Lifestyle: Man-hating? Women just aren't up to the task

I've never known a woman carry that chilling aura of compressed perma-rage against the opposite sex that hangs around certain men

If you don't know what misandry is, where have you been? The fun you've been missing! Misandry is hatred of, contempt for, and ingrained prejudice against, men. As a term, it has risen in prominence as a slam-dunk riposte to the term misogyny. These days, every time someone talks about misogyny, they are usually accused of being a misandrist, especially if they are female.

It doesn't matter if you don't think you are one, if it's a simple case of mistaken identity. The first time it happened to me, I didn't even know what it meant – I had to look it up. In those days, misogyny was mainstream, misandry was very niche. Now it's everywhere – just about anyone can be called a misandrist, it's not special any more.

Those who make it their business to seek out misandry have done a sterling job of "finding" it just about everywhere, and, by doing so, popularising and formalising the concept. "Misandry!" goes the cry every time concerns are raised about, say, domestic violence, parliamentary representation, pay-gaps … all those man-hating classics.

However, while misandry exists (because everything exists), it will always be small fry compared to misogyny. It will never make it into the big leagues. It's not just that misandry hasn't got the numbers, it also hasn't got the rage.

Male rage takes many forms, and one is misogyny. It's not the same as anger from either gender, which comes and goes.

Male rage seems to be as cold and calculated as it is horribly permanent. While of course women get pissed off with men, I've never known a woman to carry that chilling aura of compressed perma-rage against the opposite sex that hangs around certain men. The relentlessly churning core of hostility, condescension, entitlement and resentment.

Only last week, a study from the University of Florida said that men are far more likely to secretly want their wives or girlfriends to fail, to be less successful than they are, because it boosts their own sense of self-worth.

It said that men were more likely to feel threatened when their partner succeeded, preferring them to fail, and this remained true in more equal societies such as Holland. By contrast, however well, or otherwise, their partner is doing had no effect on a woman's self-esteem.

Well, this feels new. The male competitive streak was always presumed to be about the workplace. Now it seems that "dog eat dog" has not only gone inter-gender, it has invaded personal relationships.

What does this mean when increasing numbers of women are the main, if not sole breadwinners? Could it be affecting those figures of recession-related domestic violence – women bearing the brunt of male frustration, when ironically women are often cited as the worst affected by the recession? Is this going to be another sign of these hard times; the rise of the threatened perma-enraged male?

Is it even possible to debate this, without the predictable zombie-drone of "misandry"? After all, here is a study about male rage, swirling around women, everywhere, even in their personal lives. How else would you describe these men needing women to fail to make themselves feel better, while curiously women (supposedly such big man-haters) need no such thing?

See what I mean about "small fry" – misogyny outguns misandry every time. In this one way, in terms of entrenched cold rage, women are unequal. Pathetically, we can't even muster up enough bile to resent our partners' success. Those who cling to "misandry" as if it were the sex war's holy grail are going to have to face it – women just aren't up to the task of hating men as much, as imaginatively and as permanently as some of them hate us.

Simon, Simon, we get it. We just don't believe it

Like me, you're probably enjoying the shots of Simon Cowell succumbing to the curse of "OPDA" (just like regular public displays of affection, but overdone with it).

Recently, the X Factor mogul and his pregnant lady-love, Lauren Silverman, have been snapped enjoying kisses, cuddles and adoring gazes, on outside tables in St Tropez, Nice and London. One such table was a branch of Café Rouge, which is strange, as Cowell usually favours "celebrity hangout" the Ivy, when in Blighty.

Cowell also tends to sit inside, rather than outside, restaurants. Moreover, the last time he tried kissing in public, with then-fiancee Mezhgan Hussainy, it had all the romantic urgency of dental flossing. But here he is, smooching with Silverman, and she only has his head in a determined vice-like grip for a few of the photos.

We're chuffed for them, aren't we? (Aren't we? You curmudgeonly lot.) However, everyone knows besotted couples tend to stay in, "snuggling", cooing and watching 30 Rock box sets. They certainly don't sit in pavement caffs looking "entranced!" while paps take photos. While Cowell has rolled rather well with the shock-pregnancy news, he needs to curb the OPDA.

Why Miley's knickers got us in a twist

Well, what to say about Miley Cyrus's raunch-fest with Robin Thicke at the MTV video music awards? I haven't seen such demonic tongue-waggling since Linda Blair in The Exorcist. When did Elastoplast start making matching knickers and bras? If Cyrus was trying to bury her child star past she definitely managed it – digging a graveyard plot in the sprawling celeb-cemetery of Trying Too Hard. Yes, Miley, we realise that you're all grown up: congratulations on achieving full sexual maturity – no one ever managed it before.

More seriously, why has Cyrus been internationally slut-shamed? Never mind the lengthy pop-cultural history of female shock-performance (Madonna was wandering around starkers for her Sex book over two decades ago). Never mind that Thicke was also there, moronically grinding away. Giant foam fingers aside, Cyrus's "twerking" wriggles of her bottom were nicked straight from black culture (rap, hip-hop, R&B, etc). And while it's true that artists have been criticised for all the "ho"-ing and "bitch"-ing, it says something that the world really goes crazy when a white girl does it.

It seems that certain people have been too PC-shy, too jumpy about being accused of racism, to criticise overt sexism. Fine, but then it's hypocritical for these same people to suddenly become censorious when a young white woman is involved. This sort of thing has long been a staple of music videos, so it's nonsensical to have global outrage when someone like Cyrus does it – especially as it's long been routine for black females to be degraded in the same way.

This is entertainment racism, double standards of the most brazen kind. Rihanna had to get beaten to a pulp to get the world's full attention – all Cyrus had to do was twerk.

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Barbara Ellen