Letter: White men are insulted most

White men are insulted most

Sir: Alexander Hofman (letter, 8 March) states as a fact that "there are far more ways to insult a woman or a foreigner than there are to insult a white male".

Even the most cursory of glances through Partridge's Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English reveals that for every one derogatory term describing a female there are at least seven insulting males, while terms derogatory to foreigners (and blacks) are about only one fifteenth as common as terms insulting (presumably) white English males.

Insulting each other with imagination and verve has been, since the beginning of time, the way English males relate to each other.

JOHN FLETCHER

Shepton Mallet, Somerset