BBC - Owen Jones

[Zabo]

If you have ever had the 'pleasure' of listening to Radio Five with Stephen Nolan at weekends you will have noticed that Owen Jones has become a regular panellist. The BBC's Shock-Jock* in chief has him in the studio alongside somebody from the extreme right - just for balance of course. He also pops up on various phone-ins such as Nicky Campbell. Invariably he's introduced as a correspondent/columnist from The Independent and author...how could I forget?!

Needless to say he, like Penny, is more than delighted to opine on any given subject and to express his many years of experience and expertise in the hope - he thinks - of educating the great listening public.

The question I have is this? Are there no BBC Guidelines which state a host should not stick to the same contributors week in, week out? Is there only one person who can be paid to represent the so called 'Left'? Is there not a single person in the U.K. who can hold forthright opinions on the subject of the day besides Jones?

Would a letter to the BBC Trust be of any use?

*Shock-Jock. I use the term within the confines of 'emotional exploitation'. For example: "Would you like to tell us how you felt when you were feeling suicidal'? "What's it like being fat and being subject to abuse?'

 

[ayatollah]

The ever greater rise of Owen Jones is a mystery. He is certainly loved by the media:

"In September 2011, he was voted the most influential left-wing thinker of the year by readers of the Left Foot Forward blog.[21] The Daily Telegraph placed him as one of their 'Top 100 Most Influential People on the Left 2011'.[22] The Independent newspaper named him as one of their top 50 Britons of 2011 "

And yet this avid self promoter seems to have no noticeable activist socialist credentials to speak of at all. Indeed he seems to have pinched most of his "Chav - defence of" stuff from reading the IWCA website, and I've never been awestruck with the originality of anything he's actually said on the many media outings I've seen/heard him on. Stand by for his full recantation of these "youthful immature views" in a few years , as he rebrands himself and moves decisively to the neo Liberal Right, and gets a "voice of the ordinary man" column on the Daily Mail !

 

[Zabo]

Good post Ayatollah. Appreciated.

I think I will write to The Trust and and them about their Editorial Guidelines and selection criteria given they are supposed to be committed to Equal Opportunities.

 

[Blagsta]

Good post Ayatollah. Appreciated.

I think I will write to The Trust and ank them about their Editorial Guidelines and selection criteia given they are supposed to be committed to Equal Opportunities.

you wouldn't know left wing if it smacked you in your ugly pus filled face

 

[Zabo]

you wouldn't know left wing if it smacked you in your ugly pus filled face

It goes without saying that I would consult you first Blagsta. You erudition and intellect along with your peculiar truncated sentences are something to behold.

I hope you will enjoy the company of your friends.

 

[Blagsta]

It goes without saying that I would consult you first Blagsta. You erudition and intellect along with your peculiar truncated sentences are something to behold.

I hope you will enjoy the company of your friends.

its good to have friends, not that you'd know

 

[Zabo]

not that you'd know

The Rumsfeld syndrome. Wonderful!

Merci!

 

[Blagsta]

Have you been smoking crack?

 

[Captain Hurrah]

The ever greater rise of Owen Jones is a mystery. He is certainly loved by the media:

"In September 2011, he was voted the most influential left-wing thinker of the year by readers of the Left Foot Forward blog.[21] The Daily Telegraph placed him as one of their 'Top 100 Most Influential People on the Left 2011'.[22] The Independent newspaper named him as one of their top 50 Britons of 2011 "

And yet this avid self promoter seems to have no noticeable activist socialist credentials to speak of at all. Indeed he seems to have pinched most of his "Chav - defence of" stuff from reading the IWCA website, and I've never been awestruck with the originality of anything he's actually said on the many media outings I've seen/heard him on. Stand by for his full recantation of these "youthful immature views" in a few years , as he rebrands himself and moves decisively to the neo Liberal Right, and gets a "voice of the ordinary man" column on the Daily Mail !

Didn't he reject, or fail to even acknowledge, an invitation by IWCA members to visit and talk to them about their pro-working class activism? Activism which doesn't have as its guide an analysis which may as well involve writing people off as 'chavs,' and inherently racist?

 

[Captain Hurrah]

you wouldn't know left wing if it smacked you in your ugly pus filled face

A pseudo-intellectual currently trying to be pass himself off as being knowledgeable about contemporary Russia. This, with even blagging a naive and inadequate knowledge of the various intellectual currents of Soviet-era dissidence (some of it far-right), and in the present cheer-leading certain individuals who while approximating the Russian version of 'liberal' (and in economic terms, we could include Vladimir Putin) have awful views of non-white, non-Slav compatriots living in that country known, in administrative terms, as the Russian Federation.

Not to mention those peoples of former Soviet republics in the CIS, who for reasons of grinding poverty have been migrating into that country seeking often low-paying work, and ended up being vulnerable to terrible exploitation and abuse because of it.

 

[claphamboy]

When I first spotted Owen Jones popping-up all over the place, I thought 'who the hell is Owen Jones?"

I googled him & found his website, with this article - who the hell is Owen Jones?

 

[goldenecitrone]

I heard he was shagging Laurie Penny. Fucking class traitor.

 

[The39thStep]

A pseudo-intellectual currently trying to be pass himself off as being knowledgeable about contemporary Russia. This, with even blagging a naive and inadequate knowledge of the various intellectual currents of Soviet-era dissidence (some of it far-right), and in the present cheer-leading certain individuals who while approximating the Russian version of 'liberal' (and in economic terms, we could include Vladimir Putin) have awful views of non-white, non-Slav compatriots living in that country known, in administrative terms, as the Russian Federation.

Not to mention those peoples of former Soviet republics in the CIS, who for reasons of grinding poverty have been migrating into that country seeking often low-paying work, and ended up being vulnerable to terrible exploitation and abuse because of it.

Is this self reflection or are you talking about someone else?

 

[Captain Hurrah]

Is this self reflection or are you talking about someone else?

Your gentle ribbing is alive and kicking. Outsider's view from (non-white) Mrs Hurrah.

 

[chilango]

If you have ever had the 'pleasure' of listening to Radio Five with Stephen Nolan at weekends you will have noticed that Owen Jones has become a regular panellist.

Back in the days when Edwina Currie was on R5 she used to regularly have Alice Nutter from Chumba as the "left wing" contributor. Waay better show in those days.

 

[imposs1904]

Back in the days when Edwina Currie was on R5 she used to regularly have Alice Nutter from Chumba as the "left wing" contributor. Waay better show in those days.

you know alice isn't her real name?

 

[chilango]

I know.

 

[The39thStep]

I must say that I find Stephen Nolan and Tony Livsey ( on Radio 5) extremely irritating.

 

[love detective]

Didn't he reject, or fail to even acknowledge, an invitation by IWCA members to visit and talk to them about their pro-working class activism?

Given that he had spent 5-6 years in Oxford (and after that moved to London) some of which were spent writing his book, he was asked why he hadn't made any attempt to make the short trip down the Cowley Road from Oxford University to BlackBird Leys to see in practice the attempts being made there by the IWCA to do something about the crisis in working class representation that he was writing about in theory

His response at the time was that he had wanted to interview someone from the IWCA when doing research for his book but 'ran out of time' so didn't bother but he 'wished he had done' and was still very interested in doing so. All of the above exchange took place publicly on twitter where he was making all the 'right noises'

Then in a private email he was given the opportunity to make that contact that he 'wished he had done' and 'still very interested in doing' and since then we've never heard a word back from him since. Neither did he make any effort to respond to a number of constructive criticisms made of his overall approach/analysis.

No idea what Ayatolloh is going on about him getting his ideas from the IWCA website - quite the reverse I would say and these were the kind of criticisms that were made of him, by the IWCA, at the time, i.e. both in the mistake he seems to be making (an idealised/romanticised/homogenous view of the working class) and the reason for it (a walking on eggshell type approach to his subject matter as a result of his distance from it). Also the point about how his approach/viewpoint seems to put forward a working class which is completely determined through things external to them, leaving it as a passive object, devoid of any kind of individual or collective agency, rather than the active subject that it is/needs to be

On the topic of Jones I noticed the other day he made the claim that

I have never got a single job handed to me through a contact

So all those jobs working in parliament, for trade unions, for the press and now this new think tank were achieved through applying for jobs that were advertised that other people could apply for?

 

[Captain Hurrah]

ayatollah was just making a crap dig. Later on he'll no doubt be getting out his crap Trot template, that he uses for everything else.

 

[danny la rouge]

When I first spotted Owen Jones popping-up all over the place, I thought 'who the hell is Owen Jones?"

I googled him & found his website, with this article - who the hell is Owen Jones?

I didn't realise he had any connection with Falkirk.

 

[Smokeandsteam]

His bessie mate is called Ellie Mae O'Hagan who is a "freelance writer, campaigner and activist". This is a sample of her campaigning "As the tube pulls up at Tottenham Court Road to whisk me home from the latest UK Uncut protest, I catch my own reflection in the window. I’m holding an orange umbrella, or should I say, the orange umbrella: the one that was used as a meeting point outside the Ritz the first time a group of pissed-off activists decided to shut down a Vodafone shop.
It looks luminous against the Perspex, like a glowstick. I’m not sure if its prominence is because of its colour, or because it’s so potent with meaning for me. It’s like a gaudy little piece of UK Uncut history.
I get on the tube, slump down, and audibly exhale. A man opposite spots the sound system I’m also carrying, the one that was used for Josie Long’s set during the protest, and asks whether I’ve been busking. I say no, and tell him I just turned Barclays into a comedy club as part of a protest. The carriage falls silent. I can tell people are eavesdropping whilst feigning nonchalance. ‘Ah!’ he exclaims, ‘So you’re an anarchist then!’ The woman next to him, his wife I think, tuts, ‘she’s not an anarchist,’ she says impatiently, ‘it’s because they’re not paying their taxes.’ I mumble a bit, too tired to get into a debate. Turns out I don’t have to; she goes on a pro-UK Uncut diatribe on my behalf. ‘It’s like that Philip Green,’ she continues, ‘giving all that money to his wife in Monaco.’
It’s the first time something like this has happened to me: an apparent member of the mythical squeezed middle, at least not your average protester, knowing all about us and pronouncing on our behalf. Maybe I was being arrogant, but I couldn’t help thinking that she wouldn’t immediately have thought of Philip Green if it wasn’t for UK Uncut. The experience was a timely indication, I thought, that UK Uncut is gaining significant traction."

As someone said earlier (LD I think) the system is shitting people like this out constantly.

 

[Smokeandsteam]

No idea what Ayatolloh is going on about him getting his ideas from the IWCA website - quite the reverse I would say

What he did imo was to thieve examples from RA/IWCA - the Karen Matthews case for example - to support the incorrect political point he wanted to make.

 

[Captain Hurrah]

I wonder if they pissed off the Vodafone staff.

 

[love detective]

What he did imo was to thieve examples from RA/IWCA - the Karen Matthews case for example - to support the incorrect political point he wanted to make.

it's incorrect politicalness gone mad!

 

[frogwoman]

It’s the first time something like this has happened to me: an apparent member of the mythical squeezed middle, at least not your average protester, knowing all about us and pronouncing on our behalf. Maybe I was being arrogant, but I couldn’t help thinking that she wouldn’t immediately have thought of Philip Green if it wasn’t for UK Uncut. The experience was a timely indication, I thought, that UK Uncut is gaining significant traction."

The first time. Really?

 

[Lo Siento.]

His bessie mate is called Ellie Mae O'Hagan who is a "freelance writer, campaigner and activist". This is a sample of her campaigning "As the tube pulls up at Tottenham Court Road to whisk me home from the latest UK Uncut protest, I catch my own reflection in the window. I’m holding an orange umbrella, or should I say, the orange umbrella: the one that was used as a meeting point outside the Ritz the first time a group of pissed-off activists decided to shut down a Vodafone shop.
It looks luminous against the Perspex, like a glowstick. I’m not sure if its prominence is because of its colour, or because it’s so potent with meaning for me. It’s like a gaudy little piece of UK Uncut history.
I get on the tube, slump down, and audibly exhale. A man opposite spots the sound system I’m also carrying, the one that was used for Josie Long’s set during the protest, and asks whether I’ve been busking. I say no, and tell him I just turned Barclays into a comedy club as part of a protest. The carriage falls silent. I can tell people are eavesdropping whilst feigning nonchalance. ‘Ah!’ he exclaims, ‘So you’re an anarchist then!’ The woman next to him, his wife I think, tuts, ‘she’s not an anarchist,’ she says impatiently, ‘it’s because they’re not paying their taxes.’ I mumble a bit, too tired to get into a debate. Turns out I don’t have to; she goes on a pro-UK Uncut diatribe on my behalf. ‘It’s like that Philip Green,’ she continues, ‘giving all that money to his wife in Monaco.’
It’s the first time something like this has happened to me: an apparent member of the mythical squeezed middle, at least not your average protester, knowing all about us and pronouncing on our behalf. Maybe I was being arrogant, but I couldn’t help thinking that she wouldn’t immediately have thought of Philip Green if it wasn’t for UK Uncut. The experience was a timely indication, I thought, that UK Uncut is gaining significant traction."

As someone said earlier (LD I think) the system is shitting people like this out constantly.

What am I doing wrong that I can't get in on this shit? Wrong public school? Wrong uni?

 

[Schmetterling]

Besides: Owen Jones + Verso: akin to vanity publishing. Only, the author gets paid.

 

[The39thStep]

I didn't realise he had any connection with Falkirk.

Very little or no connection politically with Stockport either according to labour people I know

 

[ItWillNeverWork]

So would people prefer that Owen Jones not be on TV/radio so much? If so, why? What should replace him?