I rarely watch TV and when I do, I try to watch something worthwhile and mentally stimulating. I actually do not own a TV, but the house we are staying in has one and sometimes my yetzer ra (evil impulse) gets the better of me and I sneak it on. I watched QandA last night and it is a good show usually with high class guests. Yesterday they had an incongruous mixture. The Panellists were Simon Callow - a British actor, writer and director, Sefi Atta - Nigerian novelist, Anthony Appia - a Ghanaian English writer and lecturer and Germaine Greer - tired literary hack with flapping lips and sagging hips who has not written anything of note since she wrote The Female Eunuch and a few papers and articles for magazines. She loves publicity and her nortorious attack on Steve Urwin just after he died, has remained imprinted on my memory as a bit of really bad taste writing and totally insensitive to his family to boot. She would never make a novelist because a novelist has to have some empathy for the characters he or she writes about. Germaine, poor thing, has no empathy and her favourite phrase is 'I am appalled.......BLAH BLAH BLAH and the tirade goes on and she has developed into a 73 year old ranter par excellence. I want to give her a soap box and say to her,'Get out of the media spotlight love and go into a quiet corner of Hyde Park and talk to the plants, (they will probably die of toxic shock after a few hours) maybe Prince Charlie and Camellia will join you on the odd occaison when they want to communicate with a tired old feminist with saggy boobs and tired tummy who ogles young boys.
Unfortunately Germaine has a vagina fixation. As a woman I was embarrassed for her last night. Does she understand how she comes across to an audience? Obviously not.As a white woman I sniggered in shame and embarrassment for several minutes at the look of shock that crossed Sefi Atta's face when Germaine grandly spouted off that 'African men have a preference for a dry tight vagina'. Either Germaine has done some sort of survey (G-D knows how?!) about the preferences of African men's sexuality and she ignores the fact that there is more to a relationship than just sex. We are not animals but Germaine puts human sexuality down on the level of 'entertainment' and mechanics'. It is obvious that she has never really entered into a deep and meaningful relationship with a man. She is somehow emotionally stilted in that area. The ABC's host Tony Jones tried to save the moment with some factual details and tried gallantly to question this woman where she has gotten these facts. Trouble is Germaine presents her opinion as fact and this woman is so sure of herself that those who come up against her are intimidated by her ability to present herself as some sort of literary G-D of letters.
Germaine is an educated perverted old woman who should leave young boys and African women and their genitals (thank you Sefi for that sweet commonsense comment) alone. Let her go home and snuggle up with her vibrators and whatever else mechancial she interacts with and leave humans alone.
I have never liked Germaine and this QandA session left me feeling icky all over and real pity for her. I find it abominable that all her interactions between men and women boils down to sex and its mechanics. Yes, sex is a part of a male female relationship but there is so much more to a relationship and marriage. There is LOVE Germaine and TRUST, HONOUR and the RELATIONSHIP that is so much more than sex and sexuality. You can have a relationship that is meaningful and deep without sex. I am talking about a deeply impoverished woman who has never given birth, never had a child or never even cared for a child or another human being enough to commit deeply to them on a level that is beyond sexuality.
One good thing coming out of this is that I will read Sefi Atta's novels now. She came across as sensitive, perceptive and aware. She is down to earth and funny when she was allowed to get a word in when that silly old white literary whore allowed her to get a word in edgeways.
Loved the comment of the writer who said he was going to write 50 Shades of Gay as opposed to Grey. Hopefully it would be better written and more literary than 50 Shades of Grey.
Here is the link to the session on QandA.
Well worth the entertainment value.
http://www.abc.net.au/tv/qanda/txt/s3570412.htm
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