I haven’t bought a newspaper for about five years. I read them online. On Sunday, however, I was at a friend’s house and, while the kettle was boiling and my friend was laying the cakes out, I flicked through the pile on the coffee table. Ah, Sunday Times Style, I thought, and had a look. (Unfortunately you can’t link directly to it online.) And then I came across the following gem.
Why women are left on the edge, howled the title. Strapline:
‘Despite having outwardly perfect families, jobs and homes, many fortysomething women are in the grip of depression.’
Okay, I could spend several hours patiently deconstructing that bit in itself, (my fortysomething life isn’t ‘outwardly perfect’ for a start), but you have the UK’s next government to worry about. It goes on to say that:
‘It’s a funny thing about women of a certain age. Never before have there been so many gorgeous, high-achieving ambassadors from the fortysomething frontline…’
Okay, why does an age group need ambassadors? And do we really need to hear about how ‘high-achieving’ they are when, in the current climate, lots of women are struggling just to pay the bills? The writer then uses Michelle Obama and Sam Taylor-Wood as examples, which is odd because both, while having certainly achieved things in their own right, have attained their high status through their husbands.
The piece then goes on to suggest that, in the old days, the depressed 40-something would just lie back and complain for a month, but women nowadays can’t because:
‘We’ve got careers, Botox appointments and small children and their grandparents to look after.’
Um, okay. What about all the 40-something women in the old days who needed to work or look after children? I sense political confusion here, because any woman with the kind of high-achieving career that is being described here as so devastating to a woman’s emotional wellness certainly does not do her own childcare or act as a full time carer. There is also the barely disguised agenda that women should not be working because it is damaging them. But, and this is the kicker, why are ‘Botox appointments’ mentioned in the same breath as fundamentals like work and family?
After the obligatory soundbite from a therapist, saying that women have ‘lost their sense of meaning’, the piece goes on to say that:
‘More than anything, it is this sense of loss that pervades depression, particularly in the current climate. The loss of a marriage, job or parent can trigger feelings of despair, compounded by a wider malaise — ‘
Nothing wrong with that. Until you read what comes next.
‘— loss of the passion to consume as we shop less flamboyantly’
What the flying dog’s cock? Is she saying that, for women, not wanting to go shopping any more, because you can’t overspend and get into so much debt, is a cause for depression? And that we are such trivial little fools that we actually live for shopping?
Then we have some thoughts from Sally Brampton, and someone else saying that women are more competitive these days. Oddly, the author doesn’t go on to say that it’s partly shallow, meretricious bullshit like this piece which contributes to that, but never mind.
Then, along comes the final clincher. Here’s ‘psychologist and author’ Dr Cecilia d’Felice:
‘…thinks it’s ironic that we put ourselves through all this angst at the very life stage where we should really be coming into our own. “These are the best years of our lives,” she says. “If you’re lucky, your parents are still alive, you’re on top of your job and enjoying your kids.”
Great. Can’t argue with that. But here’s the killer:
“You are never going to be younger than you are today, and you are never going to be more attractive.”
Ever been punched in the stomach? Thanks for that. I really needed to hear it. I feel like reporting her (whose side is she on?) to the HPC. I pray that she has been misquoted.
What’s more, having instructed women to stop competing with other women and worrying about stuff, Style then goes on to present, (if my memory serves, as we were all shouting very loudly by then, and another friend even rang me about it), a) a piece by a woman complaining that her banker husband is a workaholic who is obsessed with making money, and b) a picture essay on a huge beautiful house belonging to Millie out of Ruby & Millie. Does anyone at Style even care what they print? Do any of them care about the way ordinary people, by which I mean their readers, actually live?
Let’s recap.
1) All women Sunday Times readers are an ‘us’, with rich husbands, kids, big houses, and highly paid careers.
2) Careers make women really stressed, but it’s their fault, not society’s.
3) All women are obsessed with shopping.
4) That women are competitive with each other and this is bad for us, but look! Here are some more articles about impossibly rich and famous people and their lifestyles, all presented as just another option.
It’s not that this is new. ST Style has been peddling the ‘we’re all rich now, isn’t it great’ line for nearly 10 years now. It’s time for an ST version of Observer Woman Makes Me Spit. I don’t really want to attack the writer, Anita Chaudhuri, personally, although she really ought to take more pride in her work. It’s the editors who let this retarded crap through that are to blame, and the whole dreary misogynist culture that employs them.
What is really serious is that women are suffering a lot of mental problems, but this piece does nothing to either explain or help. Also, what is given the umbrella term ‘depression’ can be a natural reaction to life, and is not a national disease affecting one gender. I haven’t felt this angry about something in the paper for years.
Is there any wonder that this election has had almost no women in it? If this is how the mainstream media sees us, we are effectively silenced.
Posted on May 11, 2010
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