Alex Callinicos/SWP vs Laurie Penny/New Statesman Facebook handbags

[treelover]

Urgh. Middle class privately educated appropriation of working class terminology.

Paul Mason isn't a public school boy..

 

[TopCat]

I'll have an attempt at a short precis for you:

it started off being about Laurie Penny making a cock-up with regard to Alex Callinicos/someone she thought was AC's son.
It then morphed into being about how a particular group of media personalities (incl. Ms. Penny) had set themselves up as the voice of a generation/spokespeople for various leftish movements. These people and the milieu they operate in was termed "the bubble".
Many examples of people from "the bubble" talking shite, talking down to people not in the bubble and telling the w/c what was best for it followed.
Then Laurie Penny joined the thread, for some reason assuming we were picking on her, and were fascinated by her toilet habits.
She accused posters in general of being misogynist, and two posters in particular of being racist, due to her making assumptions about a piece of IWCA analysis. It took about 100 pages before she made a grudging extremely-qualified "apology".
Then we got onto her about how "the bubble's" fondness for identity politics and intersectionality obscure the most important divide of all: Class.
Things went downhill.

Thank you. Can you give an indication of where Ms Penny's toilet habits are discussed so i can cut straight to the shit?

 

[andysays]

Thank you. Can you give an indication of where Ms Penny's toilet habits are discussed so i can cut straight to the shit?

I'm pretty sure that was less interesting (except perhaps to Ms P) than it might sound

 

[el-ahrairah]

http://www.salon.com/2013/05/12/jaron_lanier_the_internet_destroyed_the_middle_class/

urgh

 

[goldenecitrone]

Stoke Newington Literary Festival - 3rd - 8th June, I am in you.

That looks good. Cheers for the heads up.

 

[treelover]

[QUOTELaurie Penny is the contributing editor of the New Statesman][/QUOTE]

when did that happen?

 

[treelover]

btw

Billy Bingo?

 

[Nigel Irritable]

That said, none of this stuff has ever been mentioned by a single person to me outside of on here. No one.

I never really had you pegged as a tumblr man in the first place.

 

[sihhi]

I never really had you pegged as a tumblr man in the first place.

Is that your moustache on twitter, Nigel?

 

[sihhi]

Did you ever find how exactly this happened:

I got this stuff from street queers and sex workers and trans women

Were sex workers really the ones leading this charge?

 

[Nigel Irritable]

Is that your moustache on twitter, Nigel?

I'm tempted to say yes, but honesty compels me to admit that it actually belongs to a former runner up in the world moustache championships.

 

[Nigel Irritable]

Did you ever find how exactly this happened:
Were sex workers really the ones leading this charge?

One suspects not, but much like the Combahee River Collective in a more important sense they should have been. There's a higher sort of truth involved in these things.

(To be fair to the intersectionalist involved in that conversation, she didn't claim that sex workers etc led the charge on intersectionalism in general. Just that she heard about it from that direction. Which I don't have any reason to doubt).

 

[sihhi]

One suspects not, but much like the Combahee River Collective in a more important sense they should have been. There's a higher sort of truth involved in these things.

Can you explain what hayrr was actually refering to? What started it all?

 

[Nigel Irritable]

Can you explain what hayrr was actually refering to? What started it all?

Some nonsense involving Lisa Ansell, I think.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Thank you. Can you give an indication of where Ms Penny's toilet habits are discussed so i can cut straight to the shit?

Well that's just it, I'm not sure her toilet habits were discussed. There was some remarking on the photo she posted in an article that showed her bedroom, but nothing about poo-age and pissage!

 

[ViolentPanda]

Yes I can understand this sort of stuff then - when the AIDS panic was at its height etc when lesbians were accused of ruining children's lives by forcing dads to be single dads while they swanned around Greenham Common.

But some of the stuff now has even less subtlety and more arbitrary divisions. I'm sure that lot would never have accepted people using the word honkey like that S.U. officer is doing.

I agree, but I'd argue that the whole thrust of this particular take on intersectionality that's being parlayed around at the moment isn't (as it was back then) about exploration of an alternative discourse to that pumped out by the mainstream - it's too often about carving out a personal identity-based "kingdom" from which you can feel justified in using such divisive terms as "honkey". After all, you're only reflecting back at others their oppression of you, or at least that's the assumption!

 

[sihhi]

Some nonsense involving Lisa Ansell, I think.

What was it cos today we have this:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/lisa-ansell

lisaansell3 ‏@lisaansell3
Basically our radical left is nasty wee posh boys practicing for when they get to the House of Commons or the media org of their choice.

Michael W Story ‏@MWStory @lisaansell3 radical anything is mostly nasty wee boys, posh or otherwise

Michael Story has himself as "Filmmaker, occasional writer, Social Policy Postgrad and Captain of Shooting at the LSE. Ignite talk here: http://Michaelwstory.com/talk
LSE, London · socialhypotheses.wordpress.com"
Why have these people bought websites that popularise their names?

Hi, I’m Michael Story. I’m very interested in making videos and writing about things but I am too much of a dilettante to build an audience. Here are some things I have done:
‘London’s 66,000 guns’, recorded at Ignite London.
‘The Captain and the Enemy’, a short film about retired Capt. Maurice Seddon and his court battles.
‘How Religion Made Me Homeless’, a short film I made with Nadia Gomos, who told me her amazing story about being victimised by unscrupulous faith healers when she read…
‘Miracles for Sale’, an article about the time I went to a televangelist event for fun and found that up close it was quite the opposite.
‘I went to a Get Rich Quick Scheme Disguised as a Nazi‘, an article about the time I went to a get rich quick scheme disguised as a Nazi. This one is from a new blogging project I am doing called ‘Social Hypotheses‘ which will have a more social science theme.
When I’m not doing these things I am a full time postgrad research student in the Social Policy department at the LSE, where my interests are Income Redistribution and International Migration.

"Too much of a dilettante" but has bought a website with his name.

Is this the radical left getting murdered on its own turf?

Basically our radical left is nasty wee posh boys practicing for when they get to the House of Commons or the media org of their choice.

Is this what the radical left wants - to be the new Owen Jones - is that what it is?

 

[Buckaroo]

Well that's just it, I'm not sure her toilet habits were discussed. There was some remarking on the photo she posted in an article that showed her bedroom, but nothing about poo-age and pissage!

No discussion but one post. Page 207. #6208

 

[barney_pig]

I am glad that now middle class women will not be oppressed by their gardeners

 

[ViolentPanda]

No discussion but one post. Page 207. #6208

I'm slightly apprehensive that you knew that, Bucks.

 

[Buckaroo]

I'm slightly apprehensive that you knew that, Bucks.

I didn't know it but I remembered her making reference to it, searched her posts and found #6224 page 208.

 

[Dillinger4]

Paul Mason isn't a public school boy..

He is from Leigh if I remember correctly.

 

[ViolentPanda]

I didn't know it but I remembered her making reference to it, searched her posts and found #6224 page 208.

That's what you say now!

 

[Buckaroo]

That's what you say now!

How dare you imply something I don't comprehend. FTR I do not have an unhealthy interest in the toilet habits of the voice of a generation. Check your privylege.

 

[weepiper]

FTR I do not have an unhealthy interest in the toilet habits of the voice of a generation. Check your privylege.

*GROAN*

 

[goldenecitrone]

How dare you imply something I don't comprehend. FTR I do not have an unhealthy interest in the toilet habits of the voice of a generation. Check your privylege.

What about topiary? Check your privet 'edge.

 

[Nigel Irritable]

What was it

I'm not entirely sure, because for obvious reasons I don't follow her on twitter. As I understand she posted some stuff about some Novara dude and some other leftist being posh boys. They responded by asking if scabbing fits into an intersectional analysis. They all seem to know and hate each other already.

 

[BigTom]

I'm not entirely sure, because for obvious reasons I don't follow her on twitter. As I understand she posted some stuff about some Novara dude and some other leftist being posh boys. They responded by asking if scabbing fits into an intersectional analysis. They all seem to know and hate each other already.

I think I saw a bit of this, she said that Pierce Penniless and Aaron Peters edit: Adam Ramsey had done well out of austerity, which Pierce challenged and she said that they'd built this social network around initially the UCL (?) occupation and now Novara which was how they'd benefited. Accusing them of being in a media bubble and being faux-left and not really caring... which tbh is exactly what I thought she was.
oddly, when I saw Pierce's tweet asking her how they'd done well I thought about reply that he'd never got 4.5k followers on twitter without austerity.. then I saw her response and realised that basically was what she was saying.. because of course this is all that matters.
I have no idea what the Novara crew's financial/material position is - clearly they have a lot of cultural/social capital but I've never had the impression that Pierce is well off. I'm sure she was saying something about oxford too but I thought they were all UCL graduates.

tweet that started it but the conversation doesn't hang together on twitter: https://twitter.com/lisaansell3/status/333318813393235968

 

[Delroy Booth]

I'm not entirely sure, because for obvious reasons I don't follow her on twitter. As I understand she posted some stuff about some Novara dude and some other leftist being posh boys. They responded by asking if scabbing fits into an intersectional analysis. They all seem to know and hate each other already.

A while ago Lisa Ansell wrote an article defending the right to scab, i wrote a pithy reply, in the style of Angry Letter to the Daily Worker circa 1935, calling her out for it, ended up escalating into a massive chidlish shitstorm (I posted on here about it at the time but I can't be arsed searching for it) and I'd thought we'd sorted out and made our peace amicably the last I spoke to her about it, but she brought it up when she was having a go at Novara-guy accusing him of "cheering on threats to her" or something - Which is really unfair to him beacuse even Lisa (quite graciously following a heated exchange of emails that I was a bit freaked out by) accepted that I wasn't threatening her and it was a misunderstanding, and I apologised for being a loudmouth gobby dickhead with fuck all self-awareness, and obviously I was happy that we managed to sort it out fairly amicably in the end. Trying to attack this guy by his supposed association and/or support of me, who's really no harm to anyone regardless of the what you think of the politics, is pretty cynical of her. I don't even know him.

 

[sihhi]

I think I saw a bit of this, she said that Pierce Penniless and Aaron Peters edit: Adam Ramsey had done well out of austerity, which Pierce challenged and she said that they'd built this social network around initially the UCL (?) occupation and now Novara which was how they'd benefited. Accusing them of being in a media bubble and being faux-left and not really caring... which tbh is exactly what I thought she was.
oddly, when I saw Pierce's tweet asking her how they'd done well I thought about reply that he'd never got 4.5k followers on twitter without austerity.. then I saw her response and realised that basically was what she was saying.. because of course this is all that matters.
I have no idea what the Novara crew's financial/material position is - clearly they have a lot of cultural/social capital but I've never had the impression that Pierce is well off. I'm sure she was saying something about oxford too but I thought they were all UCL graduates.

tweet that started it but the conversation doesn't hang together on twitter: https://twitter.com/lisaansell3/status/333318813393235968

I'm not sure exactly what the source of it all is either, but she retweeted this that got sent to her:

@lisaansell3 Some parties are left wing, some parties are right wing, but all parties are white wing


https://twitter.com/1000cuts/status/333313393123553280

based around how some Green Party types are snotty arseholes - no doubt some are.


Adam Ramsay probably does do OK austerity or no austerity given that his family have a a Scottish Baronetcy with a castle and lots of farming land.
I think the Pierce Penniless guy obviously wanted to pointout the difference but got attacked.

Nishma Doshi an Asian Green Party member takes her to task for some bits of it but then gets attacked too:

J ‏@piercepenniless
@lisaansell3 I really can't have this conversation today Lisa, shouldn't have responded to your implication I've 'done well' from austerity.

NishmaDoshi: But Lisa, you're white so you must have done well out of austerity too!

lisaansell3 : Nishma, self awareness is the key hunny.

Nishma: your conception of "done well" is clearly at odds with everyone else. None but the elite benefit from a recession.

Lisa: Nishma YOU are the elite. How do you not know this? I mean really look at what you said.

Lisa: go away, search for yourself, hop between countries, and call it what you like. But really listen to what you just said

Nishma: I know that. But so are you. So get off your high horse.

Lisa: I am the elite? Really Nishma. You are joke. Go country hopping and enjoy bleeding the poor for your jollies.

Lisa: I am the elite? Are you fucking joking you spoilt silly little brat.

Lisa: I know dossing around finding yourself and wondering how to fit your parents expectations is hard, but really Nishma-piss off.

Lisa: you misunderstood hunny. I am not the elite. I am a sign that the elite arent as smart as they thik they are.

Lisa: we all know more than you and are not a faceless amorphous poor. Now stop getting your jollies off poverty and grow up.

Then some male leftists said something or other, and it became shouting at her and they will become the next Nigel Farage.

Her attack on the other lot still can't get down to it completely.

lisaansell3 ‏@lisaansell3
Lesson one. Shouting at women might seem like the answer to everything, but its not. You'll end up like NIgel Farage. 1 solution politician

https://twitter.com/lisaansell3/status/333667217549967361

This is priceless though isn't it: -
"Some parties are left wing, some parties are right wing, but all parties are white wing"

Hey Sinn Fein, stop being white wing!