Is the Guardian worse than it used to be?

I won't finish reading that, but does it explain anywhere why this retired stockbroker can't just use his fucking money to fly everywhere all the time now?

I couldn't finish it either. It's off the chain.

It's the obvious question, isn't it.

guardian literally ripping off youtuber content now are they

i.e. there was a wendover productions/half as interesting video on this very topic...yesterday? maybe a total coincidence idk

I think the piece was initially published on Narratively in July.

I finally finished this. The guy seems to always have had massive problems that money could hide. So cringey that he would call the reservations number to chat for an hour and then feel compelled to make a reservation to hide it. His entire life was so delusional, thinking you are having authentic experiences while traveling first class, staying first class and buying peoples' gratitude and adulation.

curious as to why they are doing 21st century arts roundups in september of 2019. why now?

I thought the same!

They know something about the Mayans that we don't.

well, most of us

*knowing postapocalyptic nod*

unacceptable that airlines are limiting my right to all the gold tophats tickets i might want

It would've been cheaper for American to just have hired a therapist the reservation number could've routed his calls to.

how many gold tophats does it take to exceed your baggage allowance?

Have you booked a free seat under the name of your fictitious son or not?

it's not hand luggage if it's on yr head tappingtemple.gif

Matt D’Ancona sacked by The Guardian, reportedly for not being sufficiently right-wing.

announce guido

They'll call him back when Ruth Davidson becomes PM

No really, I'd do the gig, for my usual rates.

— Guido Fawkes (@GuidoFawkes) September 22, 2019

He’s like those never trumper columnists in the US. Constituencies of, at most, dozens of people but massively over represented in the op ed section of liberal papers. They allow centrists to feel warm and fuzzy about there being adults in the room on “both sides” and nothing changes. 100% fine with him being fired and replaced with someone whose views are consistent with modern mainstream conservatism (I a headbanger).

A week late, but the tale of the man with his unlimited air pass reminded me a bit of this:
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2019/sep/14/starting-a-business-has-made-me-a-lot-more-frugal

It's a piece on lawyer and campaigner Steve Wardlaw.

"I might be what some might call “wealthy” but bizarrely I’ve become a lot more frugal since starting my own business a few years ago. I’m more conscious that money has to last. I’m also trying to make sure other people are provided for. I want my nieces to go to university and the cost of that will fall to me.
...
Our Kent property is a converted oast house, which has three chimneys and looks like a cross between a hobbit house and a Disney princess’s castle. It’s lovely, you open the back door and you see nothing but fields. I bought it for £610,000 and it’s probably worth north of £1m now. We spent about £200,000 renovating it, which involved moving a few walls, adding a dog-friendly shower room, and a new staircase.
...
(My partner) also collects Doctor Who memorabilia and Egyptian artefacts. For our wedding we each bought a picture for the other – two of a set of 50 by the artists Jake and Dinos Chapman, who took a series of original Goya etchings and over-painted them to look like grotesque cartoons. My mother hates them!"

If this was the internet I would arrange the text into one of those 4Chan "Mr Bones' Wild Ride" montages with DOG-FRIENDLY SHOWER ROOM repeated several times.

"100% fine with him being fired and replaced with someone whose views are consistent with modern mainstream conservatism (I a headbanger)."

How is this a good thing?

I’m also fine with him fired and not being replaced.

I believe caek’s point is that replacing “moderate conservatives” who have no audience other than hate-readers with actual frothing bigots is at least honest.

Right. If the token conservative is there to “represent the other side” they should at least hold the other side’s views. And the particular views dacona holds are not only representative of almost no one (and wrong), they are also especially comforting and unchallenging to centrists who don’t themselves hold these views.

Fair enough. I think the other side is so deranged on some issues that to even see it argued in respectable pages is to see it normalised. Ancona at least pretended to be socially liberal.

Otm. Guardian is a fucking mess for even caring about publishing more right wing opinions tbh, when most right wing publications will never publish anyone left of Hugo Rifkind.

the "comforting carbon monoxide leak" vibe that center right commentators give off to center left people is a huge practical problem in the US (where i live now). it's perhaps a bit less of a problem in the UK, and the danger of platforming the further right opinions might be more salient in that context.

"comforting carbon monoxide leak"

^ this is in quotes because i said it. sorry i can't write.

the "comforting carbon monoxide leak" vibe that center right commentators give off to center left people is a huge practical problem in the US (where i live now). it's perhaps a bit less of a problem in the UK, and the danger of platforming the further right opinions might be more salient in that context.

― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek),

Its a big problem in UK and a major contributory factor in fracture between public and media. Over-representation of "Tory Remainers", or socially liberal / economically conservative, or whatever you call them - inverse of actual centre ground. Illusion of this group being larger than is actually the case, and having to cater to it, this

Its like the creation of a 'palatable opponent' that you can have polite disagreement with, but to what end? what is the point of this? Give us the real deal or don't bother

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EHzWolWXUAIEtbp?format=jpg&name=large

oh lord

I'm never more aware of my working-class origins than when I remember my mother doing a cleaning job whilst heavily pregnant and then getting very ill and having a miscarriage that nearly killed her.

For the Evening Standard, not the Guardian, but Grace Dent wrote the most cringeworthy paragraph of all time. pic.twitter.com/8BUbiHrYcY

— Dril Kafka (sicko mode) (@RuairiWood) October 26, 2019

that's..... incredible.

That's not even the most cringeworthy paragraph in that piece:

I am working class. Oh yes I am. Don’t make me play Working Class Top Trumps with you because I’ll win. I’ve owned a Staffordshire bull terrier (Bess), I’ve holidayed in Tenerife, I have silver fillings. My godfather was a Geordie called Uncle Bob who sold sewing machines. I went to a comprehensive school — OK, when I could be arsed. There was no literature in my home aside from Jackie Collins smut from car-boot sales and a News of the World part-work on the Moors Murderers. In my youth I dated hot boys who lingered in young offenders’ institutions (oh, come on, those were the best ones). My teenage schoolfriends had babies with lads called Teabag, Gozzy and Bello.

you don't reckon grace dent is probably in on the joke here?

what does it mean to be in on a really shitty joke

rly makes u think

it reads differently if it's supposed to be 'in character', i have never got what she's about tbh

people moan about Mao murdering too many people, but at least he worked out that if there ain't no food then all the restaurant critics die as well!

petition to get calzino onto the guardian's writing staff

Morrissey says

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/oct/27/morrissey-performs-in-la-wearing-fuck-the-guardian-t-shirt

Puzzled by the Dominican Republic line. Where is that anyway?

I met Grace Dent once. She was very bad - mendacious, secretive, tricky. Probably not the way her writing seeks to come across.

Lol I read the guardian way more than I would like and have never heard of grace dent before, nor have I noticed a single story about Morrissey except the occasional "great British albums" boring bollocks they do. Certainly not any "anti Morrissey" stories. Also the smiths are really boring.

Oh right she does the restaurant reviews.

Who are the only good restaurant critics, or former ones apart from Meades?

bought £1 pack of Haribo Starmix. Worst weets ever in history of my life, rubbery, tasteless, disgusting. "Happy world of Haribo" Bollocks

— Michael Winner (@MrMichaelWinner) June 24, 2012

that one guy left twitter always retweets

rayner/o'loughlin are rightly lauded but maybe too fbpe for current ilx?

rip

http://www.anorak.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/tumblr_inline_mgzn1gvBZY1r2qscg.gif