Equality?

The Orange Female-Only Book prize.

Just watched a debate on tv (debate might be aggrandizing it - it's a chat show) about the Orange prize. It started back in the nineties when there was a lack of equality in the Booker prize and others. The Orange prize was necessary to challenge the hegemony of the 'boys club', but now the Booker lists a lot of female authors. Has the Orange prize lost it's justification?

It's not like the MOBO (Music Of Black Origin) which is purportedly representing and rewarding minority music (another debate for another time). Women are not a minority group, so why are they being treated as such?

If people want to have a female-only prize, so what? I think the key question is "so would you be ok if there was a 'men only' book prize?" I dont have a problem with this either, except that there will inevitably be comparisions of prize money and god help the men if their prize is larger.

There was only one woman on the panel of four, and she was an old school feminist. She had some credibility to begin with, as she pointed out that the only reason that men were able to create art and music in the past (whereas women were far less likely to) was that they didn't have to do anything else. A man could be an itinerant artist, a woman was expected to be a wife and mother. That's all good and I agree that there is nothing genetic that makes men better than women at art or music - it was the misogynistic society that caused the disparity.

Then she went a bit wimmins lib and said "and although things are a bit better now, women still do the majority of the work in the home". A younger guy on the panel took offence to her comments and pointed out that modern relationships were in fact partnerships and that most women he knew would never accept anything less than a fair split of the work. She was dismissive and went into really aggressive patronising(matronising? *grin*) feminism.

I loathe this type of "you subjugated us once, now you need to give us everything and if you disagree then I shall label you as a bigot" identity politics that seeks to set people up as oppressors. I got it when I lived in Uganda - like I was somehow responsible for colonising their country. I got it at Pride a few years ago for being straight. I got it at university in a debate for saying "I refuse to apologise for being white, straight, middle-class and male" (I got thrown out of the debate for that one - go me). I did not enslave your forefathers, I did not subjugate your great-great-grandmother, I did not lynch your ancestor, I did not make laws making your sexuality a crime. In addition - since when did _you_ suffer any of these things? You are not the victim and I am not the oppressor.

I believe in equality. I believe in a meritorious society rather than a privileged society. I accept that it is an ideal rather than a likely reality. I don't like positive discrimination, but I recognise that it is the only way to force acceptance amongst the ignorant - the problem comes that once you have established an acceptable role for a black manager or female doctor or gay soldier, do you continue with the positive discrimination? It is a double-edged sword, because fulfilling a quota immediately removes you from being considered as 'the best person for the job', even if you are. Once the glass ceiling has been shattered, stop flying people onto the roof - let them take the stairs like everyone else (I apologise for that woeful analogy).

Which in a long roundabout way brings me back to the Orange prize for women. Is it positive discrimination? I think originally it was. I don't think it is now - I see it purely as a closed group award (as opposed to an 'open' one). Apparently there is a black female author award as well. Great.

Would it be deemed unacceptable to have a white male author award. If the niche awards are not positive discrimination, then why is there a problem with another niche award for white males? I think there would be uproar if that award was setup, and I think I would agree with the uproar. Which is confusing, because it shouldn't be a problem.