Fishwifely ramblings

Reading a forum post yesterday by a woman ranting and raving about how she could not help but scream insults at unwanted phone callers, because to do otherwise would be to be walked all over, "fishwife!" leapt to the forefront of my brain. Then I gave myself a virtual slap for being so un-feminist, not to mention classist. Why, some twenty years after I first read about the dear Mrs Bourhill, pregnant fishwife, in a House of Lords judgment is this hideous label still embedded into my psyche?

According to the Merriam Webster dictionary, the term may refer to a woman who sells fish or a "vulgar, abusive woman", and dates back to the 15th century, when "wife" meant a tradeswoman, married or not. If you google "what is a fishwife?" you get some interesting results, including some Sun article about Kerry Katona. I don't know much about KK, apart from the fact that someone writes pulpy books under her name, but when I think fishwife, Jade Goody is more likely to spring to mind, notwithstanding that I have never actually watched Big Brother.

There I go again, being un-feminist, calling people fishwives, and you know I am not thinking they actually sell fish for a living. At least I don't say it out loud and at least I question myself afterwards, that's got to be worth something, right?

Back to the House of Lords, some old coot Lord Mancroft (in the debating chamber, not the court, thank non-god) might as well have said British nurses, nay British women, are all fishwives when describing his recent stay in an NHS hospital. According to him, all nurses in the UK are clones of that mad Irish nurse on the Catherine Tate show, and not only that he reckons most young British women are probably like this. I'm hoping for his sake he has no female relatives. The Guardian quotes him thus:

"The nurses who looked after me were mostly grubby - we are talking about dirty fingernails and hair - and were slipshod and lazy. Worst of all, they were drunken and promiscuous," he said, adding that the nurses were "an accurate reflection of many young women in Britain today".

Maybe he's seen one too many Amy Winehouse videos, but when I google around for information on him, Wikipedia tells me the dear Lord is a former heroin addict! Plus, he is married and has a daughter, who presumably is a young British woman! I'm thinking in this case, it's Lord Mancroft who is the fishwife.