For all my jibes, there was something truly impressive about the sheer scale of the crowds, the enormous number of women and men, filling the streets of Washington in a noisy bubbling ribbon of pink and placards.

But it is an army lacking a common purpose. Lacking a common cause. Every one of them wielding a placard for a different grudge they bear. Many unable to give a coherent reason for being there. Most at odds with the placards they carried. Many cross a woman didn’t win.

But simply being a woman is not enough.

This was a march defined by gender, not purpose – much like Clinton’s campaign. And a march where the meaningless drivel of the speakers was matched by the lack of a clear aim of those marching.

No one would argue their hearts were not in it. I found myself smiling at their happiness in each other’s company, their relief to be together, reminding each other they are not alone.

But a shared sense of victimhood is not sufficient to make change happen.