Because Waitrose Eats Your Soul
And so, again, we visit the pages of the Guardian, where Felicity Lawrence looks forward to the downfall of big supermarkets. You know, those dark, forbidding entities that have “marched across our food and shopping landscape,” casting shadows so vast and terrifying that “it seemed there was no part of our consuming lives they did not want to capture.”
Tightening her moral corset, she says,
People are in revolt against Big Retail… The fall of this empire looks as though it will be fast… It is hard to mourn.
It seems I’d missed these dramatic events, this fall of empire and popular revolt. Perhaps, like many others, I was busy buying groceries at a reasonable price in a pleasant, airy supermarket with polite and helpful staff. But apparently the “supermarket model” is not only accompanied by “social destruction,” it’s also a “colossal market failure.” And so we – that’s thee and me – will somehow find both the time and enthusiasm for “smaller baskets” and “more frequent provisioning,” several times a week from righteous local suppliers – where they exist, that is, and regardless of the weather and any scheduling commitments. Their prices may be higher and their supplies less varied and reliable, but at least their moral aura will meet Guardianista standards. And so never again will dark forces “make us buy things we never intended to buy.” Never again will we be seduced by discounted biscuits and that sinful Pot Noodle.
As is the custom at Kings Place, Ms Lawrence then goes on to tell us what it is “we” think:
We don’t want the illusion of “choice” that 30-40,000 lines offer, especially when so many of them are just variations on the same theme of highly processed fats, sugars, and salt disguised by additives.
That’s all supermarkets sell, obviously. Damn their glowing eyes. And even if it wasn’t, we mortals have no ability to make decisions regarding how we spend our money. We, it seems, just drift down those supermarket aisles, no shopping list in hand, scooping things at random into our baskets. Yes, dear reader, we all shop by poundage and volume. Didn’t you know?
If Ms Lawrence’s pieties sound familiar, you may be thinking of Friday’s column by Deborah Orr, who told the nation – or the tiny part of it that reads the Guardian unironically – that the big supermarkets are “in trouble” because they’re,
viewed as having helped to impoverish town centres and are now looking horribly antisocial.
You see, the entire nation – not just a subset of well-heeled Guardianistas – is raging against the convenience of the local supermarket, where cheap food is plentiful and easy to find. Instead, says Ms Orr, we’re all spending our weekends in joyful protest at the nearest out-of-town farmers’ market, where securing a week’s food shopping is a more ambitious task and generally more expensive. And we’re doing this because – yes, because – “people don’t have as much money to spend.” This is what we’re all doing, apparently. Just like her.
Update, via the comments:
The Observer’s Joanna Blythman, who was evidently handed the same article template, is also very fond of the presumptuous “we,” a term she uses repeatedly. She too just knows how “we” feel, thanks to her uncanny mental powers. And amazingly, we all agree with her. Apparently, the nation’s shoppers are no longer interested in convenience or price, or the cost of their time – despite her own article suggesting the opposite – and “we” now favour the “creative independent retail sector,” by which she means, “farmers markets, box schemes, bread clubs [and] food co-ops.” You see, paying more for food and spending much longer finding it, filling our otherwise empty afternoons with more frequent trips and smaller baskets, is “increasingly shrewd and practical.”
As Jen quips in the comments,
More people are shopping at big cheapo supermarkets Aldi and Lidl which ‘proves’ everyone wants to shop at farmers’ markets where food is more expensive. #ObserverLogic.
And on the subject of those legendary farmers’ markets, of which so many Guardianistas speak, commenter Lancastrian Oik steers us to this.
Instead, says Ms Orr, we’re all spending our weekends in joyful protest at the nearest out-of-town farmers’ market, where securing a week’s food shopping is a more ambitious task and generally more expensive. And we’re doing this because – yes, because – “people don’t have as much money to spend.”
Deborah Orr has never let logic stop her.
Once upon a time it was a key characteristic of a leftist to actually want the poor to be able to feed themselves and their families.
Once upon a time it was a key characteristic of a leftist to actually want the poor to be able to feed themselves and their families.
Yes, but the proles aren’t choosing foods that are sufficiently artisanal.
If Guardianistas had proper jobs, and weren’t paid so that they could afford au pairs, maybe they’d realise that going to a supermarket saves a fuck-load of time. Furthermore, if you’ve got limited transport options spending an entire day buying the family provisions is a major pain in the arse.
Incidentally, Deborah Orr is also the one who wrote about the ‘chosen people’. Again, being on the left used to mean having strong opinions about anti-Semitism.
Deborah Orr has never let logic stop her.
No, but at least she’s wrong, reliably wrong, in fascinating ways. As when she turned her mental cutting beam to economic matters, insisting that “only banks can create wealth.” And we mustn’t forget her belief that chronic alcohol abuse is entirely the fault of capitalism. Readers may recall her emphatic use of the phrase “the fact is” – a bold wording, given that Ms Orr didn’t feel it necessary to support her claim with any.
More recently, she was upset that women aren’t choosing to appear on comedy panel shows as often as she would like. Although our seething Guardianista offered no evidence that women are being discriminated against by producers or audiences – indeed she inadvertently acknowledged the contrary – she nevertheless insisted that the “gender imbalance” is an “injustice” and so something must be done. According to Ms Orr, female comedians are shy, fragile creatures, uninterested in advancing their careers, and decline invitations to appear on comedy panel shows because there aren’t enough women on comedy panel shows.
Then there was her insistence that very bright children should in effect be distributed by the state, shared out by decree, regardless of the consequences for the children themselves. Ms Orr admitted that “eggheads” tend to benefit from studying among similarly able and motivated peers, where lessons aren’t routinely disrupted and where cleverness isn’t seen as something to be mocked, discouraged or physically punished. Impervious to contradiction, she maintained that bright children should be sentenced to mixed ability classes in the state comprehensive system. I.e., precisely where the mockery, discouragement and physical punishment is most likely to occur.
Clearly Ms Orr is a moral powerhouse. We must bend to her will and thereby save the world.
Oh my word!
It’s a rare and hysterical imagination indeed that can detect the Dark Side of the Force at work in those announcements for spillages in Aisle 11.
A few years back, I was completely baffled by the strength behind a ‘Say No to Tesco’ campaign [http://www.nomillroadtesco.org/timeline/]
The more so because the very particular small road where these protests were held has not one, two or three, but four late night Fried Chicken and Kebab places, an Indian takeaway, a pizza takeaway and *five* coffee shop / diners / greasy spoons – all in a single stretch of road of much less than half a mile in length.
It also already had a Co-op so quite why Tesco should be singled out was a bit beyond me.
I did ask once why the protests and fuss.
“It’s about people wanting to preserve the community” came the answer, from a protesting Socialist Worker Party member … amid the litter of polystyrene takeaway boxes that lay next to the bin, part filled with rain-soaked deep fried chicken batter and soggy chips, lightly splashed with vomit.
The Tesco is there now and does a roaring trade.
Tim Worstall points out that Ms Lawrence doesn’t seem to understand the term “market failure.” And much else besides.
Regarding Ms Lawrence’s assertion that online shopping safeguards us innocent, sheep-like consumers against the primeval urge to buy things we never intended to buy.
She’s obviously never seen me on Ebay or Amazon after a couple of glasses of claret.
Parsing Guardian columns could easily lead to madness. It’s why I distract myself with compilations of ephemera and stories about unsightly foods and malfunctioning toilets.
Much cheaper to shop as and when you need things, rather than fill a trolley with a week’s supplies
Er, no. It isn’t.
Regarding Ms Lawrence’s assertion that online shopping safeguards us innocent, sheep-like consumers against the primeval urge to buy things we never intended to buy.
She’s obviously never seen me on Ebay or Amazon after a couple of glasses of claret.
Or me a few bucks short of the Free Shipping threshold on Amazon.
Much cheaper to shop as and when you need things, rather than fill a trolley with a week’s supplies
Er, no. It isn’t.
I’m not sure how Ms Lawrence arrived at that strange assertion. Setting aside the fact that supermarkets are generally cheaper, often by some margin, there’s also the cost of one’s time. If I wanted to shun supermarkets for reasons of piety, I’d have to spend huge amounts of time trying to find all of the different places I’d have to visit instead in order to buy the same things as before, probably at higher prices, and then find the time to visit those places more often, every few days, making more journeys by car or public transport.
Unless of course she means that the nation’s womenfolk should abandon their jobs and instead spend their days going back and forth across the city, on foot, with whatever five items they need for that day’s meal.
She’s an American Republican?
“People are in revolt against Big Retail… The fall of this empire looks as though it will be fast… It is hard to mourn.”
Yes, I too foresaw the collapse of nations at the hand of ‘big retail’. I then turned off the alarm, realized it was a Saturday morning, and went back to sleep.
Guardianistas and other like-minded beings know just so much about things that simply aren’t so.
Unless of course she means that the nation’s womenfolk should abandon their jobs and instead spend their days going back and forth across the city, on foot, with whatever five items they need for that day’s meal.
My old gran shopped this way from the ’40s right up until the ’80s, when a shiny new Presto supermarket opened nearby. Strangely the social fabric of her town was not ripped apart by big retail, as all the old ladies and housewives found that they could spend their afternoons gossiping in tea rooms rather than traipsing from shop to shop.
Strange how Ms Lawrence’s call for us to fight our way back to a better future involves driving shopping habits back to the mid 20th century, a period viewed by Guardian types as being terribly unprogressive.
Just a quick question: Can we not have one fucking thing the doing of which does not have some political and/or social implication? I, mean, just one thing. I don’t ask for much.
“Can we not have one fucking thing the doing of which does not have some political and/or social implication?”
No. No you can’t.
Sorry about that but there you are.
Does this play into the tired “Everything is political” mindset of so many liberals/progressives? My only questions are the following: Do these people live in the real world? Or better yet, on this planet? There are moments where you have to laugh at some of the crap the Guardian churns out but at times, it becomes exasperating to see how some rather unhinged folks will find fault for the most trivial things, as well politicize it.
I’ve lost count of how many Guardian articles have managed to find some esoteric sorrow in the supermarket aisles. I remember Leo Hickman fretting about the sin of buying mangetout – and his belief that the way to make poor people richer is to not buy their goods.
There’s nothing sinful about Pot Noodle. I’d be more embarrassed to be seen buying the Guardian.
Of course, in the real world, the business model that’s actually on its last legs is the newspaper.
“there’s also the cost of one’s time.”
Leftists think economics is about money.
One of my dominant memories of life as a small child in the 70’s was the interminable traipsing around after my mother as she did the bi-weekly shop. The retail wasteland that was Ryde 40 years ago is depressing to recall. Our peregrinations took us from one end of the town to the other: baker, butcher (or fishmonger), greengrocer, newsagent, haberdasher’s, shoe shop, etc.. It took hours, with incrementally heavier purchases, which all had to be carried, or wheeled round in a little trolley. It was bloody exhausting. And then Tesco’s megastore descended on the edge of town like an alien mothership, and there was general rejoicing.
“more frequent provisioning,”. I’m a Scottish immigrant to Canada. When I returned in 1977 and then again in 1990, my Aunt Jess used to “more frequent provisioning,”. She didn’t have a very big refrigerator. She went, time consumingly, yet enjoyably, to the local market. For provisions.
It strikes me that the ‘return to nature’ motiff of going back to those time consuming days is just a screen for the yelping of more free time to pursue it. Without the time freeing production of valued trade.
“it seemed there was no part of our consuming lives they did not want to capture.”
Translation: They try to stock whatever we want to buy.
The bastards.
Farmers’ markets are great for extras if you’re lucky enough to have one nearby but the idea that you could do a full weekly shop there is bloody silly. The local one’s only there for one day every two weeks.
Modern marketing studies do show that product placement and display can have affect on sales volumes for items in supermarkets (When was the last time you chose something from the bottom shelf). Guardianistas interpret this as corporate manipulation. Rational people interpret this as good business, don’t buy what they don’t need and aren’t above tossing a few extra treats or supplies in the cart if the deal is good.
If this was their marketing campaign, would they see the hypocrisy? No.
“Only Guardian Brand Narcissistic Pseudo-Insights Can Protect you from the Predation of Big Retail. Get a Friend to Subscribe and get 50% off your Next Six Monthly Payments”
“People are in revolt against Big Retail”
So much so they can be seen going there in their millions, every day. While I am tempted, Guardian-style, to say it is solely to protest and wag fingers (but not chocolate fingers, it must be emphasised) I suspect as these revolting masses are coming away with laden trollies that they are weak and have been sorely tempted while protesting.
Of course the answer would be for the Guardian to start its own supermarket. Much like this: http://www.thecommentator.com/article/3661/the_guardian_has_opened_a_coffee_shop_no_it_s_not_a_joke
The local one’s only there for one day every two weeks.
Same here. There’s one in the city centre that materialises for a few hours every month or so and which survives, insofar as it does, because it’s parked near other, much bigger food retailers. It’s somewhere you might pause on the way to somewhere else. There’s also a smaller, shabbier affair in an unglamorous part of town, but that only winks into existence for a few hours once every three months. Hardly the backbone of a regular shopping routine. Once in a while, as a treat, I visit the Chatsworth House farm shop in Derbyshire. They do some great cheeses (over a hundred to choose from) and excellent steak pies. But it’s not exactly cheap or a viable place to buy basics every couple of days.
These places are additions to supermarket shopping, not a credible replacement. Which may explain why, despite Ms Lawrence’s grandiose claims, the collective market share of the big supermarkets (around 95%) is essentially unchanged from previous years and seems likely to remain that way. The sizes of the players relative to each other may change, and more of their custom is now online, but that’s about it. Hardly the twilight of “Big Retail,” or a “revolt” against it.
But hey, it’s the Guardian, where “facts are sacred.”
re the comedy panels drama, why is it that reading the comment section is something is like stepping into an alternate universe? So much righteous indignation at this seemingly trite observation on life. “Something must be done about this injustice!” responds the crowd, while I slowly slink away towards the exit, making sure to avoid eye-contact.
Tightening her moral corset,
Snork.
At least her toddler is not a vegan:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/oct/08/toddler-vegan-problem-prejudices
At some point, such as this one, stupidity rises to level of a moral failing. The idea that there exist enough readers to support the writing of such poppycock is highly dispiriting. Is there no way we can separate ourselves from these idiots and let them go smash?
Tim Worstall points out that Ms Lawrence doesn’t seem to understand the term “market failure.”
Why am I not surprised the Guardian’s “special correspondent” on food business would fail a basic economics class?
Morning, all.
At least her toddler is not a vegan
Yes, but is her child gender-normative? Because we may have to fix that:
“it seemed there was no part of our consuming lives they did not want to capture.”
Translation: They try to stock whatever we want to buy.
The bastards.
That.
David
I had a small post lined up regarding her, but somehow I let it slip into internet oblivion. Somehow you caught onto the gist of what I had written.
consider…
Could it be that in a society focused on individualism, rich in diversity and multiculturalism, children’s upbringing is one of the last bastions of intolerant adherence to tradition? I started wondering if home-schooling parents faced the same level of scrutiny and criticism.
She seems unaware on a general level what changes are going on around us. I’m not sure if she is really implying that adherence to traditional parenting is intolerant?. Or is it an intolerant adherence to tradition, meaning she knows better than those intolerant traditional people still doing things the wrong way? *shrug*. Either way the reality is that once you take away the traditional aspects of a culture and the parts that transmit that culture to the next generation you don’t have much culture or tradition left. Without culture there is no ‘diversity’ and no ‘multiculturalism’ to celebrate. All that’s left in her equation is (radical) individualism (and I guess some civic-nationalism) of which the gender neutering of our children is but one aspect. We cannot choose our sex and thus it restricts our ability to truly ‘self-create’ as fully autonomous individuals. Therefore gender is oppressive and must be made not to matter!.
It’s ironic she doesn’t realise that people are going to home school their children to avoid this kind of “upbringing”. I know that my wife and I will be keeping a close eye on the schools our future children might attend, and home schooling is an option we would consider.
“It also already had a Co-op so quite why Tesco should be singled out was a bit beyond me.”
Funnily enough, most of my friends who wax lyrical about the diversity of Mill Road’s shops do most of their shopping in Co-op. Apparently it’s bigger and more convenient than all those precious little “ethical” groceries that need to be protected, plus it stocks essential items such as bacon and booze. The much-resisted branch of Tesco, as well as being the symbol of all that is evil in modern retail, is also far too small.
As for me, I live slightly closer to Asda.
Armstrong and Miller’s take on the middle classes and the famers’ market
“Farmers'”. Damn.
The Tesco is there now and does a roaring trade.
The ‘No Tesco’ campaigns have attracted some lovely, lovely people.
Armstrong and Miller’s take on the middle classes and the farmers’ market
I think what won me over was the rhyming of ‘market’ with ‘Morten Harket’. That, and the line, “Cupcakes. Six for thirty pounds!”
“Everything is political” because the Left has decided it so. It’s like War – you are at war if an enemy attacks you. Your opinion that you aren’t at war is irrelevant – the bombs still drop.
And shambling groups like the often maligned MRAs are ruffling feathers because they assume it is actually war and fight in a similar manner. Feminists loathe their own rhetorical tricks when they are employed to describe the ‘personal is political’ lives of men.
“And shambling groups like the often maligned MRAs are ruffling feathers because they assume it is actually war and fight in a similar manner. ”
Yes, that’s why they are much maligned – it isn’t actually war, its a debate, and treating one like the other makes you look like a bit of a pillock.
‘That, and the line, “Cupcakes. Six for thirty pounds!” “
I liked “… and eggs with shit and feathers on”, but maybe that’s just me.
Here’s a thing. In the pages of the New Statesman, members of our cultural establishment try to find out which of them can piss highest in a disdaining white men competition.
That’s white men generally, apparently, but especially that “dying class” of “straight, white, middle-class men,” whose collective crimes include – but are in no way limited to – sexism, intolerance, humourlessness, lack of feeling, “greed, selfishness and homophobia.” Stephen Fry lets us know how much he dislikes those “ghastly” bourgeois people – the ones who aren’t famous and gay like him, that is – that “rotten, mushroomy class,” as he puts it. By which I assume he means the people who, you know, buy his books and watch his programmes (and thereby pay his mortgages). And possibly he means you, and many members of your family.
Oh yes, the middle-class white chap. That ultimate horror in the world.
Yes, but Fry does point out that he is talking about himself and his. And the Farage male that they are talking about is pretty ghastly, isn’t it? I think Laurie Penny is one of the brightest and friendliest commenters there, funnily enough.
Yes, but Fry does point out that he is talking about himself and his.
He tries to exempt himself from the worst of the “ghastliness,” the alleged sins of an entire notional class, on account of his being gay and having a Jewish mother. The absurdity remains.
And the Farage male that they are talking about is pretty ghastly, isn’t it?
Who mentions “the Farage male”? I don’t know what that means.
I think Laurie Penny is one of the brightest and friendliest commenters there, funnily enough.
I’ll just leave that there, shall I?
I think the Great White Male they are talking about is personified by Farage. he is the type whose days are numbered. We hope. I think the fungal quality of men like that is hard to overlook.
‘I think Laurie Penny is one of the brightest and friendliest commenters there, funnily enough’.
That isn’t exactly a complement for the others, if you actually think about it.
“I think the fungal quality of men like that”
For a moment I thought you were talking about a stereotyped diseased ridden outgroup like Gypsies or the Jews. I was about to object. Thank Gaia there’s a stereotyped diseased ridden outgroup we can irrationally hate.
I think the Great White Male they are talking about is personified by Farage.
But does anyone interviewed actually say that or even mention him? No. Instead, their comments are sweeping, and ostentatiously so. It’s signalling, after all. Hence the air of in-group conceit.
It reminds me of Jonathan Miller’s description of people who voted Conservative as “typhoid,” and his comments about the “idiocy” of bourgeois suburbanites, those idiots, the ones whose taxes pay for arts subsidies to loftier souls like Jonathan Miller. And it reminds me of Mary Warnock’s famous raging against Thatcher’s blouse, or rather, its suburban, lower-middle class connotations. It’s much the same dynamic.
“Thank Gaia there’s a stereotyped diseased ridden outgroup we can irrationally hate.”
Irrationally? Pfft. The ‘fungal’ was referring to the DH Lawrence poem, by the way.
Not entirely clear from the context I have to say.
like a fungus, living on the remains of a bygone life
sucking his life out of the dead leaves of greater life than his own
That makes all the difference doesn’t it. Likening the out group to disease is SO different to describing it as parasitic.
Irrationally? Pfft.
Do I take it that that means you genuinely hate them, and that same hatred is rational?
So that’s hatred; hatred of men of a specific ethnic group, whom, because of their demeanour, dress sense and your own pre-conceived notions as to the nature of their pre-conceived notions, it’s OK (being empirically rational) to hate?
Sheesh.
Right, I’m outta here for the evening. The latest batch of ephemera will materialise just after midnight. Play nicely. No spitting.
“it isn’t actually war, its a debate, and treating one like the other makes you look like a bit of a pillock”
Oh, there’s a debate?
You mean like the mob of topless feminists in Argentina who attempted to ‘debate’ the abortion issue by trying to storm a cathedral, then assaulting the men barring their way, spray painting the eyes and crotches, performing lewd sexual acts in front of them while screaming obscenities like a coven of distempered harpies?
Or feminist ‘professor’ Mireille Miller-Young who tried to debate the same issue by assaulting a teenage pro life activist and wrecking her sign?
Like the mob chanting ‘hail Satan’ outside a Texan abortion clinic who were intending to hurl jars of urine and feces before the cops confiscated them?
Perhaps you were thinking of the screeching hordes who gathered to condemn the defendants in the Duke rape case simply because they were white jocks, and continued lying about their guilt long after it became clear that the entire case was a hoax?
Yeah, there’s some real rational, cool headed, disinterested, facts-driven civilized debating going on right there. Anyone who sees any undue hostility from feminists must be some kind of pillock.
Yes, that’s why they are much maligned – it isn’t actually war, its a debate, and treating one like the other makes you look like a bit of a pillock.
What is it, exactly, that is just a debate?. Is Feminism just about polite debates?. That’s news to me. You could try telling that to those who are publicly labeled woman haters, creeps and rape supporters, for not seeing things the right way and for having an incorrect word-view. Incorrect meaning it doesn’t align precisely with Feminist dogmas.
Those of us who are adults know there is no literal war, and those few who genuinely hate their ideological opponents and passionately describe contested issues in terms of conspiracies, and their battles waged, aren’t just there for formal debate. Ok?. Further, while I’m not an MRA I’ve seen them in action often enough to know that what transpires between them and your average Feminist scold could hardly be called debate.
Yes, but is her child gender-normative? Because we may have to fix that:
Hopefully bleacher seats or an internet feed or something to allow mass viewing will be set up so that one and all can watch the wannabe administrators as all the student’s biology—
—-not sexual preference, not cultural influence, not baseball vs interesting matters, but biology—
—kicks in, and then the wannabe admins then have to explain that even though the students are all just blobs, some of the blobs seem to have some occurrence about once a month . . .
…some of the blobs seem to have some occurrence about once a month…
Blobs on the blob?
Blobs on the blob?
Yeah, that too—Albeit I seem to recall that faking with toilet paper is a longstanding favorite . . . which will then drag the vehemently denied reality right back out into the open again . . . !
Back to supermarkets.
Here’s Julie Burchill being brilliant about Tesco:
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2007/dec/19/tesco.supermarkets
“Do I take it that that means you genuinely hate them, and that same hatred is rational?”
I think hatiing UKIP is entirely rational if you hate the things they stand for (bigotry in general, racism in particular).
“Oh, there’s a debate?”
Yes, there’s a debate. If you think it’s a war I think you are teensy bit hysterical.
It’s worth pointing out, again, that Farage and UKIP aren’t mentioned anywhere in the article. Despite some jibes at “alpha males” and “middle-class white men” in particular, the bulk of the comments seem aimed at an entire notional class of white men, to which all manner of sins and supposed sins are casually assigned, as if self-evident. Apparently, this vast category of mankind should “end up in a zoo” or embrace extinction. It’s the woolliest of posturing.
“I think hatiing UKIP is entirely rational if you hate the things they stand for (bigotry in general, racism in particular).”
Don’t be disingenuous. I know that’s like asking gravity to stop working, but nevertheless.
It was you who introduced the notion of “the Farage male”.
And (leaving aside your disingenuousness for the sake of debate) if you hate UKIP as a whole because of “bigotry in general (and) racism in particular“, do you also extend your “rational” hatred to, say, Islam, based on similar criteria?
Just asking, like.
I looked up all the contributors to that New Statesman piece on Wikipedia. Out of 17, at least 10 went to Oxford or Cambridge, and at least 8 were privately educated. Every single one of them is part of the establishment. When they talk about the middle classes, they’re looking down. This is what passes for the left these days – the aristocracy sneering at the staff.
“And (leaving aside your disingenuousness for the sake of debate) if you hate UKIP as a whole because of “bigotry in general (and) racism in particular”, do you also extend your “rational” hatred to, say, Islam, based on similar criteria?”
Nothing disingenuous about it, I hate UKIP because it is a party of bigotry and racism. Islam is a different sort of thing. Of course it is, like Christianity, brimming with bigotry in its books and some of its doctrines and manifestations, but it isn’t a party. I don’t know why you think the things are alike.
And that’s how you square the circle?
Only one specific kind of ideological movement is worthy of hatred, the political party?
That’s ridiculous. Really, really ridiculous
“Only one specific kind of ideological movement is worthy of hatred, the political party?”
Islam isn’t even an ‘ideological movement’. You could choose any number of ideological movements within Islam (or Christianity) that are hateworthy, though. But I still don’t get why hating UKIP should require some sort of Islamic ideology test.
Troll, feed, don’t, the.
A little word puzzle, there.
Smudger- yes, of course.
Sometimes I just feel the need to get down and get all forensic.
Agree really I myself can’t help . sickness , sometimes a it’s
nice we all . if could though agree be It would
Islam is a political ideology first and foremost, with religious sanction. Anyone who would equate the bigotry and hatred inherent in Islam with Christianity is either a liar or a fool.
It’s a strange world where Tony Parsons and Julie Burchill appear to be the only sensible commentators.
Minnow chooses to attack the UKIP because, being generally civilized folk, they make for a soft target. It’s got nothing to do with principles or beliefs, it is to do with which provides the easiest avenue for self-righteous posturing which is at the same time entirely safe. It’s the equivalent of putting “likes Thai food” in a dating profile: an unimaginative cop-out.
Same bollocks (again) in the Observer.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/oct/26/supermarkets-reign-is-over-hail-the-independents
More people are shopping at big cheapo supermarkets Aldi and Lidl which ‘proves’ everyone wants to shop at farmers’ markets where food is more expensive. #ObserverLogic.
More people are shopping at big cheapo supermarkets Aldi and Lidl which ‘proves’ everyone wants to shop at farmers’ markets where food is more expensive. #ObserverLogic.
Heh. It’s as if they’re all using the same template. I notice Ms Blythman is also very fond of the presumptuous “we,” a term she uses repeatedly. She just knows how “we” feel, thanks to her uncanny mental powers. And amazingly, we all agree with her. Apparently, the entire nation is no longer interested in convenience or price, or the cost of their time, despite her own article suggesting otherwise, and everyone is itching to spend their afternoons using “farmers markets, box schemes, bread clubs [and] food co-ops.” Because paying more for food and spending much longer finding it, time few of us have, is “increasingly shrewd and practical.”
I hate UKIP because it is a party of bigotry and racism. Islam is a different sort of thing
In no way creating dubious distinctions to suit your progressive world-view, then.
The charge of “bigotry” we can ignore, as anyone can call each other bigots if they disagree. But “a party of racism”. What does that mean, exactly? Are all the members KKK members? Or did a UKIP member once display a slight fear of change to their world once?
Of course we know that anyone who wants to control immigration is going to be called racist/xenophobe by certain progressives, but that is more or less just name-calling. My point is that “a party of racism” is pure politics-speak, and designed specifically to obstruct understanding and stifle debate. I hope this might get through to whoever goes by the name of Minnow
(incidentally, my mother – a hard-working immigrant – also believes that UKIP contains nasties. I don’t know. Farage doesn’t seem to seethe with hatred, though some of UKIPs other members & supporters may be an odd lot. But I think it’s foolish to denounce everyone who shows concern over immigration as racists. There is such a thing as love for your own culture and values, and it is not the same thing as hatred for others’. Though I expect I’d have trouble getting that into some people’s heads..)