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So, TLC putting the men in their place was one of those refreshing, empowering things which everyone could enjoy, even if that second line about how a 'scrub' is also known as a 'buster' was confusing to anyone outside the US of A.

This was followed by a stready stream of R&B heartbreak songs, in which girls find out they are being treated badly by their thoughtless and randy boyfriends, and create merry hell about it, or songs about how career women get sidetracked by sponging losers. Destiny's Child, you know who I'm talking about...

Nowadays, the gloves are off, and there is no aspect of stereotypically male behaviour which is off limits. µþ±ð²â´Ç²Ô³¦Ã© has a song about her fella thoughtlessly hitting on other women, and having no idea how upsetting this is for a girlfriend. She even claims that if she was a boy, she would somehow rectify this situation for all mankind, which might be a big ask, truth be told. Katy Perry finds that her man's lack of commitment is unsettling, and has written a succession of sweary one-liners about this. Britney's fella is an out and out crumpeteer, and this makes her want to take all of her clothes off in a sauna.

Hell, Lily Allen even has a song about, erm, y'know, a boyfriend who, er, doesn't turn out to be everything she hoped for, physically speaking.

*blush*

P!nk seems to have come out fighting, in a typically all-over-the-shop fashion, dismissing her ex-husband Carey Hart in song form, while giving quotes to journalists about how much she misses him in real life. Meanwhile, Alesha Dixon claims that she can find little use for a man who can't dance, which rules out 95.4% of all men below the age of 60. And the ones who are over 60 aren't exactly eye-candy, now are they?

Christina Aguilera, on the other hand, is singing a song about herself. But even SHE manages to turn keeping a good man into a Herculean...sorry, Bodicean effort, because that's what a girl needs to do to prevent the kind of horror scenarios other girl singers sing about.

Leona Lewis is having her cake and eating it on an epic scale, given that part of the reason she gives for her own infidelity is that her man is too busy out gallivanting to notice that his girlfriend has found someone to help while away the lonely hours. You can't help but think that her pleas to be forgiven are largely ironic, and a bit pointed.

Heck, even that nice Hannah Montana girl has taken to listing the things she hates most about the boy she loves. And only number seven is complimentary.

And the reason I mention all this is because this week's Top 40 is FULL of these songs.

So, stepping past the three-woman hen party that is the Sugababes 'Girls', what have we learned about how our pop women currently view the male of the species?

Well, you can't rely on them. And they're weak, and greedy. And clingy, and also the opposite of clingy. They act different when they're with their friends. They want to spend your money and borrow your car. They're never there when you need them, and this means that you have to go out and find another man when you're bored, and this is also their fault.

And sometimes the man you go out and find can be a woman, providing she's got the right fruity chapstick on, and this is OK, because men like that kind of thing, because they are filthy, depraved, spineless, dirty, lazy and they don't move their stuff out, even when you are pointing in the direction that they should take it.

Girls, on the other hand, are magical, soft skin, red lips, so kissable, hard to resist AND touchable. Just don't try any of that stuff if you are male, they'll break your face off.