walked past but she intervened, "a little bit crazy with depression", and the circle of tormenters vanished.

Rural areas were male dominated, not just through rugby but also in pop culture such as Footrot Flats, Fred Dagg, Bogor and Barry Crump. She and her friends were encouraged not to be "girls".

123rf "Rugby is a legitimate way for a group of young boys to inflict injury on others. But because New Zealand has a strong rugby culture, the chimp-gang ethos is not limited to the paddock."

Dolan writes about unknowingly being taken to see a steer being shot and butchered. Eight years old at the time, she couldn't breathe but realised it was a test, so assumed a poker face. "The sacrament was over, the lesson had been taught."

Dolan's views aboutfrom my experiences rugby breeds blockheads and and pissheads with deep-rooted emotional issues who start fights at pubs because they lost."

Honkyghost appreciated Dolan's efforts: ​"Finally, someone's writing about this stuff !!!!! Good on you."

Some readers partly shared Dolan's dim view of rural life in New Zealand.

Among them was nica, who wrote: "Rural upbringings are brutal and misogynist, with rugby being the most acceptable form of cultural expression, but they are also a little wild and free compared to the city version, with a lot of opportunity for children to get lost in nature, and experience a free, happy, roaming childhood full of summer days and swimming and all the rest.

"However, to evolve, for those that want, it really is necessary to move on, but that kind of freedom