Joanna Lumley meant well – despite her words on rape

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jan/27/joanna-lumley-rape-advice

Version 0 of 1.

Joanna Lumley should be ashamed of the toxic vocabulary she used in her "safety advice" to women on a night out. "Don't look like trash, don't be sick down your front" and the rest. Slap a wig on her head and we could be back in the 1970s, hearing some judge blaming a mini-skirted victim-slut for her own rape.

However, while Lumley's vocabulary was one thing, her intentions were quite another. She warned: "Somebody will take advantage of you, either they'll rape you, or they'll knock you on the head or they'll rob you." Does this sound, as many claim, as if Lumley was victim-blaming? Or just that she wanted women to take precautions? Because frankly so do I.

Indeed, as someone with past drunken, staggering, heel-breaking form, I have my own advice for young women. Which is to be as wild as you like, but please stay with your girlfriends, in your girl packs. I am convinced that, even at your drunkest and most vomit-prone, you are safer, less vulnerable, than you would be stone-cold sober, walking alone. In my view, the girl pack has deterred more attacks than any amount of rape alarms or sprays. As far as I'm concerned, young women can vomit down their fronts for all eternity just so long as they do it from within the safety of the pack.

So there, I've "done a Lumley"; I've stated my opinion that there's safety in numbers. Which is not suggesting that victims are ever to blame for their rapes. Only rapists are responsible for rape, however much the victim might have drunk, flirted or spewed into her handbag. The right to say "No" does not expire, melting away like a snowflake on a hotplate, in the face of male desire or, more likely, the rapist's cold calculating sense of entitlement and opportunism.

However, this does not mean that Lumley should be gunned down with what amounts to ideological hysteria, sometimes verging on the salacious. Am I alone in noticing that Lumley also mentioned battery and robbery, but all anyone fixated upon was rape? Moreover, while only 8% of sexual assaults are "stranger-rape", it's worth noting that Lumley was addressing that 8%, just as I was with my girl pack rant. Is this permitted or are we only allowed to talk about the sober, conservatively dressed "blameless" victims, attacked by people they know? To my mind, this seems to stray dangerously into the territory of some rape being more equal than others.

Furthermore, since when was suggesting basic safety strategies tantamount to insisting that women don burqas and hire armed guards for all excursions? That's the same quasi-utopian view that dictates that, as it's (mostly) males who rape (mostly) women, it's males who should be lectured, punished and forced to change. I agree, let's make rape men's problem! But hang on, we already did. Sadly, in the real world, away from women's studies modules, rapists don't seem to care that we are "on to them". They just carry on raping.

It seems to me that those who would never victim-blame still have to concede that the world is a dangerous place – that there is a big difference between meekly accepting rape as a female burden and being practical and proactive about the fact it exists.

More than anything, it grieves me that women are fighting with each other about this. That someone such as Lumley has been torn apart for expressing concern about young women, albeit with dodgy, outdated vocab. If not advice from our own real-life experiences, what are older women supposed to say to young females who might make up the 8%: "Rape is a male problem, so don't alter your behaviour to protect yourself"?

Is this enough for the real world? Some of us would rather be less ideological (but more useful), trotting out advice about girl packs.

Hols with Richard Branson? What a pain in the Necker

Sweet Jesus, never let me end up on Necker island, Richard Branson's private Caribbean island aka hell in flipflops. A photo tweeted by Branson showed the "fascinating, eclectic group who've dropped by". In reality, David Hasselhoff, Rachel Hunter, Ronnie Wood, Natalie Imbruglia, Kate Winslet, her new husband and Branson's nephew, Ned Rocknroll. And some others.

The photo, a portrait of Out Of Control Smugness of Our Times, is all sun-kissed, faux bonhomie, but reveals a Necker pecking order. The Hoff's pretty girlfriend, Hayley, is crouched uncomfortably, end of line, looking as though she's flung down her waitress tray and "photo-bombed" at the last moment.

This image is haunting, though not for the reasons Branson intended. However luxurious, could you imagine going to Necker as the nobody plus one of a somebody? Endless days being mistaken for the "help", being patronised by mega-famous buffoons, the rest of the time sobbing in your cabin with panic attacks, with doctors opining: "Sorry, she's 'non A-list' and there's no known cure." No thanks!

Sorry, Dickie, I know you're desperate for my company, but I'm turning you down. Anyone for Skeggy?

Let's hear it for househusbands

Could the househusband upgrade the concept of the housewife? Due to the recession, men now represent 10% of those staying home and caring for children, an unprecedented rise of 19,000 to 227,000 in a year. As more women become the main breadwinners, it makes sound economic sense for men to stay at home, but there could be more to it than that.

This is not about housework – study after study shows that men still regard this as "woman's work". Boo! Bad men! However, could this entrenched attitude, centuries in the making, inadvertently be a positive thing?

Traditionally, staying at home, caring for children, has always been irredeemably low status. The 2.3 million who undertake the all-important task of raising future generations are currently being described as "economically inactive". Charming. Women have always had to put up with such unfair jibes, but are men prepared to?

As a rule, men don't take kindly to being perceived as low status. That's why male-dominated professions generally carry more kudos (salaries, recognition) than female-dominated ones. Moreover, when men want to do something, they are quick to restyle it as high status. Just look at cooking. One minute, women were doing it all, with precious little fanfare or acknowledgement; the next, men got involved and suddenly it's all high end, scientific, serious and, above all, manly.

Could men do the same for stay-at-home parenting – turn it into a desirable, high-status activity? As they grow in numbers, they could demand respect, recognition, perhaps even payment. So, stay-at-home mums – look kindly upon the sudden influx of men clogging up the Starbucks aisles with their Bugaboos. If they do for childcare what they did for cooking, things could get pretty interesting.

<em>• This article will be opened for comments on Sunday morning.</em>