Gayle pass: why you should never read the comments section

TO THOSE hell-bent on making the world an antiseptic misery have me asking a question: is it now a damnable offence to ever ask a work colleague on a date?

PLOT twist: Chris Gayle is actually a feminist performance artist so devoted to his craft that he developed a seamless Jamaican accent and pretended to care about cricket for 20-odd years.

Sadly, no.

The self-styled Caribbean Adonis of Twenty20 boundary-chasing acted up, cracking onto a journalist during a live feed and embarrassing her six ways from Sunday in front of a national audience.

Being a professional, Mel McLaughlin stifled any urge she may have had to jam the microphone up his proverbial block hole.

Despite Chris Gayle not being a method-acting Germaine Greer propped up on Milo tin stilts, his bludgeon-dumb actions have at least let sportsmen around Australia know what is and what is not acceptable.

Having a different chromosome does not entitle you to humiliate members of the opposite sex.

It should never have been in doubt.

But once the dust settled, I made a fatal mistake and read the comments sections.

Hearing from drongos saying she was not dressed in a hessian sack and was therefore "asking for it" makes my skull numb.

These are the same "F*** off, we're full" dropkicks who get cold sweats and convulsions when they spot a woman sporting a headscarf.

But equally berserk are the nouveau puritans who think no man should look at a woman without written permission signed and witnessed by a Justice of the Peace.

If the internet is anything to go by (so help us), their ranks are swelling, alongside the number of ways to hurt their feelings.

Cracking onto someone in a humiliating way is a grotty act.

So is piling on unwanted pick-up attempts that make someone's skin crawl.

But those hell-bent on making the world an antiseptic misery have me asking a question.

Is it now a damnable offence to ever ask a work colleague on a date?

I suppose the all-conquering spread of Tinder means non-digital interaction is unnecessary until pictures and ;) winks have been exchanged over the internet.

I will never experience what women go through on a daily basis and I understand that we men need to seriously look at how our actions affect others.

The way I see it, if you treat women like dirt, you cannot possibly love your mum.

This issue needed to be discussed, but I really hope this Chris Gayle frenzy has reached its logical conclusion.

Because some nut job in North Korea apparently just dropped an H-bomb.

Originally published as Gayle pass: why you should never read the comments section