The Sisterhood of Men-Baggers

I didn’t take an oath of allegiance, yet emails from the Sisterhood of Men-Baggers invade my Inbox.

At first I was naïve. I would see the subject headers: “This is so true!” or “Worth reading to the end” on missives sent to me by intelligent, long-time friends and I would look forward to some witty, insightful or perhaps even moving content. Instead I would find men-bagging. Tired, gender-based stereotyping enshrined in boring, dog-eared humour. In essence, blatant, unfunny sexism.

All men, apparently, can’t cook, lack empathy, don’t like foreplay, are lazy fathers, think it’s funny to fluff the covers after farting, buy their partners inappropriate lingerie, and refuse to ask for directions. In general, they are responsible for all of women’s woes.

Here was one with the subject header: “When you need a laugh …”

Just a thought for all the women out there.

1. MENtal Illness
2. MENstrual cramps
3. MENtal breakdown
4. MENopause

GUYnocologist (poetic spelling)
Ever notice how all of women’s problems start with men?
Send this to all women you know (and men with a sense of humour) and brighten up
their day!! … and when we have real trouble, it’s a HISterectomy

Hilarious.

What, I wonder, would women think if women-bagging emails took up the same amount of cyberspace? (They don’t. My research - an extensive survey of some men I know - reveals that men rarely create or distribute women-bagging communiqué. Interestingly, they do, however, aid and abet in the delivery of men-bagging emails by sending them on to their female partners. In other words, it seems men believe their own bad press - and accept that their partners will get a kick from such content.)

Of course, we shouldn’t be surprised that bagging men persists as a form of entertainment. After all, we have official, government-sanctioned, mass-distributed men-bagging. Witness the advertising campaign run by the New South Wales Roads and Traffic Authority which relates driving over the speed limit to the perceived size of a man’s penis. Apparently, it is OK to tell your five-year-old son that you are wiggling your pinky at the man in the car next to yours because he is driving too fast and must therefore have a small penis, which is, of course, a bad thing.

How little boys comprehend that their own wee willies are not included in the jibe is left to the most sensitive and discriminating of parents to deal with. To say nothing of the damage done to the self-worth of men who through no fault of their own - speedsters or otherwise - did not emerge from adolescence with a porn-sized prick.

I suppose the current broad acceptability of men-bagging is simply an evolution in a long tradition of private men-bagging gatherings. It may not be a formal agenda, but when a bunch of women get together (especially those in long-term relationships with men, and most especially those with children) the subject matter nearly always strays that way.

Stories abound of the latest domestic scandal in which Male X purchased double the butter but no washing powder, or thought he might wear thongs to a restaurant. Ladies-who-lunch, girls’ nights out, women-only weekends away and even book clubs can all be petri dishes for men-bagging.

To be fair, the typecasting is often applied to both genders - but usually only in so much as it either puts women in a reasonable light and represents men as blundering fools, or it expresses how hard it is to be a woman.