It would be hard to find a person more “woke” and “right on” than me. So I find it odd that a comment I made on Slugger O’Toole has been deleted.

There is an excellent post by Ms Kellie Turtle. She is described as a feminist activist and PhD researcher. So she is a professional full time feminist, not just one who does Feminism at the weekend or in her spare time. Therefore her views are worth considering.

This is a really good post. For the benefit of American readers, Doug Beattie is the current leader of the Ulster Unionist Party. I have always doubted his (relatively) liberal credentials but Slugger O’Toole and the letsgetalongerist dominated media have spent years looking for a liberal unionist who will somehow secure the “union”. Mike Nesbitt, Robin Swann, Steve Aiken…even Peter Robinson…and now Doug Beattie.

But thanks to an ill-judged Twitter joke and even more historical tweets, Beattie’s reputation as the reforming unionist has been shredded. Doug Beattie is now Doug Beaten-Docket. A worthless bet.

What to do?

Well certainly people who NEED a liberal unionist will certainly think in terms of “Doug, what on earth possessed you to say THAT?” or maybe try and re-habiltate Doug.

I actually made a very sensible comment on the thread. Upticked by six readers.

“I was reminded of former politician Ed Balls doing a documentary on care homes or those life swap documentaries where posh teenagers have to live on benefits.

What indeed have we all learned?
Doug Beattie seems to be the sort of UUP man who could only come from Portadown, Dungannon, Lurgan and Cookstown and that’s different from being UUP in obviously nationalist or obviously unionist areas.
A frontiersman.
As I am a frontier nationalist, I have watched with some surprise that the man I see when I am passing on the bus is different to the press conference man, the man in the Stormont Chamber, the man on the View.
I am struck that rather than being more than meets the eye, Mr Beattie is actually less than meets the eye…or he is just what he is.
And anything that I have learned in the last few days has not changed my mind. Indeed only those who invested some hope in Beattie will be left to wonder.
How Beattie is seen in the Stormont press gallery or in NIO or academia is one thing…but why not ask the people in Killycomaine, Brownstone, Garvaghy, Mourneview, Taghnevan (Catholic and Protestant areas in his Doug’s constituency)
Good, Bad, indifferent.

As the feminist anthem “I am Woman, hear me roar”, tells us that part of the journey is “make my brother understand”. Many of us get it. We never heard our mothers, grannys, aunts, sisters tell stories of toxic men.
But we have heard our wives, cousins, sisters in law and female friends and many have honoured us and trusted us enough to tell us some of their pain.

We want to make d**n sure we don’t hear it from daughters, granddaughters, nieces.
Yeah…we get it.
And what we all need to get is that “toxic” knows no boundaries in terms of genre.

Would I like to hear Doug “communicate” ?
Well…frankly no.
Two years ago or two weeks ago, Doug Beattie or “when the time is right”, Doug Beattie has never said anything or will say anything that I want to hear.”

But was this later comment of mine too frivilous

“I am a new man….it makes me a babe magnet”

Those who know me as a wee, old, fat baldy man will know me well enough to know that I am not by any traditional or other metric “a babe magnet”. But I do hint at a serious point that women should be as wary of men who PROFESS to being a “new man” or “woke”.

Yes there are Dinosaurs. And there are Dinosaurs in sheep’s clothing.