The recent comments from Employers and Manufacturers' Association chief executive Alasdair Thompson that women were paid less because they took sick days when they had their period continue to reverberate. Columnists Elspeth McLean and Simon Cunliffe believe the focus should be on the wider questions of pay equity, women's productivity and child rearing.
Maybe we should be thinking about a back-up event should the unthinkable occur - yet another Rugby World Cup defeat.
Let's make it something we excel at without even trying.
After all, who wants to get involved in anything which might involve producing buckets of sweat at the gym for years on end and risking injury grasping slippery odd-shaped balls?
It also needs to be something we could stage at the Forsyth Barr stadium to stop it turning into some ugly overpriced white elephant once Elton John finishes tickling the ivories in late November.
Since the building looks like the Sydney Harbour Bridge from the peninsula, perhaps we could get Oprah and a planeload of screaming fans to fly out for a pilgrimage walk over it. We would, however, need to ensure the structure could cope with the examples of the obesity epidemic likely to be in the entourage.
Perhaps it would be better to involve a local celebrity, Pam Corkery. She has abandoned her plans for Pammy's, a bordello servicing women in Auckland.
News reports suggested she had attracted more than 1000 job applications, presumably from reliable chaps who wouldn't need any monthly time off.
It doesn't sound as if Pam would be keen to continue with the concept anywhere else so there's no use suggesting she bring it to the stadium. (A pity really - through the old girl MPs' network she could have saved a bit on advertising by asking Hilary Calvert to lend her eyes sign for the venture.)Presumably, Pam's decision to pull the plug means the team lined up to do the documentary series on it might also be at a loose end.
If she is looking for a new reality TV project, how about a competition, New Zealand Indignant (apologies about the grammar), to find the most indignation-filled person in the country.
There could be live weekly shows recorded at the stadium where contestants would air their outrage on a chosen topical issue.
Pam would run the show. With her talkback radio experience, she would be great at winding everybody up whenever dullness lurked.
Audience members would be encouraged not only to vote for their favourites, but to boo, applaud and interrupt at every opportunity.
I predict there would be no shortage of participants or audience members. We are all experts at being righteously indignant.
Indignation is a wonderful thing because it doesn't necessarily involve thinking, just an ability to react quickly, loudly and hopefully longly to whatever it is which is the passing outrage producer.
In the past week, Northern Employers and Manufacturers' Association chief executive Alasdair Thompson's radio comments, questioning women's productivity by suggesting women took more sick leave than men and referring to some women's once a month ''sick problems", have been the lather catalyst.
Instead of just issuing an apology and hiding from the media until the frothing dissipated, he felt obliged to subject himself to television interviews and things got even sillier.
The screened sections of these were not impressive, making him look domineering and irascible and close to snapping point. Perhaps he was.
At the time of writing, Mr Thompson's fate was unknown. Was he treated fairly?
Watch the full version of Campbell Live's interview by Mihingarangi Forbes and decide. You might be surprised to hear him talk about women being more productive totally in life than most men because not only do they often arrange all family finances, they run households, care for children and go to work.
Has all this indignation led to sensible discussion about women's productivity, child rearing and pay equity?
Is anyone asking if the number of hours anyone spends at work are necessarily indicative of productivity?
In a factory setting the link might be obvious, but in many jobs that would not be the case.
Is there no economic benefit to the country in having children reared well, even if it means sometimes women or men have to take some leave to do that?
Does the time women might take out of the workforce for child-rearing make them more or less valuable employees?
Does the voluntary work many do in community organisations mean they develop skills which their male counterparts lack?
Does anyone offer to pay those women more when they re-enter the paid workforce?
Are childless women getting a fair deal when it comes to promotion?
It is much easier to use energy baying for Alasdair Thompson's dinosaur blood than bother too much about any of these things.
On New Zealand Indignant, such superficiality will be encouraged.
And if you think that sounds silly, is it any sillier than trying to persuade people to buy shares in power companies they thought they already owned or changing the rules to suit a casino?
I feel some indignation coming on. Pammy, come home.
Elspeth McLean is a Dunedin writer.
