RosieH

It's like praying while the plane goes down.

Sean you feisty devil. Of course I'm green-lite. I haven't given up holidays abroad and I like too many shoes and I eat meat. But I don't have pets or children, so it's probably ok.

What Quids said, except to add that, speaking as someone who used to work for a big retailer, the one I worked for didn't even do it to save money, but just to appease its greenlite customers who opine about carrier bags while still insisting on eating asparagus out of season and blueberries from Chile.

Pets - they're for people who can't make friends with their own species, right?

Oh pish and tish. You started a thread attacking people, and then call them bullies when they retaliate? And, I don't believe East Dulwich IS cockney. Or a meringue?

Oh for fuck's sake Huguenot, you're being deliberately obtuse. Were you staggeringly bad at verbal reasoning as a child? Woman is to man as lady is to...? There's no gender concealment going on here, simply a request that women be afforded equal respect. Unless you would ask for a gentleman doctor (to what, open the door for you and kiss your hand?), don't ask for a lady one. Ask for a female or woman doctor by all means, but not a goddamn motherf**king ladylike doctor who'll probably need to have her wandering womb removed when she faints at the sight of your rash. It's not fucking rocket science. Bah fucking humbug.

More kisses for Sean.

Huguenot

Dear god man, you can be ridiculously patronising. If you think trying to address gender bias in language, something important to a great many women, is a "pointless pursuit" then what are you being, other than diminishing? Language, thought and perception are inextricably bound: just because you, Mockney and D_C don't subscribe to the notion of the "little lady" doesn't mean that thousands / millions of other men (and some women) don't. If you think the notion that women are somehow weaker or to be protected - an idea that is perpetuated and reinforced by lots of commonplace language, including the diminutive 'comedienne' - is in no way related to sexual harassment or glass ceilings, then you're a great big mental. I'm not talking about banning any words, and I'm certainly not for 'wimmin' and its ilk - I'm talking about moving away from using certain words that patronise or belittle (however well-meaningly). Was the move from 'coloured' to 'black' also unedifying, diminishing and pointless? Anyway, it's Christmas - so for you my alpha-male combatant, a libation :)-D. And I'm looking forward to not-laughing at the inevitable Miranda Christmas special, where Miranda falls on top of a Christmas tree and a man who is way out of her league inexplicably finds it sexy.

Messing with you, man, YOU MASSIVE PEDANT. C'mere while I kiss you.

Heh, just messing with you, fella. I've been at the Christmas spirit (brandy in this case).

Sorry Jah, didn't mean to go over your head...

What the hell you talking about now fella? I don't follow that comment at all. My point comes down to this - phrases like "lady doctor" aren't replicated for men (has anyone ever asked for a gentleman doctor - complete with cravat and top hat perhaps?), words like comedienne effectively serve as a diminuative. They're patronising rather than differentiating - the female equivalent of 'man' is 'woman', not 'lady' - it's really simple. To say there are more important things to worry about - arguably yes - parity on pay isn't due to be heading our way any time in the next 50 years. To say it's not important that an entire gender is patronised on a daily basis, well some would argue fellas, that that's typical of a patriarchal view..!

Brill, thanks all, and for PMs too - really helpful. Sadly it's not ED based, or I'd post it on here - from the hot debate about cat breeding, and missing cat threads, I know we have cat lovers aplenty in the environs.

My apologies, this is a work-related thing, but it's getting near Christmas and time is running out. I need to try to get some information out quickly to help cute little homeless moggies (and doggies and ferrets) get a warm bed in this icy winter. Does anyone read any great blogs / animal websites they'd recommend?

Mockney and David, you're both intelligent enough to know that words are imbued with meaning that goes way beyond the thing that is signified. If we don't say Prime Ministeress, why should we say comedienne?

:)-D

Oh Sean. With an R surely? Now then sir, do not debase a serious discussion of semiotics and gender politics with your unbecoming levity. Tawdry and not a little shameful. *shakes sad head sadly*

Wait, wait, what's the mist affair thing?

David, that's true if you don't subscribe to Lacan's theory of the signifier and the signified. But I do, to some degree. And Sean, I apologise, I'm in Christmas party mood. Can't find any mulled wine, but I've cracked open the Ferrero Rocher and in the absence of cracker jokes am making the funnies.

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo, not lady, never lady. Woman. Woman. Is it so hard to say?

Sean, if you're looking for a word to rhyme with 'Dungeness', you'd go with 'comedienne'? Laureates of England, lock up your quills, MacGabhann's a'comin'..! And David, yes we can.

Haha, Fabricio, I wasn't. But I'm delighted to learn that I'm thinking on a similar intellectual plane to Roland Barthes. Yes sir, cheese my baby. Oh, and actually I meant that I was fannying about. I applaud your slightly perverse world-view that has led you to this non-ccnformist approach to dating.

Hmm Huguenot, I'm unconvinced, having never once heard anyone in Manchester use rhyming slang (and rotten seems a bit harsh for the way bobbins is employed). Just did an internet trawl and the suggestion arose that 'there were nowt left but bobbins' could be the cause. I like that more. Only the rubbish left, none of the thread. Nice. Edited for forgetting the ion in suggestion.

Ah, but Fabricio, while Sartre's character may have said what he said, that same character chose to stay in that particular hell, rather than leave les autres behind when the choice was given him. So is this really what Sartre thought, or simply what his character Garcin thought? In the same way that when Shakespeare wrote "neither a borrower nor a lender be", he placed those words in the mouth of Polonius, a foolish old man. Did Shakespeare really think it so terrible to borrow a shilling for a piss up in a brewery? What I think we can learn from this is that my boss is out of the office, so I'm fannying about with literary pedantry, instead of working super-dooper hard. But I always liked Huis Clos so I applaud you and your reptilian lips for that.