Help! I’ve been born in the wrong period of history.

I’m a white male living in a time when white males are not allowed to be heard. My kind are, evidently, despotic and abusive. I doubt there has been a single episode of The Drum in the last two years that hasn’t alluded in some way to us being unfair to women. De-powerment, suspicion and shame have been rained down on us.

Pity the boys growing up at this time. What are they to do with their testosterone induced strength and inclination to strive and compete? Do we consign them to a shadow existence, socially acceptable only as effeminate metrosexuals? Men should rarely be seen and never heard… until, of course, the next war or disaster, when the call will go out for warriors and heroes… and be met by silence.

Being a white male means, of course, that I must conform to the expectations of the highly feminised, virtue signalling gate-keepers of Western literary culture. “Do not write about a woman in your books, for you are not a woman. And do not write about an indigenous Australian. In fact, unless you write about men being unfair to women, you won’t be published at all.”

Yes, I’ve been born in the wrong period of history, for I am old in a culture that sees no value in age. It has no place for its seers. New truths have been invented, truths that scorn the wisdom of history.

But there’s worse to tell: for I am also a Christian. Today’s opinion leaders tell me that Christianity should be scorned for its unchristian behaviour. (The irony of this statement has yet to be appreciated.) Society today only learns about Christianity through the jaundiced eye of atheistic commentators and liberal clerics who have lost their faith. Those who truly know are kept in the shadows—unseen.

So, as an old, white, Christian male, I am struggling to be allowed to write. The fact that I dare to do so is a form of madness.

But there again, prophets have always been seen as mad.

…And now (sigh) some caveats for the scandalised:

• Of course there should be zero tolerance for abuse of woman.
• Of course women should have equal opportunity to men.
• Of course we need to respect the culture of indigenous Australians.
• Of course the church should be called to account for vile behavior that is the antithesis of authentic biblical Christianity.
• No, I am not claiming for myself the status of seer or prophet. That is for others to decide.