There have been several issues emanating from the Australian Football League in the past few months which have underlined just how dominant the feminist narrative is in the land down under. How strange, that a sport which has celebrated masculinity and men for decades is now a leader when it comes to pushing feminist ideology and presenting men as a gender in need of “fixing” or demanding that men respect all women simply because they are women. Yes boys-that includes the drunk women who grab your crotch in the nightclub and beg you to take them home to your bed.
Two years ago I wrote an article for AVFM which focused on the absurd and dishonest way in which women are accorded equal status with men for their courage and self sacrifice in war during annual commemorative services.
It seems to be an appropriate time to revisit this issue with another ANZAC Day close at hand (25th April) where we honour our Australian servicemen and women.
This morning I was reading my Sunday paper when I came across an article by a former football coaching legend, Mick Malthouse. He had written about some of his favourite memories of the ANZAC Day clashes between Collingwood and Essendon (two powerhouse Australian Rules Football clubs.)
It was the fourth paragraph which made it hard for me to digest the hot cross bun I had been enjoying. Let me quote it for you.
‘From the landing in Gallipoli on April 25th, 1915, ordinary Australians have done an extraordinary thing by fighting for our country.
These are men and women, some of them so young you couldn’t call them adults, who left their families, dressed in a uniform, armed themselves with artillery, worked side by side to dig trenches and scale rock cliffs and came face to face with an enemy knowing they had to kill if they wanted to live.
That is sheer undeniable bravery. That is brutal. Horrific. Inconceivable to the rest of us.” The bolded words are my emphasis.
I think what stuns me the most about this revisionism is the complete lack of response from anybody to what is a blatant, deliberate misrepresentation of the truth. Perhaps a war historian or any journalist with a shred of integrity could question this version of the ANZAC legend? No-just silence.
It saddens me to think young people may read this and logically assume that when a legendary coach writes that men and women dug trenches and charged the enemy with fixed bayonets, that is exactly what happened.
Some may question my fixation on this annual lie telling.
My anger is not simply because of the injustice of giving credit where it is not due and therefore lessening the focus on those who truly deserve our undying gratitude, though that should be reason enough. It is the fact that this is symptomatic of the sickening, sad surrender to the feminist power bloc that controls our media, government and society. Feminism demands that we revise the facts of history to suit their agenda.
Walk through any book shop and you will see a glut of books promoting “girl power” and female superheroes saving the world in seemingly every new blockbuster that hits our screens. Watch any cop or detective show and you will see women catching or killing the bad guys (the bad ones are still always male (that will never change) or outwitting her bumbling male peers. The real world says this scenario in the criminal underworld is rare to the point of being a myth.
I was reflecting on the fact that whenever atrocities occur in time of war feminists point at men and only men and blame toxic, brutal masculinity. How often do we hear the childish comment- “if women ran the world there would be no wars!” Yet when the accolades and praise for the courage and sacrifice of our warriors are being given, women happily step up to the podium and stand alongside men, happy to pretend that both men and women gave their lives on the bloody battlefields throughout their nation’s history.
Can you imagine the outcry were an article in the paper to praise the incredible courage and strength our men and women show in childbirth? When women screeched in horrified outrage I would simply say-but we hold your hand and offer words of support. Sometimes we even cut the umbilical cord. Of course, we deserve equal credit and recognition!
While my focus is on our Australian Football league there is another issue which has come to the fore in the past few weeks. The AFL recently introduced a women’s national football league. I was very excited about this. I love our indigenous game and in my view, allowing more people to play it is a great idea. The women’s game however has a long way to go before it can be called elite or become a spectacle patrons are willing to pay money to see.
This season all women’s games had free entry. Crowds were good as were television ratings though the games were being played in the summer (footy’s off season for men). Nevertheless, it stirred my heart to see young women playing footy in the magnificent black and white stripes of the Collingwood Football Club.
Alas. My joy was short-lived as time and again the creation of this league brought constant references to “gender equality”, “equal pay”, “girl power” and of course the scourge of domestic violence. One talented female player( Darcy Vescio) started a trend with a tshirt she had made which read:
“Wen you laugh togetha cos you know ur gonna smash the patriarchy”
Of course this went viral and many girls got the slogan stamped on their tshirts.
Feminists are deluded. Nobody smashed anything-especially women. Men opened the door to a world they created entirely on their own and asked women if they would like to join them.
Then the clubs started linking the introduction of a women’s football league to gender equality in our society and the need for us all to show respect to women and stop violence against women. Just check out the concerned looks of the male players and administrators as they talk about equality and respect for women as though the very notion is alien to our society and especially men.
Instead of expressing gratitude for the enormous work of mostly men, to get this league up and running, it immediately becomes an excuse to bash men and demand more.
The demands for better pay are already being stridently made even though the only reason the competition is so vibrant and thriving is due to 125 years of hard, grinding slog and sacrifice by MEN! Sound familiar? Now many women believe the girls should reap the rewards of all this work without having done anything to contribute to the flow of money into the AFL’s coffers.
There is a thriving netball competition in our country yet it is a game played exclusively by women at the elite level. Local competitions allow for mixed teams but why has there not been a concerted effort to include men and boys in all male teams at the highest level? The hypocrisy is truly stunning. In fact, our friend Clementine Ford wrote about the dangers of allowing men to play women’s sports.
So the real thrill I was experiencing when I first watched young women take to the field in an official clash has been crushed by this avalanche of feminist propaganda, happily spewed by all of the male commentators who want to keep their job.
The AFL also has a Women’s round where we lavish praise and thanks on women and all they do for our great game. We have another round dedicated to raising funds for (and awareness of) breast cancer. I always wonder why all the female sporting bodies aren’t dedicating days to the dads/men in their lives and why no female sporting competition, as far as I know, raises millions of dollars in funding for male specific diseases? Yet even given the fact that men are continually raising awareness for women’s issues and providing them with tens of millions in funding ( our national cricket team does the same) it is still only men and male sporting competitions that are branded sexist and told they must give more respect to women. Not a word is spoken about the complete absence of support for men from any female collective.
I have one final comment to make which is related to the AFL.
I read a brief letter in one of our daily major newspapers. The writer commented on the fact that not one critical word had been directed at any female footballer throughout the women’s football season. He was right. One team, the eventual premiers (competition champions) had a girl who was borderline obese but undoubtedly a talented player. If a male had walked onto the footy field in her condition he would have been torn to shreds, mocked, made the subject of derisive jokes, given a nickname and been featured in the worst possible light in photos splashed across our papers.
This appears to be another rather trivial aspect of the coverage to focus on yet it is once more symbolic of a much greater problem at the very heart of our society. Women cannot be criticized. Women cannot be ridiculed. Women cannot have their appearance appraised negatively. Women are untouchable. The commentators knew this-I would say instinctively. It was clear that the girls were to be presented in the most flattering light regardless of what took place on the football field.
This would be okay if not for the incessant cries from feminists for women to be treated as equals of men. Yet we all know they do not mean this for a moment.
The same rules apply in any sphere where a woman has power or is the focus of our attention in sport, politics or the world of entertainment. Men can be eviscerated by the media and general population and it is entirely ignored or often applauded. Women immediately cry “sexist’ or “it’s only because I am a woman” and sadly most males buy this sickening cop out from the very same women who demand “equal treatment.”
So, I am off to another ANZAC Day clash featuring my beloved Collingwood. I have accepted the fact that there are moments in the pre-match ceremony which I will only endure by breathing deeply and thinking happy thoughts until the men come out to strut their stuff on the mighty MCG
