Michel Houellebecq’s controversial novel, “Submission”, published in 2015, received a mixed reception from both the press and politicians. Not surprisingly, Marine Le Pen, leader of the right-winged “Front National”, described the work as, “fiction that one day could become reality.” Michel Houellebecq’s political fiction is in nothing a visionary work, it’s just a succession of false provocations. […]
Women’s Rights
“Transgender” As A Noun – A Step Towards Gender Equality?
I wasn’t planning on writing anything else on the subject, so quickly, until I received a few comments, pointing out that I had made a terrible mistake, making me (for some) unworthy to write anything on the subject of transgender people. On a “Feministing Community” website, I also came across the following devastating statement which […]
Would You Accept A Transgender Person As Your Secretary?
Erratum – I have been correctly told – “correctly”, because that’s the way it is (is it the way it should be?) – that the word “transgender” without the term “person”, should not be used. It is deemed to be insulting, in the eyes of transgender persons. If you think about it, my unintentional misuse of […]
Feminism Never Killed Anybody
I recently wrote a post on “The Neon Demon”, a 2016 horror film that I watched on my movie pay-channel. My main thought was that Nicolas Refn, who directed the film, had cast the female characters with such masculine bias, that they were literally transgendered into men. I got the following Facebook response that really intrigued […]
“Beauty Isn’t Everything, It’s The Only Thing.”
Horror films are really not my genre, but I do admit that if the storyline is good, and the special effects not too distasteful, they can make for compelling viewing. With aspiring model, Jesse, moving to Los Angeles, and getting gobbled up by predatory beauties, Nicolas Refn’s 2016 film, “The Neon Demon”, certainly underscores my […]
Charlie Hebdo and the Caliphate Factory
“We didn’t know.” At the time of Hurricane Harvey, Charlie Hebdo’s cartoon, featuring Nazi’s drowning in Texas, with the caption “God exists, He has drowned all the Nazi’s in Texas,” provoked a mis-directed world-wide outcry. The latest controversy will probably cause much less international hysteria – if at all – but is even more important […]
Sexism And The City – Nature Or Nurture?
Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them. – Margaret Atwood The last time I said anything remotely qualified as sexist, was in 1980, in a Chinese restaurant in the West-End of London. The chopsticks were hygienically wrapped in a beautiful red paper sleeve, decorated with Chinese […]
I Can See The Toilets, But Where’s The Bar?
Rightly or wrongly, I cannot relate to how members of LGBT communities feel about themselves and the situation they find themselves in. This does not mean that I’m not aware that, most of the time, these human beings are the victims of severe and unwarranted discrimination. The fact is, that due to my own sexual […]
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Dressed To Thrill: Meet The “Kini’s”
When we stopped over in a hotel in Strasbourg, on our way down to Italy, my son was looking forward to a dip in the hotel pool. We were deeply disappointed to find out that the hotel rules did not allow boxer-short-type swimming trunks, the reason being that such trunks “disturbed other clients”. “Discriminatie” (discrimination) […]
Simone Veil And Abortion – A Woman’s Voice In A Man’s World
Simone Veil (1927 – 2017) [perfectpullquote align=”left” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Abortion is a drama and will always remain a drama[/perfectpullquote] Simone Veil will be remembered as the health minister who gave women throughout France the right to abortion, as well as being the first woman to become president of the European Parliament. She […]