There are days when it is easy to imagine a stifled war going on in Australia. In kitchens and cars, bars and bedrooms, skirmishes break out between men and women in an ongoing battle of the sexes.
I write this knowing that if it were published in a major newspaper here, there would be an instant barrage of hate mail from the dark shirted men, shadowy casualties of the fight, who seem ever-ready for an organised response to any view from a female about the state of play between women and men in this country.
Some 30 or so years on from the strident emergence of the feminist movement, this battlefield is tinder dry, any spark set to ignite a firestorm.
Men here are highly sensitive to criticism. They have been for the past 25 years; probably since the no-fault divorce laws were first introduced - a significant tipping point in undermining male domination of the family unit.
And as for women, well our prejudices lay just beneath the surface ready to bubble forth when we sit in groups (there’s safety in numbers) to discuss the latest assaults and wonder about tactics – all men are bastards, emblazoned on the conversation.
A recent battle between a friend, who had been sleeping with the enemy, has thrown the tensions into sharp relief. A sensible, attractive, intelligent, woman who had not rushed into marriage has now found it falling down around her with the consequent collateral damage. Within her own four walls she is fighting a hidden battle for the basic right to live without being blasted with verbal abuse every day. She has an escape plan but it is moving slowly.
I suppose it is the natural evolution of any revolution that things should be undone before they are remade and you can’t know beforehand if it will all turn out for the better.
I am bored with this war.
I want to get over it but I’m afraid I’ll be caught off guard; lord knows my own personal battles have been anything other than victories.
But wouldn’t it be nice if men and women could just like each other, respect the qualities in each and work together in harmony. Yes it is a cliché from the Miss Universe contest, but I want world peace.
And why does the war feel so much harsher here. It is brutal. There are certain places when fueled by alcohol, men appear like mad, lust-crazed barbarians. Don’t go to the cricket in summer unless you are happy to get a score out of 10 and a loud, crude, appraisal of every one of your body parts on your way to the toilet. They are Vikings set to rape and pillage your ego. It is not admiration it is hot and hateful.
I think I know where it comes from. I have been in pubs and heard the war stories from their side.
She took my kids, she wants more child support, she cleaned me out!
It may be a pub thing, but I have never heard the self-reflection required to move on – there is never a …maybe I could have been more this or that..maybe we just had different aspirations…no, it is simply, she’s a bitch.
I once met a guy who, at just 23 years old, had already decided never to marry because he wanted to avoid any chance of having the family farm at risk from the claims of a divorcing wife.
Just like most conflict in the world – economics is right there in the mix.
And I have met hundreds of women who have struggled to keep their world together as single parents – working two jobs – one unpaid, running the home and life in general and one paid, sometimes two because equal pay for women is still not achieved.
I’ve heard the stories of kids who never or rarely see their fathers.
They spend years wondering what they did to deserve such determined disinterest. They grow up with the scars of war – a new generation enters the fray.
I have been friends with the enemy too. I have been the supportive voice on the other end of the phone when they have come home to an empty house - no furniture, no children, no dog – a first sortie in a war set to wage for years.
It is actually one hell of a mess.
It is a betrayal of the cause, but there are things I miss about the time before the liberation army’s first strike.
I miss unconscious complements – the ones that had no sexual timbre – an appreciative whistle with a smile that had no hint of lust or predation – just a “you look nice”.
I miss a sense of order about relationships. I miss politeness – “never swear in front of a lady”.
I miss male shyness. I miss being cared for, respected for no other reason than that I am a woman.
And yes, I know if you unpack all of that, it existed from a base of satisfied, unchallenged, dominance – it easy to be nice when you are in charge and benevolence makes you happy.
There was a time when there were more benevolent, happy men.
Today in Australia, it seems if you scratch a man, you open a wound, and they don’t hold back. There is no protection for women. The fight is an equal weight bout. That is the price of freedom.
All very well and good until things get physical or you come up against the remnants of the old order in the justice system or in the myriad of others ways in which the “playing field” is still uneven.
Is it any wonder that so many of us just don’t want to play anymore? We are attracted and repulsed all at once – like some crazy mucked up conundrum of physics. It is unbelievably tiresome to live every day with such competing tensions.
When I was in London earlier this year, I got the feeling that the war was not as intense there. Maybe that is the tourist experience, but in a little tube station in Hammersmith, a sweet, old, Irish official saw me looking lost and asked me “Why is such a lovely lady as you looking so troubled?”
Grateful for his help I told him I was not sure if I was in the right place and I was late for meeting friends for coffee. He put me on the right train but added, “Lucky friends, I’d like to be meeting you for a nice cup of coffee and a chat, you have a nice morning.”
It was such an unthreatening, polite, interplay that it left me smiling for hours.
He was probably from the time before the war, he was lyrically Irish, he had a happy twinkle in his eye, he is a dying breed.
It has been years since I have met such an uncomplicated, happy, man here at home – they are probably hiding out in nursing homes and bowling clubs. Maybe we should employ them as diplomats.
Don’t get me wrong, I still listen to love songs, they’re a big part of my fantasy world.
PS: Keep the faith, Kelly.
