That Jo Swinson article about google searches during her leadership, against the backdrop of the prevalence of casual misogyny in the recent leadership contest is a harsh reminder that as a woman in politics you just can't outrun structural inequality - no matter how good you are

You're never going to have ’gravitas’ or be charismatic or driven or have leadership potential. You’re always going to be too inexperienced. You're too young until you're too old. Don’t even think about looking a day over 30. Or having kids, or, dare we say it, choosing not to.

There is no way to be a woman in politics that makes you good enough for the kind of men who have already decided you're an object. No way of dressing to stop the weird online messages or weirder canvassing experiences that leave you shaking from something that isn't the cold.

There is no way to be a woman in politics that will ever let you play on an even playing field. You’ll always have to work harder, block out more background noise, and have to bring your own chair to the table. On days when you don’t, you’re just waiting for the next day you will

I stopped trying to find the impossible balance between being a person & being free from gendered criticism in politics a while ago, having realised the only way you can do that is to not be there at all (which plenty of people I've found myself on the wrong side of would prefer)

But I really worry about how many brilliant women there must have been before me who didn't make it that far. How many are still trying, and how many quit. How many women who would be brilliant politicians who look at us all up to our necks in this stuff and think ’Nah’.