OH, TO BE IN ENGLAND: Julie Burchill: My vagina is not a ‘bonus hole.’

I grew up working class in the 1970s; my mother taught me to call it Down There. Practically no one apart from sex-ed teachers used the v-word back then. Thanks mainly to feminists, its use is far more widespread now. But still there is work to be done. The Eve Appeal found in 2014 that a whopping 65 per cent of women aged 16 to 25 have a problem with using the word vagina or vulva, while 40 per cent said they used wimpy names such as ‘lady parts’ when discussing gynaecological health.

So imagine having a daughter today, just starting school. You’ve been scrupulous about using the correct word for her primary sex organ, and then she comes home from school squealing: ‘Mummy, mummy – I’VE GOT A BONUS HOLE!’ Do you think that couldn’t happen? If so, what planet have you been living on for the past few years?

George Orwell, to the white courtesy phone, please!