Stop dumbing us down!

I recently read a sentence in a magazine that scared me to my very core: "Shoes. Is there anything they can't do?"

I get it — it's supposed to be cute, silly and acknowledges that women like to look good. But it gave me a shudder because when it's written in a women's magazine that's full of nothing but images of bags, 16-year-old models with hollow eyes and articles on how to dress like Diane Kruger, I wonder just how ironic it's really being.

These women's magazines grate on me a little. They reduce the essence of being a woman to one thing — fashion. I once worked on a women's magazine that sounded like a dream project — until the editor said he wanted it to "make news interesting to women". What he meant was shortening the headline stories to picture-led pieces of just 50 words and padding out the magazine with plenty of celebrity "news" as well. Angelina Jolie was a favourite cover star — a woman who goes out of her way to do charitable work but is so beautiful that we only talk about what bag she is holding.

This editor seemed to find the idea preposterous that making the news more basic (and preferably with a fashion angle) was unnecessary. It should go without saying that women are not so vacuous and easily distracted that we can't sit and read a newspaper.

But it's not just the magazines that are treating us like airheads. Chick-lit and films are at it, too. It's impossible to read the blurb on the back of any chick-lit book without feeling Virginia Woolf is turning in her grave. Most of these books are about neurotic writers who are too uptight and odd to find a man but who eventually do in an unlikely place. Save yourself Dh69 and buy a nice lunch instead.

I recently had to write a short synopsis of Confessions of a Shopaholic but beyond writing "It's a film about a woman who spends all her money on clothes", I really struggled. I'm not suggesting that liking clothes is anti-feminist. I like clothes, but certainly don't feel that my wardrobe, or my lack of designer shoes, defines who I am. I have bitten nails and enlarged pores on my face but I am still a good and interesting person. If women don't look fabulous at all times, they are fair game for criticism.

If a female celebrity dares to step out of the house in a hooded jumper and no make-up, they will pay for it by being splashed across the gossip columns with snide comments about how they have ‘let themselves go'. You just don't get this kind of thing aimed at men. I am not remotely interested in whether Cameron Diaz has spots or whether Jessica Simpson has put on weight. If we women are saying we are interested it's because we want to reassure ourselves that celebrities are real people too. But we are not comforting ourselves, we are merely criticising fellow women. Instead of attacking each other over something so irrelevant, let's unite and prove that we will not fit into this Barbie-shaped niche that has been carved for us. Let's tell the people who count what is important to us - and it's not shoes.