The facts of life

Despite the inevitability that time keeps moving on and things change, arguably some of them don’t.

Amidst the often-mocked doctrines of the “woke” generation, diversity, political correctness – and yes the feminist-inspired “Me Too” campaign – one cannot deny some inevitable truths.

Being of my generation, I may be bewildered to a degree by some of today’s obsessions but the fact remains that, whatever the point in history and whatever the signature subjects of its time, somebody or something has to ascend to the top of the pyramid in every walk of life and thence become an icon of the day.

It happened in every decade of the second half of the 20th Century and it happens now.

My point is that – when it comes to the female gender – attractiveness (whatever than means) plays a part.

We can celebrate the larger woman, we can insist that talent should out (irrespective of looks or appeal), but at the end of the day, there can be no denying that sex appeal – boiled to its essence, classic looks and presentation – always counts for something.

It comes with territory of being a woman. And this has as much to do with the attitudes and views of other women as it does with anything so trivial as a male perspective.

It’s one thing to be talented, but those lucky enough to have been also gifted in the looks department will always become more popular and commercially-successful than those less blessed. It’s a fact of life.

To those who do (or might like to) deny this only need to look at the “female” pages in the newspapers and/or celebrity magazines – or even the broadcast schedules filled with Reality TV programmes – to get a “heads up” of the way mass society lionises the attractive over the ordinary.

See here for a piece by Morwenna Ferrier on some of the issues arising as the feminism tries to come to terms with the post-Harvey Weinstein world and some of the consequences of advancing ‘female empowerment’, as appears today upon the website of – THE GUARDIAN