The Trials & Tribulations Of The 21st Century Woman…

Was it the play on words that made all those marketing folk agree that this "Nudie Tee" was the perfect gift for golfers? How they must have congratulated themself that a "tee" was not just a tiny piece of plastic driven into the ground to support your balls but, you know, the last syllable of the word "nudi-ty".

Yes, it is rather good, isn’t it? As these things go.

Few products underline the fact that golf is still largely considered a man's game than a tee designed to look like a naked female torso. Such a small, insignificant thing that you can knock the head off it with just one swing of your big manly arms.

Errr…just where is this going?

Joanna Sharpen was surprised that the image of the tiny packet of plastic torsos – available for just £2.99 from Amazon and Ebay – upset her so much.

Well, yes. So would I be if that sort of thing upset me. Wait. Who is Joanna Sharpen?

After all, her day job as project manager for charity AVA means that she has become pretty inured to examples of physical violence and abuse. As an adviser and moderator on the government's This Is Abuse campaign she has also spoken to some 3,000 young people, a third of whom reported being raped. Some, she says, were as young as 10 years old.

Ahhhh…. Now the penny drops! She’s a professional grievance monger.

Trying to explain her visceral response to a "novelty gift", she points out that she saw it just after having to compile a list of the names of women recently killed by their partners.

With golf clubs? On golf courses? Because, otherwise, I’m not seeing the connection…

"The product resonated with me because of the fact that the bodies are headless and two women this year were decapitated," she says. "They have no arms, as if women are purely sexual objects and have no need of a head or arms. People see them as a gimmick, a novelty. But they do so much damage."

Well, only if they are sharpened and thrown very hard.

Sharpen launched an online petition on Saturday in a bid to get the "nudie tees" withdrawn.

Didn’t work out quite as she’d hoped.

Having got nowhere trying to get a response from Dunlop UK – their website suggests writing a letter and gives a non-working phone number – Sharpen has written to the owner of its parent company, Mike Ashley.

And that too isn’t likely to work out all that well:

When Mike Ashley was previously accused of sexism over a pink cleaning kit ("It's girls' stuff"), the controversial billionaire just seemed to have decided that ignoring the criticism would make it go away.

Heh! So of course, the ‘Guardians Woman’s Blog’ is rallying the troops:

… the online sale of such garbage is part of a larger picture, one in which sport is simply the easiest playing field for men to behave badly on. Just shut up, have a laugh, take the joke, stop moaning. Or take a minute and sign this petition. No one is guaranteeing a proper response, but what's the alternative?

To maybe realise that you are making yourselves look utterly ridiculous by complaining over trivialities, because all the main battles for equality have been won long ago?

Nah. Keep on keepin’ on, sisters! At least you are providing amusement value.