One minute Charlotte Proudman was an unknown 27-year-old barrister finishing a PhD on female genital mutilation and the law. The next she was at the centre of a global media storm, hailed a martyr by the sisterhood and a ‘Feminazi’ by her many detractors.

All it took to trigger this toxic debate was a brief message, posted by solicitor Alexander Carter-Silk, in response to an approach Proudman made to him on the professional networking site LinkedIn.

His crime? To say he thought her picture on the site was ‘stunning’.

I am surprised that Charlotte Proudman, pictured, hasn't changed her name to Charlotte Proudperson

She blasted back by posting his comments on Twitter for all to see, adding that his comment traduced working women and that ‘sexist’, ‘unacceptable and misogynistic’ comments like his subjected them to ritual humiliation, silencing them professionally .

I’m only surprised she hasn’t changed her name to Charlotte Proudperson

What she forgot to mention is that she regularly posts on Facebook comments like ‘oooo lalala!’ and ‘hot stuff’ about attractive young men.

Such hypocrisy aside, Ms Proudman believes she has given a voice to women in the battle of the sexes and will not be silenced. Well, she certainly does not speak for me — nor for any women I know, young or old.

Her supposed male oppressor has been labelled a sexist dinosaur but, in truth, it is Ms Proudman who is stuck in the ancient past.

She is fighting old feminist battles that women of my age fought — and won — decades ago.

If she’s truly concerned about gender inequality in today’s world then she should take a long, hard look at the facts, which suggest that it is men, not women, who are struggling in almost every area of life.

There are now more young female graduates in law and medicine than male. More women than ever are starting up their own businesses.

Girls did better than boys in their most recent GCSE exams, and a higher percentage of females are now going to university.

Full-time working women earn more than men until their mid-30s, when they take time off to have children. (Their choice, incidentally, not a misogynist conspiracy.)

By contrast, the most under-performing group of people in our society today are boys and young men.

They are more likely to be illiterate, to attempt suicide, to take drugs and to be excluded from mainstream education.

But then I suspect Proudman and her fellow militant harpies aren’t interested in equality for men and women, but in female supremacy.

I’m only surprised she hasn’t changed her name to Charlotte Proudperson.

P. S. As for Alexander Carter-Silk’s comments about his own 27-year-old daughter, they were distasteful beyond belief. If ever a couple deserved each other’s public humiliation, it’s these two lawyers.

Members of the British Science Association want to replace the original image they sent into space, inviting aliens to planet Earth, with something more PC.

‘The plaque shows a man raising his hand in a very manly fashion while a woman stands behind him, all meek and submissive,’ said Jill Stuart, an expert in space policy.

‘We really need to rethink that.’ No chance we can send them Charlotte Proudman, I suppose?

Big red X for Rita

Rita Ora, pictured, looked too trashy for a tarts and vicars party in her bright red outfit

X Factor judge Rita Ora turned up to a Hollywood bash this week in an outfit that would have looked too trashy even for a tarts and vicars party.

Clearly the girl has no friends. If she had, they’d have reminded her of the golden rule: show cleavage or legs but NEVER both.

To which I would add my own advice: the only place red leather like that belongs is on government despatch boxes.

Madonna is charging fans up to £450 to watch her pole-dance atop a crucifix while she stomps on a bikini-clad nun as part of her latest tour.

I realise she’s running out of ways to shock, but doesn’t this sick stunt smack of rank desperation?

Besides, if she’s that eager for attention, how about pole-dancing in a burkha while stomping on a bikini-clad imam?

No, thought not.

On the day our beloved Queen became Britain’s longest serving monarch, the anti-monarchy group Republic said: ‘When anyone survives for this long it is usually a sign of something wrong.’

What’s truly wrong is to make such a disgusting and insulting remark about any 89-year-old woman, let alone one who has served her nation so well for over 63 years.

Silence is golden, Paula...

After days of increasingly tearful interviews, Paula Radcliffe has finally released her test results to prove she is no drugs cheat.

Gold medal for honesty, Paula.

But just for the record, most of us never realised you were under suspicion until you took to the airwaves claiming you were being unjustly persecuted.

Sometimes a dignified silence is the best option.

False modesty from Mirren

Helen Mirren claims in an interview that she ‘doesn’t give a damn about looking good’.

Oh, please! This from a woman paid a fortune to promote L’Oreal’s age-defying products and who seldom has so much as a hair out of place on the red carpet.

You’re a great role model for later-life beauty, Helen, but please don’t insult us by claiming you don’t care.

Helen Mirren, pictured, is paid a fortune by L'Oreal to promote their age-defying products

WESTMINSTER NOTICE BOARD + Around lunchtime today, Harriet Harman will stand down as Labour’s acting leader for the second time. I disagree with almost everything she stands for, but can’t hide a grudging admiration for her. She has shown commendable grit and resilience as her party has been busy tearing itself apart. If Labour had one iota of common sense, they would be fighting for her to stay on at the helm, instead of plumping, in all likelihood, for a man who has more chance of bicycling to the Moon than of becoming PM. + When questioned about our abandonment of Afghan translators, Armed Forces Minister Penny Mordaunt said there was no major problem, and that she was unaware of a single former interpreter killed by the Taliban. Since then, there have been two attempts on translators’ lives. But then what else can we expect from a woman most notable for taking part in the trashy, high-diving reality show, Splash! + Scientists have discovered fossils of what may be the first humans and named them Homo naledi. With a brain the size of an orange, hairy features and pre-historic attitudes, shouldn’t they be called Homo Corbyn? + Barack Obama says the day he spent eating the left-overs from a grizzly bear’s salmon supper with adventurer Bear Grylls was one of the best days of his presidency. Given what a let-down he’s been in office, I’m tempted to agree. Advertisement

Show compassion for Sgt Blackman

Terrible things happen in war and none more so than watching your fellow soldiers being picked off by a Taliban sniper in Afghanistan, the limbs of their dismembered bodies then hung from trees.

That’s what makes the life sentence handed to Royal Marine Sergeant Alexander Blackman for murder so unjust.

As this paper reveals today, he had witnessed horrors beyond imagining before the fateful moment he fired his pistol at a Taliban fighter whom he believed was already dead.

Like many, I believe Blackman was the victim of a show trial, in a bid to prove that we British are above the barbarism of the terrorists.

We are. But as his wife so eloquently put it, surely we are also a nation of compassion, and this fine soldier should not spend the next six years of his life in prison for a crime that, let’s be honest, so many of us would have committed without hesitation under the same circumstances.

Well done Anne Robinson for getting a new factual series from the BBC at the age of 70

Having won 5.7 million viewers with her show Britain’s Spending Secrets, 70-year-old Anne Robinson is to front a major new factual series for the BBC.

A perfect riposte to those complaining about sexism and ageism on TV: it’s not about how old or how female you are, but how good you are.

And how good your plastic surgeon is.

Sad that David Walliams and his supermodel wife Lara Stone have divorced after just five years of marriage.

In the courts this week, he cited her ‘unreasonable behaviour’ as the cause of the split.

Privately, he’s said to have objected to her modelling shoot in which Justin Bieber rolled around atop her naked torso.

Perhaps not so much unreasonable behaviour as unfathomable.

After foxtrotting off with Strictly Come Dancing siren Kristina Rihanoff, former rugby star Ben Cohen has moved back in with his wife and daughters.

Apparently, he’s short of money and they haven’t managed to sell the family home.

Hmmm. What are the odds Ben does a ‘Paul Hollywood’ — another fool who ran home after finding his sexy young lover too hot to handle?

With the X Factor losing out to Strictly in the ratings war, its new co-presenter Caroline Flack ‘accidentally’ took a selfie showing off her new hairstyle . . . and right nipple.