OPINION - Carol Vorderman: Why I'm taking on Shaun Bailey and the other men like him

Shaun Bailey is a misogynist. Not only that, he’s a coward. You see “misogynist” is just a fancy noun for “someone who bullies women” and all bullies, as we know, are ultimately cowards. Quod Erat Demonstrandum.

I’ve been on the receiving end of a lot of Bailey-type bullying after I began tweeting about political misdemeanours in November 2022 from Conservative MPs.

“A person who obviously has bitterness, arrogance and envy in her heart. There’s no amount of plastic surgery or Botox that will cure that.” — Marco Longhi MP.

“The sooner we ban single plastics, the better. ” — deputy chairman of the Conservative Party, Lee Anderson MP.

“You are... deliberately misleading people. For clicks. Because that makes your shit, lonely life feel better.” — Johnny Mercer MP.

And from Right-wing screechers.

“Does she represent the RAF good like that with her tits hanging out there?” — Charlie Mullins (Pimlico Plumbers) on GB News.

They just can’t cope with the fact that a woman of almost pensionable age won’t get back in her box

They just can’t cope with the fact that a woman of almost pensionable age (with the mighty resource of her iPhone) won’t get back in her box and is highlighting, with evidence and data, the corruption and mistruths told by this Government. They just don’t like it at all, so they go on the group attack.

Perish the thought that a “celebrity” (all encompassing noun there) dare stray from what they perceive as her narrow lane. Well, tough — I’ve strayed and I’ll carry on straying.

Last week, Bailey was shouting on some GB News programme which I’d never heard of. Let’s be fair, the snarling on GB News all merges into one sound after a while, I’m sure. I don’t watch, well hardly anyone does. Strangely, the day after I left BBC Radio Wales I had a message from the GB News managing director inviting me to look around the studios assuming I was looking for a new job. I wasn’t. I didn’t answer.

Anyway, there was Bailey, shouting about how I’d been “piling in” on him, or in normal speak, when the Daily Mirror found the video of the dancing fools at Bailey’s Jingle and Mingle party I had the audacity to pass comment. Gosh, what a terrible thing for someone to do. How dare a woman comment on the disgraceful and arrogant goings on of “serious politicians”?

And here’s the rub. They aren’t “serious politicians” at all. Most of this current Tory crowd are charlatans who have been to some dire Conservative Stage School to learn their divisive communal grunts, as well as walking directions from Portcullis House to Tufton Street without the aid of Google Maps.

All supported by various elements of Right-wing media and the Witches of Fleet Street — you know exactly who I mean by that, and don’t pretend you don’t. You’re allowed to list them while smirking. It could be a brilliant new game.

So Bailey was having a shouty time, nobody was listening as nobody was watching (obviously), so emboldened by the vacuity of the programme, he went further to rant: “Look, on one hand, she’s got all that stuff, you know, she’s a serious political commentator." Here he rolls his eyes. "And then if you look at her Instagram it’s all pictures of her bums and her boobs. So what is it here? She can’t be both.”

Tumbleweed. Bit weird if he’s been cyber-stalking me on Instagram, but there we go.

Two days ago, I put his little rant out on X and Instagram with the hashtag #SexistShaun. Such was the reaction from good men (who are the majority of men) and women, within 20 minutes it was trending at number one on X. Everyone, apart from Bailey and his associated ranters, could see it for what it was.

It’s been debated on national television and radio since and overwhelmingly Bailey has been shown up as a pathetic little bully with a shouty voice. The younger generations are incensed and I’m glad they are. They are a fairer generation than mine on issues such as this.

It has had the Streisand effect. Many outside of politics didn’t know who Shaun Bailey was, now millions more have seen photos of him with his little gang of Jinglers and Minglers, know he’s had to resign from two London Assembly committees, also know that he’s basically failed to be elected many times over, and that then the Lord of the Liars, Boris Johnson made him into one of his Dishonourable Peers. Yep, one of that crowd. Well done, Shaun.

He hasn’t apologised. Of course he hasn’t. Instead he mumbled some nonsense about, “I was trying to make the point that we are in a country now where we are at each other’s throats. She is a chief architect of that.” Which is a long way from what he actually said.

And obviously, it’s all my fault. Exactly what every screaming narcissist and abuser says to the people they’ve been picking on when they’re caught out. The game’s up though.

I’m writing to the Tory chief whip in the Lords and to Caroline Nokes, chairwoman of the Women and Equalities select committee, about Bailey’s behaviour and let’s see what happens.

Why am I doing this? I’ve had enough of the bullying of women, enough of girls of all ages having to put up with the crap that’s explained away by “just lads being lads”. It isn’t.

Yesterday, the chief fire officer of the South Wales Fire and Rescue Service resigned when a shocking report was released into misogynistic comments and sexual abuse rife within the service. We have had too many reports of this kind in the services we rely on for our safety, the Met Police being one of the worst.

In September last year it was reported that 275 officers are awaiting a gross misconduct hearing, a significant proportion of which involved alleged violence against women and girls.

Misogyny is a culture. It aims to demean, humiliate, put the little woman in the corner. It’s the safety net for all abusers.

Now I’m post-menopause. I have ripped up the celebrity rulebook. I’m here without apology and without fear. And it’s time to call them all out.

What Bailey and the rest of his ilk don’t like is that those of us without a voice have found a voice.

All of those who felt that they didn’t have any way to express what they suspected about this Government, or didn’t have the evidence, or thought that the Government would always get away with it, now we speak as one.

It’s laughable that Bailey and all the Right-wingers like him are so thin-skinned because, quite simply, they can’t argue with a woman about the subject matter.

To quote their heroine Margaret Thatcher: “If they attack one personally, it means they have not a single political argument left.”

How true.

Carol Vorderman is a presenter and author