Angela Epstein again. Line-by-line

I think Angela Epstein just gets up in the morning and thinks "what can I do to set women's rights back a decade by lunchtime?". Or maybe she thinks "what would really piss Kate Smurthwaite off?". Well her latest effort "Why it's every wife's duty to make other men fancy her"is a spectacular success on both fronts? Here's how:

"Standing in front of the bedroom mirror, I give my reflection one last appreciative glance. I’ve got a night out with some female colleagues at a swanky new bar, and I’m determined to look my very best."

Determined? In spite of all the odds stacked against me? Determined to battle every obstacle like the Indiana Jones of the Boots cosmetic section. Well good for you. I usually do my make-up on the bus to make time for an extra glass of prosecco, but you have it your way.

"Arrogant as it may sound, I’m happy with what I see: freshly blow-dried hair, carefully applied lipstick, a pair of leg-stretching killer heels and a dress that manages to be both sexy and elegant."

Both sexy AND elegant? Stop press! Well lets hope there's no human rights abuses going on in Syria today cos we are not going to have time to write about them!

"All that’s needed is a final spritz of perfume — just enough to entice, not too much to overpower — and I grab my clutch and keys and head for the door."

She's like Carrie Bradshaw isn't she? I keep my keys already in my rucksack. The last thing I do before I leave the house is have a piss.

"Tonight, I want to attract a man. Not because I’m some predatory divorcee out to bag a scalp, nor because I’m a mistress-in-waiting looking for a little extra-curricular activity."

Sorry - is there some law against divorced women dating? Most divorced women I know like going to the cinema and a little light S&M, I don't know any who eat their date and put his head in a bag.

"No, I am a happily married woman, with no interest in any man other than my lovely husband of 20 years, Martin, the father of our four children."

Phew! For a minute there I thought it was my job to hate you, but no, you're sticking to the official rules of the patriarchy.  And really? No interest in any other man? You should watch more Ryan Gosling movies.

"But that doesn’t stop me from making sure that whenever I’m 'on show', be it at a social event with Martin, a work engagement or — in the case of tonight — out with a few girlfriends, I dress in a way that will attract male attention."

When you're "on show"? What is this? Crufts?

"A recipe for trouble? I don’t think so. It’s critical for a married woman, however happy she is, to make herself desirable to other men."

Other men who you have no interest in?  Well since you have so much free time, why not apply for a job you don't want or enter a competition you don't want to win?

"And before all those sour-faced, school-run mums with their hands up a chicken or their elbows in a twin tub start hurling their curlers at me, let me explain."

Yeah I hate women who cook or do laundry for their kids, don't you? And what do you think those curlers are for? They're to make your hair look curly. Presumably so random men will fancy you.

"Some women dress to impress other women — so they’ll pass the brutal, look-you-up-and-down appraisal routine practised by all judgemental ladies."

Yes judgemental people are awfully judgemental aren't they? You might want to get new friends, cos my mates don't give a hoot if I show up for a party in my pyjamas.*

"But I’m not interested in what other women think. Men are the barometer by which my attractiveness to my husband can be measured, ensuring I never take his interest in me for granted."

So you value men's opinions but not women's? You are SO writing for the right paper.

"It’s easy, after years of marriage, to assume your husband will fancy you no matter how you look. And at the end of a busy day, with four children to take care of, it can take a lot of effort to — well — make an effort."

Yes raising four children must be very hard work. I suggest afterwards put your feet up and have some wine. Stop beating yourself up. Perhaps your husband could try being grateful for all the work you do and supportive?

"Bad habits set in... not bothering with make-up when you both go to the cinema (who’s going to notice your sallow complexion in the dark?)... ditching your contact lenses for your pebble-thick glasses if it’s just a quick supper at the local gastropub..."

How are these bad habits? Being ugly is not "bad". And being ugly in the dark definitely isn't bad.

"I see married women all the time in their ugly shoes or with their badly concealed baby weight, tagging alongside an uninterested spouse."

What would be the point of dressing up fancy for someone who isn't interested? And presumably he's in hot pants, right?

"These women are, I’m afraid, inviting their man to stray."

Anything that doesn't start "darling I've heard about this great swingers party...", isn't an invitation to "stray".

"For, reprehensible as it is for any man to cheat, a woman who no longer values her own sexiness is compounding any potential weakness on her husband’s part."

How can you value your own sexiness? You're a woman so you consider your own opinion invalid!

"The way to keep him interested is to make him insecure — show him that other men are interested in you, so he’d better value what he’s got."

Ah yes, the key to all brilliant marriages: insecurity. Here are some other top tips: why not paint spots and wrinkles on him with make-up while he sleeps and start a rumour on Facebook that he's a sex pest. Who's he going to leave you for when all the other chicks in town think he's a pervert with bad skin?

"I realise that mine isn’t a popular view. The other evening, I went for a drink with a female work friend. I was in tight-fitting jeans, full make-up and high heels; her notion of dressing up was to take off her apron."

What was she wearing under the apron? Lingerie? Maybe she doesn't care what you think. MAybe you were being judgemental. Maybe she's having a tough, stressful time and wanted a drink with a sympathetic friend. Oooops.  And we all know you HAVE to wear high heels Angela because of your awful cankles. Also what was achieved here? Even if all the men in the bar were queuing up to offer you a drink and their business card, you would have to have gone home and told your husband about it to deliberately try and make him jealous. Making you weird.

"I explained my theory, only for her to snarl: 'If my husband’s seen me give birth, he can cope with me in an old top and jeans.'"

Wow, why do these smart people hang out with you? And is "snarl" just tabloid speak for "said while being ugly". And do your friends know you talk about them like this?

"But that’s precisely the point. Your spouse remembers only too well watching his beautiful bride transformed into an enormous, foul-mouthed harpy on the delivery table."

Hopefully he remembers the magical day he became a parent and the brave woman who went through all that pain. Maybe you date different guys to me.

"He knows how you look in the morning with last night’s make-up landsliding down your face and hair matted like the bottom of a cat basket."

Of course he looks great in the morning with a hangover and his make-up everywhere! (Or doesn't he bother wearing make-up when you go out? Uh oh, license to stray alert!!)

"If that’s all you ever show him, it’s simply inevitable that he’ll take you for granted."

You have quite a dim view of women. And quite a weird life if you are only ever hungover or in labour.

"Sure, he may love you — but when you stop showing him your desirable side, his attraction to you will become as tired and routine as the weekend shop."

Love is, of course, not enough. He needs to be horny all the time. And what about him? What alluring ensemble has he plumped for? Jeans and a faded polo shirt again? Ooops.  It's like he's begging you to shag every guy you meet.

"That’s why you have to remind him that other men find you sexy — otherwise you dent his delicate male ego by suggesting he’s not worth scrubbing up for."

So you scrub up for other men to remind him that you're willing to scrub up for him? No doubt he understands your message loud and clear!

"Remember, if he married you, he must have fancied you (once)."

Maybe he could help, maybe over breakfast he could occasionally mutter "you used to be quite attractive"... You could return the favour by peering up for your Cheerios and whispering "I used to want to have sex with you".

"I’m a hard-working, multi-tasking, mother-of-four battling encroaching age and fatigue."

Guess who is eventually going to win in the gripping battle between you and age? Yup, not you. And wouldn't it be more useful to put your top battling skills into battling for better childcare provision and more support for working parents? Then when you make some progress you can treat yourself to a spa day...

"I would describe my looks — without some clever M&S upholstery and a load of cosmetics — as utterly ordinary."

Oh I see, so sorry, this article wasn't intended for me at all - I'm gorgeous.

"But that just makes me work even harder."

If you want to "work" on improving your relationship - spend time together, do something you enjoy. Don't act like it's your wifely duty to pile on make-up for every trip to B&Q.

"My husband is, at best, bemused by my theory. The other night, as I was wiggling up and down the bedroom in a clingy cream frock and fretting over which heels to team it with before we headed out to a charity do together, he commented: 'Does it really matter? Who really cares, apart from me?'"

And you value men's opinions, not women's right?  So you listened to him.

"Ah, but at the function, when one of the male organisers told me I looked 'rather hot', he bristled and threw a proprietorial arm around my shoulder. Hurrah! Result!"

This is more important to you than the fact that, by your own admission, he loves you?  Maybe he just thought the guy was being creepy and was trying to help you shake him off.

"Working hard so other men notice you triggers a Neanderthal response in your man." 

Ah - science! Could you please refer me to the journal and article in which this research was published for peer review?

"It takes him back to those bygone days when males, high on pheromones, would prowl round for potential mates."

Are you talking about the 80s?

"Nothing is more guaranteed to drag him away from checking football scores at a party and place him firmly back by your side than the appreciative glance of a lusty competitor."

Sorry - I thought you wanted to stop him sleeping with other women? Now you want to stop him finding out the football scores?

"And the greater the status of the man who notices you, the greater the impact on your other half. It will reinforce his pride in the fact that you are his."

And remember the higher the status of the guy who fancies you - the more cows he's likely to offer as a dowry. Oooops - wrong century!

"It works the other way, too. Nothing reignites my interest in my husband more than the flutter of another woman’s eyelashes in his direction."

Very grown up - I don't want him unless somebody else does. Have you considered therapy?

"I buy him beautiful clothes for his birthday, even though they might court the sort of female attention that I know raises my hackles. It’s all part of keeping the spark alive."

Is there anything you and your partner like about each other that isn't physical? What a weird relationship. You dress him up, encourage other women to oogle him, then this angers you and you want him. Really? And if so could you just role play this at home?

"Does it get me into trouble? Occasionally, yes. There will always be men for whom a reasonably-presented woman will seem fair game."

So someone fancies you and you're not interested and this constitutes "getting into trouble?" or do they refuse to take no for an answer? In which case we're talking about "sexual assault" which is not your fault.

"This is why turning heads has to be done with a restrained hand. Men are simplistic about smoke signals."

Most men don't understand smoke signals at all. But they're not bad with English I've found. And how is looking "your very best" using a restrained hand? Surely you should go for "looking your second best".

"If you’re heavy handed with the hair-flicking, pouting and skirt-hitching they automatically assume this is semaphore for 'there’s a Travelodge around the corner'."

Most men also don't understand semaphore. Nor why you would want to use it to alert them about local landmarks. What is it with the smoke signals and the semaphore? Or maybe you mentioned somewhere else that your social circle is predominantly Native Americans and air traffic controllers.

"When I sense there is any danger of that, I can’t get back to my lovely man fast enough."

I thought you were only interested in him when other women were pawing at him?

"Ultimately, I still fancy my husband and want to do everything I can to ensure he still fancies me too."

So do that. But don't go telling the rest of us what to do like it's a "duty", and blaming us for infidelity and relationship breakdown. If we needed any evidence that dressing up fancy doesn't magically make your relationship last look at all the glamorous celebs getting divorced every year, while frumpy old Mr and Mrs Baggins on your road are probably celebrating their golden wedding anniversary. If there's one thing we know about great relationships it's this: they're not built on superficial attraction and petty jealousy.

"But even if he put a ring on my finger, it doesn’t hurt to keep him on his toes too."

Yes it does - deliberately making people insecure is a crappy way to behave. By all means dress up when you want to, flirt if you enjoy it, because you're a human being and you've every right to go out on the town and enjoy yourself.  But don't go pretending you're doing it for anyone's benefit but your own.

*That's "turn up to a party" (at someone's house, or a bar) "wearing my pyjamas". There is no party in my pyjamas. Sorry for the confusion.

Anna Soubry: Feminist Icon. Line-by-line.

Arggh!! Sometimes I think the Tories have an evil masterplan to disenfranchise women. Slashing benefits for carers and single parents, destroying public sector jobs, etc, etc. Then I realise their plan goes even further than that. They're actively trying to break down the credibility of women in the public eye by appointing the most stupid ones they can find to the highest offices they can spare.  Witness Anna Soubry. Weep.


"I've noticed that every public health minister has been a woman"

Great observation. Have you noticed anything else? Like your government auctioning off our healthcare service to the highest bidder? Mega corporations force-feeding junk food to children? An obesity crisis?

"and it's been seen as the soft, girly option."

I'm sure some people out there think jobs done by women are easy. That's probably because they (a) don't do those jobs and (b) are misogynist tossers. Don't let them influence your use of language here.

"It's bloody well not, it's one of the most important jobs."

Indeed it is, so you might want to think about doing it well.

"To be quite frank, when the PM said to me: 'I want you to do public health,' I thought: 'Oh boss, I respect you so much, but I'm the only woman here and I get public health – I hope there's no connection there.'"

You were the only woman at the meeting and you suspected the person who called the meeting might be behaving in a sexist way?  No shit sherlock. Amazed he didn't pat you on the bum and ask for two sugars.

"Maybe I can make people realise that this is not a soft bloody girly option, it is a big serious job."

Girly does not mean easy.

"I'm a huge fan of our prime minister … but I did sit there in the cabinet room and think: 'Boss, you do know what you've just done? You've given public health to the girl again"

Who is this "girl"? I want my government run by sensible adults though frankly I can think of some toddlers who could do better than this lot.

"except I'm not a girl, I'm a tough old bird.'"

I'm a tough old bird who loves to use sexist language to describe myself. What is wrong with "woman"? I never hear David Cameron describe himself as a "boy" or a "tough old cock".

"I came into politics to fight lefties …"

Were you drunk when you gave this speech? You came into politics to "fight lefties"? Not to make people's lives better or to serve the nation...? No, fighting them goddarn rootin tootin leftie scum. And which ones? Us lefties are constantly falling out over stuff, when we're not too busy growing organic veg and being gay.

"That's where political fighting goes. The Tory party must learn from its own history that when we fight each other, you can guarantee to lose."

And also win. Confucianism 1.0.

If you want to do something useful Anna - how about signing up to the Leave Our Kids Alone campaign? I think it's brilliant. And it would definitely be a positive for public health.

Me on Channel Five News

In case you missed it: me on channel five news debating page three. Check out Neil Wallis's patronising back pat at the end of the clip!  Eww.  ***takes Brillo pad into shower***

I seem to be their guest of the moment lately, here's me from a few weeks back discussing the Delhi Rape case with the much more sensible Sunny Hundal:

Mehdi Hasan makes me really angry.

Well, correction, the people who allow and probably even pay for him to share his transparently stupid views in public make me angry. So here's the line-by-line, if I can get through it without breaking something...

"“You believe that Muhammad went to heaven on a winged horse?” That was the question posed to me by none other than Richard Dawkins a few weeks ago, in front of a 400-strong audience at the Oxford Union. I was supposed to be interviewing him for al-Jazeera but the world’s best-known atheist decided to turn the tables on me."

Seems like a reasonable question.  I mean we need to know if we're being interviewed by someone rational or not don't we. Especially since you were no doubt about to ask him some questions about atheism.

"So what did I do? I confessed. Yes, I believe in prophets and miracles." 

We'll get to the prophets and miracles later.  Lets just rewind here - the winged horse? In order to believe in the existence of a winged horse you'd have to throw out everything we know about zoology and evolution.  I'm pretty sure the laws of aerodynamics are getting a thrashing too.  It's ridiculous and ludicrous. So what a brilliant question from Dawkins - exposing you as completely irrational. I guess you felt pretty stupid, hence why you're still going on about it.

"Oh, and I believe in God, too. Shame on me, eh? Faith, in the disdainful eyes of the atheist, is irredeemably irrational; to have faith, as Dawkins put it to me, is to have “belief in something without evidence”."

Another brilliant point from Dawkins.  Wonder if anyone else totally brilliant has ever said that?

"This, however, is sheer nonsense. Are we seriously expected to believe that the likes of Descartes, Kierkegaard, Hegel, Rousseau, Leibniz and Locke were all unthinking or irrational idiots?"

Yes and Aristotle and Plato supported slavery and considered it "natural". Great thinkers can be wrong. Otherwise the first time someone showed up with an IQ over 120 they'd have got everything right and there'd be no more debate about anything.  And in defence of all these people (1) they lived a long time ago before science had reached the modern era, (2) many people nod along with religion because it helps them in their careers, etc and (3) none of them ever EVER said they believed in the existence of a flying horse.

"In trying to disparage “faith”, Dawkins and his allies constantly confuse “evidence” with “proof”; those of us who believe in God do so without proof but not without evidence. As the Oxford theologian (and biophysicist) Alister McGrath has observed: “Our beliefs may be shown to be justifiable, without thereby demonstrating that they are proven.”"

Proof and evidence are not the same, they're highly related concepts though. Proof is enough evidence to draw a conclusion beyond reasonable doubt. And if you have any evidence at all on the flying horses issue, call me,  I think New Scientist would be really interested in an exposé. I'm pretty sure that one is neither proven nor justifiable.  Footnote: neither Dawkins, nor me, nor anyone needs to go around "disparaging" faith so long as you keep telling people about the flying horse. Really.  We'll just get some popcorn and watch while you do the job for us.

"The science bit"

Does this not feel like a shampoo advert?  Now here comes the "science"...

"Those atheists who harangue us theists for our supposed lack of evidence should consider three things. First, it may be a tired cliché but it is nonetheless correct: absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. I can’t prove God but you can’t disprove him. The only non-faith-based position is that of the agnostic."

The only reason that it appears you can't disprove God is because the definition of God is so vague and constantly being changed by religious folk!  If we take the approach of nailing down God (pun intended lol) it's easy to disprove Him/Her.  So (1) if we can agree that "God" means a being who knows and cares about human life and has the power to change things on earth. Then look at the fact that child rapists continue to exist, that good people often suffer painful illnesses, that famine and drought affect whole communities indiscriminately. This proves that He/She either doesn't care or can't intervene. So that God doesn't exist. And (2) if we can agree that this deity rides around on a winged horse, theres the whole of zoology and evolution and all the rest sat there disproving His/Her existence.

"Second, there are plenty of things that cannot be scientifically tested or proven but that we believe to be true, reasonable, obvious even. Which of these four pretty uncontroversial statements is scientifically testable? 1) Your spouse loves you. 2) The Taj Mahal is beautiful. 3) There are conscious minds other than your own. 4) The Nazis were evil."

On the contrary evidence can be presented for all of these things.

1, 2 and 4 are just about definitions.  We can't prove "love" unless we define "love". We could define it based on brain chemistry and then test for the relevant chemicals. We could define it more prosaically on (for example) willingness to perform an unpleasant task on someone else's behalf. Either way as long as we agree on a definition, we can test it. We can define beauty based on the percentage of viewers who consider a sight pleasing. Or we can use definitions based on complexity and symmetry. We could even again look for the chemical balance of a typical brain when it reports identifying "beauty" and then test for it. Evil is fairly neatly defined as deliberate abuse of human rights. We can demonstrate that that occurred.

3 is a strange one.  Great leaps and bounds in progress are being made around consciousness. We may soon have a much neater scientific understanding of it and be able to thus define and test for it.  But there's plenty of evidence for others being conscious by some definition or another. In fact you posing the question suggests to me that you're conscious, although your believing in flying horses suggests only just.

"This isn’t just about metaphysics, aesthetics or ethics: science itself is permeated with unproven (and unprovable) theories."

None of them are about the existence of flying horses. And nothing is unprovable, things may be unprovable with current methods and equipment, but science moves on.  We might once have wondered how anyone would ever prove the earth wasn't flat, but now with space travel, everyone accepts it.

"Take the so-called multiverse hypothesis. “It says there are billions and billions of universes, all of which have different settings of their fundamental constants,” Dawkins explained to a member of the audience in Oxford. “A tiny minority of those billions and billions of universes have their constants set in such a way as to give rise to a universe that lasts long enough to give rise to galaxies, stars, planets, chemistry and hence the process of evolution...”"

Yeah it's a theory. I don't think Dawkins is suggesting it's a fact.

"Hmm. A nice idea, but where’s your evidence, Richard? How do we “prove” that these “billions and billions” of universes exist? “The multiverse theory may be dressed up in scientific language,” the cosmologist Paul Davies has admitted, “but in essence it requires the same leap of faith [as God].”"

No, it's a theory.  One day we may discover wormholes and travel to other universes. Maybe in one of those universes there are flying horses.  Cos there sure aren't in this one!

"Third, there are plenty of good, rational and evidence-based arguments for God. You don’t have to agree with them, but it is intellectually dishonest to claim that they, too, like God, don’t exist."

No there aren't. There aren't any. If there were scientists would evaluate them.

"Take the Kalam cosmological argument – first outlined by the medieval Muslim theologian al-Ghazali, and nowadays formulated by the Christian philosopher William Lane Craig as follows:

1) Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
2) The universe began to exist.
3) Therefore, the universe has a cause.

Whether you agree with it or not, it is a valid deductive argument, a genuine appeal to reason and logic."

But it's a total nonsense. Firstly because the term "begin" implies there was a time when it was not here, and then a time when it was here. And that only makes sense if we think of time as something that already existed, before the universe. But time, without a universe, is meaningless. Time, and thus beginnings, only starts to exist as the universe comes into being.  Secondly this argument builds a huge huge HUGE paradox. The universe exists so something must have created it. Lets call that thing God. So if God exists something must have created God. Lets call that thing super-God. So if super-God exists...  Incidentally this is a fun game to play if you're having trouble sleeping or don't like the other people at a dinner party.

"Or how about the argument that says the universe, in Davies’s words, “is in several respects ‘fine-tuned’ for life”? Remember, the late Antony Flew, the atheist philosopher who embraced God in 2004, did so after coming to the conclusion that “there had to be an intelligence behind the integrated complexity of the physical universe”. To pretend that Flew, of all people, arrived at such a belief blindly, without thinking it through, “without evidence”, is plain silly."

If the universe wasn't fine-tuned for life, we wouldn't be here.  That's like the person who wins the lottery saying "God made me win", forgetting that many of the millions of people who didn't win also prayed to a God.  In fact the fine-tuning of the universe is one of the reasons behind the multi-verse theory.  Currently no scientists are debating fine-tuning in the context of the flying horse theory.  And isn't it rather weird to imagine God spent ages fine-tuning universal physical constants to create galaxies, stars, planets, moons, black holes, supernova and life on earth and then looked round afterwards and went "oh, I'll also make a flying horse".

"For Muslims such as me, faith (iman) and reason (aql) go hand in hand."

Yes and then faith blindly throws reason out of the window.

"The Quran stresses the importance of using science, logic and reason as tools for discovering God."

Yes - not as tools for finding out if God exists or not, for "discovering God.  Which is a bit like using crayons to make an omelette. Also in 4:34 the Quran says it's ok to beat your wife.

"“Will you not then use your reason?” it asks, again and again. But hasn’t the theory of evolution undermined Islam? asks the atheist. A few years ago, Dawkins accused British Muslims of “importing creationism into this country”. He has a point. These days, the vast majority of my coreligionists see Darwin as the devil."

Of course they do.  Darwin's work showed for the first time in history that there categorically wasn't and never had been any such thing as a flying horse! What fools they must have felt. Why the next thing someone will tell them the moon isn't really a crescent shape. Ooops.

"Yet this is a new phenomenon. Many of Islamic history’s greatest scholars and thinkers were evolutionists; the 19th-century scientist John William Draper, a contemporary of Darwin, referred to the latter’s views as “the Muhammadan theory of evolution”."

Yes and I've heard people refer to you as a journalist, yet here we are Mehdi, churning through all this nonsense.

"As I pointed out on these pages back in January, “one of the earliest theories of natural selection was developed by the 9th-century Iraqi zoologist (and Islamic theologian) al-Jahiz, 1,000 years before Charles Darwin”. And almost 500 years before the publication of On the Origin of Species, the acclaimed Arab philosopher Ibn Khaldun wrote his Muqaddimah, in which he documented how “the animal world then widens, its species become numerous . . . the higher stage of man is reached from the world of the monkeys...”"

Impressive. Now lets play a fun game called "whose religion stopped those ideas becoming widespread, being tested and then used as a basis for further research?"  You go first.

"Stages of man
There is, indeed, nothing in the Quran that prevents Muslims from embracing evolution."

No, nothing at all. Nothing except WHHHRFFF WHHHRFFF what's that, nothing in the Quran that WHHHRFFFF WHHHHRFFF prevents Muslims from WHHHRFFF WHHHRFFF oh I'm so sorry I can't hear what you're saying - there's something landing behind me over here WHHHRFFF WHHHRFFF well fuck me it's that flying horse of yours Mehdi. Now, what was your point about the compatibility of the Quran and evolution again?

"In his recent book Reading the Quran, the Muslim commentator Ziauddin Sardar notes how creation is presented “as a dynamic, on - going phenomenon that is constantly evolving and changing”. Sardar points to verse 14 of chapter 71, where “we are specifically asked to reflect on the fact that ‘He has created you stage by stage’ ”."

Evolution definitely doesn't show that human beings were created in stages by a deity.  Also you might want to be honest here and admit that the Quran also claims the old 6 day Extreme Makeover: Universe Edition version of creation.

"Yet the theory of evolution, whether Muslims accept it or not, doesn’t explain the origins of the universe, the laws of science or our objective moral values."

No, it explains the evolution of humans and other animals, plants, etc.  Hence why it's called the theory of evolution. Other scientific theories explain those other things.  And what objective moral values? The ones, once widely believed and today still practiced in much of the world about how it's ok to beat your wife? See ... the Quran (4:34).

"In short, most of us who believe in God do so not because we are irrational, incurious or immature but because He is the best answer to the question posed by Leibniz more than 300 years ago: “Why is there something rather than nothing?”

So here we are.  The New Statesman is now publishing an article espousing a 1400-year-old answer to a 300-year old question?  And that answer is: something exists, so something else (of unknown origins) must have made it, I imagine He probably rides about on a flying horse. I weep.

The Daily Fail and Faking It

Oh dear, according to the Daily Mail men (remember you're all straight) like to look at women's faces during sex, not because it's wonderfully romantic or increases communication and intimacy but because they're trying to work out whether we're faking our orgasms or not.

Let me help you all out here.  Here's how you can tell if your (female) partner is faking her orgasms: she always has one.  Even when it's just a quickie or she's had a bad day or is feeling a bit unwell.  The best way to tell she's not faking is if sometimes she says "ooh, not quite, here, try this".

Seriously, good sex = communication. If you don't have the guts to talk about it, should you really be doing it at all?

You are welcome.

Join me for New Year's Eve!

Hello readers!  Just to let you know - or if you know anyone who lives in or near London please pass this on - that I'm going to be performing at a brilliant fun New Year's Eve show/party.  It's called The Ultimate Intimate Comedy and Sing-Along New Year's Eve Party and it also features some of my favourite comics: Greek whirlwind Katerina Vrana, Chris Coltrane (host of lefty show Lolitics) and cabaret favourite Luke Meredith.  Then after we've done our respective things, including silly games and prizes Luke is going to lead us in a lovely sing-along all the way up to midnight and then the bar stays open til 3am.  The best part is it's a really small intimate venue so EVERYONE will get to be part of the games and fun and it's only £20 a head including nibbles.  Tickets onsale here and strictly limited so book soon!

Bigotry double-speak alert

Eww, this is creepy.  The Guardian has published a piece by Timothy Radcliffe sinisterly trying to say, without giving any real reasons, that religious opposition to gay marriage is not homophobia.  It's a cavalcade of nonsense.  Here's why, line-by-line:


"It is heartening to see the wave of support for gay marriages."

Yeah, shame the church is still a hotbed of bigotry.

"It shows a society that aspires to an open tolerance of all sorts of people, a desire for us to live together in mutual acceptance." 

Tolerance and acceptance?  I want to live in a society that does not tolerate or accept bigotry of any kind. Including that kind that comes, as it so often does, from organised religion.

"It seems obviously fair and right that if straight people can get married, why not gay people?"

Yes it does. Because it is.  The article should end here.

"But we must resist the easy seduction of the obvious."

We must also not forget Occam's razor. If it looks like bigotry and it smells like bigotry... it's probably bigotry.

"It once seemed obvious that the sun revolved around the Earth..."

Not wholly true, but it was science that showed the earth revolves the sun, not religion.

"...and that women were inferior to men."

This is still "obvious" to millions of people around the world, and almost always because religion teaches that it's true and that it should be perpetuated by denying women their basic rights.

"Society only evolves when we have the mental liberty to challenge what seems to be common sense."

Yes we should challenge things that seem to be common sense, but we shouldn't reject them outright unless we find compelling evidence. Doh.

"Many Christians oppose gay marriage not because we are homophobic..."

No - thinking gay people should have less rights than straight people IS homophobic.

"...or reject the equal dignity of gay people..."

If people have equal dignity, they probably ought to have equal rights.

"...but because "gay marriage" ultimately..."

Putting it in quotation marks is stupid and offensive. If gay people get married, that is, or would be, gay marriage.

"...we believe, demeans gay people by forcing them to conform to the straight world."

No it doesn't, unless you plan to make gay marriage compulsory. It gives them the option of having what others have and also all the other options straight people have, live living together, dating, being single, having group sex, whatever. And marriage wouldn't be part of the "straight world" if we made it available to all.  And there's no such thing as the "straight world", we live in the "real world".

"Richard Sennett of the LSE argues in Together, the Rituals, Pleasures and Politics of Co-operation, that western society fears difference."

All human beings instinctively fear difference because we don't fully understand people who aren't like us.  This is the root of intolerance, we need to overcome it. One of the main barriers to that is organised religion.  Organised religion almost always teaches that anyone who doesn't live a certain way and believe a certain pile of nonsense is going to be punished for it, often violently and torturously.

"Because of growing inequality and a fluid society in which people move rapidly from one job and place to another (if they can get a job at all), we do not learn the art of living with people who are unlike us."

Actually in the West we live in a more mixed culture than at any time in history.

"We are highly tribalised."

No we used to be tribalised. When we lived in tribes. That's where the word comes from. Yes there are remnants of tribal living around still but in general we no longer live in tribes.

"He asserts that "tribalism couples solidarity with others like yourself to aggression against those who are different"."

Not always true in some ways.  Historically tribes would only have been "like-minded" because they were blood-related and because infants were communally raised by elder tribe members who passed on values.  It's likely many people in tribes disagreed with tribe leaders or felt they were different to other members. But often they may have kept quiet because falling out with the rest of the tribe meant great personal risk. It's unlikely they knew how individuals in other tribes felt about issues, and in some cases tribes co-operated and in others they fought or competed.

"The internet enables us to bond with like-minded people."

And yet here I am reading your twaddle Tim! But good - if I can reach out to others who also hate bigotry, I'd like to do that.

"If we disagree, we can disengage in a second."

Which is much better than having a war isn't it?  Would it be better to force people to live full time with people they don't actually get on with?  Also I've never "disengaged" with someone online because of their sexual orientation.  Nor would I.

"Zygmunt Bauman argues that the mobility of modern society encourages "the impulse to withdraw from risk-ridden complexity into the shelter of uniformity"."

Well we certainly can use the internet to find others whose opinions we agree with if we want.  And that's a brilliant thing for people who feel different to those around them and may be being bullied or having their needs and feelings ignored. This would include gay and trans people as well as, for example, those trapped in religious communities who do not believe supernatural nonsense.

"Tolerance means, literally, to engage with other people who are different."

Engage with them by fighting to deny them the same rights as you?

"It implies an attention to the particularity of the other person, a savouring of how he or she is unlike me, in their faith, their ethnicity, their sexual orientation."

Remind me to go round savouring how others are different to me in their ethnicity.  Mmmm, a brown person... How the hell does this work? Or savouring their different sexual orientation.  Mmmm, boy-on-boy action, tasty. Gay men and women don't want to be savoured by creepy old religious dudes, they want to be treated equally by everyone and by the law.  And when it comes to your homophobic faith, excuse me if savouring it doesn't leave rather a bitter taste.

"A society that flees difference and pretends we are all just the same may have outlawed intolerance in one form, and yet instituted it in other ways."

But we are all different - some people want to marry in their 20s, others in their 80s. Some want to marry more than once, some never at all. And some people want to marry someone the same sex as them. We're not pretending everyone is the same, we're insisting everyone should have the same rights. To describe legalising gay marriage as "instituting intolerance" is real double-speak.

"It says, "we shall tolerate you as long as you pretend to be just like us"."

But gay people don't need to pretend to be "just like us". They are "just like us". In fact they are "some of us". Doh!

"We put up with various religious faiths as long as they are confined to the private sphere, or reduced to decorative role."

Actually we go to enormous lengths to encourage religion. If churches paid tax none of the recent welfare cuts would be necessary at all. And we allow religion into our schools and public services, even into taxpayer-funded roles in our hospitals and armed forces. It's disgusting and it needs to stop now, especially since the church persists in pushing it's homophonic agenda in all of these places.

"At Christmas, a tree, and a menorah for Hanukkah."

The tree is pagan by the way and has everything to do with culture and toss all to do with religion, as do the presents under it.

"Religious conviction, if it impinges on the public sphere, is viewed with a mixture of fear and derision."

Well it does impinge on the public sphere. Twenty-six unelected all-male Church of England bishops sit in the House of Lords and influence the laws that affect the rest of us. And yes of course it meets fear and derision because we want our laws to be based on fairness and human rights, not outdated bigoted supernatural nonsense.

"And so it is both true that modern Britain is a model of multiculturalism, and also that we drift around in a fog of mutual ignorance."

While cheese IS NOT chalk, we also note that cheese IS chalk.  We're not a model of multiculturalism, we get it right sometimes, and we're not drifting around in a fog of ignorance, we get it wrong sometimes.  Like for example right now some bigot is writing in The Guardian about how we shouldn't allow gay marriage. And as for "mutual ignorance", yes there are probably a small number of straight people in the UK who are to some extent ignorant about the gay community but I fail to see how there are gay people who are ignorant about straight people. That is the privilege of being the vast majority of the population.

"Cardinal Basil Hume taught that God is present in every love, including the mutual love of gay people."

Well I thought I might be drifting around in a fog of ignorance about the gay community I'd definitely ask Cardinal Basil Hume for his opinion.  That's definitely a better idea than asking someone who actually is gay. And thanks Basil, I'll bear that in mind while I fuck other atheists.

"This is to be respected and cherished and protected, as it is by civil unions."

Respected so much that gay people aren't allowed to use the same words or legal documentation as straight people, nor hold their ceremonies in the same buildings.  How is that "respect"? And why should anyone "cherish" having less rights?

"But to open up marriage to gay people, however admirable the intention, is ultimately to deny "the dignity of difference" in the phrase of the chief rabbi, Jonathan Sachs."

Eww, don't quote Jonathan Sachs at me. I met him once. Horrible bigoted man. (And I think I may have said that!) And "the dignity of difference", really?  The dignity of unequal rights?  The dignity of "not quite the same"? The dignity of "don't use our special word for it"? With all due dignity - fuck off.

"It is not discriminatory..."

Yes it is. Denying equal rights is discrimination.

"...merely a recognition that marriage is an institution that is founded on a union that embraces sexual difference."

Marriage is an institution founded on male control over women.  Historically men could marry several women and have concubines, etc too.  Women had little or no say in the matter. Love was not really a factor in a lot of historical cases, it was much closer to slavery.  The meaning of marriage has constantly evolved for the better. And anyway Christmas trees are FOUNDED on pagan worship, so why aren't you campaigning to bring that back?

"It is not a denial of the equality of the love between two gay people, for all love is of infinite value."

If love is of infinite value then it must be worth more than the church's petty outdated ideas, no?

"A society that fears difference and does not engage with it will ultimately fall into intolerance."

So if we allow gay marriage, this will lead to intolerance. So being tolerant will lead to intolerance. Have you read 1984 Tim?

"Real conversation with people who are different is frightening: it changes how you view your own identity."

Yeah the last time I spoke to a gay person I totally shit myself. Not.

"In his book on Dostoevsky, Rowan Williams quotes Mikhail Bakhtin: "Dialogue ... is not a means for revealing, for bringing to the surface the readymade character of a person; no, in dialogue a person not only shows himself outwardly, but he becomes for the first time that which he is – and we repeat, not only for others but for himself as well.""

Note how directly after he calls for conversation between people who are different he then quotes another straight white bloke's book about yet another straight white bloke. Not one woman, non-white person, gay or lesbian, transperson, etc has been quoted or even mentioned in this whole article.  And you think the rest of us are scared of difference?!!  I guess asking a gay person's opinion would be too frightening huh?  But hey, I'd be scared of gay people too if I was a bigot.

"An easygoing tolerance, rubbing along beside each other without much curiosity, is not enough."

Tolerance is a bloody good start. And equality in terms of marriage is a step on the road to equality. And if your level of curiosity about the gay community is so strong that you sought out the opinions of three straight white men: a Rabbi, a Cardinal and a former Archbishop? I'd hate to see how you do research on dogs, probably by asking cats, or newts. And again you seem to be implying that gay people for the most part just muddle along without interacting with straight people. But they don't, they can't, because straight people are bloody everywhere and run everything.

"We need to recover a confidence in intelligent engagement with those who are unlike us, a profound mutual attention..."

So go on. Ask a gay person if they want to be "equal but different", if they think marriage is "founded on sexual difference", if they want less rights than you.  Hint: they don't!

"...otherwise we shall crush a life-giving pluralism." 

Yes "pluralism", what a lovely word for "inequality". Remember the good old days when South Africa had "pluralism" for black people? No nor do I because apartheid was just discrimination!

"It will not only be gay people who will suffer."

But lets be honest, when gay people have less rights, it is MOSTLY gay people who suffer.

"We shall all be the poorer."

This whole article doesn't suggest one single way in which anyone shall be "the poorer" for living in a society that recognises gay marriage.  The point seems to be that we should reject gay marriage because it might discourage some people from engaging with those who are different to them? On the contrary it will highlight how similar we all are, in that we are all human beings.  Gay marriage will actually lead to more engagement, especially between gay people who love each other! Plus it will make it really obvious which churches (Unitarians, Quakers, etc) are open minded and enthusiastic about being a part of gay people's lives and which ones (CofE, Catholic) are going to continue to support bigotry.