Letter to Mslexia

I had forgotten that I sent this letter to Mslexia  which surprise surprise they did not publish!  Oh yes they did see blog Jan 11th!
Re-Viv Groskop's Standing Room Only (issue 47)


I hate phrases like ' hairy feminists' and 'strident women' especially when used by women.
Come on let's tell it like it is. Look at the facts. How long did it take us to get this far in the battle
for 'equality'? Which by the way doesn't mean 'the same' and it has been and still is a battle for many women.
It has taken from the begining of time for women to be allowed to keep their own earnings, own property and have rights over their own children.
Do you really think we have achieved equality in less than one century?
Why have women found it prudent, often necessary to write under a male nom de plume?
Of course we need all women events for women writers. Why do we have to be so apologetic about it?
I found my own voice in an all women's writing group and was drowned out in a mixed group.
My confidence has been achieved over many years with the help of all womens' groups.
When will women who think that they have never been oppressed realise that the reverse is true
for most of us?
What is wrong with being called a 'woman writer'? For me that is a positive. I want to read books written by women writers.
I spent too much time when I was young reading male writers whose work, to be honest, bore no relevance to my experience.
What a relief it was to discover Doris Lessing, Virginia Woolf and Germain Greer to name a few.
And while I'm on my hobby horse what is wrong with 'misery memoirs'? How many times have I heard it said there are too many?
Well don't read them but remember that the women who do and the women who write them benefit enormously because guess what? Thousands of women have miserable lives.
I don't like so called thrillers or detective stories. I can't find anything entertaining about the murder of a woman (and it usually is a woman) but that doesn't stop thousands being written and millions being sold. And dare I say mostly by men.
So I for one am pleased that all women events are on the increase. And of course they will be fun but not because they have to be VIv but because all women together do have fun but oh my god they will be much much more.
I am proud to be recognised as a feminist and I never forget that women died so that I could vote.
Is this talking to the converted in Mslexia? I hope so.
Oh and by the way Viv, it was a woman who said, ‘ If there’s no dancing at the revolution I don’t want to go.’