I have just about had it with the way men are portrayed in greetings cards. My wife told me that it was nearly impossible to organise a “spontaneous” Father’s Day card from my children recently because all the cards on sale contained messages along the lines of:

Dad, as you sit and read your paper
Beside your breakfast spoon and cup and saucer,
Today, remember how we think of you
As a lecherous, fat, boozy old dosser.

And that was one of the least poisonous ones. Birthday cards are even more consistent in their portrayal of us all as thick, fat idiots. Try getting a card for a man over 35, and I defy you to find anything different from:

Have a great day, you birthday boy
And drink as much beer as you can.
What else can you do at your age,
When your life’s gone down the pan?
You thick, fat idiot.

Subtlety is not the outstanding feature of these cards, which are the essence of contempt for the male being. Their very look and feel shout loathing, even though that loathing has probably been manufactured by men in the greetings card industry who think that there is a huge market in articulating utter disdain for half the population. Maybe that explains why when you go into a card shop now, alongside the signs labelling standard categories such as Mother’s Birthday, Sister’ s Wedding, or Family Funeral, more than half the shop is taken up with a large sign for “Thick, Fat, Sad, Golfing, Impotent, Slobby Men”. One is free to pick any card at random from this section; it will contain roughly the same stark message, such as:

Happy Birthday, golf-git.

Or

Ooops. Now you’re 40, you’re a sad sack of dust.

Or

All the best, now your genitals don’t work.

So consistent are card messages in portraying all men as barely functioning degenerates, that I wonder if the greetings industry is not missing a trick here. Surely they can come up with more specific variations on the theme of male inadequacy? What about:

Happy Birthday to a wonderful dad
Obsessed with cars and electrical wiring;
Too engrossed in engine oil to notice
The divorce lawyer mum is hiring?

Or

Drunk, insensitive, narrow-minded and boorish
Are adjectives some others would mention,
But the one quality that sums you up as a partner
Is your unwavering anal retention.

And why stop there? Why not produce a range of greetings cards for men that claims to express masculine emotions clearly and succinctly? For example:

This Valentine’s Day, my darling girlfriend,
My love burns with a flame that dances and flickers,
My heart beats in unending rhythm with your soul,
‘Cos I’ll do what it takes to get into your knickers.

Or

To my darling wife, now our child is born,
You’ve made me proud and excited and happy.
So here’s to a new stage in our life together,
One in which I’ll go nowhere near a nappy.

Or

With deep sympathy, my friend,
At this time of your painful loss.
Words can’t express my sorrow
So let’s go bet on a horse.

This last example raises an even more worrying possibility:

This is it.
There’s nothing more to be said,
Other than congratulations
Now your male partner’s dead.

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