Sexism, power and hate caught in a gaze

Unprovoked street attacks on women have spiralled

The Spectator magazine – once edited by Boris Johnson, need we say more? – has published plenty of nonsense in its day, but have they completely lost the plot?

A furore has erupted over its publication of an article by writer Lloyd Evans, who described attending a Cambridge University lecture on Kant by a distinguished professor. Evans was so overcome with lust for her honey-blonde hair, flowing like silk over her erotic shoulders – I might have made that line up, but it was similarly nauseating – that her political reflections were lost on him.

Afterwards, he paid for sex with a prostitute in the “rougher end of Cambridge”, just to hammer home, in case any of us suffer from amnesia, that women divide into goddesses and w ***** .

In 1973, British film theorist Laura Mulvey coined the expression “the male gaze” to describe the way women are objectified – in art and life – when the world is seen through a male lens. “The male gaze projects its fantasy onto the female figure, which is styled accordingly,” she wrote.

I wonder if Mulvey realised back then that the phrase would still be relevant 50 years later. The Spectator didn’t. In 2015, it declared “the end of feminism”, via a writer who talked about her ability to wield influence wearing high heels and red lippie, and was clearly drunk on the power that youthful looks – temporarily – give women.

Feminists, she suggested, should stop spending so much time “dwelling on their own vaginas” and start using their brains. No doubt they will when men like Evans learn that vaginas are not actually where women’s brains are located.

What is “the male gaze”? It’s when the bloke in the garage ignores your PhD in nuclear physics to talk, darlin’, like you are a spanner short of a set; or when a whitevan-man feels empowered by speeding round on the wrong side of the road so that you jump out of the way – just to show you who’s in the driving seat.

But it’s also men like Evans who describe women purely in terms of physical characteristics, because their sense of entitlement is boundless and shameless. “Get out of the basement and get some action – even if you have to pay for it,” Evans advises his critics.

Professor Ypi, he judged, was blonde, and sexy because she was articulate – even if he didn’t know what she actually said. His prostitute was “dark haired” and “buxom”. There are many ways considered inappropriate or disrespectful to write about different races, ages, or gender identities. But women?

Evans is baffled by criticism. Complete strangers, he confided to The Telegraph, were calling him a pervert, just because of his “romantic life”. Romantic? Mate, if you want to be considered for Mills & Boon, you’ll need to up your writing game.

“Sexism, Hate, Mental Illness: Why Are Men Randomly Punching Women?” the New York Times has asked in recent weeks. Incidents of unprovoked street attacks on women have spiralled, with one New York visitor describing how she saw reference to such assaults on TikTok, but dismissed them as too bizarre to be real. Until she got there, saw a “well dressed” man staring at her in the street and, minutes later, felt his fist hammer into the side of her head before he ran off, leaving her with black and blue bruising down her face and swelling in her ear.

In Britain, England’s honour-based violence has soared by 81% in the last five years. In Scotland, reports of sexual crime have increased by 96% over the last decade. No doubt Lloyd Evans would protest at being mentioned in the same article as these statistics. He hasn’t, after all, committed a crime, assaulted anyone, or been charged with inappropriate behaviour. But that misses the point.

The male gaze is important because of the power imbalance it creates, the hateful culture it encourages, the disrespect it tolerates. It’s a tributary running into a river of problems.

Thankfully, some of the appalled reaction to Evans’s article has come from men. The word “feminist” has become frustratingly divisive, when really all it means is people – men and women – who want equality. For that, men need to give up some of their “looker” status in exchange for something more profound.

Lloyd Evans may have described the prostitute as more satisfying than the professor, but those given the privilege of looking are not always those who see most clearly.