You would be forgiven for tossing your copy of the Mail on Sunday in the bin yesterday morning (24 April). The tabloid carried an article so crass that it almost beggars belief the piece made it past newspaper editors. Conservative Party sources had accused Angela Rayner, the deputy leader of the Labour Party, of being so intimidated by the Prime Minister’s “Oxford Union debating training” that she used her body to distract him in parliament. An accompanying picture of Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct gave readers the proverbial wink.
The response was unequivocal horror at such a crude debasement of a senior female politician. On social media, many women not only expressed their outrage but also shared stories of being on the receiving end of that all-too-familiar sniggering schoolboy sexism at work. Responding to the article, Rayner rose above the slime. “Women in politics face sexism and misogyny every day – and I’m no different,” she tweeted. Boris Johnson “and his cheerleaders clearly have a big problem with women in public life. They should be ashamed of themselves.”
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