Queens and Servants

Spending time with some fellas today, I thought to myself that the men at the table were used to women who are queens of the household. I know the partners of 2 of the men and they are definitely queens as well.

So that got me pondering. I know there are some women who are self-effacing and would probably not describe themselves as queen, they may even joke that they are the servant of the house. The question is, do we need more regality in the home, in order to raise lovely men who are sweet and respectful? Should we not even joke that we are servants, but instead act like queens? Every woman I know who is the queen of her house, has happy menfolk (even though people from outside cannot understand how the men could be happy there...)

I think of men as dogs and women as cats. Dogs like heirarchy, they like to know who is the boss and in a power vacuum, will appoint themselves as top dog. Cats like to do their own thing and not really decide one way or another on anything or anyone. So a cat needs to assert herself in a home with dogs in because otherwise the dog will assume a power vacuum. However since dogs are usually stronger, the cat must use regality to assert her power.

No doubt some cats are heirarchical and some dogs are regal, but you get my point..

I think my son might have swine flu.   I have heard that it is no longer recommended to give him Tamiflu so I have a look online to see what I should do next.  So I enter a Kafkaesque world, which feels more like something out of 1984 than the Britain I have come to know and love.  I am directed to a website where I complete an online assessment - the first question wants to know where we live.  Why should I provide that info first?  Surely that should come last, if at all?  Putting in fake location information as our address is NOYB, I find out that he may have it and I am now authorised to get Tamiflu.  There is no advice on what to do instead of using Tamiflu.

So now I look elsewhere on the web, trying to find advice on how to deal with swine flu without using Tamiflu.  Instead I find lots of information about the side effects of Tamiflu but the best advice comes from a mum in Mumsnet - bed rest and Calpol, monitoring them to see if they get worse.  Why couldn't there be some 'official advice' saying this.

Eventually I ring the helpline and there is just a recorded message.  I notice that there is another telephone number for the 'treatment' line so I ring that instead and there is another long recorded message.  I hang up when the disembodied voice tells me that I might be prosecuted for misuse of the system.  Where's a doctor on the end of the phone when you need one?   I can't help but wonder how capital = money infected the process for dealing with this epidemic...

My son tells me that icecream helps a lot too...

So Roman Polanski has finally been arrested for his rape of the 13 year old girl in America, now a woman in her thirties. Once again, the press emphasises his glittering record of filmmaking, providing just a passing comment about the rape itself. Just like Gascoigne, who has admitted beating up his wife but has not been dropped from the public eye, Polanski appears to be able to commit heinous deeds and still be feted. We will know that feminism has truly succeeded when crimes against women turn men into outcasts, rather than ignored if they are famous enough. Does the indifferent response to the aggressive behaviour of famous men like Gascoigne and Polanski reflecta similar indifference to the treatment of 'ordinary women' by 'ordinary men'? Well with one in 6 women experiencing domestic violence at some point in their life, it seems so.