27 JANUARY 2001, Page 28

Boring is better

From Diana Chapman Sir: Amazing, isn't it (How exams are fixed in favour of girls', 20 January)? When women were underachievers no one pointed out that the system was loaded against them. Not allowed into life-classes or the dissecting room etc., it was assumed that women were as God made them — a bit dim and definitely inferior to men.

Now that the scales are beginning to tip in the other direction, up jump the likes of Dr Madsen Pine crying 'Foul — unfair to men!'

Well, since the dash and flair of the male sex have given us the H-bomb, the concentration camp and the despoilment of the planet, to name but a few, perhaps we'd be better off with a bit of boring female pedestrianism for a while.

Diana Chapman

London NW5