was smart and funny, because he called Theresa May a whore.  If you can’t disagree with a woman without reaching for all those filthy old insults, screw you and your politics.”

“I’m sick of ‘liberal’ men whose mask slips every time a woman displeases them, who reach immediately for crude and humiliating words associated with femaleness, act like old-school misogynists and then preen themselves as though they’ve been brave.  When you do this, Mr Liberal Cool Guy, you ally yourself, wittingly or not, with the men who send women violent pornographic images and rape threats, who try by every means possible to intimidate women out of politics and public spaces, both real and digital. ‘Cunt’, ‘whore’ and, naturally, rape. We’re too ugly to rape, or we need raping, or we need raping and killing.”

“Every woman I know who has dared express an opinion publically has endured this kind of abuse at least once, rooted in an apparent determination to humiliate or intimidate her on the basis that she is female.  If you want to know how much fouler it gets if you also happen to be black or gay, ask Diane Abbot or Ruth Davidson.”

“I don’t care whether we’re talking about Theresa May or Nicola Sturgeon or Kate Hooey or Yvette Cooper or Hillary Clinton: femaleness is not a design flaw. If your immediate response to a woman who displeases you is to call her a synonym for her vulva, or compare her to a prostitute, then drop the pretence and own it: you’re not a liberal.”

“You’re a few short steps away from some guy hiding behind a cartoon frog.”