*shuffles on, stage left*

So according to the ol' stats on this thing, I haven't posted since March. Well, THAT was a spectacular success, was it not? So much for writing every day...although in my defence there was a lot of hospital time and health *things* going on, so I got out of the loop a bit. That's still no real excuse though, because that was sorted (hopefully finally) back in the summer and it's now almost Christmas. So basically I just suck and must be shot at dawn for dereliction of blogging duties.

However, since a shiny new year is almost approaching us (and 2012 is, of course, destined to be the end of the world because the Mayans apparently couldn't count any higher, so because of their ineptitude we are subsequently going to suffer The Apocalypse on 21st December), I figured I ought to have a new year's resolution to actually keep this thing going again. Plus I've been nagged by a couple of people...and nagging basically means "if you don't do it there'll be hell to pay young lady so I suggest you crack on" - voila! Le Blog Lives Again!

Well, I hear (no one) ask - what have you been up to since you left the Blogverse? Basically this: I was in hospital, I went to Munich, I went to several gigs, I laughed with my friends, I cried with my friends, I discovered A Song of Ice and Fire in all its glorious forms, I wrote a few poems, I half-wrote a few novels which need to be finished and I procrastinated wildly about things. I also sort of forgot I had a blog...which is a shocking admission for which I must be severely punished. However I fully expect the madness to resume again because I need to get back into the habit of writing every day, even if it's just randomness on here, so I feel I should give you all fair warning (those hardy souls who continue to brave the madness and actually read the crap I write): this blog will contain nuttiness. There will be moaning. There will be nonsensical things which even I will fail to understand when I read it back to myself. There will be political ranting and outrage about the fate of the world. There will be serious amounts of Game of Thrones/A Song of Ice and Fire love, as well as Criminal Minds adoration. There will be shoes, and vintage clothes, and friends and hopefully some travel. There will also be the big Three-Oh to contend with.

Buckle your seat belts, ladies and gentlemen. It's going to be a bumpy ride...

In Which I Suck...

Wow, I'm a terrible blogger! Write in this thing every day, she said. Got to keep the old brain ticking over, she said. The words 'epic' and 'fail' spring to mind here...thank whichever deity you believe in (today - Jeff, the God of Biscuits) that I don't actually get PAID for this shiz, otherwise I'd be broke and sponging off my parents. Oh, wait...

Well, thanks to a seriously crud case of Real Life having its wicked way with me (about time something did...) there hasn't been much happening in the world that is especially noteworthy. Well, lots and lots of terribly awfully bad horrible things, but really I don't want to bore you with the details of some of them and the others are not really for public consumption. However, it never fails to amaze me that just when I think things couldn't get any bleaker and maybe now's the time to start kicking arse, something happens to brighten my day. It doesn't have to be anything hugely majorly important, but there it is nonetheless.

So here's to the little things and seeing the bright side. Even if you have to use a magnifying glass to do so.

Inspiring Women...

I had an email today that made me stop and think (thanks, Oxfam). The 8th March is International Women's Day, a day to celebrate the achievements of 'the fairer sex' past and present, and they were asking people to tell them about the women who inspire them and who they will be celebrating come the big day. This happens to tie in very nicely with a book I'm reading at the moment (shockingly, not about serial killers, sex workers, vampires or scandalous artists and/or poets), so despite the fact it's a few weeks too early, I shall take advantage of the inspiration and write a blog entry on the women who inspire me the most.

The first is glaringly obvious. Clearly I and every other emancipated woman in the UK owe a HUGE debt of honour to Mrs Pankhurst and all the other women who fought, suffered and, in many cases, died in the struggle for women's suffrage. It sort of goes without saying that come the 8th March, I will pause for a moment and think of them, the pioneers; the women who refused to accept the status quo and stood up for what they believed to be right. They were often cruelly treated in the eyes of the law (hasn't that always been the Lot of Woman?) but they were utterly fearless in the face of oppression, imprisonment, assault (both physical and sexual) and force-feeding and for that I stand humbled and grateful before their collective greatness.

The second is perhaps just as obvious but many times more personal: my mum. There just aren't enough words in the dictionary to describe what an amazing woman my mum actually is, but I'm going to try...Not only did she give me life, but she has been there for me every single day since; for every illness; school performance; boy crisis; friend crisis; the good times and the bad, she is always there to support me and scold me when needed. After my parents divorced and we moved in with her parents, Mum raised the two of us while holding down a full-time job and, eventually, helping nurse my Grandad through his final illness. When I went through my own 'troubles' for a few years, she was always there to love me and let me know she was there for me; I didn't appreciate it at the time, and I'm fairly certain that if it were me I'd have booted me out of the house for being so unremittingly horrid to everyone, but now I appreciate just how much she actually did for me. And it's not just me - whenever any of the family or her many friends need her, she's there, even if things in her own life aren't going so swimmingly. Mum, if you read this, I know I don't tell you often enough just how much I love and appreciate you but you truly are one of my best friends and a total inspiration to me. xx

My third inspiring lady is the utterly fantabulous Sarah Jezebel Deva. Sarah inspires me because she knows exactly what she wants and she goes out and works bloody hard for it; when she was unceremoniously bumped from Cradle of Filth's tour, she didn't let it deter her ambitions and has moved from 'that bird who sings backing vocals' to a front-woman in her own right. And a bloody brilliant one at that. She's worked her arse off to get to where she is and in my own humble and very biased opinion, she deserves to have all the success in the world. Not only has she come a long way (and battled a fair few demons of her own, I understand) but she is one of the nicest people I have ever had the privilege of meeting and I wish her all the success in the world.

My fourth inspiring woman is Elizabeth Siddal. Lizzie is probably best known as either the tragic wife and muse of poet and artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti, or as the model for John Millais' beautiful painting of Ophelia in the Tate Britain gallery. What many people don't know is that Lizzie was a highly talented artist and painter in her own right, and the streak of melancholy which runs through her work strangely appeals to me. I admire Lizzie in a strange sort of way; some of her behaviour was frankly appalling, but I understand exactly why she did it and in those days women had to do whatever they could to ensure their survival. Lizzie was an individual when most women did as they were told; her work as an artist is incredible for someone who learnt so late in life and her poetry is just beautiful. It saddens me that more people don't know about her (perhaps that's another blog entry) but part of me is glad as well; it makes me feel like I know something the rest of the word doesn't.

Fifth, Hillary Rodham Clinton. Hillary is just so, so inspirational; it was her "women's rights are human rights" speech that first helped politicise me. She trained as a lawyer, was the first female partner in her law firm, and the first female chair of the Legal Services Corporation. As both Governor's wife and First Lady, she campaigned tirelessly for the rights of women and children and worked incredibly hard behind the scenes. When the Monica Lewinsky scandal hit, Hillary was dignified throughout the whole thing and as Secretary of State she's the most powerful and influential woman in America. She hasn't always been right and I haven't always agreed with her methods, her beliefs or her actions, but when it comes down to it I think she's an outstandingly powerful advocate for what women can achieve.

My last heroine is a relatively new discovery for me. I picked up a book called 'The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks' thinking it was a novel; turns out, it's a true story. Henrietta Lacks was a poor black woman who died of cervical cancer in the early 1950's. Before her treatment, such as it was in those days, began, doctors took a sample of the cells from the cancer (without her knowledge or consent) and sent them to a lab in attempt to grow them. Henrietta sadly passed away; her cells, however, kept right on growing and multiplying and developing, and are still growing to this day. He-La, as the chain is known, was right there at the forefront of genetic and cell research; they were the first ever cells to stay alive in culture since research had begun a few decades earlier, and they haven't stopped since. Henrietta's cells were used to develop the polio vaccine; they have been part of the research into the genes which cause cancer and those which suppress it; they helped develop drugs to treat Parkinson’s, influenza, leukaemia...Henrietta Lacks is one of THE most important woman in medical history and yet hardly anyone knows about her. It was absolutely dreadful that the cells were taken without her consent, and heartbreaking that she died, but Henrietta Lacks is one of those women who need to be celebrated on 8th March. Her cells, and therefore part of Henrietta herself, live on...

There are of course other women that have inspired and moved me, but this is my core 'pantheon' and I will celebrate them on International Women's Day with pride and gratitude...

So come on, guys 'n' gals...who are YOUR inspirational women?

THE best TV show ever...

Rastamouse!!

I don't care if it's a kids show. I don't care if it's not PC. I don't care that it's about a stop-motion animated mouse. It. Is. COOL!!

Confusion is just a state of mind...

Sometimes I do things and I don't know why I do them. Sometimes I think far too much about things. Sometimes I act impulsively. Sometimes I do things I know my friends will think me foolish for. Sometimes I feel like I'm supposed to be a 'grown-up'. Sometimes I feel like I want to be a child. Sometimes I like it when people tell me I should never change. Sometimes I hate it when they do. Sometimes I'm crazy; sometimes I'm angry; sometimes I'm tough; sometimes I'm vulnerable; sometimes I'm scared; sometimes I'm the queen of the world and sometimes I'm totally fearless. I'm a daughter, a sister, a cousin, a niece, a granddaughter, a friend; I'm everything I've experienced and everyone who went before me. I'm an idealist; I'm passionate; I believe in the inherant goodness of the world and I've seen the darker side of that coin which only makes me want to believe all the more. I've met my heroes and been disappointed; I've met others who have taken me completely by surprise. I've done things I never thought I'd do. I've got a list of things I might never do. I've loved, I've lost, I've been let down and I've been picked up again. I've struggled and not always succeeded. Sometimes I've been weak, sometimes I've discovered strength I didn't even know I had. I have dreams. I have nightmares. Sometimes I think I've got it all figured out. Sometimes I think I don't have a clue.

Most of the time, I think I'm just trying to get through.

Blog While You Can...

Also known as the 'crap, my Internet/laptop/life is broken so make the most of the access while you can!' post...Except this is actually a serious blogging. Which must make a change. Right, better get on with it, then...

There are some things about my job that I really, really enjoy, to the point that it becomes so much more than just a job to me. One of these is the research project I'm currently undertaking - and have been doing off-and-on for a while now - on prostitution. What started as a throwaway comment in a meeting six months ago and then became a request to find out a bit more from my boss a few months later has shifted and turned into something that is now making me question my morals, opinions and everything I ever thought I stood for.

I have to be honest - while I would always have considered myself a feminist for my unswerving belief that women should not be subservient to men, a lot of the 'big issues' that feminists have discussed over the years kind of passed me by. I guess I was very fortunate that I was born when I was; my generation didn't have to fight and die for the right to vote and, by the time I'd started work, much of the original fighting for equal pay had been done. There are still battles to be fought on that front for sure, and like many young women my age I suppose I've been a bit lax and blase about the whole thing and done very little about it, but the fights over pornography and prostitution which characterised the early feminist marches never really entered my sphere of thought. I knew they happened, but I never gave much thought one way or the other to whether I considered them 'offensive' or not. As far as prostitution was concerned I had a vague notion that it ought to be legalised, if only to help protect the prostitutes themselves, but the amount of research I've done into this has made me completely and utterly rethink my opinions on the subject. If I'm honest, I'm still not entirely sure where I stand, but I know that I'm fascinated - hello, 4 new text books on the subject - and I'm almost positive I've found a cause...

The main feminist stance on this matter seems to be the radical feminist one, which basically states that all sex work equates to a violent misogyny and therefore is used by the patriarchy and its institutions to oppress women. This 'violence against women' discourse does NOT refer to the assaults, rapes and murders which sex workers endure; instead, it focuses on the idea that the actual SELLING of sex, the commodification of women's bodies (because in this view of prostitution, male and transgender sex workers are non-existent) is violence against women. Whether you're a student pole-dancing to help pay your extortionate tuition fees at medical school, a mother working in a massage parlour to help supplement your benefits, or a street sex worker funding a drug habit, you are all victims of this violence because (allegedly) a woman's essential being is so invested in her body and her sexuality that she is intrinsically damaged by being paid for sexual acts. I clearly missed this memo...Anyway, flippancy aside, I have serious, serious problems with this stance. Yes, I can sort of see the commodification argument, but I am deeply uncomfortable with the implied notion that 'violence' in this case DOESN'T focus on the higher-than-average rates of ACTUAL violence (murder, rape, attempted rape, assault etc) that sex workers face. This also implies that all men who pay for sex do so because as a gender they have an innate need to victimise, degrade and dominate women; that male sexuality is not about pleasure but a perversion born of their need to control and subjugate. Now I've met some bastards in my time, but come off it; how naive would you have to be to believe that every single bloke on the planet doesn't give a damn about anything other than reasserting the patriarchal dominant order every time he sleeps with someone? The human race would have died out long ago if that was the case.

A lot of the feminist opinion also highlights the plight of trafficked and exploited women and children in the sex trade. Now I'm not stupid; I know the sexual exploitation of children DOES happen and that women and children ARE trafficked across the world, but actually the numbers are not as high as certain sections of the community and media would have you believe. Where this happens, of course, we should do everything we possibly can to catch the perpetrators and help the victims (although just sending them straight back to their country of origin can often lead to them being resold to other traffickers, so there's lots of international work to be done there). Similarly, I fully support the flip side of the argument that there are sex workers who CHOOSE this line of work and again, I think we should respect that decision. It's not for everyone, but then again neither's flower arranging and we don't condemn florists in the Daily Mail. Personally, I guess I'm in the middle ground here; while we should support those who choose sex work and help those who are being trafficked and exploited, the majority of prostitutes are plying their trade to fund drug habits, supplement their incomes etc. There are a huge number of social and economic factors that drive people into prostitution; make headway on those and you'll start to deal with the issue itself.

There seem to be three main schools of thought on the prostitution problem and how to solve it: legalise it, or at least parts of it, as in the Netherlands and parts of Australia; regulate it, as in Ireland, or decriminalise the sex workers and instead focus on the 'punters', as in Sweden. The 'Swedish model' is what the last Government was seriously considering in 2006 when they last reviewed the situation; quite what the ConDem Nation (thanks, Ryan!) will do remains to be seen, but I have reservations about all three approaches. Legalising brothels, as in Victoria in Australia, or having managed street zones were touted as being safer for sex workers; however, illegal prostitution rocketed in Australia and so did the numbers of criminal gangs controlling the industry, which also happened in Amsterdam and led to the mayor removing the 'tolerance zones' in 2003. The managed areas often have strict codes of conduct as well, which can lead to prostitutes with drug problems not being permitted to work in indoor settings; and in countries such as Greece or Germany, where registration is a legal requirement for sex workers to regulate them, many simply refuse to sign up as they don't want the stigma of prostitution following them for the rest of their lives, especially if sex work is only a short term thing. The Swedish model focuses on arresting punters rather than prostitutes, which may well stop the 'revolving door' problem of fining sex workers and forcing them back onto the streets to pay said fine, but means that punters will be more nervy and may drive away the 'decent' ones, thus exposing the sex workers to even more harm.

And it's the harm statistics that have really opened my eyes to how horrendous the situation actually is. The mortality rate for sex workers is twelve times higher than the general population and in several different studies across the UK, over two thirds of the women spoken to had been attacked in some way. The rates of assaults, rapes, robberies and murders are horrendous; sex workers, especially street-based sex workers, are among the most vulnerable groups in the country. And not just by punters, either; in December 2003, a 25 year old woman who worked as a prostitute in Ipswich named Cara Martin-Brown was kicked and beaten to death by a local man who was NOT a punter. Be honest - you haven't heard of Cara, am I right? That's another thing that has made me feel ashamed: thank the Gods, the serial murder of women who work as prostitutes (because they are SO much more than that stereotype, thank you, mass media) doesn't happen very often; Peter Sutcliffe, Steven Wright and Stephen Griffiths are thankfully anomalies rather than the norm, but how many women who work as prostitutes who have been raped or beaten do we hear about? For that matter, unless it IS a serial killer running riot, the murder of sex workers generally goes unreported. These women are highly vulnerable; to enact laws that drives the sex trade further underground and forces sex workers to make snap decisions about which clients they'll go with is frankly irresponsible. For all the handwringing that went on at the time of the Ipswich murders, the country as a whole has done remarkably little to change either its opinions, moral judgements or anything to try and improve the situation. Handwringing doesn't save lives. Actions do.

I don't know what the answer is - if I did, I'd be either ludicrously rich or an insufferably smug know it all - but one thing I DO know is that, unless Britain as a whole wakes up and collectively does SOMETHING to get to grips with the issue of prostitution, even if it's just starting a debate on the subject, more women will be raped, beaten, robbed and killed on our streets. Jack the Ripper wasn't the first; Stephen Griffiths won't be the last. Not unless we do something.

I also know this: putting aside all issues of prostitution's morality, inevitability and the radical feminist and other debates, as you read this blog somewhere in the UK a woman is going out to sell sex. She might be lucky and come home again safe and sound; she may be robbed, or beaten or killed, but she will be out there and no amount of horrifying statistics is likely to change that. I know because I've spoken to several of the girls in the local area who work as prostitutes; I've done outreach with them and I've seen what they endure. I hope I never hear that any of them have been murdered, and I'm hopeful that the work I'm doing at the moment will go someway to bringing in a local strategy that can help us tackle the issue. I don't know. But I think about them a lot, and this whole thing has made me think again about my own moral judgements and opinions. It's not going to be easy, but we HAVE to start thinking about this otherwise we risk sending out the message that, as a society, we're content to condemn an entire section of the population to violence and death. After Ipswich we said never again. After Bradford we said never again. How many more times do we have to say never again before we really mean it...?

To WAG Or Not To WAG...?

Happy New Year, Blogverse! I know I’ve been MIA recently, but Real Life has been slightly mad over the past few weeks and shows no real signs of getting back to normal, but I have at least vaguely remembered how to write. Here goes…

As you probably know by now, my taste in men is somewhat eclectic (much like my taste in art, films, books, music, shoes, clothes…hey wait, I’m sensing a theme here…) This analogy also extends to sport. Well, to sports MEN at any rate…I’m the first person to admit that I love rugby more than any other sport as much for the (ahem) talent as for the game itself; there’s something to be said for hulking great forwards and super-speedy backs, and I even find the broken noses attractive. Well, in some cases, at least. But, fickle woman that I am, my early adolescence was shaped by my complete and utter devotion to football. Not for the game itself, you understand – I support West Ham, for gods sake; it’s a running joke among my friends that this means I don’t understand or like football – but for the men who played it. My first crush was Ryan Giggs (ahh, Giggsy…*sigh*) and then I fell headlong into the path of Liverpool’s ‘Spice Boys’, headed by Jamie Redknapp. By the time David Beckham came along, I was a fully-fledged adolescent WAG-in-waiting. Long after I turned to other specimens of masculinity to lust after, there was still a teeny-weeny part of me that hankered for WAGdom.

And why not, I thought? After all, when your other half earns X-many squillions a week and all you do is (seemingly) shop, what’s not to love? To be able to say, “Ooh, original vintage Vivienne Westwood pirate boots? I’ll take six pairs please!” – Well, that sounds like my kinda heaven! I dreamed of being a ‘lady of leisure’, buying tons of gorgeous outfits so that when the cameras spotted me in the stands on Saturdays being ‘supportive’, I’d look good on the big screens. And I could holiday ANYWHERE I WANTED. In the WORLD! Cushty…I’d even make like the Victorian philanthropists of old and do Good Works, giving time and money to charity while looking stunning in the latest outfit especially designed for me by Alexander McQueen. And all I’d have to do was look vaguely interested on Saturday afternoons and pretend I understood the offside rule. Piece of cake. And we loved them, didn’t we, the WAGs? They were like gorgeous, glamorous butterflies who, for the briefest of moments, captured the country. No, make that the world.

And oh, how I wanted to be one; to be gorgeous and glamorous and jet out to Bali for a month in the off-season without thinking about it! But then I grew up. I don’t have the face, the figure or the hair to be a WAG and, as footballers were replaced by others in my affections, my dreams of WAGdom became just that: a dream; a gloriously childish fantasy I had once indulged in before actors, rock stars, vampires and rugby players took over. (What can I say; I had a thing about James Marsters in Buffy, ok?)

But then, as dreams do, things started to turn sour when the reality check finally kicked in. Getting married in Vera Wang and having the whole thing covered in OK magazine seemed less appealing when the revelations started; infidelities, affairs with lap dancers and prostitutes...suddenly the whole thing seemed less glamorous and more tawdry, and we realised that being a WAG and ‘standing by your man’ meant so much more than freezing your D&G-clad arse off on the side of a football pitch. Wayne Rooney, John Terry, Ashley Cole…not even the Queen of the WAGs, Lady Beckham herself, was immune to the scandals when it was revealed that David had had a ‘thing’ with Rebecca Loos; the whole thing became frankly unpalatable and, although many made the decision to not castrate the ungrateful wretches with a pair of blunted nail scissors, who among us didn’t give a tiny cry of, “about time she saw the light” when the lovely Cheryl Cole finally gave that scumbag Ashley the heave-ho?

The reason for writing this entry is that I’ve just read an interview with Abbey Clancy, the impossibly tall and glamorous girlfriend of the impossibly tall and, er, not Peter Crouch. Last year, having just found out that she was pregnant with their first child, Abbey also found out that Peter was alleged to have slept with a prostitute who had sold her story to the News of the World. As you do. Naturally, the tabloid press went wild, and Abbey was plunged headlong into the media spotlight. She refuses to comment on whether he did or didn’t do it, but she has stood by her man and as far as she’s concerned, that’s that. What struck me about the interview with Abbey were the comments she made about the misconceptions Joe Public has about the WAGs: that they all set out to snare a footballer husband; that all they do is shop; that they don’t have two brain cells to rub together. As she points out, you have to be able to take care of yourself, even if you do end up living the dream and attaining WAGdom. She freely admits that the thing she’s most proud of is that her work as a model and TV presenter meant that she could afford to pay for her younger brother and sister, who were having a terrible time at school, to go to a private school; her little brother went from failing everything to taking and passing all his GCSE’s a year early.

The funny thing is, she’s right. Suppose you do end up marrying the next David Beckham and living the high life as the new Queen of the WAGs (sorry, Posh). And suppose that Lover-Boy ends up having an affair with someone else and you decide to do the sensible thing and kick him to the kerb. What are you going to do with yourself then? Even the current nation’s sweetheart, the lovely Cheryl, has had to make a go of her solo career and her work on the X Factor (although it must make Ashley sick to his stomach that his ex-wife probably earns more money than he does and is more loved by the lads who would previously have worshipped his skills on the pitch. And here I refer to a quote from my brother who, when discussing Girls Aloud and the lovely Cheryl, noted “oh, they sing as well?” Bless…) So long as the women who plough the fields of WAGdom are prepared to work for their designer togs, they’re all right by me, cos once he’s gone, girls, a woman has to pay her own way.

And you know what? Good luck to ‘em, I say. Because there is no way in hell that anything could induce me to nail my colours to the mast of WAGdom these days; not for a whole shop if Vivienne Westwood pirate boots. Although if David Beckham ever DOES come knocking, I may well be persuaded to change my mind.

Now being a rugby ‘Scrummy’ on the other hand…