From now on all my blogging will be at A Cultural Philistine.
Bye.
Wednesday 19 January 2011
Tuesday 17 August 2010
Stuff I'm reading
I've never done links before - what really is the point of a blog with as little traffic as this one directing people to more read blogs? But I was bored and read some good stuff across blogs recently
I start with Chris Leslie MP at Labour Uncut chronicling 100 regressive measures by the coalition in their first 100 days in power
UK Polling Report has an excellent post on why Sky's poll which has Labour on 24% and the Lib Dems on 8% is completely bogus
The Enemies of Reason has a piece on bullying about weight in the Daily Mail, something which extends beyond the articles and into the comments, a subject I've covered myself
Minority Thought is excellent as always with his post on 'fury' in the Daily Express
Beyond the blogsphere, I've been reading the excellent George Monbiot book 'The Age Of Consent' which has got me thinking, expect a blogpost on it when I've finished.
That's my lot for now.
I start with Chris Leslie MP at Labour Uncut chronicling 100 regressive measures by the coalition in their first 100 days in power
UK Polling Report has an excellent post on why Sky's poll which has Labour on 24% and the Lib Dems on 8% is completely bogus
The Enemies of Reason has a piece on bullying about weight in the Daily Mail, something which extends beyond the articles and into the comments, a subject I've covered myself
Minority Thought is excellent as always with his post on 'fury' in the Daily Express
Beyond the blogsphere, I've been reading the excellent George Monbiot book 'The Age Of Consent' which has got me thinking, expect a blogpost on it when I've finished.
That's my lot for now.
Monday 16 August 2010
Wilful misinterpretation from the Daily Mail...
... in this article about a woman who was fined £75 for littering, headlined: "Smoker faces £2,500 fine... for dropping cigarette ash on pavement." As one heavily negatively rated comment said:
"Second SHE HAS NOT BEEN FINED £2500 FOR LITTERING!
She has been fined £75 for littering. The extra £2,425 is for being an idiot."
Damn right. As well as lying about the fine the Mail has seemingly lied about why she received the fine, in the first place, in their first line reporting that:
"An elderly widow has been threatened with a £2,500 fine by council officials for dropping cigarette ash on the pavement."
If that was indeed the case the woman in question is well within her rights to appeal, but in the penultimate paragraph, as usual buried, is the response from the council:
"'In general terms, however, our wardens do not issue fixed penalty notices for dropping cigarette ash. They do for dropping cigarette butts, which are specifically classed as litter under the Environmental Protection Act."
Ah, so she dropped the butt, so that's littering and although the fine may be heavy handed, she has no real defence.
And finally, another small lie, the woman is not being threatened with a £2,500 fine, if you look at the letter close up you can see that she could be liable for a fine of 'up to £2,500.' Just a small one, but it adds to the general deception of the article. Classic Mail.
"Second SHE HAS NOT BEEN FINED £2500 FOR LITTERING!
She has been fined £75 for littering. The extra £2,425 is for being an idiot."
Damn right. As well as lying about the fine the Mail has seemingly lied about why she received the fine, in the first place, in their first line reporting that:
"An elderly widow has been threatened with a £2,500 fine by council officials for dropping cigarette ash on the pavement."
If that was indeed the case the woman in question is well within her rights to appeal, but in the penultimate paragraph, as usual buried, is the response from the council:
"'In general terms, however, our wardens do not issue fixed penalty notices for dropping cigarette ash. They do for dropping cigarette butts, which are specifically classed as litter under the Environmental Protection Act."
Ah, so she dropped the butt, so that's littering and although the fine may be heavy handed, she has no real defence.
And finally, another small lie, the woman is not being threatened with a £2,500 fine, if you look at the letter close up you can see that she could be liable for a fine of 'up to £2,500.' Just a small one, but it adds to the general deception of the article. Classic Mail.
Sunday 15 August 2010
The Coral - Butterfly House
I promised to expand this blog into new areas, so I'm going to review the new album from one of my favourite bands in the world - The Coral - who have come up with their first album since the masterpiece that was 2007's Roots and Echoes. Their new album entitled Butterfly House is no huge leap from their previous ones, in some ways it moves forward but in other ways it seems a backward step,
It all starts off well enough with one of my favourite songs off the album, "More Than A Lover", which hints at a more intense album, but is ultimately a just a very good Coral song, expanding on what has come before, and one of the few instantly catchy songs on the album. Leading on from that "Roving Jewel" hints at an expanded sound, with the use of a harmonica building on a typically Coral melody.
The album has its share of memorable songs, "1000 Years" the first single off the album is the closest the band get to a "Dreaming Of You" type song, and like the first track is instantly catchy, but despite the fact that the band try to expand on their sound, it's arguable whether they improve it.
There are other good songs on the album however, "Green Is The Colour" has a slower tempo than most Coral songs and the album benefits from this change up, as it does from the calmer tones of "Walking In The Winter." "Falling All Around You" does what it tries to well as a pretty acoustic and piano driven number, and "Coney Island" shows what the band can do sometimes when they try something new, being perhaps their darkest song to date, with an off kilter edge and circus type vibe.
This album in many ways seems trapped between continuing to churn out very good songs which are a bit repetitive, and trying to change things and make this their magnum opus. This is most obviously shown through the differences between "Into The Sun" which instantly feels like you've heard it before with the melody bearing some similarities to several songs off their previous albums and the darker "Coney Island which sounds slightly more like their eponymous debut but with an extra edge.
Despite some of the flaws, I would give the album 3 and 1/2 stars, and recommend it for further listening. There are seventeen good songs on the Butterfly House and that may well be too many. There are no complete flops on the album but it, just goes on for too long. If you cut out the last four songs and the bloated "North Parade" you come out with another 4 star Coral album which delivers a sharp set of good tunes.
It all starts off well enough with one of my favourite songs off the album, "More Than A Lover", which hints at a more intense album, but is ultimately a just a very good Coral song, expanding on what has come before, and one of the few instantly catchy songs on the album. Leading on from that "Roving Jewel" hints at an expanded sound, with the use of a harmonica building on a typically Coral melody.
The album has its share of memorable songs, "1000 Years" the first single off the album is the closest the band get to a "Dreaming Of You" type song, and like the first track is instantly catchy, but despite the fact that the band try to expand on their sound, it's arguable whether they improve it.
There are other good songs on the album however, "Green Is The Colour" has a slower tempo than most Coral songs and the album benefits from this change up, as it does from the calmer tones of "Walking In The Winter." "Falling All Around You" does what it tries to well as a pretty acoustic and piano driven number, and "Coney Island" shows what the band can do sometimes when they try something new, being perhaps their darkest song to date, with an off kilter edge and circus type vibe.
This album in many ways seems trapped between continuing to churn out very good songs which are a bit repetitive, and trying to change things and make this their magnum opus. This is most obviously shown through the differences between "Into The Sun" which instantly feels like you've heard it before with the melody bearing some similarities to several songs off their previous albums and the darker "Coney Island which sounds slightly more like their eponymous debut but with an extra edge.
Despite some of the flaws, I would give the album 3 and 1/2 stars, and recommend it for further listening. There are seventeen good songs on the Butterfly House and that may well be too many. There are no complete flops on the album but it, just goes on for too long. If you cut out the last four songs and the bloated "North Parade" you come out with another 4 star Coral album which delivers a sharp set of good tunes.
Thursday 12 August 2010
Rise of the body fascists - Curse of the Mail comments
I'm just going to get straight to it, here is some immense stupidity in the comments of a Jan Moir opinion piece. Who would have thought it? Ignoring the article, which isn't that bad, just incredibly boring to me, let's dive straight into the comments, starting with this gem from Cindy Chaplin
""Curvier"? How I hate that word. What you mean is "fatter". Why can't people just say so?"
Interesting point Cindy, so in the spirit of straight talking, instead of saying: "You have an interesting name" I will from now on tell idiots like you that "You have a stupid name." That feels a lot better, I like all this insulting; "Cindy Chaplin you are a colossal brainfart."
Jane in Brighton has another interesting bit of body fascism:
"TRANSLATION: I don't take care what I eat, I stuff myself and drink too much, I don't take any exercise.............BUT I still want to look like an attractive, slim woman.
GET REAL, PLEASE."
Insinuating that all women who are larger than a size 12 are fatties who stuff their faces? Check. Insinuating that only slim women can be attractive? Check. Shouting because everyone CAN'T HEAR YOU OTHERWISE? Check. Congratulations Jane, you've managed to live in one of the liberal capitals of Britain and become one of the biggest body fascists in the Daily Mail comments.
Now one from a man, maybe he can bring some sense to proceedings. Unfortunately he can't, over to you Alan...
"Let us be quite honest sizes 16 / 18 + can never be elegant and certainly not as you say "real womanly". Ms Moir there are actually places in the world where slim trim and elegant are the national norm and where women are very much real. Stop making excuses for the UK trend towards over eating and lack of exercise, instead try to instill some pride of appearance into our womenfolk. Oh and by the way, start at first base, yourself."
Oh, just fuck off.
""Curvier"? How I hate that word. What you mean is "fatter". Why can't people just say so?"
Interesting point Cindy, so in the spirit of straight talking, instead of saying: "You have an interesting name" I will from now on tell idiots like you that "You have a stupid name." That feels a lot better, I like all this insulting; "Cindy Chaplin you are a colossal brainfart."
Jane in Brighton has another interesting bit of body fascism:
"TRANSLATION: I don't take care what I eat, I stuff myself and drink too much, I don't take any exercise.............BUT I still want to look like an attractive, slim woman.
GET REAL, PLEASE."
Insinuating that all women who are larger than a size 12 are fatties who stuff their faces? Check. Insinuating that only slim women can be attractive? Check. Shouting because everyone CAN'T HEAR YOU OTHERWISE? Check. Congratulations Jane, you've managed to live in one of the liberal capitals of Britain and become one of the biggest body fascists in the Daily Mail comments.
Now one from a man, maybe he can bring some sense to proceedings. Unfortunately he can't, over to you Alan...
"Let us be quite honest sizes 16 / 18 + can never be elegant and certainly not as you say "real womanly". Ms Moir there are actually places in the world where slim trim and elegant are the national norm and where women are very much real. Stop making excuses for the UK trend towards over eating and lack of exercise, instead try to instill some pride of appearance into our womenfolk. Oh and by the way, start at first base, yourself."
Oh, just fuck off.
Tuesday 10 August 2010
See the connection? The Daily Mail and their readers don't.
As all intelligent people who ever read the Daily Mail know, the newspaper isn't the most consistent, but these two articles I noticed today just magnified this.To compound it they were both placed in the same box of stories, almost next to each other:
Does the Mail seriously not see the links between the two stories? Let's first look at the "Council carried out out risk assessment on boy, 14, who wanted to mow tiny patch of village grass" story. This fits into the normal Mail narrative of something being stopped by the 'Elf and Safety brigade,' and if you didn't read the actual story it would be quite reasonable to expect that they stopped him from mowing the grass. Turns out they didn't and just carried out a slightly lengthy risk assessment.
My issue with the Mail here isn't their coverage of the story which doesn't blame it on the 'elf and safety brigade' but on council red tape, but more the fact that they saw fit to cover the story in the first place. In the consideration of whether a story is newsworthy, one of the things to be considered by the editor is what reaction it will engender from the readers. The Mail is perfectly aware that this story, fitting into their overall narrative of 'red tape' 'elf and safety' and appealing to their readers hatred of bureaucracy is going to enrage their readers and therefore they don't dig too deep and look for the real reason behind red tape and bureaucracy.
The real reason, in many cases is the compensation culture that is prevalent in many parts of society these days, as illustrated in this article: "Mother sues National Trust for £300,000 after son, 11, is killed by falling branch during visit to stately home"
This story is a relatively simple one and it is chosen mostly because it again advances a tabloid narrative, the 'compensation culture' that their readers will get worked up about. The same readers might comment with something like: "this cultural [sic] of litigation is getting out of hand" and then go over to the other article and comments something about how this bureaucracy is getting out of hand without making the link between the two, in that the bureaucracy is often caused by the culture of litigation, often fuelled by the tabloids. It seems like concious doublethink on the Mail's part but it just feeds their readers stupidity and stops them seeing the full story beyond their narratives.
Maybe it's not doublethink by the Mail, maybe it's just plain and simple stupidity or the fact that the articles may be written by different journalists. However, the people in charge - Dacre and his sub-editors - must notice the direction their newspaper is taking and unless they're just completely stupid, it's just deliberately misleading to the readers, fuelling their prejudices.
Basically, what the Daily Mail does best.
My issue with the Mail here isn't their coverage of the story which doesn't blame it on the 'elf and safety brigade' but on council red tape, but more the fact that they saw fit to cover the story in the first place. In the consideration of whether a story is newsworthy, one of the things to be considered by the editor is what reaction it will engender from the readers. The Mail is perfectly aware that this story, fitting into their overall narrative of 'red tape' 'elf and safety' and appealing to their readers hatred of bureaucracy is going to enrage their readers and therefore they don't dig too deep and look for the real reason behind red tape and bureaucracy.
The real reason, in many cases is the compensation culture that is prevalent in many parts of society these days, as illustrated in this article: "Mother sues National Trust for £300,000 after son, 11, is killed by falling branch during visit to stately home"
This story is a relatively simple one and it is chosen mostly because it again advances a tabloid narrative, the 'compensation culture' that their readers will get worked up about. The same readers might comment with something like: "this cultural [sic] of litigation is getting out of hand" and then go over to the other article and comments something about how this bureaucracy is getting out of hand without making the link between the two, in that the bureaucracy is often caused by the culture of litigation, often fuelled by the tabloids. It seems like concious doublethink on the Mail's part but it just feeds their readers stupidity and stops them seeing the full story beyond their narratives.
Maybe it's not doublethink by the Mail, maybe it's just plain and simple stupidity or the fact that the articles may be written by different journalists. However, the people in charge - Dacre and his sub-editors - must notice the direction their newspaper is taking and unless they're just completely stupid, it's just deliberately misleading to the readers, fuelling their prejudices.
Basically, what the Daily Mail does best.
Sunday 8 August 2010
Very little ever changes
In between watching the cricket this afternoon, I've started reading John Simpson's book "Unreliable Sources." I got the book for my birthday several months ago, and started reading it but only got through the first chapter for some reason. When I returned to it today I started reading a chapter on the reporting of Immigration at the beginning of the 20th century.
The only things that seem to have changed between then and now are the targets of the attacks and the fact that journalists now have to be a bit more subtle, but only a bit. The main attacks are by the same suspects now as they were then: the Express and the Mail. One telling quote is when Simpson says:
"The Express was almost comically virulent, looking for every possible way of stirring up feeling against the immigrants"
Some of the headlines are strikingly similar to ones used today, the Express running a headline "Alien Horde for Great Britain" and "Alien Horde Coming." Some however were as Simpson says, comical: "NATION MADDER. CAUSES OF INSANITY. MENACED BY ALIENS"
The link between immigration and crime, however erroneous is as common now as it was then, the small improvement over the century being that it no longer verified by dodgy science such as that practised by Dr. Ernest W. White in the Express of 1st August 1903
In his article the psychologist speaks of immigrants "with poor bodies and poorer minds", "of the criminal type", "in many cases with neurotic inheritances" and warns that "If no stop is put to this, the stability of the race, mental as well as physical, will be undermined"
It's just a good thing that dodgy science like this is no longer practiced in the tabloids today.
Oh. And some more
The only things that seem to have changed between then and now are the targets of the attacks and the fact that journalists now have to be a bit more subtle, but only a bit. The main attacks are by the same suspects now as they were then: the Express and the Mail. One telling quote is when Simpson says:
"The Express was almost comically virulent, looking for every possible way of stirring up feeling against the immigrants"
Some of the headlines are strikingly similar to ones used today, the Express running a headline "Alien Horde for Great Britain" and "Alien Horde Coming." Some however were as Simpson says, comical: "NATION MADDER. CAUSES OF INSANITY. MENACED BY ALIENS"
The link between immigration and crime, however erroneous is as common now as it was then, the small improvement over the century being that it no longer verified by dodgy science such as that practised by Dr. Ernest W. White in the Express of 1st August 1903
In his article the psychologist speaks of immigrants "with poor bodies and poorer minds", "of the criminal type", "in many cases with neurotic inheritances" and warns that "If no stop is put to this, the stability of the race, mental as well as physical, will be undermined"
It's just a good thing that dodgy science like this is no longer practiced in the tabloids today.
Oh. And some more
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