Sorry, but it is stupid to be so drunk

MR JUSTICE Gilbert is in hot water with the feminist screechers because he observed that a young woman who had been sexually assaulted was foolish to have become so drunk that she could provide only a “befuddled” recollection of events. I would have thought the judge was stating no more than the blindingly obvious when he went on to say that her being drunk did not excuse what happened but that people should make sure they protect themselves.

Odd, isn’t it? We accept advice about taking care of our handbags or locking up our houses and cars but then resist it when it comes to the rather more important issue of our own persons.

It is also very anti-equality to say that women have no responsibility to stay sober because all that does is hand the responsibility for a woman’s safety to the man. Let him take charge. Let him protect her. Bring on the knight on a white charger. She is just a poor, helpless little soul who cannot be expected to control her own behaviour.

Somehow that was not quite the vision we had in the early 1970s when we were fighting for equal rights.