Book review: How to Kill Men and Get Away With It, by Katy Brent

Welcome to the world of Kitty Collins. Busy London socialite. Instagram influencer. Wholesale murderer.

She has her reasons, initially only slaying men, almost accidentally at first who she chances upon and who crucially behave very badly in the course of their everyday lives.

We all know the sort. The married man who sleazes over younger women on a drunken night out. The bastard who ghosts her friend after their all too brief relationship with the “clingy” female gets too “serious” for him. Or any number of the gropers, potential rapists or misogynists who walk our streets, drink in our pubs, dance in our nightclubs, vote in our parliaments, work in our offices and sit in our homes on a daily basis.

Less sinister than Dexter and with more fashion sense than Norman Bates, Kitty soon finds herself addicted to this sort of morally righteous brand of killing, finding it provides a real sense of purpose to her otherwise rather shallow social media orientated existence. But with a potential new boyfriend looming on the horizon and an anonymous stalker taunting her with threatening messages, can Kitty really go on killing men and getting away with it forever?

Author Katy Brent has created a marvellous anti-hero here in this wonderfully compelling first novel. Certain to be made into a TV series or film soon, this is a British American Psycho for the 2020s, but somehow a lot more accessible and certainly a hell of a lot more fun.

Published by: HQ Digital. Available on ebook now and in book form on 16 February 2023.

Book review: Radical Victorians, by James Hobson

The Victorian era is sometimes remembered as a stuffy, prudish period when radical ideas were either not proposed or not listened to. This is not entirely true. Here, author James Hobson details the lives of nineteen ground-breaking Victorians who boldly blazed a trail for various ideas and positions, which in most cases, were not widely adopted until much later, if at all.
Of the nineteen figures included not one, except perhaps Labour Party founder, James Keir Hardie is well-known today. Hobson’s interest is not in those who like Charles Darwin, saw their radical theories widely absorbed into mainstream society during their lifetimes. The book is more interested in the outliers: the often lonely figures who stuck to their guns in the face of almost universal indifference, hostility and sometimes hatred.
None of the nineteen figures lived to see their arguments become popular. Some of their outlandish notions, such as gender equality, freedom of the press and the notion of cremating the dead, have become widely accepted since. Others, such as socialism, vegetarianism and republicanism remain significant minority opinions, which are at least tolerated today. Others, such as spiritualism and eugenics have largely fallen out of favour.
Th figures included are a mixed bunch. For example, whatever good points they may have had, the vegetarian, Anna Kingsford,, socialist Henry Hyndman and scientist, Francis Galton were all undeniably very racist by modern standards. And while the author keeps an open mind, it is difficult to read the chapter about spiritualist, Florence Cook, without concluding she was some sort of fraud. Many of these figures were eccentric. Some were deeply flawed. All were very unusual.

But some undeniably great things and did much to improve the lives of large numbers of people. The 19th century temperance movement has developed a reputation for hypocrisy and cant. In the chapter on Ann Jane Carlile, Hobson reminds us that this wasn’t always the case and was, at any rate, tackling an extremely serious alcohol problem which was destroying thousands of lives. Josephine Butler, likewise, did invaluable work in combatting the sexual double standard enforced by the odious Contagious Diseases Act. Even Francis Galton, today notorious as ‘the father of eugenics’ was justly celebrated during his lifetime for his very real scientific achievements. His ultimately wrongheaded ideas about selective breeding were shared by many on both the left as well as the right at the time. They would become inextricably linked to the horrors of Nazism, but this would only happen long after Galton’s death in 1911.
In short, this book presents a fascinating portrait of a society tentatively taking the small but essential stepping stones towards the world we know today.

Book review: Radical Victorians: The Women and Men who Dared to Think Differently, by James Hobson. Published: May 30th 2022, by Pen and Sword.

Netflix film review: Moxie

Moxie is the story of how a group of teenaged girls band together to defeat the sexism endemic in their high school.

The sexism is everywhere. The school American football team are treated as all-conquering heroes, even as they slap girl’s behinds in public and send out lists of which of the female students has the “best rack” or is “most bangable.” One suspects both this behaviour and the language used – though undeniably unacceptable – is actually fairly mild compared to what actually goes on in many schools in both the US and UK.

Worse still, a serious complaint of harassment made by new girl, Lucy (Alycia Pascual-Peña) against bullying sports star, Mitchell (who, in an interesting piece of casting is played by Patrick Schwarzenegger) is not taken seriously at all by the school’s head, Principal Shelley (Marcia Gay Harden). Another girl is angry over being unfairly penalised for wearing a tank-top, others are irritated by the lack of support given to girls’ sports by the school. A trans student is also annoyed to be excluded from the school production of Little Shop of Horrors. Long-suffering liberal teacher, Mr. Davies (Ike Barinholtz) amusingly ties himself in knots by trying to retain a neutral stance amidst the rising tide of rebellion.

One student, Vivian (Hadley Robinson) has had enough. Inspired both by the defiant attitude of her new friend, Lucy and by tales of the 1990s riot grrrl activism of her mother (Parks and Recreation star, Amy Poehler, who also directs this), Vivian single-handedly conceives, devises, writes, produces and distributes MOXIE! an underground magazine designed to tackle directly the plague of male chauvinism which infects the school. She manages to keep her own role in producing the new journal entirely secret from friends and family, an element of the story, I personally didn’t find entirely believable. At times, Vivian exhibits signs of the intolerance which occasionally emerges in such movements. She also comes close to alienating her best and oldest friend, Claudia (Lauren Tsai).

Based on Jennifer Mathieu’s novel, I did not find every aspect of the film entirely convincing. The name Moxie or MOXIE! rever really works as a film title.

But as a well-acted and potentially inspiring call to arms against the evils of everyday sexism, Moxie is definitely worth watching.
Moxie is available to watch on Netflix now.

Book review: The Problem With Men, by Richard Herring

Some years ago, the comedian Richard Herring noticed something funny happening on Twitter.

Many unusual things happen on Twitter, of course, but Herring noticed this particular trend always occurred on March 8th, the date officially designated as International Women’s Day.

“When is international men’s day?” one tweet would typically begin. “Or am I once again being positively discriminated against?”

Other such tweets would be more argumentative in tone. “Imagine the uproar if there was an international man’s day…” Or “Is there an international man’s day? #askingforafriemd” or even “When’s international men’s day then? Of course there isn’t one. So much for equality!!”

Lots of these tweets appear every year. The vast majority are posted by men. All have been prompted by news of International Woman’s Day. Perhaps they make a reasonable point?

Well, in fact, no. In fact, they do not.

Because firstly, as Richard Herring points out, all of them have been tweeted simply in an attempt to spoil International Women’s Day. This is a silly and childish response, the equivalent of a child having a tantrum at another child’s birthday party, which they have been invited to, simply because it is not their own.

Second, almost everyone tweeting may be safely presumed to have some sexist intent (e.g. to rile women or feminists).

And thirdly…there is an International Men’s Day already! There has been for years, a fact any one of the multitude of idiots sending out the army of tweets on the matter, could have found out simply by Googling it within seconds. It is on November 19th.

Richard Herring is one of Britain’s most likeable and intelligent comedians and often likes to set himself these little challenges. Years ago, he set himself the task of replying to every single tweet asking the inane question always with a witty response informing them that the big day is on November 19th.

Two years ago, he started doing this for charity. If I may quote Wikipedia:

“On 8 March 2018, in aid of International Women’s Day, Herring raised over £150,000 for domestic abuse charity Refuge by responding to anyone on Twitter who asked when International Men’s Day was (it is 19 November).He did the same on 8 March 2019, raising almost £130,000. He repeated the exercise for the final time on 8 March 2020 and streamed himself responding to tweets live on Twitch. He raised a further £70,000.”

Three cheers for him!

In fact, four cheers as this short book detailing his experiences is a treat. Extending into such topics as why many men confidently believe they could score a point against Serena Williams on a tennis court (they couldn’t), why female leaders have a better record on dealing with COVID-19 than male ones do and whether a man can ever be considered a feminist, this is thought-provoking, intelligent and lots of fun.

The Problem with Men: When is it International Men’s Day? (and why it matters), by Richard Herring. Published by Sphere, November 5th 2020.

Three cheers for political correctness!

Few terms have become so debased within the lexicon of political discourse than political correctness. Like the term “liberal” in the United States, the term has become almost an insult. Peter Hitchens describes it as “stern, fierce movement which is completely sane and sets out deliberately to stop us from saying – and thinking – various things. It is not a joke.” Newspapers like Hitchens’ own Mail and the Daily Telegraph routinely blame political correctness for everything under the sun. Some even liken it to the tyrannies of Nazi Germany and Stalin’s USSR.

What are these bold claims based upon? Basically, it comes down to this: Fifty years ago it was acceptable to make sexist, racist and homophobic remarks and jokes in public. Now it isn’t. Most people recognise this as a good thing. The Right have never come to terms with it. So the next time you read any garbage about “political correctness gone mad” remember: that’s all the writer is complaining about. They want to be racist or offensive in some way but society has changed so much it no longer permits them to be so.

That’s all there is to it. And no one is more humourless about it than the modern Right.