Yesterday I read an article by a ‘broody feminist‘ I wasn’t, initially, sure what one of these was, so I clicked through wondering if it might be a new faction of feminism about which I could have an opinion (I think I probably fall into the category of ‘Opinionated feminists‘, or somewhere on the venn diagram where they cross over with ‘Drunk feminists’ and ‘Feminists who like crisps’). It turns out that a ‘broody feminist’ is just a feminist who wants children. The author, Charlotte Gill, explains that:

“as feminism has progressed, saying you want babies has become deeply unfashionable – synonymous with “I have no career ambition.” On the other hand, a child-free existence has been painted as progressive and exciting, sold successfully by celebrities like Jennifer Aniston and Kylie Minogue.”

Which is interesting, because it’s not really true. Sure, it is very slowly becoming more acceptable for women to say ‘I don’t want kids’, and we’re no longer treated like we’re the gruesome offspring of the Childcatcher and Cruella DeVille. But I think calling it ‘fashionable’ is quite a leap – given Daily Mail headlines that screech at us about our biological clocks, and misguided advice by people like Kirstie Allsopp about how we should all have a baby or two before we try and get a degree. I won’t spend too long on the truth or otherwise of the argument, because I’m sure you know that while many people are fighting to emphasise that you don’t have to choose to procreate, there’s still an assumption that you will. There’s definitely not, as Charlotte seems to be arguing, a dominant feminist view that parenthood is a Bad Choice for everyone.

If I could wave a magic wand that changed our narrative around children, I wouldn’t be arguing that fewer women should choose to have them, or that we should all have them at certain times or what have you, I’d change it to this:

• Having kids is one of many options when it comes to making life choices.
• It shouldn’t be assumed that anyone either will or won’t have kids: no matter what their gender, relationship status, etc.

In short, having kids is a bit like training for a marathon – it can be incredibly rewarding, it’s definitely admirable, but it’s also a lot of effort so not everyone wants to do it. Anyway, I’m not here to talk about kids – have ’em, don’t have ’em, whatever makes you happy. Here I want to talk about silence…

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Did you know that men have evolved to have slightly louder voices than women? Well, it’s true. As a general rule, men will speak at a higher volume than women do, and will tend to dominate more conversations. This is because, in our evolutionary past, it was necessary for men to put in most of the hard work to find mates. Alongside the usual: standing around looking rugged, they also used their mating megaphones (a primitive feature which eventually evolved into the mouth) to shout for female attention. ‘Ugg!’, or what have you – I don’t know, I don’t speak neanderthal, but it was basically a primitive version of ‘hey darling, I am ready to impregnate you in order to further the species! Check out my spaff-packets and make your choice!’ The rest, as they say, is history.

Now, before you start writing me angry letters about how actually neanderthal men communicated by dropping a dead mammoth at the feet of their lover, please understand that I made all of the above up. I mean, obviously.

The initial fact may or may not be true, I don’t know. It sounds maybe a bit plausible, doesn’t it? That men have evolved louder voices? I’ve not checked it, of course, that would take ages. But what I have done is constructed a vaguely plausible story as to why people might have evolved that way, then carefully ignored any facts or examples that might not fit.

Do I win £5?

Crappy evolutionary dating theories

Believe it or not, I get sent quite a few emails from people who have found The Answer when it comes to dating – ‘how to be an alpha male by killing the metaphorical 21st century mammoth’ or what have you. Normally I delete and ignore.

Yesterday’s captured my imagination, though, because it was funnier than the others.

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The other day, I was playing Magic: the Gathering online, like one of the cool kids. I like to play it in the evenings, because I find it relaxing to scream ‘Fuck off with your TWATTY DRAGONS’ at the telly while glugging wine. After half an hour or so of being repeatedly beaten by a bunch of cheating nobheads, I realised that I’d been horribly sexist.

“Oh look,” I’d exclaim when my opponent brought out a ridiculously overpowered beast which which to savage me. “I imagine his bastard ogre will decimate my teeny elf in a manner of seconds.”

And it did. But that’s not the point. The point is I was playing against someone with a generic, genderless username, and yet I’d repeatedly referred to them as ‘he’. In fact, almost every Magic opponent online is a ‘he’ in my mind, despite the fact that I would rage against anyone who told me any given game was for boys or girls.

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“Oh actually I think women should run the world. There’d be fewer wars, for sure!”

Oh do you? Thanks. I’ll get cracking then, shall I? You pop over there and sit in a corner and I’ll roll my sleeves up and apply my tidying skills to the world’s problems. For I am woman: meek and mild and gentle and peaceful yet also great at multitasking and international diplomacy.

When you think about it, it’s weird that women haven’t been running the world all along, isn’t it? When so many men in power think we’d do such a bang-up job. After all, they’re really keen for us to take over the world, so why on Earth have we not yet stepped into the powerful jobs that they have no doubt left, because they genuinely believe that a woman would be better at it?

Oh, right.

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Yesterday on Twitter I spotted this piece of genius: Tegan (aka BellJarred) has a message on her Tinder profile that tells people to only message her if they’ve read five books written by women. Inundated, she is… but not with messages from guys who’ve read five books by women.

There are two things here that annoy me. Primarily the point that these people have obviously ignored the one criteria she stipulates. Regardless of whether you agree with the criteria, that’s pretty frustrating, no? And secondly the fact that good books by women are not exactly hard to find. Here’s the deal: you don’t have to read books to be a good person. I bloody love a good book, but I’m not going to shit on you if you’re not a reader. What I will be really fucked off about, though, is if you are a voracious reader and yet you can’t name five books you love that are written by women.

In a rage after reading some of the messages sent to Tegan, I did a quick whip-round my bookshelves and picked the first few books I could see that were written by women.

Check out the lists below, recommend more awesome books in the comments (and you get to enter a competition in the process which is FUN), or go and read BookCunt’s blog, because she’s spectacularly funny and sweary and reads way more books than I do.

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