Breaking News: Men Are Attracted to Women

Comedian David Baddiel, a former TRIGGERnometry guest, has once again landed himself in hot water in a Times interview in which he said that when he is speaking to a woman in addition to taking her seriously he also notices whether she is attractive or not.

For the record, I like David and disagree with him on many things. His last book, Jews Don’t Count, raised interesting questions but, as I said to him in our interview, he identified all the dots about why identity politics is terrible and then refused to connect them. More recently, he was seen complaining about the casting of Cillian Murphy, who isn’t Jewish, as J. Robert Oppenheimer, who was. I’m willing to hear the argument, of course, but the notion that Jews are underrepresented in Hollywood seems questionable to me. More seriously, I think identity politics is terrible for minorities, especially successful minorities like Jews, and I wish people would stop playing a game that is designed for us to lose.

With his most recent comments, however, he stepped on one of the biggest landmines in modern society because he dared to confess that men are, in fact, attracted to women:

Naturally, this provoked a backlash from his progressive fellow travelers, with Ellie Mae O’Hagan, “Head of Engagement” at the Good Law Project, suggesting that “on balance, it's better if men don't say stuff like this out loud”.

So far so normal.

However, my friend Nina Power, who could hardly be accused of being a deranged feminist, also responded to Baddiel’s comments with a critical piece which prompted me to think more about this issue.

It is difficult to navigate this discussion without being summarily misrepresented as a sexist but it’s an accusation I’ve yet to add to the mantle piece so let’s have a go.

I’ve been happily married for 20 years and have zero interest in any external romantic entanglements. To me, family is everything and with a young child, hopefully the first of several, I am the perfect case study for a domesticated man.

Nonetheless, in my days as a stand-up comedian, I spent some time working on a routine I never actually wrote that revolved around a simple idea: