I’ve been both hugely impressed and deeply incensed by my fellow women this week. First up, a sizeable group started posting photographs of themselves, without make up, on the internet and nominating others to do the same. Aimed at raising awareness and cash for breast cancer charities, the craze became known as the ‘Bare-Faced Selfie’. Almost immediately, others (depressingly, the more intelligent, better educated, with a higher public profile) began doing their sisters down.

First problem? Team Selfie had been using the C word, claiming their actions required  ‘courage’. They might have said something like: ‘Oh God, not sure I’m brave enough. LOL.’ or ‘Well done, Hun, very brave!’

It was banter. It was kidding around. It was self-depreciating humour. It may even have been good old-fashioned modesty.

Talk about lighting the blue touch paper on the firework of self-righteous outrage. ‘Weeks of chemotherapy, that’s brave!’ they cried on their blogs, in our national newspapers. ‘Watch a loved one die in pain before you can talk about courage!’ A lot of words were used but they largely said the same thing. Unless you have suffered (sub text here being: suffered and let the world know about it) from cancer, then you have no right to make light of it with vain, attention-seeking nonsense.

Well, excuse me, but hundreds of thousands of women got involved in the Selfie craze and quite a few of them MUST have more than a passing acquaintance with cancer. My younger half-sister lost her mother to the disease a few years ago. I had my own brush with its dark shadow in my early thirties. I’ve remained healthy but that shadow is there, lurking behind me, and always will be.

I’ve said this before but it bears repeating. Sooner or later this disease affects us all. Nobody gets to call dibs on cancer. Nobody has a monopoly on suffering.

In any event, when did courage become an absolute? When did there become only one, extreme kind?  I might consider myself brave if I jump into a cold swimming pool. It doesn’t compare to taking a lifeboat out in a force nine, or riding the Grand National, but it still requires going out of my comfort zone. This week thousands of women pushed aside their comfort zone to do some good and did not deserve to be criticized.

Our other error, say Team Shouty, was to perpetuate the myth that only women caked in make-up can be considered beautiful. Well, actually, no we didn’t. If anything we did the opposite. Every post I saw was accompanied by a string of supportive comments: ‘Well done, hun, you look great.’  ‘Looking good, Mrs X!’ We were telling each other we still look good without make up. We were telling each other that friends don’t care how we look. We were being kind and supportive.

Make-up is an entirely personal choice. Some of us won’t leave the house without it. Others don’t allow it in the house and between the two extremes are multiple shades of grey. It rarely comes anywhere near me, if I’m totally honest. I’m a writer for Godsake, I spend 90% of my life looking like the aborted child of a swamp monster and a bag lady, but like my numerous ‘sisters’, the face I present to the outside world is inextricably linked to my self-esteem. The shouty feminists might not like it but I say tough. I don’t tell you to wear more make-up, you don’t tell me (or anyone for that matter) to wear less.

Still, against the backdrop of women tearing into each other in depressingly familiar fashion, the Selfie brigade have a trump card and I’m going to play it again. Since the whole business started (on Wednesday, I think) over £2 million has been raised for cancer charities. And counting.

Keep it up, ladies, keep posting your brave and lovely pictures on the internet and let the shouty, self-righteous feminists do their worst. We’re better than they are.

Late last week, I provoked a bit of a Twitter outcry by supporting the call (by Allison Pearson in the Daily Telegraph) for a burqa* ban.

I was accused of ignorance, of condemning a practice of which I know nothing. I was told that the burqa is a matter of personal choice and that by advocating the removal of that choice I was being illiberal, racist and oppressive. I was told to do my research before voicing my ‘ill-informed’ opinion in future.

Fair enough. I’ve spent the weekend reading countless arguments for and against the burqa, listening mainly to Muslim voices. I’ve read newspaper articles, blogs, comment streams, opinion pieces and watched televised debates. Some of the material I’ve read was sent to me by the very people who attacked me on Twitter, so I can safely assume it presents the definitive Islamic position. Now, having spent many hours immersed in the subject, I feel able to give my considered and informed view:

The burqa is a vile, degrading and oppressive garment that should be banned in Britain.

Being a little claustrophobic, the thought of being trapped in a mobile prison of black polyester fills me with horror. I struggle with over-warm clothes on hot days and can barely imagine the misery of a black tent over that clothing, especially were the heat of our gentle British summer to be magnified to that of Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan or Iran.

Wearing a burqa would mean never properly seeing the colours around me, experiencing birdsong or the wind in the trees as a muffled echo, not being able to smell flowers, the roasting of coffee or bread baking. It would mean never being able to run, swim in the ocean, cycle down a country lane, walk through the meadows with my dog, or chase my child around the park. It would mean not being able to dance in public, or eat in a restaurant without the revolting prospect of food smeared around my veil and face, having my every utterance coming back at me in a fetid haze of warm breath. It would mean being unable to communicate properly with the people around me, engendering distrust and intimidation simply by walking amongst my own kind.

Exactly this life is imposed upon millions of women around the world in the name of religious observance.

It is a false imposition. The burqa has no basis in the Quran. (I’m grateful to my Muslim correspondents for confirming that.) It has been described by British Muslim Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, a passionate anti-burqa campaigner, as ‘a perversion of (the) faith.’

Here’s the actual verse:

“O Prophet! Tell your wives and daughters, as well as all believing women, that they should draw over themselves some of their outer garments (when in public): this will be more conducive to their being recognised as decent women and not molested.”  Quran 33 – 35

This is nothing more than a call for modest and appropriate dressing and, on this, I am 100% on the side of the prophet. Who doesn’t dread the sight of the middle-aged, male torso, tattooed and sun-burned, waddling along the sea front? What sensible woman doesn’t feel a moment of silent despair at footage of intoxicated girls, tottering along high streets in short, tight skirts and low-cut tops?

Greater modesty, of both men and women, would hugely benefit our western society, but modesty does not require a black shroud. I’m a big fan of the shalwar kameez, traditionally worn by women in south and central Asia. It is elegant, graceful, feminine and completely comfortable. (I have one, I know what I’m talking about) It can be dressed up with sequins and embroidery to express God-given individuality, or be in a somber, plain fabric for the less assuming. It protects from the sun (and in a heavier fabric from the cold too) Above all, covering as it does, the entire body apart from the hands, feet and face, it surely offers modesty enough to satisfy the most hardline Islamist.

But no, it doesn’t. Nor does the more moderate hijab. Hard-line fundamentalists will be happy with nothing less than the complete imprisoning of the female body because it says, as little else can, that a woman is inferior, deserving of a less full life. That a woman is the possession of a man, to be unwrapped by him alone. That a woman is a living embodiment of temptation to evil, and should be invisible in mainstream society.

This is the reality of the burqa in the world today.

And yet there are women in Britain who insist upon their right to wear it. I feel sure they must be few in number, but they are wheeled out whenever the issue is debated. These women, invariably young, intelligent and articulate, have made this choice for themselves and we are told that, in a free and liberal society, that choice must be respected.

Well, I won’t respect it. These young women are thinking only of their own rights and wishes. They are not considering either the impact upon the societies around them, the message they are sending around the world, or the suffering of others. “I don’t care how you feel,” said a disembodied voice below a pair of brown eyes in a video I watched. ‘I have a right to do this and I will.’

They are blinkered (literally) grasping at the rights that a free and liberal society bestows upon them, but refusing to recognize that such a society entails responsibilities as well. In free societies, the opinions of other people have to matter and, in the west, innumerable people find the sight of a veiled woman disturbing and intimidating. Society is an inevitable compromise between personal freedom and collective responsibilities. Most adults accept this. It is time these women started behaving like adults.

In this excellent article, Yasmin Alibhai-Brown lists sixteen reasons to object to the burqa and I agree with all of them:

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/yasmin-alibhai-brown/yasmin-alibbaibrown-sixteen-reasons-why-i-object-to-this-dangerous-coverup-2261444.html

For me, though, the most powerful argument should be that women who veil voluntarily are condoning the imposition of the burqa (the most obvious manifestation of the oppressive side of Islam) on millions of their Islamic sisters worldwide. Why should anyone object to the burqa, religious leaders in Iran can rightly claim, when women in the west wear it by choice? Yet, educated women in a free society can remove their veils at any time. Their sisters in Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran, beaten and tortured for the smallest sartorial transgression, cannot. Where is the conscience of a woman in Britain who thinks only of her freedom to annoy and frighten those around her, regardless of its implications for others?

I would even go as far as to say that women who wear the burqa by choice are dishonouring their mothers and grandmothers who underwent huge personal suffering to win them greater freedom.

I’ve spent many hours in the last few days trying to understand why women choose to behave in this way, why the entirely sensible and moderate hijab isn’t enough for them to demonstrate their faith and, frankly, I see only one argument: “I am doing this because I can. It is my right.”

Well, I too have a right. The right to tell you what I think and here it is: The battle against the burqa isn’t really about you. It isn’t even, primarily, about the people you intimidate or the culture you are rejecting. It’s about millions of women around the world, of your own faith, who don’t have your rights, who don’t have your choices and who don’t have people like Allison Pearson and Yasmin Alibhai Brown to speak up for them.

You might like to think about them, next time you veil up.

* For the sake of brevity in this article, when I say burqa, I mean both the niqab (covering the whole body but leaving eyes visible) and the burqa (covering whole body and the face with mesh, so even eyes cannot be seen)

It started harmlessly. My sister, Louise (a bad influence for over forty years) had Facebook posted a naked-faced ‘Selfie’ to raise awareness of breast cancer and was badgering me and her long-suffering girlfriends to do the same.

Me: Can’t I just make a donation?

Her: No, I’ve done it and so must you.

Best just to go along with it. I posted my own on Facebook, made a brief reference to it on Twitter and thought that would be the end of the matter.

By coincidence, that morning, I went to the funeral of a friend who died two weeks ago of a brain tumour. No flowers, donations instead to Macmillan Cancer Support. Leaving church, I couldn’t see the collection box. In normal circumstances I might have left it, telling myself I’d donate another day, but I’d pledged, via my Selfie, and I had to follow through. So far so good. Macmillan was a modest sum better off and I’d made good on my promise.

I got home to find a storm kicking off on Twitter and we No-Make-Up Selfie post-ers on the receiving end of some pretty mean-spirited flak. How dare we claim to be brave? People who suffer cancer, who lose loved ones to cancer, who undergo months of chemotherapy are brave. We vain, self-absorbed women are simply attention seeking, jumping without thought onto the latest bandwagon, achieving nothing more than a good old wallow in our own self-gratification.

It was a pretty harsh wake-up call, to be honest, and one that preyed on my thoughts for the rest of the day. Had I been thoughtless? Crass? I’m the first to admit to personal vanity but insensitive to real suffering? I hope not.

The How Dare We mob became relentless, sending a steady stream of bile our way. Here’s the jist of it, and my own, considered at length, reaction underneath.

Simply posting a photograph of yourself achieves nothing.

Granted, but I think it was very clear that women were supposed to post, donate and encourage others to do the same. The purpose was to raise awareness AND cash.

These selfies include no link to a charitable website.

Well, some of them did, and those that didn’t, including mine, probably assumed that people are intelligent enough to find a way to donate to major charities if they so wish.

There is nothing brave in putting a photograph of yourself, make-up or not, on social media.

Compared to racing into a burning primary school to rescue the reception class, I guess it doesn’t stack up. But most of us are sensitive to how we’re seen by the world. Self-image is important and it took – maybe not courage, exactly – but a firm gritting of the teeth to make public a representation that was a long way from flattering. In any event, none of the posts I noticed were making any claim to courage. (We were more concerned with the damage we inflicted on others.)

People who have not suffered (subtext here: suffered publicly) from cancer have no business making light of it in this way.

By this stage I was starting to get cross. Few of us, once we reach a certain age, have not been affected, either directly or indirectly, by cancer. No one has a monopoly on suffering and this disease impacts upon us all. Consequently, we all have the right to address it.

This nonsense perpetuates the view that women only look good when caked in make up.

Another valid point on the surface. Women’s body image is inextricably linked to their self-esteem and this is an ongoing problem; not one I’m about to make light of. On the other hand, every post I saw was followed by a flood of comments. A lot of words were used, but they all largely said the same: ‘Well done, Hun. You look great.’ The exercise actually became quite affirming, surprisingly positive. Women were being told they looked good without make-up. Whether we believed it or not, we learned, if we didn’t know already, that good friends don’t care how we look.

People don’t need a daft gimic, they should be donating anyway.

Except that whilst people all over the world are very well-meaning when it comes to supporting good causes, they tend to need a nudge in the right direction. Wasn’t the frenzied posting of photographs exactly such a prompt? It certainly prompted me to seek out the Macmillan tin.

Regular monthly donations achieve far more than one off splurges.

Without doubt, but very few of us are wealthy enough to make regular payments to every charity that touches our hearts. A few years ago, mainly in response to our young son’s demands that we support every good cause that came our way, my family decided to support three charities with regular, if modest, donations.

My husband chose RNLI, because he’s a keen sailor and he might need a lifeboat one day. My son, about six at the time, chose the World Wildlife Fund’s Tiger project, for reasons that probably don’t need explaining. My own cause? Well, surprise surprise, Cancer Research UK, because I had my own brush with the disease some years ago (no details, it’s personal).

Those are the three good causes we support on an ongoing basis and, when particularly moved (or given a shove by a family member) we’ll make one-off donations to others. I suspect there are hundreds of thousands of families like us all over the UK.

So, all things considered: No, I hadn’t been crass. I hadn’t jumped on an attention-seeking, ill-considered and ultimately rather offensive bandwagon. And nor had anyone else. These women meant well. And, in spite of what an oft quoted proverb tells us, when intentions are good, good usually follows.

And then something rather wonderful happened. The two main breast cancer charities got involved, fully endorsing the ‘Bare-faced’ Selfies and reporting the fabulous news that donations had surged during the day. It was too early to put a figure on the amount raised but that hardly mattered. An increase of a few hundred pounds alone would have made the exercise worth it and I suspect it was a lot more than that.

Here is the link, if you don’t want to take my word for it. http://news.uk.msn.com/selfie-windfall-for-cancer-charity

I thought about ending this post with another “Bare-faced” Selfie. This time with tongue firmly out and fingers waggling from the tip of my nose. My very own No-Make-Up-Cocking-A-Snook-Selfie.  I decided against. It would be childish and, more importantly, a deeply unflattering look for me.

I’m doing it in my head though. I’ll be doing it in my head all day long.

Two items on Twitter caught my attention yesterday. The first, a notice on the UK Small Business Directory, to whit:

Please note: This is a serious website for serious men with serious businesses. If you are just a little housewife running a little play business from home earning some pin money while your man is out earning a living, please don’t register your latest hobby here.

I’m honestly not certain if we were meant to take this seriously. I didn’t, I chuckled and moved on, but I don’t doubt others did and spent much of their day ranting, re-tweeting and generally squirming uncomfortably in twisted knickers. The offending notice was brought to my attention, via a re-tweet, by @everydaysexism, which seems to exist to hunt out real or perceived examples of disrespect shown to women. Personally, I can’t stand the site, and have un-followed authors who insist on re-tweeting vast swathes of its nonsense. Being a woman with plenty of self-respect and a healthy sense of humour, I don’t get terribly excited in the face of occasional banter, chauvinism, disrespect or even mild teasing on the part of others.

The other item, which merited far more attention, but I doubt received it, was news of an imminent change in the criminal prosecution code in Afghanistan.  Under this new law, passed by the Afghan parliament and awaiting the signature of the President, victims will no longer be able to testify against close relatives. Make no mistake about it, this law impacts primarily upon women, because when women become victims of a violent crime in Afghanistan, that crime is largely perpetrated behind closed doors by members of the victims’ own families. If this law goes ahead, it will effectively silence not only victims but also most witnesses to such crimes. Under this law, there will be no recourse for:

• Women who are starved, raped and beaten by their husband’s families.
• Women who are forced into marriage to end feuds or settle debts.
• Women who are mutilated by their husbands, often for running away from abusive marriages.
• Women who are killed by fathers and brothers, for so called honour crimes.

This same government, last year, floated a proposal to bring back stoning as a punishment for adultery. It remained a proposal, thank God, but for how long? Foreign troops will be all but gone from Afghanistan by the end of 2014. When the attention of the world drifts elsewhere, curbs on the increasingly conservative pressure groups within the country will crumble and women, once again, will become powerless in the face of male domination and aggression.

So there we have it, women in the privileged west winding each other up into a fury because of perceived disrespect and women on the other side of the world whose lives and liberties, already given scant protection by the law, are on the point of becoming worthless.

But you know what, we don’t have to look as far as Afghanistan if we want to get excited about crimes against women.

In Now You See Me, my first Lacey Flint book, there is a scene in which a young black girl is raped by her boyfriend and his mates. At the time of publication, this scene was much criticized for its ‘gratuitous and unnecessary detail’, especially as it wasn’t, strictly, necessary for the story.

It strikes me, though, that if you’re going to write or read crime novels, then you have to be prepared to confront some uncomfortable truths and one of those is that violence against women is endemic to the human condition.

Now You See Me is the story of a contemporary serial killer who appears to be echoing the crimes of the notorious real-life murderer, Jack the Ripper. It’s the story of a young police detective, herself the victim of abuse, who has to confront her own demons in order to track down one of the most brutal killers she and her colleagues have every encountered. Plenty of nastiness there, you might think, without the need to hunt out more. I’d agree.

Except, while I was still planning the book, I saw a TV documentary made by Darcus Howe about the prevalence of gang rape among young black communities in London. We’re talking about girls, some as young as 12, being forced into sexual acts by gangs of boys whom they know, who sometimes include their own boyfriends. The boys responsible can’t see that they’re doing anything wrong. No one gets hurt, so where’s the problem? The girls are miserable and frightened, but they don’t believe anything can be done. Their communities offer little in the way of protection, adopting a ‘they must have asked for it’ attitude. Other girls even collude in the attacks, to maintain their own place in the gang-dominated social hierarchy.

The police, I don’t doubt, take seriously every such case reported to them. But these attacks are being perpetrated by boys whom the girls know, are friends with, maybe even have a sexual relationship with. The girls are not forced into the places where the attacks happen, the boys use condoms. It becomes the word of one girl against that of several males. Such cases are very difficult to prosecute, even when they are reported in the first place, as few are.

The problem, which Darcus Howe was brave enough to confront, but few others have been, is that this is a problem specific to black communities in the inner cities. This is not to say that white men don’t rape, or that white women don’t become rape victims. Of course they do. But there is a particular prevalence of rape culture among this particular ethnic group which no one in a position of influence will admit to, and until they do, women are suffering.

On the other side of the world, women are suffering violence at the hands of those on whom they should be able to rely for protection. No one will help them. Here, on our doorstep, young women are suffering violence in the knowledge that their communities and the authorities will do nothing. No one will help them, either.

The rest of us, meantime, get ourselves all worked up about everyday sexism.

Now You See Me is a Kindle daily deal today. 99p on Amazon.