When Radicals Collide

“If I were the patriarchy, I’d be laughing at us right now.”
Can’t decide who to cheer for… Can they both lose?

HahahaHAHAHA.

Mr E,
So far as I can make out, the dispute seems to be about journalistic accuracy, which, given the parties concerned, is a tad comical. Though sceptics may wonder whether some other, less high-minded rivalry is also in play. Either way, radical-on-radical action is often entertaining.

Ross,
“What’s most interesting to me is that Ms Penny’s penchant for making things up is an open secret among fellow left wing pundits.”
Laurie is also, it seems, willing to fabricate threats against her, thus raising her status in her own victimhood hierarchy. During a Twitter exchange with Guido Fawkes about protests at political fundraising events – an exchange in which Ms Penny was faring badly – things took a strange turn.
A mocking Guido said,

You might see your mum and dad at the ball.

Laurie replied,

Why would my parents be at a Tory ball? They’re both legal aid solicitors in Horsham, and they vote Labour.

Then, abruptly and apropos of nothing, Laurie seemed to lose her mind:

Stop threatening my family, you pathetic little man, or I’ll report you to the police.

A puzzled Guido replied,

Eh?

Adding,

Imagine the scene: “Officer I’d like to report someone for suggesting my parents might be Tories.”

Despite being asked to present proof of this alleged threat to her family, Ms Penny declined. Though this lack of evidence didn’t inhibit some of her admirers and fellow activists, who promptly made threats against Guido of a less imaginary kind. Among them, Aaron John Peters, a “Ph.D. candidate at Royal Holloway, proud UCL grad and occupier,” who said,

@GuidoFawkes: your card is marked by a lot of very angry people who are very good at direct action both off and online.

So although we laugh at Laurie Penny’s lack of journalistic and intellectual credibility, there is a more… pathological aspect to it.

There is something about Laurie Penny’s writing that reminds me of the various politically preoccupied university students I’ve known. It brings back memories. There must be a universal style book somewhere or at least a secret decoder ring.

“Okay, now she’s officially creepy. “
Yeah, I mean the fact she just flips out and makes wild accusations in a forum where everyone can see what’s been said is a sign that she is a little loopy.
Though it does reinforce my opinion that she’s just a chronic attention seeker, manufacturing drama to make everyone look at her.

“If I were the patriarchy, I’d be laughing at us right now.”
We laugh at you anyway. You’re a very silly person. And using terms like “the patriarchy” doesn’t help your not being laughed at cause.
And why is Ms Penny threatening to call the police on Guido? Aren’t they the guys she has running street battles against all day long?

What’s most interesting to me is that Ms Penny’s penchant for making things up is an open secret amoung fellow left wing pundits.
Someone should tell Michael Ezra…
http://hurryupharry.org/2010/12/21/laurie-penny-voice-for-a-generation/

Tom,
Yes, Laurie does seem to have trouble distinguishing reality from the convenient-but-imagined.

The debris may amuse.
It did. 😀

As a general fan of feminist journalists and writers, I would like to support Laurie; unfortunately I cannot because I know that she is indeed dishonest and immoral in her journalism.
She appears to have no qualms in lying about about anything to rise up the journo ladder even if it means dishonestly tainting the lives of those around her as a result.
The article she wrote early on in her ‘career’ about burlesque is a case in point in effectively ruining other people’s reputations through deceit – and is how I personally know that she will lie to get ahead. (http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/may/15/burlesque-feminism-proud-galleries).
Laurie got involved briefly in a cabaret group at Oxford University that i was also part of. Unlike many male and female students involved Penny chose to strip down to nipple tassels while performing in the show.
However in this article, which she ironically wrote at a time when she still had naked frontal pictures of her upper torso on Facebook (which she has subsequently chosen to remove) she wrote that she was forced to strip and forced to smile (“until your face hurts”) through her misery.
The Guardian webpage indeed now has a number of corrective notes at the bottom including: “Changes were made to the second paragraph to make clear that the author was not persuaded by the managers of a local burlesque troupe to get into stripping, but did so voluntarily.”
However the horrible implications made on our directors/producers (both rather camp male burlesque performers themselves) by the original article cannot really be removed.
She also made the bizarre comment that while at the Edinburgh fringe “it was a rare day indeed when a shy, bewildered girl wasn’t crying in the toilets backstage because she thought her costume made her look fat”. I was on that tour, and am still friends with most of the girls who were on that tour. They were all flabbergasted (and would have been amused had not the implications of this line from the article been so insulting to them) by this as they did not feel fat (thank you very much), did not ever cry on that trip, were not bewildered, and did not feel like victims in any way while in the show… And of course the majority hadn’t wanted to show off all their body parts (on stage or on Facebook) as Penny was so keen to do anyway!
After Edinburgh, the directors decided to be less generous in letting almost anyone who wanted to to perform in the show in some way do so. Hence Penny – who was not a natural performer – was no longer asked to be in the show. Perhaps this is where her bitterness lies. Therefore her article also mourns the demise of certain acts, claiming the show “ditched our most subversive acts”. It certainly did not as anyone who saw the later shows can attest to. But yes it had ditched the less talented ones involved!
In all, she attempted to smear the really rather gentle directors/producers of the show by saying they forced her to strip, made girls cry and made them smile through the misery. Essentially she painted them up to be horrors, which couldn’t have been further from the truth. She also painted the girls (oddly enough not boys – i guess boys have no feelings or body issues to contend with in her mind) as being insecure victims when they were performers, singers, comedians and dancers who still feel very proud to have been involved in the show.

@ Alex Levi-Smith
That is a fascinating, and disturbing, post about Ms Penny. She is clearly a female version of Hari.