Men using words like "love", "darling" and "sweetheart" in certain situations to belittle women is one of the most common strategies in the everyday sexism playbook. Unfortunately, despite the pervasion of "woke" values through society and women's increased willingness to tackle sexist bullshit, it persists.
Someone who's not prepared to take it lying down is sports journalist Lynsey Hipgrave, who cut off a caller on the talkSPORT radio station on Monday morning after he repeatedly referred to her as "love" and "darling". Listen to the call below and it's easy to see why.
Hipgrave was on air with co-host Danny Kelly discussing the recent controversy involving Football Association chief executive Martin Glenn, who today apologised for comparing the Star of David with symbols such as the Nazi swastika. After the discussion, the presenter invited listeners to call in with their opinions but one caller refused to refer to Hipgrave by her name.
You wouldn't call Alan Brazil "darling", would you? 🤦♂️@LynseyHipgrave1 was on 🔥 today... 👊👏
— talkSPORT (@talkSPORT) March 5, 2018
📻 Plenty more from Lynsey at 10am tomorrow! pic.twitter.com/DlJwT3cfNQ
"Hello Gareth," says Hipgrave, welcoming the first caller, to which the caller replies "hello love," and he persists throughout.
Hipgrave, noticing what the man is doing asks: "What's your thoughts about this love?" When Gareth says he believes Glenn should be sacked over the scandal, Hipgrave asks whether his apology is enough for him to stay in his job and the caller replies, "Excuse me darling..."
Hipgrave then tells him: "Alright, you don't need to call me darling, I'm not your darling," but Gareth doesn't listen. He then addresses her co-host by name and calls her "love" for a second time.
Hipgrave then takes the admirable decision to sack off the condescending call, saying: "Gareth do you know what? Because you can't speak to me properly I'm going to sack your call off love but there you go."
The radio station shared the audio clip on its Twitter account in support of Hipgrave, captioning it: "You wouldn't call Alan Brazil 'darling', would you?" And many listeners, including sports stars, fellow sports journalists and football fans, also leapt to her defence.
I was getting annoyed for you there @lynseyhipgrave1 completely agree no room for patronising in this day and age ‘darling’ 🤦🏼♀️
— Amy Christophers (@Thatsportsspice) March 5, 2018
Yesssss @lynseyhipgrave1 brilliant!!! 🙋🏼♂️👏🏻💪🏻🤣 https://t.co/DdBU99KsCu
— Alan Shearer (@alanshearer) March 5, 2018
💯 with you @lynseyhipgrave1 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼https://t.co/O4nOvH1qxO
— Women in Football (@WomeninFootball) March 5, 2018
She warns him and he carries on , if you listened to the next caller she explains it wasn’t him just calling her love , it’s the patronising “darling” that annoyed her. He’s a Liverpool fan which was more offensive
— Tim c (@Timcorps) March 5, 2018
Calls Danny 'Danny', calls Lynsey 'love' and 'darling'.
— Crippy Cooke (@CrippyCooke) March 5, 2018
It would drive me nuts hearing that on a daily basis so don't blame @lynseyhipgrave1 one bit.
Would he call the queen 'darling' too?
Can you even imagine a world in which male presenters were belittled in this way? Us neither.
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