Fay Weldon suggests men are the new sub-class, spayed of power and thrust into a girlie culture...

Authors: Riddell, Mary Source: New Statesman. 07/03/98, Vol. 127 Issue 4392, p14. 3/4p. 1 Black and White Photograph. Document Type:

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FAY WELDON SUGGESTS MEN ARE THE NEW SUB-CLASS, SPAYED OF POWER AND THRUST INTO A GIRLIE CULTURE. THEN WHY IS THE NUMBER OF RAPES UP THREEFOLD?
ListenSelect: Some things will always fail the glamour test. No glitz, for example, attaches to sago pudding or polyester trousers with stirrups under the feet or William Hague's sinusitis. Or, for that matter, rape; except in the eyes of Fay Weldon, who wants to "deglamorise" it for men. And which men? Gary Rennie ought, on paper, to cut it as a glam, postmodern rapist. Career in accountancy. Tormented his victim, a former girlfriend, by e-mail. "Thanks for making me feel bad about myself," he is supposed to have said, after raping her. This week he was jailed for seven years. Not much glamour there. Nor is the woman he raped likely to agree with Weldon's further point, made in a Radio Times interview, that the crime should be "defused for women and returned to the category of aggravated assault". In the face of universal horror, Weldon is now cavilling. When she said that "rape is not actually the worst thing that can happen if you're safe, alive and unmarked after the event", she meant that death was worse. This is a rather fatuous amendment. While rape may indeed be preferable to the ebola virus, the inference remains that any domestic violence preserving both life and complexion is not such a bad thing in an age when victimisation is redefined to fit her theory of "gender inversion". Men, she has previously suggested, are the new sub-class, spayed of power and thrust into a girlie culture, in which caring Tony Blair idolises rock stars and Bill Clinton favours non-penetrative sex. Leaving aside the quibble that Clinton actually displays all the feminine characteristics of a testosteronic pitbull, there are certainly examples to support Weldon's thesis. Princes Charles and Andrew kiss in public. David Beckham wears Posh Spice's knickers to get in touch with his feminine side (such a shame that she borrowed them back for the Argentina game). Surveys that used to

display the feebleness of women now deride the ineptitude of men. Can't drive. Can't cook. Can't even iron. The notion that showy little examples of sexual rebranding have anything serious to do with gender politics is absurd. Weldon's theory appears to have come unstuck at the point where she tried to reconcile the image of the new girlie with that of the unreconstructed rapist, the traditional object of hate for a legion of man-hating feminists. Such women, solid of purpose and hairy of leg, would never-unlike Weldon--be spotted having their nails done at Harvey Nichols. Nor would they countenance her glib brand of post-feminist prophecy. If Weldon thought that her views on rape might be accepted as an oblique hymn to female empowerment, she has been disabused by the odium slung at her. Nonetheless, she has offered something useful. The rape debate has gone quiet, as the lentils, dungarees and stridency of the old feminism have mutated into the sushi, Armani suits and pragmatism of the new. As the clamour line on the graph descends, the number of reported crimes continues to rise. According to the Home Office's interim survey, the rapes recorded by the police increased threefold between 1995 and 1996, while the conviction rate dropped from 24 to 10 per cent. Two-thirds of the cases studied did not get as far as a file being sent to the Crown Prosecution Service. As the study goes on, the reasons remain unclear. In some cases, there was insufficient evidence. In others, complainants withdrew their allegations. It is possible that they took the comforting Weldon line that their assailant "simply wanted sex" (as opposed, one assumes, to wanting to borrow a tin of catfood or discuss the works of Erasmus). It is also entirely possible that they failed to receive due attention in a culture in which male officers-according to the recently published annual report of the Police Complaints Authority--retain "an outdated and unacceptable attitude" towards women. And should Fay Weldon stand similarly condemned? Time, perhaps, to be charitable, if only on the grounds that she has contrived, however inadvertently, to expose both the shallow gloss of her brand of new feminism and the unfinished business of the old. For that, at least, she deserves some thanks.