Carry on Camping

The “Carry On” series of films were British comedies that relied on heavy use of stereotypes and double entendre - although as Terry Pratchett might have described it, heavy use of single entendre. They’re a bit dated now, but I did enjoy them when I was growing up.

The basic premise of Carry on Camping is that two amorous guys trick their not amorous enough girlfriends into going camping with them at a nudist ‘colony’. Yes, I think that’s the term that was used back then. The style of humour can be typified by a couple of quotes

Mrs. Fussey: Joan may think you're a gentleman, but personally I've got sore misgivings.
Sid Boggle: You ought to put some talcum powder on them.

Miss Haggerd: Don't rush me. I think you'll find it's worth waiting for.
Dr. Kenneth Soaper: So's Christmas, but you won't find me stuffing your turkey.

Not the best jokes ever written, but it was all good not-so-clean fun. I dread to think what the Carry On team would have done today if they were allowed to make a film poking fun at gender ideology.

The word ‘camp’ applied to personality refers to “ostentatious, exaggerated, affected, theatrical” behaviour. Well, things certainly have ‘camped up’ over the last decade when it comes to gender.

Libs of TikTok posted a video of a girl giving helpful tips on how you can let other people know what your pronouns are on any particular day.

She has different clothes for when she’s feeling feminine (more pink and girl-like), when she’s feeling masculine (more black and boy-like) and when she’s feeling non-binary (a more ambiguous clothing style). In today’s exciting world, of course, this kind of cosplay is seen as something significant, and something significantly different than mood. She also has a set of bracelets or badges that will help other people to see what pronouns she’s using on a particular day.

What interested me was the phrase “when I’m feeling like a guy”. In best ‘Carry On’ tradition my first thought was that if she’s not thinking about humping, or actively trying to hump, anything vaguely feminoid, she hasn’t got the ‘feeling like a guy’ thing quite right for her age group.

Isn’t that very stereotypical? Yes. But then so is wearing ‘boy-like’ clothes in order to show the world you’re feeling like a guy on that day.

This whole “I feel like X” thing, where X is something you are biologically not, makes me want to ask the question : how the fuck would you know?

Someone who is female, for example, who says they ‘feel like a man today’ is really saying I feel like what I think a man feels like.

Let’s consider another issue ripe for sexism, off-colour remarks, and offence; periods. It’s something all women suffer, unless there’s something that’s gone a bit awry or medically suppressed by contraceptive meds, for example. For many women it can be really, really uncomfortable. It is also, for many women, a time of the month where emotions can be, let’s just say, unpredictable.

As a guy I can do my best to understand, to be extra thoughtful and caring during this time, but I literally have no idea what it really feels like to have to go through that once a month. And even if you’re lucky enough not to be badly affected there’s all the extra shenanigans with the various feminine hygiene products that must be thought about, bought and worn.

I know what it feels like to be a bit nervous about walking through some areas of a town as a guy, but I have no idea what it really feels like to have the worry and perceived threat of a sexual assault at the back of my mind.

And these are just two obvious examples of some of the sex-based pressures that differ between men and women.

I can have a stab at empathy and try to imagine what it really feels like. I can read accounts written by women. But I can never really “feel it in my bones”, so to speak.

It’s like when religious people tell me God is like this, or like that, my question is the same : how the fuck would you know? All you’re telling me is your own idea of what you think God is like.

Yet if I reject the premise that someone who feels like a woman actually IS a woman, then I’m variously described as hateful, a bigot, someone who denies existence, incites violence, or even causes violence.

But, as ever, the ‘progressives’ try to progress too far. Twenty years ago if I’d been called a racist, I would have been quite upset and concerned. It would have instigated some serious self-reflection. These days my reaction would be, meh.

And it’s because of shit like this

Which demonstrates the intersectionality of the insanity.

There are people who claim that their gender cannot be described within the framework of gender (try working that one out at home), or who have progressed beyond the gender of genderfluid and now have a more gaseous or plasma-like gender. And despite the claim there are an infinite number of genders (yes, really) someone who is the gender agender is not any of them - despite ‘agender’ being a recognised gender.

This is all camp as fuck. It’s ostentatious, exaggerated, affected, theatrical nonsense. But we’re all expected to play along with it, to have an affirming bit part in their self-indulgent drama. We’re the extras in some weird post-modern Carry On movie.

It is, of course, rich source material for any SarcasmLord, but this gender campology can have serious consequences. There have been some interesting discussions about women’s rugby recently. The usual ‘progressive’ folk are arguing that self-identifying females should be allowed to play on a women’s rugby team. It’s an issue of rights, they say.

No, it really isn’t. It’s an issue of women’s safety.

One of my former bosses recounted the story of when he was in a pub in Cardiff enjoying a pint after some business meeting. The pub suddenly darkened, he said, and he looked round only to find that the New Zealand All Blacks had just walked in for a bevvy. He described it as seeing colossal mountains of meat descending on the bar.

The sheer power and aggression that one of these walking behemoths can bring to bear on a rugby pitch must be beyond the imagining of most. I think it’s the same for American ‘Soccer’ (if you guys are going to call football ‘soccer’ then I think I ought to be allowed to as well). Having a 250lbs someone with extra muscles on the muscles most people don’t have, reaching near Olympic level sprinting speeds, smashing into you at full tilt is not something any sane person would relish.

Yet if one of these hulks decided to become she-hulk it’s OK for them to play on a women’s team against women? I suggest anyone who advocates for this should get a complimentary day excursion to play against their favourite rugby or American football team, followed by complimentary medical care afterwards. It might not change their minds, but it would be entertaining, if nothing else.

Biological sex is not cosplay. You cannot, as Matt Walsh pointed out on Dr Phil, just put on your sex like a costume. The sex differences between men and women are not superficial and reach down to the cellular level. Here’s just one example (of very many). In this example the difference in UTI’s in men and women are seen to be an issue of more than just basic plumbing.

The biological differences between women and men go beyond basic anatomy. Researchers must consider sex differences down to the cellular level in order to discover crucial information about the varied development, function, and biology between women and men.

A new report written by the Society for Women's Health Research's Interdisciplinary Network on Urological Health in Women and published today in the Biology of Sex Differences journal highlights how improving our knowledge about sex differences in cell biology in the female and male lower urinary tract may help stimulate breakthroughs in the diagnosis and management of urinary dysfunction for both women and men.

Sex is real. Gender is just cosplay.

But they insist on carrying on camping, and we’ve all got to buy into their strange little worlds - or else.

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