Proud to be Professionally Offended, Hysterical with a Tendency to Over-Thinking

Professionally offended and hysterical being two of the most common insults hurled at feminists who think that words actually do have power and that being an arsehole isn't normal behaviour for adults who aren't arseholes; odd as that may seem to actual arseholes. As far as I can tell, over-thinking is applied to anyone who actually graduated from Kindergarten what with their emphasis on being kind to others and sharing and eating cookies with milk.

This weeks installment has come via a Mumsnet thread on the increasing nincompoopery of one Jamie Oliver. Now, I have never understood the fascination with Jamie Oliver. I don't cook and I can't think of anything more tedious than cooking shows, with the sole of exception of every sports show going. I don't think he's funny but that might be because I genuinely don't understand half of what he's wittering on about, what with the whole not cooking thing. 

Anyway, apparently, he used this particularly stupid phrase in his show yesterday to describe barbecue sauce.

"It should punch you round the face, with a little kiss after" 

I just don't see why it's necessary or funny to use phrases which imply domestic violence. Mostly, I think it makes him sound like an arsehole, regardless of whether he intended the reference or not. Because, I genuinely can't believe that people don't see the inference of domestic violence in that statement. This is part of the normalisation of male violence against women. And, I don't believe it was an off-the-cuff remark. I think it was planned, rehearsed and agreed on because it sounded "cool" and "edgy", just as kickassangel said. It will have been chosen deliberately to increase publicity, what with the whole "there's no such thing as bad publicity". 

I, for one, am sick of this bullshit. 

I am sick of men normalising male violence against women because they think it's hip. 

I'm sick of their apologists who tell survivors of domestic violence to "get over it".

I am proud to be professionally offended, hysterical with a tendency to over-think things because it means that I'm not actually an arsehole.


Turns out kickassangel has blogged about this too here.