From the archives – and from the golden age of the Guardian – some examples of improbable agonising.
The Cupcake Menace.
Women, we’re told, are being mentally injured by small baked goods.
After telling us at length just how terrible and mind-warping these tiny fancies are, at least among women, Mr Seaton adds, “I don’t want to ban cupcakes.” And yet he feels it necessary to
say this, as if banning miniature sponges would be an obvious thing to consider, the kind of thing one does. And after banning them in his own office.
A commenter asks, “What is it with people’s inability to ignore the things they don’t like?” Meaning things you don’t like and which have no bearing whatsoever on your everyday life or the turning of the world. Say, “our” alleged “obsession” with cupcakes and their supposedly debilitating effects on helpless, hapless womenfolk. Women being so mentally insubstantial that even a tiny cake can unhinge their minds, apparently.
But fretting ostentatiously about things of no importance has long been a standard template for Guardian articles, especially if you can shoehorn in some sophomoric theorising. It’s something most papers do to some extent, due to the obligation to Fill Space Somehow, but the Guardian is by far the greatest exponent and the most grandiose. Many of its contributors have mastered inadvertent surrealism.
As commenter sk60 quipped in reply,
I love it when Guardianistas talk about “our obsession” with something that no-one I know is obsessed with.
Two Balls Bad, No Balls Good.
On being oppressed by suburban barbecues, where, it turns out, the Patriarchy reigns and women are crushed underfoot.
Mr Power is upset that some heinous “biological determinism” holds sway in the warm-weather custom of cooking outdoors. A phenomenon that, we learn, “sees women as salad-spinners and men as the keepers of the grill, the tenders of the flame, lords and masters of the meat.” “It’s a sausage-fest out there,” says Mr Power. “And it’s getting ugly.” Because there’s nothing
uglier than the sight of menfolk indulging, often knowingly, in a clichéd male behaviour – cooking for friends and family and making sure that everyone is
having a good time.
I’ve been to a few barbecues over the years, one or two with female grill-keepers, though most with males wielding the Plastic Spatula of Oppression™. I can’t say I was ever aware of much argument as to roles. It generally seems to depend on who’s in the mood or who’s the better cook, at least of the items in question, or – perhaps more commonly – who’s prepared to spend the day on duty, sweating, while smelling of grease and smoke.
I’ve yet to hear of womenfolk being locked indoors, away from the charcoal and firelighters, by surly, hissing men. And at the barbecue I attended recently, the matriarch of the house had a much more important job than merely cooking sausages. My sister-in-law kept the day lubricated with endless, quite colossal, pitchers of Pimms. Priorities, you see.
It doesn’t seem to have occurred to Mr Power that quite a few people, male and female, actually enjoy the role-play opportunity of the barbecue – the theatre, the ritual, the fun. Even – heresy! – gendered fun. But hey, the point is that some of you heathens are still arranging your leisure time and social gatherings in a way of which our Guardianista disapproves. Your barbecues aren’t being gender balanced in the way he would like.
Also, the assertion by our learned journalist:
Several thousand years have passed since men had to kill our protein, make a fire, cook it and eat it.
Her Unspeakable Woes.
Guardian writer is psychologically crushed by spellcheck software, disposable paper cups.
You see, Ms Icess Fernandez Rojas has endured this poignant political struggle before – “a lifetime of having my name misspelled and mispronounced.” Which is why you, the public, must be
told. What with your dull and obvious names, like Jessica and Angela.
“Angela could get coffee at Starbucks with ease,” says Ms Rojas, “while Icess was still spelling her name out.” Oh, this new realm of suffering: “Jessica was a staple at my local Chinese place even though Icess paid. And even Microsoft Word recognised Jenny as a proper pronoun, a proper person, over me; the red squiggle line was a constant reminder.”
Spellcheck too? Will this oppression never end? And doubtless Ms Rojas is intimately familiar with the spelling and pronunciation of every name of every employee at her local Chinese restaurant.
Prompted by Ted S in the comments. Which you’re reading, of course.
For those craving more, this is a pretty good place to start.
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