Lardy Lolitas will pay for refusing PE

JOHN the Baptist was the victim of a Judeo lap-dancing scandal when scantily-clad Salome demanded his death rather than the usual tenner for her five-minute gyrations. Such was her physical beauty that Herod acceded to her wish and ordered John’s head be placed on a platter. A dullard palace attendant served it with a side dish of French fries and mayonnaise.

Today, schools and pedestrian precincts are awash with wannabe Salomes, teenage girls with crop-tops and low-slung trousers exposing glimpses of underwear. Unfortunately, many appear to be Salome on steroids, their bejewelled fat bellies hanging over their hipster belts and, in a strike for sexual parity, cheekily exposing their builders bums in the bizarre belief they are attractive. Warning to young girls: getting dressed using a funhouse mirror can be dangerous.

Part of the obesity problem is the reluctance of teenage girls to become involved in PE, an issue the Scottish Executive will discuss as part of the national PE review. For many girls, a push-up is a type of bra and a bout of hair brushing is the nearest thing to a work-out.

School management largely condones the action of female PE refuseniks. In which other subject would the pupil be allowed to decide whether or not to participate? Week after week, legions of Marys turn up with no kit, secure in the knowledge that no effective sanction will be enacted.

All manner of spurious excuses are proffered for their slothfulness, eg girls don’t like the type of kit they are expected to wear. These apologists would have the public believe that pubescent schoolgirls are compelled to run around in bog-standard navy blue knickers and rugby socks. The reality is that PE staff have lowered the bar regarding dress code, to the extent that virtually anything goes except boob-tubes and bikinis. But stubbornly girls decline the opportunity to adopt a healthy lifestyle.

Schools even provide personal shower cabins for our demure young gels, complete with shower curtain and bench. Next door, the lads stoically endure washing en masse like cavemen standing under a cataract.

Political correctness tells us that the girls bear no responsibility for stoking up health problems such as strokes and respiratory illnesses. When the fingers point, schools surely must be held culpable. After all, how can we expect lardy Lolitas to take part in competitive team sport when we don’t provide basic après-shower necessities such as ceramic hair straighteners?

To my mind, it’s no coincidence that the decline in female activity occurs at a time when social sports is en vogue. Has anyone every witnessed a game of social badminton or as I prefer to call it, statue badminton where the greatest exertion takes place when the girls unzip the racquet covers. Playing a match where neither participant cares about the outcome is mind numbingly boring. Better then to sit kitless in the dressing room reading Hello! or Chat.

Ironically, when they become adults, many of these lassies will join overpriced gymnasiums and health clubs to tone up, lose weight and obtain a better self image. Suddenly exercise will be cool as they load their sports bag with lycra and deodorants in the vain quest for a Kylie bum or a Beyonce body.

The government is bidding to host the 2012 Olympics, and next year Tony Blair, taking time off from stage-managed standing ovations, will launch a publicity campaign to make exercise a habit for our young people, with schools at the centrepiece of the initiative. Like a dance of the Seven Veils, the campaign will be image over substance, unless the couch potato generation take some personal responsibility for their own well being.