Many women in too many societies know the feeling of being told that their perception of the world is wrong. It starts young. Girls are taught to disregard their discomfort, that “it’s not a big deal” or “don’t overreact.” If a boy pulls your hair, or makes an inappropriate sexualised comment, “it’s teasing” or “it’s a compliment.” If someone dismisses your opinions, or passes you over for a promotion, “don’t take it so personally” or “you’re playing the victim card.”
Too many women realise early on that the male-dominated perspective is "real" and the female perspective is seemingly secondary, if considered valid at all.
It can extract a heavy price from women to challenge these notions, which can then affect their personal lives as well as careers. It can take women years, if not decades or a lifetime, to unlearn this and to be able to assert themselves.
This week, the UK’s MasterChef super-judge and international celebrity Gregg Wallace inadvertently shone a light on this reality. He faces a growing number of allegations of sexual misconduct. He responded by calling the accusers “middle-class women of a certain age”.
Descriptions like these are part of the cultural playbook for diminishing women’s experiences. By using the tools of misogyny, ageism and class, the aim is to trivialise and dismiss legitimate concerns. It’s a familiar strategy: just think how in everyday life women’s concerns are described as "nagging" and often dismissed.
“Women of a certain age” is a term rooted in the 18th and 19th centuries, a euphemism for those in their 40s and 50s, supposedly beyond marriageable age – implying irrelevance. It’s code: women too old to be attractive, but old enough to speak up. Which is why his comments are really saying that the women speaking up are just bitter about no longer being attractive. But all that means is that Wallace’s comments are insulting not just to older women but to all women, because it places value on looks and not opinions. And the assumption is, how dare they voice opinions about their own reality.
Wallace’s choice to focus his wrath on these women is no accident. It’s about upholding the male reality and the voices that suggest that women’s reality is valid.
Part of that assertion of validity is that women are reclaiming the term "of a certain age", embracing it as a sign of strength and experience. The powerful response by exactly those women to the comments was a joy to behold.
Women’s experiences are often decried as exaggerated, if they are acknowledged at all.
Why didn’t they speak up, is the backlash that women raising their voices are now getting. But when you have little power, when your reality is denied anyway, and you’re trying to survive or make your way as a young woman in this world, a world in which "boys will be boys", speaking up is neither easy, nor necessarily effective. Whereas the cost can be punishing: a career that is cut short – if it ever starts – or personal life and families destroyed. If anything, Wallace’s comments and the subsequent defence of him by some, show exactly why women stay silent.
It can take decades for women to unlearn the idea that their reality isn’t real. Financial independence, confidence and understanding about how the world works come with age and experience, an emotional clarity about what needs to be challenged. That’s why it comes at "a certain age". And with confidence and resources, women are no longer at the behest of the Wallaces of this world, for approval or survival – and we’ve all known a Gregg Wallace.
It begs the question, why does society fear confident, independent and independent-minded women? And what will it take to create a world where their voices are valued rather than dismissed? When women express what they experience, the general reaction is to treat it as an inconvenience, but it’s not.
They are shining a light on the part of society that needs change.
The #MeToo movement was a prime example. Many men were genuinely shocked at the scale of experiences of the women in their lives - mothers, sisters, wives, friends and the scale and pervasiveness of the harm and what they have to do to navigate it. But the shock wasn't always because women weren’t trying to tell them. All of this is open and common knowledge among women. But too many men seemed to have had little idea – perhaps because a woman's point of view doesn’t make it into the "default" reality.
Men coming out in defence of Wallace – like they do to every Wallace in our lives – are telling society that women’s experiences are not real, that they are making a fuss, and even if their experiences are real, they will be destroyed in the process. Every insult that tries to diminish a woman’s opinion by reducing her to her looks, or that her societal value is linked to her attractiveness is a confession of how such proponents see the value of women in society.
So the question really is, why do the opinions of some men, who see women as nothing more than eye candy, seem to matter more than those of women?
Gregg Wallace is just the latest reminder that in society, women’s realities are not a challenge to the truth, they are also the truth.
