It has been one of the most regressive trends within our culture. Identity Politics. It means that victims, or those with personal experience of which they speak, enjoy a privileged status which makes their views more important than others.
However, it has taken Germaine Greer to help me recognise that this rotten unwritten rule of modern life has some worth.
Britain's most famous feminist caused a flurry of calls to the BBC switchboard this week following her appearance on Question Time.
She suggested that young girls could be sexualised by "kissing their fathers goodnight".
Oh dear. As a father of five daughters I am caught between scylla and charybdis.
Feminists want me to play an active parenting role, help emancipate my spouse from the drudgery of child-rearing, deliver sexual equality by sharing the domestic workload.
And I do that stuff. In spades.
But I get the feeling that Germaine, while exhorting me to pick up the marigolds, would rather I had nothing to do with bathtime and bedtime. That, as a man, I am good for mopping the floors, but changing the nappy of my baby daughter? That's intimate stuff and best left to women.
Well, let me lay it on the line. There is no way it is possible to run a busy household without both mum and dad pitching in on all fronts.
I am proud of the role I have played in bringing up my daughters. I love the fact they have grown up with a dad who they see doing as much around the home as their mother. And, in spite of Germaine Greer, I have no sense of awkwardness about kissing my daugthers goodnight.
If Germaine had children, she might understand this.
http://blogs.news.sky.com/familyaffairs/Post:d4047fad-68e6-4c9c-b0b2-783c9ae5dfbf
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