Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't believing in equality a key part of being a leftie? So how on earth does anyone square this with supporting football -- a game in which women are nothing more than baubles, gay people apparently don't exist and money is thrown about in a way that would make Gordon Gekko blush?

Football is a man's game -- women aren't really welcome, unless they're wearing a low-cut top or serving the drinks. Never mind Andy Gray and Richard "Do me a favour, love" Keys implying that even women specifically trained for the purpose can't understand the offside rule -- what about the Soccerettes prancing round in their skimpies? What about the female commentators chosen for their cup size rather than their expertise?

A culture of disrespect for women permeates football, from the treatment of female workers (read this eye-opening piece from a female football reporter here) to the obscene chants about players' wives and mothers.

Talking of the players, why idolise a group of young men who have apparently failed to undergo any kind of socialisation? By and large, it's too kind to describe their relationship with women as being like something out of the 1950s. It's more like something out of the 1650s -- they are the omnipotent monarchs, surrounded by sycophants and flunkies, and they have their pick from among the poor damsels who clamour for their favour.

Occasionally, they might instal a favoured waif in a mock-Tudor mansion and give her the obligatory Range Rover and small dog but she's less a wife and more a maitresse-en-titre. Show me a football marriage that even vaguely approaches a partnership of equals and I'll show you a look of profound surprise.

Then there's the money. We carp about bankers' bonuses but Liverpool FC has just spent £35m on Andy Carroll, who has little track record and is currently injured. Who is he? What wonderment is he going to weave to justify spending more than a thousand times the average salary on securing his services? It's just part of a growing trend where even those who are only moderately good at kicking a bit of leather about are handsomely rewarded for the privilege.

You might argue that Liverpool is a private company and what it spends its money on is its own business. But it's not their money -- it's yours. No Premiership club would be worth anything without thousands forking out for tickets for every match and millions more watching on television and snapping up all the replica tat they shovel out on a regular basis.

Every time you buy an absurdly overpriced ticket, every time you buy a dubiously sourced replica shirt, every time you cough up for that Sky Sports subscription, you are propping up this whole edifice. You are using your spending power to say that the misogyny, the homophobia, the rewarding of people for a fluke of genetics rather than a worthwhile contribution to society -- that's all OK. Or, at least, that you don't care enough about it to find something else to do with your Saturday afternoons.

I'm afraid, too, that I don't have any truck with the argument people make that they were "brought up with football" and that it's a great tradition. You're not attending a football match in 1933, or whenever that mythical time was when footballers were horny-handed sons of toil rather than gold-Ferrari-owning ingrates. You're going now. Trust me, the modern world offers other ways for fathers to bond with their sons.

And yes, you might have had a poster of Pele or Keegan or Cruyff on your wall as a teenager but you're an adult now and you're expected to justify your decisions. Even the Catholic Church -- hardly the institution with the greatest regard for free thinking -- requires its members to confirm that they want to honour the commitments made on their behalf as children.

So put down the remote. Tear up your season ticket. Welcome to the modern world.