Twelve years on and still critics declare that the future shouldn't be Orange. Yesterday, as the long list for the Orange Broadband Prize for women's writing was published, the latest blast of the trumpet against the monstrous regiment of female authors was still reverberating. The novelist Tim Lott elaborated on radio on his written verdict that the prize was "sexist and discriminatory and should be shunned or at least mocked mercilessly". Since Mr Lott shares his home with a wife and four daughters, this pronouncement comes to us under the "extremely courageous" label.

Whether he makes a valid point depends on what you think the Orange is for. In terms of literary awards, women are still seriously under-represented in the Man Booker stakes but, conversely, have done very well in recent years out of the Whitbread/Costa. On balance, then, it is difficult to argue that the Orange prize redresses a serious injustice. And if you view it solely as a means of celebrating women's writing, you implicitly acknowledge that such a distinctive category exists. Self-evidently, women who write do so in hugely different styles and tones. But, as the judges annually acknowledge, they probably cover a shorter spectrum of subject matter, much of which, unsurprisingly, is viewed through the prism of domestic life.

Nevertheless, we currently have a clutch of rightly celebrated women writers who have crashed cheerfully through any perceived glass ceiling in fields such as crime and science fiction. Neither do we lack successful female role models in the performing arts, even if they are routinely packaged in a manner more reminiscent of page three than Puccini.

In fact, it's probably the visual arts that have traditionally been the most profoundly misogynistic. As Germaine Greer tartly notes in her book The Obstacle Race: "Any work by a woman, however trifling, is as astonishing as the pearl in the head of the toad. Their work was admired in the old sense which carries an undertone of amazement, as if they had painted with a brush held between their toes." Even now, with some high-profile "young mistresses" featuring in major exhibitions, you could argue that it is painting which could most usefully employ an all-women award. However, in a week that also saw Harriet Harman argue for employer action to secure more opportunities for women and ethnic minorities, the outraged reaction to both Labour's deputy leader and to the Orange list tells us that the debate over the merits of positive discrimination is far from over.

It's very marshy ground we tread here. Many women will argue that to proceed on any basis other than pure merit is to patronise the very constituency you try to assist. But, mostly, that point of view comes from women who are already established, and have difficulty recognising that others might lack the opportunity or temperament to gain similar advantages. Lady Thatcher, in her pomp, saw no reason why any woman shouldn't succeed since she thought all women essentially no different from herself. (Comfortingly, she was entirely misguided.) You need look only at Holyrood set against Westminster to see the difference made by judiciously altering the camber of the playing field. When Labour in Scotland devised the scheme of having a male and female candidate selected for adjoining constituencies, at a stroke they guaranteed that the new parliament would more reasonably reflect society.

And, much derided as all-women shortlists have been in the context of election to the Commons, they do not seem to me to be an unreasonable temporary device when hundreds of years of "selection on merit" have left that chamber still looking as if it has been struck by some fatal plague that fells only female members. (The paucity of non-white members tells an even more dispiriting tale about relying on meritocracy.) Similarly ridiculed has been David Cameron's assertion that he will strive for gender equality in any future Tory cabinet, yet that in itself would send out powerful signals in a country that had a collective hot flush when it found, to its amazement, that Home Secretaries could have cleavages.

The 21st century remains a place where the possession of a penis and the absence of a womb confers immediate advantage in terms of equality of opportunity. That isn't to argue that men don't have their own set of demons to confront and slay, as the suicide rate among young men makes bleakly clear. But in terms of recognition in a world where women too often still have to be twice as good to get half as far, the Orange Prize seems a very modest and relatively harmless piece of discrimination. Like all such ventures, it adds, for a while, to the gaiety of nations. And it offers Mr Lott a splendid annual opportunity to have a ritual whinge.