I know dear, I know. The modern world is so very strange, isn't it? Not so many years ago you left a woman alone, you knew what she would be doing; cooking or giving birth. But in these distressing times of so-called 'equality' (or, as you so incisively put it, "hysterical ultra-feminist propaganda") they're even allowed to leave the house by themselves and sweet Jesus alone knows what they get up to out of the reach of your protective gaze. Except we do know what happens to them, don't we? The silly little girls have one too many and end up getting themselves raped by some poor lad who is just as unable as you to equate serious intoxication with the inability to consent. I mean, consent! Who bothered about that in your day?

I can only assume this confusion is at the heart of your recent article expressing shock and dismay that women have been known to complain about this:

A rape victim who was drunk deserves less sympathy.

Of course she is culpable, just as she would be culpable if she crashed a car and injured someone while drunk, or stepped out into the traffic while drunk and was run over.

There there. I know it's difficult to grasp the ever-shifting spheres of modern morality. I sympathise. Only last week I was told off for punching a pensioner in the face because she was standing where I wanted to be. Who knew? I mean, she didn't tell me not to. Not loudly enough, anyway.

But, because I'd hate for any future article of yours on the subject to be misconstrued by the "feminist thought police" as the breathtakingly misogynistic, unforgivably poorly-researched work of an astonishingly ignorant rape-apologist, so here's a handy list of some other things that are not, I repeat not, responsible for a woman's rape:

Bacardi Breezers
Being a mathematician
Lipstick
Post-It notes in unorthodox colours
Al-Qaeda
Excessive consumption of microwave meals for one
Standing next to a man on the tube
Liking experimental jazz
Not having a boyfriend
Having too many boyfriends
Communism
Supporting a team other than Britain in the Olympic cycling
It being a bit hot out
Wanton use of unusually advanced vocabulary
The credit crunch
Ill-advised hen night accessories
Hillary Clinton
Making butterscotch Angel Delight in a way not mentioned in the Serving Suggestions
Reading a broadsheet
The 73 night bus to Walthamstow
The woman

I trust this clears up any doubt.

Love,
Jack xxx

Debbie, Apoplectic Ebay Buyer
where is the dress? i paid for it on friday and its not here

Jack, Put-Upon Ebay Seller
Your item was posted last Saturday. Please allow another day or two for delivery; first class post can be terribly slow sometimes, anything up to a week in my experience. Please get in touch if it still hasn't arrived by the weekend.

- Saturday -

Debbie
the dress still isn't here i want my money back

Jack
I'm very sorry that it still hasn't arrived; as I said, it was posted this time last week. I'm afraid I do not know what could have happened to it, I can only assume it was unfortunately lost in the post somewhere. I have proof of postage if you would like to see it?

Debbie
what good is that I wanted the dress. this is disgusting , ive never has so much trouble before

Jack
I do offer the option for postal insurance on all my auctions and state that if this is not taken up I do not feel I can be held to be personally at fault for items that get lost en route. I really am sorry about this; Royal Mail have let me down before, hence the insurance option. I will keep my fingers crossed for you that it shows up soon; unfortunately if it does not there is really not much more I can do from this end.

Debbie
Im opening a paypal dispute and they will give my money back

- Monday -

Jack
Good news! Your item was returned to me today by Royal Mail; seems the packaging got torn somehow and it came back in a plastic bag. I have repackaged it extra securely just in case and sent it off to you first thing. Hopefully you should have it soon now, my apologies again for the wait.

Debbie
thats no good the dress was for my daughters 21st bithday at the weekend its useless now. this is an horrendous transaction it was a for a special occasion and i've really been let down.

Jack
I'm sorry to hear this. If you'd like to return the dress to me when you receive it I'm happy to refund you.

- Tuesday -

Debbie
now it will cost me money to sent it back to you and i will have to wait even longer for a refund. and my daughters birthday was completely ruined because of this.

Jack
And I am extraordinarily, magnificently and desperately sorry for both you and your daughter that is was so. I hope that nevertheless she managed to experience a small crumb of birthday enjoyment in another dress, even if it was of lesser fabulousness.

Truly, I would beat the whole of Royal Mail into a quivering mess with my bare hands for the annoyance and inconvenience they have caused to myself and some of the people I have sold items to over the years, if only I could work out with whom to start. You could have a go after me if you liked. It would probably make you feel less angry about things in general; it certainly would me. Just think of the satisfaction of using one of those chunky wooden handled stamps all over their tenderest parts. And the potential for multiple unauthorised uses of Special Delivery stickers brings a tear of pleasure to my eye just contemplating it.

Such distractingly jolly thoughts aside, we remain in this situation. And situations such as these unfortunately do happen, despite everyone's heartiest and most sincere efforts to the contrary and MULTIPLE UPPERCASE WARNINGS on auctions with regards to our personal liability on such matters. I consider that in the grand scheme of things, even with the tenner I'll lose to your refund and your daughter's entire twenties now apparently stretching before her in undressed ruins, we could all be worse off. We could be living in South Ossetia for a start. Nasty.

Your money will be on it's way the very second the dress is back. I suggest sending it Recorded; you never know what can happen to your packages once in the mail system, do you? May Royal Mail smile more benevolently, wholesomely and fecundly upon your next transaction.

Debbie
weirdo

Tags:
haiku
poetry
in the nip
apodysophilia
restraining order
viewed suspiciously by pigeons
i was just cooling my motherboard officer
philip larkin liked to do it this way too i believe
anything over 28 degrees makes me dream in comic sans
any resemblance to real persons living or dead is purely coincidental
i wake at 4am with the fear that when i am dead this will be the only record of my life

1. Never break two laws at once.
2. Tizer will remove marker pen from latex.
3. Whenever possible, drink from curly straws.
4. Don't get too comfortable.
5. Only touching something when you know where it's been gets boring quickly.
6. Silence can be passed off as grace.
7. Never get involved with a man in a homburg.
8. The cure for heartbreak is realising that hearts don't actually break.
9. Plot often and with feeling.
10. Keep shoes off the table unless you're tapdancing on it.
11. Read the Daily Mail and do the opposite.
12. Do not let anyone cut your hair in exchange for a Megadeth CD.
13. Trying to be sexy is oxymoronic.
14. Many unexpected things can be successfully used as a mixer for vodka.
15. However milk is not one of them.
16. Tapwater neither.
17. Do not wait for permission.
18. Or approbation.
19. The best sweeties often come from strangers.
20. My body is not a temple, it is a once-use only, disposable plastic tent from Argos.
21. Never foxtrot on a bendy bus.
22. Romance does not come in shades of pink and red.
23. When in doubt, twiddle your moustache.
24. Be suspicious of the originality of the self-declared cynic.
25. It's not what you do, it's what it does to you.
26. Things do not in fact happen for a reason.
27. You cannot pole dance to Bing Crosby.
28. Sherbet Dip Dabs are fine to have for dinner three days in a row, but not four.
29. You don't have to.
30. No, you really don't.

I don't quite know what to do with myself.

It wasn't unexpected, of course; as soon as he came into my life again I knew the end would come. He turns up when he feels like it and knows I'll be waiting, pre-ordered and sweaty-palmed with panting, unseemly anticipation. I took him to bed with me every night for three weeks, sighing and swooning and eking out the pleasure, each skin- tingling adverb by each goosepimply shuddering noun.

But then it was over. And now I can't seem to bear to look at anything new, never mind pick it up.

I know the short term cure for heartbreak is to go to bed with something cheap, forgettable and preferably already well-thumbed. A frivolous distraction for an hour or two to take your mind off things, a cleansing lemon-scented moist towelette for the literary palate. But it was no use. Even though I put on fresh sheets and slipped into my best perfumed nothing, I still found taking Terry Pratchett into my plumped up eiderdown nothing but a sordid and impoverished experience. I couldn't stop finding fault. His dialogue was predictable and his attempts at humour a turn off; after only twenty minutes I could no longer stand the feel of him under my fingers. I kicked him out before midnight.

So in desperation I did something I'm not proud of. I am ashamed to admit it but I must; I threw myself into a rebound.

Everyone had told me that Murakami and I would be perfect together. People I respect, too, those who laugh uncontrollably at the self-help section in Waterstones and have to wash their hands after accidentally touching a Bill Bryson. So I bade myself make his acquaintance and after a short while, decided to continue our relationship back at mine. I even took some time off work with the intention of getting to know him better.

Oh reader, I tried to love him, I really did. His humour was subtle and well timed, he didn't say anything to make me want to break his spine in annoyance and with an expert hand touched me appropriately in all the right places. Everything should have been wonderful. I should have been traipsing lightly over Hampstead Heath in unsuitably flimsy dresses with the intention of devouring him under a tree somewhere. But I simply couldn't give him the devotion he deserved. When I caught myself ignoring him in favour of the Guardian property section I knew my heart was still elsewhere. I put him sadly, guiltily back on the shelf, half read.

I am lost. The only thing for it is a period of chastity, I fear. No textual contact for at least another month, maybe more. Or until the blurb for banana guards in the Lakeland catalogue starts to sound fruity, whichever comes first.

I have always felt somewhat underwhelmed by the polite, Protestant nature of the British democratic process; I'd like to see this country attempting to do the kind of election hysteria perfected by small African states after thirty years of dictatorship. I want queues forming from the early hours (though if they could be significantly dwindling by the time I got there that would be handy), kept in line by the military (or the Territorial Army or at a push, Boy Scouts) with huge threatening guns (or water pistols if it was warm) and there's lots of excitement and shouting rude slogans about certain candidates' hairstyles before the police rush in to calm everyone down with tea and a plate of digestives with no more bodily injury than a few small paper cuts from excessive placard making.

At the very least, I'd like the ballot papers to come with a space next to the candidates' names where you could leave thumping endorsements or scathing dismissals along with your vote. I think a lot more people would be willing to engage with politics if they were allowed to write a giant ARSE next to the BNP's listing and it might just provide me with an answer to the question I've been pondering for the last few weeks: just who is it that's backing Boris? While I appreciate - with no small dismay - that not everyone is like me and my liberal hippy Commie agitator friends, whoever it is can't live in London, surely?

As I was leaving the hall, I noticed that the Sunday School had cut a giant HALLELUJAH out of shiny paper and stuck it up over the crucifix on the far wall. The Jesus on the cross was unusually Caucasian even for the Catholic church with a plump, white face and messy blond hair.

ARSE.

Roles and Society

Holly from Menstrual Poetry comments on a survey by The Telegraph that states (with admirably restrained glee) that many men believe society is now run by women and men are merely 'waxed and coiffed metrosexuals' who have to abide by female rules and long for a good only fashioned 'return to manliness'.

The World is Now Dominated by Women, Where Have I Been?

"It seems as if once women set their footprints in the wet concrete of history and start making own choices without having to consult a man before doing so, the men start to get all uppity."

Fannie offers a step by step guide to the kind of worriedly becoiffed men in The Telegraph who are fretting about the influx of women into the pubic sphere, by taking a lesson from Iraq on keeping women in their place.

A "Concerned" Man Tutorial

"Where in the world could one look for inspiration, for a guide on how to keep women in their place? Where could we possibly look for a shining model on how to integrate fundamentalist religion with government while using the correct gender-conservative ideals declaring that each gender has a proscribed place in society?"

Cara at The Curvature tries hard to keep a straight face at the pundits insistence that the wife of The New York governor caught cavorting with ladies of the night is somehow to blame for the apparent easy downward motion of his trouser fly.

Another exciting round of Men Can?t Be Held Responsible for Their Actions, Let's Blame The Wife!

"In the end, there’s nothing that you can’t turn around and blame on a woman. This time, we’ve got: Well, she didn’t have enough sex with him! In other instances, it will be: Come on, what’d she expect if she was going to burn the roast — and then talk back?!"

Sexual violence

Julie and Maia from The Hand Mirror present a duo of complimentary posts on anti-binge drinking ads from New Zealand that reinforce the responsibility of women to prevent rape by not enjoying themselves too much.

It's the victim blaming; it's not how you victim blame and Actually, She Wasn't Asking For It At All

"Anyone who believes the rape myth that women are responsible for rape if they have been drinking can do real harm to women who have been raped. This advertisement is one more reinforcement of a myth that is already way too prevelant."

Another pair of linked posts from Holly at Menstrual Poetry, this time on the commercial sex industry, offering some statistics on prostitution and thoughts on the reasons why men use sex workers.

The Truth About Prostitution and The Psychology Behind Men and Prostitutes.

"It is said that while politicians, in particular, are used to wielding power and keeping people under him in check, no one is working for this man without getting something in return–and that is where the appeal of prostitutes comes in."

Rape survivors Marcella at Abyss2Hope and Amanda at Pandagon present two differing views on the 'I Was Raped' t-shirt designed by Jennifer Baumgardner, a shirt designed to let rape victims “own the experience,” an "help chip away the cone of silence that surrounds a crime with humiliation at its core."

I Was Raped T-Shirt Not A Statement Of Victimhood

"Smart and rational rape survivors are supposed to carefully guard their secret unless they are being brave by cooperating with law enforcement. If you don't shut up about rape or don't only reveal what happened to you in hushed tones then you are suspect. The dangerousness of coming out as someone who has been raped is what should have all of us concerned and dedicated to eliminating this danger."

You know who needs to take ownership for rapes? Rapists.

"Pressure to “own” a rape probably doesn’t do rape victims a bit of good, because that puts it back into the dominant narrative about rape, which is that it’s a woman’s fault if it happens to her."

The Feminist 101 blog comprehensively debunks the views of a BNP London Assembly candidate Nick Eriksen who said earlier this month that "Rape is simply sex. Women enjoy sex, so rape cannot be such a terrible physical ordeal.To suggest that rape, when conducted without violence, is a serious crime is like suggesting that forcefeeding a woman chocolate cake is a heinous offence. A woman would be more inconvenienced by having her handbag snatched."

If women like sex just as much as men do, then why is rape so bad?

"I suggest that anyone tempted to make such objections really think a bit harder about the difference between doing something when you choose to do it, and enjoying doing it when it is your choice, versus being forced to do it at someone else’s choice with no care for your safety or dignity, and that someone being gratified at you being powerless to stop them."

Sex and Reproductive Choice

Mary from Womenstake is shocked to the core - as all of us Decent, Right-Thinking citizens are - by a recent news article that young people are Doing It and what is more, Catching Things.

Young People Are Having Sex! (And this is "News"?)

The recent “news” that STDs are running rampant among young women is already old to those working in public health. What other outcome could we expect when the federal government is funding abstinence only education, which deprives students of the basic information needed to make sex (which they are apparently having) safer?"

Author of Hoyden About Town, Lauredhel presents a well reserached analysis of free choice in birthing care and infant death from unnecessary caesarean intervention.

Death twice as likely by caesarean??

"Truly free choices are almost impossible within a societal and medical patriarchy in which birthing is considered a stupendously dangerous, messy, primitive, terrifying process which must be timed and controlled and scrutineered and interfered with in the normal course of things."

Greta poses the question: Why don’t they make a birth control pill for men?

Sex, Lies, and Contraception: The Male Pill

Because this isn't simply a question of sexist men dumping the responsibility for birth control onto women. It's a question of whether women would be willing to place the responsibility for birth control into the hands of men.

The F-Word rounds up the press reaction to my personal favourite story of the year so far, Thomas Beattie, the pregnant transman. I've tried to avoid reading any tabloid coverage of this due to a desire to keep my head unexploded until at least May this year, but Jess has suffered the rage so I didn't have to.

How the press reported on a pregnant man

"The concept that Beatie doesn’t feel like being pregnant threatens his identity as a man seems to be difficult to understand for those who are still not entirely comfortable even with those who break down gender roles, such as a female boss, a stay at home dad, etc, let alone challenge the concept of gender as a simple binary divided by an impenetrable wall."

Twisty Faster - gentleman farmer and spinster aunt - from I Blame The Patriarchy gives further thought to the 14 year old girl in the US who was threatened with the head-meets-wall lunacy of murder charges for miscarrying on an aeroplane.

The continuing exploits of the fetus-lovers

"Why is this even in the news? Because even though it was just a miscarriage, it involves scandalous dirty female sex behavior in the shape of teen pregnancy and a trash can, that’s why. Homicide cops, faugh. Why not just institute the Houston P.D. Criminal Uterus Unit and be done with it?"

Eye-wateringly sanctimonious articles about enthusiastic devotees of abstinence movements are not new, but Jessica from Feministing neatly sums up why public promotion of the lifestyle choice hurts the chaste as well as the sluts.

Why glorifying virginity is bad for women

"Perpetuating the virgin/whore stuff hurts all women, not just the "whores." Until women's morality is divorced from their bodies and sexuality, we'll continue to be defined by what's in between our legs - instead of in our hearts."

Bitch PhD writes a extremely familiar story of social and self-imposed embarrassment over menstruation and learning to let it go.

Coming out of the menstruation closet

"Fourteen years after I started bleeding every month, I feel like I've mostly gotten the hang of it. But the other day, I realized the extent to which having "gotten the hang of it" is only true within the limited context of our culture of concealment. Getting the hang of it means learning how to conceal it as best as possible, so no one ever knows you've got it."

Body Image

Two posts about the fraught relationships women have with their body hair, the first from The Jaded Hippy and the second from Anji at Shut Up Sit Down.

Body Hair

"Women have body hair. We choose to manipulate it or get rid of it. But pure and simple, WE HAVE IT. And I have always been of the opinion that we should be able to simply HAVE it, and should not feel obligated to do anything about that."

The Politics of Body Hair

"Put down the damned razor and love your body the way it is naturally, not the way you've been taught it ought to be. By refusing to participate personally, but becoming one more woman who challenges the status quo by loving her body hair, you become one more soldier in the army fighting towards making women's bodily self-esteem and equality a reality."

Rachel from Women's Health News reviews Locker Room Diaries, a book that purports to be a wake-up call for women to stop obsessing over body image but the text reveals something different.

Locker Room Diaries - An Initial, and Unpleasant, Review

"I don’t think I can bear the obsessive weighing and measuring of women’s bodies in what, one would assume from the title, would be a work precisely about refusing to let numbers rule women’s lives."

Inspired by this post, Samara at the F-Word wonders why, from scratchy lace arse-floss to crippling stilettos, women are still considered increasingly sexually attractive the more uncomfortable they are.

More on shoes.

"I wonder if vulnerability = sexiness. Would I have been even more “sexy” if I’d been wearing shoes so uncomfortable I’d been struggling to walk? Is a woman who can’t fight back the best kind?"

A woman after my own (eminently sensible) heart, Nine from Rage Against the Man-chine is mystified by commercials in which women appear to gain some kind of curious sexual pleasure from cake, marvelling at the misogyny that leads food to be thought of as a forbidden pleasure.

I don't give a shit about chocolate at all.

It’s perfectly acceptable for these women to behave lustfully with regard to food, which is odd considering the fact that they aren’t permitted to do so when it comes to actual sex. I suppose it really isn’t much of a shock; women aren’t allowed to express sexual desire without being labeled sluts, so it has to go somewhere. Best direct it toward something that doesn’t threaten men’s control over the realm of sexuality. Something like cake."

Feminism

From Jessica Hoffman at Alternet, the compelling and necessary On Prisons, Borders, Safety, and Privilege: An Open Letter to White Feminists.

"If feminism is about social change, it is about recognizing that safety in this society is a fantasy afforded only by assimilation to power, and the cost of that fake safety is the safety of those who cannot, or will not, access it. If feminism is about social change, it is about radically challenging prisons and borders of all kinds."

Helen offers a very personal take on the transfeminism debate at F-Word.

What is transfeminism?

"Perhaps, then, trans women do have insights to offer in the debate as to why our issues have a place in feminism: if nothing else, we must surely agree that gender variance, and how we express it, should be a right common to all if we are serious about ending discrimination."

Zuzu writing at Feministe uses the example of mass media misogyny towards Hilary Clinton to explain how using sexist language to dismiss and denigrate a woman you disagree with damages all women.

Why calling out misogyny matters

"I’m calling this shit out because this shit hurts women. Women like me. Women like many of you. Women like your daughters, your sisters, your mothers, your friends, your spouses, your SOs. If it’s okay to dehumanize a US Senator and presidential candidate as “that thing” or dismiss her as “that bitch” .... then we now have an environment in which it’s okay to dehumanize, demean and diminish ordinary women because they’re women."

Lina argues at Uncool on why there cannot be a single definition of feminism and by extension, why there are many ways to be 'feminist'.

On Patriarchy, or Why there cannot be a universal definition of feminism

I don't want to get all postmodern on your asses again, but the day of the metanarrative is (or ought to be) over. It's far better to engage with the language, the key words, and figure it out for yourself. In short, do not be told what feminism is (or patriarchy for that matter!).

Finally and with pleasingly neat contrast, there are also many ways to be unfeminist. Katie gives us a tongue in cheek yet annoyingly accurate top 10 list of all the ways some women manage to make life difficult for the rest of us.

Dollymix's guide to giving the sisterhood a bad name.

"5. Develop an irrational hatred for a woman you've seen in Heat magazine (but never met or spoken to), and make a point of saying "I *HATE* that stupid bitch/cow" whenever you see a picture or article about her, as though she has personally wronged you in some way."

And finally finally, April 18th is Blog for Equal Pay Day. More details here.

No more tearing of hair, no rending asunder of clothing, no praying to gods both major and minor for the damn thing to arrive immediately and deliver you from days spent discussing silicone versus plastic teats on a brownfield estate in Amersham. Or in my case, being forced to watch Loose Women from a TV on the ceiling with my toes pointing skyward as a doctor sets about my business end with a the upholstery attachment from a Dyson. No. You can trip frivolously about town with a sunny disposition and a tinkling laugh (though possibly not in light coloured clothes), safe in the knowledge that whatever else Auntie Flo might be doing, she will assuredly turn up sooner or later.

The downside of this of course is that I have no need to keep any track of even the general kind of time in which this might occur. Which means I no longer know when I'm premenstrual. If I was the kind of woman who raged and snarled, ate black forest gateau with a potato masher and constantly fell off the back of chairs when her period was due, it would be obvious. But I'm like that all the time. The only way I can tell is because my sense of taste, never all that much to begin with, slips quietly but firmly into the twisted bowels of lunacy.

This time, I bought a bag. It is large and it is green. It has one diaphanous maw at the bottom of which you cannot find anything and six tiny pockets that could only be of any use if you're the kind of woman who cannot leave the house without lipstick. It has a collection of woollen pompoms and clattering brass trinkets hanging off it that let friends and colleagues alike know where I am at all times. It is lined with carpet from an episode of George and Mildred. And it is made of moss. I can never go near another goat in my life. Not that I do so on a regular or even incidental basis, but now that I actually can't I find myself disproportionately agitated by this seemingly easily avoided curtailing of narrative possibility.

The time before, I bought a yellow satin prom dress that made me look like a slab of melting butter. And 2,500 ear plugs that I then left on the bus. Despite my almost constant hectoring, the major pharmacutical companies seem curiously reluctant to print DO NOT GO SHOPPING on capsules of Evening Primrose Oil. In league with the retailers, I don't doubt.

Still, better than that time I bought some salad.

I know laydees, I know. Us feminists lead very busy lives putting contraceptives in the water supply, fornicating outside of wedlock with communists and gathering ingredients for spells to turn other people's children into homosexuals. But should you have found the time after hard day destroying the very fabric of decent society to have written about your tireless efforts, I'd like to hear about it.

You can send me submissions through the carnival submission form or at pandemian AT pandemian DOT com until 7th April. There's no theme but the post should have been made since the last carnival, number 56 currently up at Redemption Blues. Ta.

* Strictly speaking that might just be my own general life's goal and not something necessarily endorsed by the carnival organiser.

I realise, in some circles, this is as bad as thinking Oliver Letwin has the right idea or looking speculatively at five year olds. I don't know that anyone who likes Morrissey will ever speak to me again. Nevertheless it is true. I am lazy and find merely asking if someone would like to fuck takes much less time and effort. You can always talk about music afterwards and if it turns out he owns more than one Coldplay album well, at least you got laid. Probably just the once though, eh?

Anyway, I appreciate that there may well be subtle pleasures in the actual creation of the tape itself and the whole process is not necessarily about marching inexorably to a fruity outcome. So I made one. For my own educational edification and absolutely not because everyone else is also doing it. And certainly not in order to attract the how's your father, but if your surname is Oldman, Rickman or Bowie I'm happy to open a dialogue on the matter. It gave me pleasure. Also a punctured toe, from dancing over a drawing pin.

It's not the soundtrack of my life because that is an ear-meltingly eye-gougingly face-punchable piece of linguistic titwank if there was ever one and besides which it's inaccurate; my life sounds like Ian Paisley doing the vocals for Aphex Twin and despite tireless efforts I couldn't find any of that on Limewire. But here. 12 songs that fill me up with the sherbet from seventy-two Dib Dabs and then shakes me until I froth. If you feel like taking your knickers off by the end that can only be a bonus.

And not before time; the usual suspects have, it must be said, been growing a little stale over the centuries. Which one of us looks upon the prospect of blasphemy, wrath, bearing false witness, greed or shoplifting from Primark with any real relish these days? Even the biggies - adultery, abortion, contraception, sodomy - seem to be no more an offence against God as merely against the Daily Mail.

Published in the Vatican's official newspaper L'Osservatore Romano the list of mortal sins were revealed at the end of a week long refresher course for priests on the sacrament of confession.

Putting aside the delightful image of the priests behind handed a memo slip from the Sins Forgiveness Committee as they shuffle tiredly out of the door after a five day conference on the importance of thinking outside the (confessional) box, the new sins are drug abuse, genetic manipulation, morally dubious experimentation, environmental pollution, causing social injustice or poverty and accumulating excessive wealth. The latter comes with a special dispensation for the Vatican, presumably.

I have to say however, I feel a little disappointed with their choice. At first glance it appears promising; out of the six or so new sins I have only committed three - morally dubious experimentation being the cheapest and most enjoyable by far - which on the face of it leaves plenty as yet unexplored, especially exciting as I had already gone through all the seven deadlies by the time I was 11. But the others seem to be annoyingly unachievable even by the most dedicated of heretics. If I squint very hard I can imagine someday the possibility of indiscreet wealth, but I fear the chance to meddle with anyone's DNA will lie forever out of my sticky grasp. Tacit approval of such may well turn out to be enough, but it just doesn't give the same kind of inner satisfaction as say, actually coveting your neighbour's ox in person does.

It is most inconvenient for us completionists. I can't see any way around it. Unless.... you wouldn't happen to know of a filthy-minded scientist who fanices swapping a story about that time he made a sheep with seven legs for my approximately 502 tales of lust (assorted), would you?

Edit: Indexed provides a handy guide to effective sin combining.

You used my card in
Fat Eddie's Phat Rims Shop
in San Diego.

To spare your blushes
and for the sake of your own
criminal career,

Next time you might like
to choose someone with credit
of more than 12p.