I'm male, so my opinion might not count, but this sounds obviously right to me.
Alex Callinicos/SWP vs Laurie Penny/New Statesman Facebook handbags
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I'm male, so my opinion might not count, but this sounds obviously right to me.
exiledinwales
Member
Got nothing to do with communism or the working class. Clearly politically a bourgeois element.
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
Who you aiming that at?
agricola
a genuine importer of owls
This whole, entire thread in pictures:
'I am WOMAN! Hear me ROAR!'
'They don't like it up 'em!'
Surely its:
I don't really care about Laurie Penny and I'm taking it away from class politics but....
Coming from a mental health perspective of having worked with girls with anorexia, often high achieving public school girls who internalise the perfection and good girlism expected of their class and gender, I can understand that Laurie perhaps has a tendency to feel bullied. Anorexia appears to be an illness that bullies and I would say, as an observer, that those who suffer from it are victims. To what extent this is an internalisation of their social experience I don't know but I think it's likely to be a factor for some in what is a very complex illness. It's also possible that anorexia remains an issue for Laurie, if she was so ill as to be hospitalised, it's something she may have to battle with all her life, the bullies inside.
I don't intend this as some kind of justification of her privilege or her denial of it in expressing her sense of victimhood, but perhaps her very middle classness is shaped by pressures more complex and conflicted than is generally assumed.
Coming from a mental health perspective of having worked with girls with anorexia, often high achieving public school girls who internalise the perfection and good girlism expected of their class and gender, I can understand that Laurie perhaps has a tendency to feel bullied. Anorexia appears to be an illness that bullies and I would say, as an observer, that those who suffer from it are victims. To what extent this is an internalisation of their social experience I don't know but I think it's likely to be a factor for some in what is a very complex illness. It's also possible that anorexia remains an issue for Laurie, if she was so ill as to be hospitalised, it's something she may have to battle with all her life, the bullies inside.
I don't intend this as some kind of justification of her privilege or her denial of it in expressing her sense of victimhood, but perhaps her very middle classness is shaped by pressures more complex and conflicted than is generally assumed.
SpineyNorman
Inappropriate content removed
I don't know about that. But I do think she's smart enough to understand the criticisms, take them on board and use them to improve her journalism. It's a bit of a shame that she's not willing to do this.
Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
Because her job is essentially doing what many have to struggle to find time to do, it's little wonder that when she takes Yaxley Lennon out for a slap up meal, or fucks around with giant paintings of herself, or directly contradicts herself on issues which form a basis of trust when actually working in protest groups, that people get fucking annoyed.
As work for a living, it's certainly a living. But the work is observational, it's spectatorship of spectacle. The risk is a part of it, enhances the work itself, so ducking the big moments in order to be able to tell the stories later on is admitting that the issues at hand aren't viewed as big enough to qualify as something you'd be willing to take the consequences of observing and recording at the nastiest point.
As if there's some greater, bigger, possibly even nicer thing on the horizon - a looming future upheaval where the arrest and detention of the journalist will form a concrete mobilising point around the movement of the greater whole. That implies a lack of belief that what you're viewing is going to change anything, it's just ripples on the surface rather than sea change.
Even Molly got arrested, although she certainly made the best of the situation regarding social media and self promotion. I expect that something similar happening to LP would elicit similar reponses in hashtags and articles. For the observed, for those who hold a firm faith in action and accepting consequences, an arrest is a desperate worry for friends and family and the absolute dread of the ultimate effect on employment and other facets of life.
Being blacklisted/monitored for doing a good job still allows you to do a job, the best in journalism have often made the lists and continued regardless. It's a part of the job. But for those who are active because of pure belief, faith and motivation, for those who give as much of themselves as they can in the little time they have while working for a living, an arrest can mean the end of a job and such stress on a life incomparable to a hashtag and furer article inspiration. And what's really important here is the police know that.
The example of an poster here who was accused of trying to push a police officer under a tube train, falsely, demonstrates how far the knowledge that the majority of activists are taking more of a risk than the journalism/art activist few. Yes, there are stresses, and some could even be equal to the rest of us - but then the freedom and privilege of the life you lead allows it to become a woven part of narrative, fabricated or otherwise.
You have a living to make from your work, so actually work for it.
As work for a living, it's certainly a living. But the work is observational, it's spectatorship of spectacle. The risk is a part of it, enhances the work itself, so ducking the big moments in order to be able to tell the stories later on is admitting that the issues at hand aren't viewed as big enough to qualify as something you'd be willing to take the consequences of observing and recording at the nastiest point.
As if there's some greater, bigger, possibly even nicer thing on the horizon - a looming future upheaval where the arrest and detention of the journalist will form a concrete mobilising point around the movement of the greater whole. That implies a lack of belief that what you're viewing is going to change anything, it's just ripples on the surface rather than sea change.
Even Molly got arrested, although she certainly made the best of the situation regarding social media and self promotion. I expect that something similar happening to LP would elicit similar reponses in hashtags and articles. For the observed, for those who hold a firm faith in action and accepting consequences, an arrest is a desperate worry for friends and family and the absolute dread of the ultimate effect on employment and other facets of life.
Being blacklisted/monitored for doing a good job still allows you to do a job, the best in journalism have often made the lists and continued regardless. It's a part of the job. But for those who are active because of pure belief, faith and motivation, for those who give as much of themselves as they can in the little time they have while working for a living, an arrest can mean the end of a job and such stress on a life incomparable to a hashtag and furer article inspiration. And what's really important here is the police know that.
The example of an poster here who was accused of trying to push a police officer under a tube train, falsely, demonstrates how far the knowledge that the majority of activists are taking more of a risk than the journalism/art activist few. Yes, there are stresses, and some could even be equal to the rest of us - but then the freedom and privilege of the life you lead allows it to become a woven part of narrative, fabricated or otherwise.
You have a living to make from your work, so actually work for it.
I'm not defending her journalism, I was just responding with thoughts that came to mind reading about bullying. As an aside.
Nice one
Well-Known Member
speaking as an (uneducated unskilled) working class male it does come across like she is being bullied to fuck here. If there is any serious points to be made it is being lost amongst the flurry of hyperventilation and scrunching up of used kleenex. The two points of contention remain
1. she is privileged
2. she is a journalist who lies
Neither are earth shattering revelations and frankly the level of obessessiveness does come across as a little bit weird.
1. she is privileged
2. she is a journalist who lies
Neither are earth shattering revelations and frankly the level of obessessiveness does come across as a little bit weird.
JimW
支那暗杀团
Point is not about LP particularly, as has been said earlier, but that her career is an example in microcosm of how class is reproduced even in what passes for the progressive movement these days, and that it's debilitating and poisonous.
Plenty of posh people have been good journalists, which they achieved by writing honestly about people and situations without any of the lecturing (ETA mean more the co-opting I think) or self-regard.
articul8
Dishonest sociopath
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Yeah, and you also thought there was no story with Hari. Whilst at the same time being a journo.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
"so called lefties"
"i work for a living"
If all you can see is your points 1 and 2 above then you're trying very hard not to see anything else.
SpineyNorman
Inappropriate content removed
'speaking as a'
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
I went over to rogers in the middle of this last night, and you know what - he didn't careThis thread is fucking great!
Nice one
Well-Known Member
johann hari. Journalists who lie. Not a revelation.
framed
Leave it!
I went over to rogers in the middle of this last night, and you know what - he didn't care
Well, more's the pity on him then mate.
He obviously lacks the clarity of Marxism, like wot we've got, ahem...
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
What about "so called leftie" journos who write (no,not just write, but co-edit - that is run) for anti-union mags? Not a revelation. What a nose for a story you have.
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
I get the sense that you feel world weary at times
Nice one
Well-Known Member
which goes back to why you think laurie penny is important enough to spend 2 years documenting her every utterance. And why what she says is at all relevant to you or your life. Who reads her stuff, who does it affect and who are the people most angry at the things she says?
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