the other side of the mountain

A random stroll through blogland recently revealed whole lot of ‘men are all bastards*’ or ‘all men are bastards’ (take your pick) femblog entries.

I felt vaguely insulted to be tarred with the same brush of bastardy as a whole lot of anonymous Johnny Done-Me-Wrongs, what with me being a man** and all. “How sexist!” I thought, while I glanced around to where my high horse was busily cropping the verdant turf of self-righteous rhetoric. However, it soon occurred to me that the shoe does tend to fit rather comfortably – in my case, at least. I’ve done more than my fair share of bastarding in the past and I’m pretty sure that
(a) I’m not alone in this; and
(b) I probably haven’t got it all out of my system yet.

Consider also the plethora of prose devoted to the cause of exposing the flawed nature of the human male – this is surely not just some quirky coincidence. Could it possibly be that when you really get down to it, all men ARE bastards to a greater or lesser degree?

On the other hand, maybe the women who know men of the non-bastard variety are too busy being content to find the time to write about it.

* Of course I am referring to “bastard” in the in the derogatory, or “bounder and a cad towards women” sense of the word, rather than “someone with unmarried parents”.

** Technically. Male, at any rate.