Brixton features in 4 page feature in Qantas flight magazine

[ViolentPanda]

I've a good deal of sympathy with this latest broad point. It's a more narrow, on-thread topic argument I wanted to pursue. It's pointless to ask people running a pop up dumpling shop to carry the guilt for deregulated labour in the UK and it's equally futile to lambast the writer of a lifestyle piece for a give away airline magazine for her writing about Brixton's diverse range of restaurants.

I'm not asking anyone to carry guilt. I'm asking them to give or show consideration to the milieu into which they're inserting themselves beyond the usual CSR-type bull.

 

[editor]

Stockwell, again?! Are you arguing for the sake of it?

Eh? You're asserting that Brixton's foodie joints are receiving no more promotion or coverage than any other area, so it seems perfectly fair and rational to put that to the test and chose similar places close to Brixton as a comparison.

So let's see their international coverage. What have you got?

 

[ViolentPanda]

So who is the extensive guide to NYC on this site aimed at?

While the gentrification problems are very real, I don't think this article is quite as bad as people are making out...

How about quantifying exactly how bad people are making the article out to be?

 

[goldenecitrone]

Is Brixton the new Earl's Court?

 

[ViolentPanda]

I think it's great that Brixton is being promoted abroad, and while there's much to be mourned about many of the changes we're seeing, it's a good thing generally that people are being encouraged to come here and spend their time and money.

Your fundamental error is that you believe that "Brixton is being promoted abroad". It isn't.
What's being promoted, to the exclusion of almost any social consideration, is a facet of "new" Brixton culture, some of which parasitises established Brixton culture for financial ends.

 

[leanderman]

Eh? You're asserting that Brixton's foodie joints are receiving no more promotion or coverage than any other area, so it seems perfectly fair and rational to put that to the test and chose similar places close to Brixton as a comparison.

So let's see their international coverage. What have you got?

Stockwell is no comparison

 

[ViolentPanda]

People have always come to Brixton to spend their time and money, they're just spending it on far duller things now.

A broad swathe of people, from most social strata, used to do so.
Nowadays that swathe is narrow, perhaps mostly confined to those with a decent amount of disposable income.

 

[editor]

Stockwell is no comparison

Oh, so you're shifting your position.

Here's what you originally claimed:

I am pointing out that Brixton is probably no more heavily 'promoted' than many other areas.
We might think it more hyped because we notice Brixton articles, they are brought to our attention - often here.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Of course I do. However small, the benefits of increased tourist visits to Brixton generated by that article will still be far, far greater proportionally than any possible negative effects.

I'm sure that Brixtonites having their walls pissed up by tourists, will rush to agree with you about the benefits!

It should be noted, however, that the significant increase in spend and footfall in central Brixton hasn't resulted in any extra public conveniences for full-bladdered tourists to relieve themselves in.

 

[leanderman]

Oh, so you're shifting your position.

And I stand by it. You brought up the ridiculous Stockwell comparison.

ETA: I would further note that your Conde Nast article is from four years ago, the NY Post from March 2015.

 

[ViolentPanda]

That's not how the discussion started, I thought. Certainly, this particular article is a drop in the ocean and is indeed very old news as far as how Brixton is perceived by others is concerned.

In any case, the overall suggestion of the article is 'visit Brixton'. In common with just every article ever written about a place that might be worth visiting, the writer will of course suggest a number of hightlights to check out. That's what you do when you write such article. And if interesting food is one of the pulls of Brixton, so be fucking it. People are not robots. If they bother to come to Brixton, most of them will have a look around the place, rather than just go to what the article names and promptly fuck off back to their hotel. Whichever way you look at it, of course it is not going to be financially harmful to the residents of Brixton. Certainly not this late into the game.

The overall suggestion of the article is more "visit Brixton's nu-eateries", as opposed to "visit Brixton, there's interesting food there". What's being promoted is a mediated experience of culture, like one of those restaurant tours that are utterly divorced from the cultural context of the area they take place in.

 

[T & P]

A broad swathe of people, from most social strata, used to do so.
Nowadays that swathe is narrow, perhaps mostly confined to those with a decent amount of disposable income.

Not sure that is the case at all, as far as people coming to Brixton is concerned anyway. Up until 6-8 years ago, a very wide swathe of people wouldn't come to Brixton at all, due to the reputation the place had among those who didn't know it first-hand and the depiction it got in the media. So if anything, a far more varied range of social groups visit Brixton now than they did 10 years ago, IMO at least.

 

[editor]

And I stand by it. You brought up the ridiculous Stockwell comparison.

So your position is now: "I am pointing out that Brixton is probably no more heavily 'promoted' than many other areas. Except Stockwell."

 

[editor]

The overall suggestion of the article is more "visit Brixton's nu-eateries", as opposed to "visit Brixton, there's interesting food there". What's being promoted is a mediated experience of culture, like one of those restaurant tours that are utterly divorced from the cultural context of the area they take place in.

Once again you have nailed it.

 

[ViolentPanda]

The problem with aiming this kind of all embracing opprobrium at harmless articles about restaurants is that it runs the risk of extending to a kind of joyless take on all forms of enjoyment experienced in Brixton, incase they somehow contribute towards more social exclusion or homogenisation.

"All embracing opprobrium"? Where? For opprobrium to be all-embracing, any criticism of the article would have to be highly detailed. It isn't. The criticism is specific to particular issues.

It starts with a disapproval of airline tickets and prosecco in the park, then progresses to a ban on ball games and dancing round the maypole on a Sunday. It lends credence to the idea that the left is obsessed with the destruction of pleasure, or at least the promotion of a list of types of pleasure that can be judged ideologically sound, the premises that may be frequented, and the denigration of the rest.

What a load of sub-Telegraph "political correctness gone mad" bollocks. You should be ashamed of yourself.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Superbly put.

How unsurprising that you would think so.

 

[Pickman's model]

Superbly put.

A splendid example of arslikhan

 

[ViolentPanda]

Drivel, actually. Then again all sides in this discussion couldn't give a fuck about arguments, it's all about the big fat beef.

I give a VERY BIG fuck about the arguments, whereas I don't care at all about the beef.
I do care about seeing the same old clichés trotted out by the same group of posters time and again while having a pop at the ed. Apart from anything else, it's boringly unoriginal.

 

[leanderman]

So your position is now: "I am pointing out that Brixton is probably no more heavily 'promoted' than many other areas. Except Stockwell."

It's exactly the same position.

Stockwell is too small to compare with Brixton, East Dulwich, Dalston, Peckham, Camberwell, Balham, Clapham, Shoreditch, Chiswick etc.

 

[ViolentPanda]

The mistake here of course is to assume, once again, that Brixton is somehow being singled out for 'promotion'.

It's one article in one issue of one airline magazine.

It's not about the dissemination, or about the specific target of a specific article, it's about the impact of such promotion.
For some people that's a positive - the price of the property they own rises along with the fortunes of some in the promoted area. For others it's a negative. The price of the property they rent rises along with the fortunes of some in the promoted area.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Could you see your way to giving up again?

Could you see yours to growing up?

 

[ViolentPanda]

London’s Streatham loses ‘ugly sister’ image as new buyers move in - FT.com

TBF, Streatham has always been more of a church-going maiden aunt, than an ugly sister.

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

How about quantifying exactly how bad people are making the article out to be?

It's 23.6% bad.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Milton Keynes is fine tbh. Lots of right angles

Very acutely observed, that man!

 

[SpamMisery]

I do care about seeing the same old clichés trotted out by the same group of posters time and again while having a pop at Pop. Apart from anything else, it's boringly unoriginal.

Fixed the spelling mistake for you

 

[leanderman]

It's not about the dissemination, or about the specific target of a specific article, it's about the impact of such promotion.
For some people that's a positive - the price of the property they own rises along with the fortunes of some in the promoted area. For others it's a negative. The price of the property they rent rises along with the fortunes of some in the promoted area.

Though I doubt this alleged 'promotion' has much, if any, effect on house prices.

 

[ViolentPanda]

editor don't you get tired of being so bloody angry all the time?!

Perhaps, like me, he's got good reason to be "angry" when he lives in local authority social housing that his local authority has already shown has very little security any more - a local authority some of whose Labour councillors have praised the demographic change gentrification is causing, and who support "regeneration" of council estates on the most flimsy of excuses.
Let me be blunt. If you live in local authority social housing in any area where the authority has pretensions toward "raising" the demographic bottom line, there's plenty to be angry about.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Fixed the spelling mistake for you

Go fuck some livestock.

 

[ViolentPanda]

But she doesn’t just talk about foodie places she starts her article with an analysis of Brixton. She is making political points in her article. See the start of the article where she sets the scene.

If your point is that a "lifestyle" magazine is not political she certainly hasn’t followed that in her article.

It's a pretty poor analysis - bog-standard "cribbed from another shit article" poor.

 

[editor]

Though I doubt this alleged 'promotion' has much, if any, effect on house prices.

Wait. So you're saying that when an area becomes fashionable and gets featured in trendy mags, in-flight publications and the international media as a must-see destination, it has no impact on house prices?