I do understand how someone can look at that picture and find it upsetting; I think that was the point.
― SHAUN (DJP), Wednesday, 22 January 2014 14:58 (ten years ago) link
That may well have been the point - a satire of racism, I don't know and tbh I doubt it. But the issue here is more Jones' explanation - that *this* piece is a "critique" of the misogyny of older piece - ok, but why does the artist need to use black women as a prop (instrumentalisation of bodies of WoC, etc) to make this point? And why does Jones, a white art bro, think it's ok? As NV says above, his approach is smug and dismissive.
― My god. Pure ideology. (ey), Wednesday, 22 January 2014 15:57 (ten years ago) link
oh I didn't read the Jones piece past the first few paragraphs, I decided life was too short
sorry, that's probably not helpful
― SHAUN (DJP), Wednesday, 22 January 2014 16:35 (ten years ago) link
http://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2014/jan/22/noel-gallager-hates-oasis-videos
"Is he trying to get to the CD player?"
― carson dial, Wednesday, 22 January 2014 17:03 (ten years ago) link
this is off topic, but has anyone else seen the documentary about Allen Jones that included interviews with people who own one of his sculptures and have it on display in their homes?
― Dolly Dilly Dally (soref), Wednesday, 22 January 2014 17:04 (ten years ago) link
so was that chair article mansplaining or whitesplaining?
― ^ sarcasm (ken c), Wednesday, 22 January 2014 17:14 (ten years ago) link
The headline for the Jonathan Jones article in the print edition is 'A pastiche that begged to be misunderstood', which seems a better/more measured title than 'Why there's nothing racist about the 'racist chair'', is the online headline just there to be more click-baity?
― Dolly Dilly Dally (soref), Wednesday, 22 January 2014 20:36 (ten years ago) link
though as said above Jones's article itself is not particularly measured or sensitive
― Dolly Dilly Dally (soref), Wednesday, 22 January 2014 20:38 (ten years ago) link
I would not buy that chair to sit on.
― cardamon, Wednesday, 22 January 2014 21:45 (ten years ago) link
She's sort of making the thing the artwork suggests come true - it seems to be saying 'We're such horrible people that we'd tie someone up and use them as a chair', or 'Somewhere, it is not unlikely that a chair like this would be for sale'. So actually using it as a chair, I mean
― cardamon, Thursday, 23 January 2014 02:41 (ten years ago) link
xpost Headlines online and print are almost always different. In print you can still have nuance, because the reader has the context of the whole page or article in front of them. Online headlines have to have all the key terms in, otherwise Google's alogorithms don't pick them up, which is why they all read so baldly. You could say that's clickbaity, but it's not actually trying to get to the reader so much as the search engine
― Unsettled defender (ithappens), Thursday, 23 January 2014 20:40 (ten years ago) link
I am just going to quote this particular review in the singles column, word for word:
Sheryl Crow - One (by Joe Bish). Sheryl Crow is the unequivocal queen of dad boners. If your old man is having trouble in the sack then just show him a picture of First Cut is the Deepest-era Crow and the blood will slowly march to his phallus like a stream of dutiful pallbearers on a busy Friday.
I especially want Dorian to read this. And to reflect that this is an actual review, which was printed in a national broadsheet, not the gutter press, not some fanzine, not the "would smash" threads of ILX, but a quality newspaper with national distribution, and presumably, the reviewer in question was paid to produce those words.
Now I want you to go back and read the comments about Ezra K and a few jibes about his eyelashes or his haircut or the cut of his casual slacks, and tell me, again, that the discussion between Alfred and I was problematic, or out of order, or even excessive, when compared to what is written up there above, in your own newspaper.
I mean, can you imagine someone reviewing the new Vampire Weekend single, saying "Ezra is the unequivocal king of mum boners. If your old lady is having trouble in the sack then just show her a picture of Vampire Weekend and the juices will start to flow until she's as lubed up and ready to rumble as a West Country holiday resort in flood season."
For real, that review is too stupid and too eye-rolly to get in any way upset over, but I just want to remind you the world that we live in, and what's problematic, and the environment in which mine and Alfred's comments take place.
― these birches is awful (Branwell Bell), Monday, 27 January 2014 13:09 (ten years ago) link
Disclaimer: I'm friends with Joe irl. This is his schtick, he's a bratty 20yr old who takes the piss out of everything. It's a tossed-off sentence in a singles review...
― the Shearer of simulated snowsex etc. (Dwight Yorke), Monday, 27 January 2014 13:13 (ten years ago) link
Except it isn't. It is the entire culture in which women are judged (as artists, as musicians, as politicians) by their effect on male members.
if your "bratty piss-taking" is indistinguishable from the thing it's taking the piss out of, you are part of the problem, not part of the solution. Why does this dude get a free pass on it for "piss-taking" but Alfred and I equally making jokes and having fun gets out the pearl-clutchers of ILM?
I'm not pearl-clutching at this review, it's too fucking dumb to waste time on. But I do want to say that this is the environment and the context in which *my* remarks get problematised? Really?
― these birches is awful (Branwell Bell), Monday, 27 January 2014 13:17 (ten years ago) link
amazing how bratty kidz just taking the piss are so often indistinguishable from sexist clichés that have been trotted out since time immemorial
― lex pretend, Monday, 27 January 2014 13:17 (ten years ago) link
lol xp
until she's as lubed up and ready to rumble as a West Country holiday resort in flood season
lolled a bit too hard at my desk tbh
― schlager top (Noodle Vague), Monday, 27 January 2014 13:19 (ten years ago) link
I'd be FPd if I took that as a display name, wouldn't I? ;-)
― these birches is awful (Branwell Bell), Monday, 27 January 2014 13:21 (ten years ago) link
did smirk, u shd tbh. start with 'as' for maximum effect
― i assume "Little Joey" (imago), Monday, 27 January 2014 13:23 (ten years ago) link
i think the consequences will be depressingly predictable
― schlager top (Noodle Vague), Monday, 27 January 2014 13:26 (ten years ago) link
http://cdn.hitfix.com/photos/408221/vampire-weekend-holiday_article_story_main.jpg
can someone add the caption 'king of mum boners' to this pic of Ezra, thx
― soref, Monday, 27 January 2014 13:33 (ten years ago) link
What happens on fridays?
― kinder, Monday, 27 January 2014 14:09 (ten years ago) link
OK, that’s it. The world doesn’t need any more “bratty 20yr olds who take the piss out of everything.” It needs proper writers who are capable of writing.
But I have to remind myself that this is the same paper which, over the last month, has run “thinkpieces” saying that Uk*p have a point and mass immigration does not, that Rachel Reeves cravenly copying Government policy on migrants is a refreshing addition to the debate, that it’s all right for male politicians to be “a bit creepy” (and that was the paper’s Chief Political Writer talking about the Rennard affair) and that old people are burdens on humanity who need to have their retirement toys taken away.
Also this is the paper which, despite their Christmas Eve letters page being entirely given over to angry readers threatening to take their business away unless the columnist who wrote the last article mentioned above was removed, continue to publish the columnist in question every Monday. What a great advertisement for young wannabe journalists; you want a column in the Guardian? Just break the law, lie to the police, get put in jail and have your old pals at the paper take you back when you come out. Why even bother with going through journalistic training when all the paper clearly wants is not good journalism but what Charlie Brooker correctly termed “yelpy clickbait”?
Then again, if you pay peanuts, you get bratty 20yr olds who take the piss out of everything.
― Here he is with the classic "Poème Électronique." Good track (Marcello Carlin), Monday, 27 January 2014 14:23 (ten years ago) link
I think it was just a pastiche that begged to be misunderstood, guys. Chill
I think "Proper writers" would be wasted on a review of Sheryl Crow - One.
― ^ 諷刺 (ken c), Monday, 27 January 2014 15:23 (ten years ago) link
I think broadsheet newspapers have a duty to inform, educate and entertain the highest common denominator of their readership rather than continually pandering to the lowest. Yes, it's elitist - but so is smugly assuming that your readers are so easily and stupidly pleased if you run nothing but hit-gathering clickbait.
― Here he is with the classic "Poème Électronique." Good track (Marcello Carlin), Monday, 27 January 2014 15:35 (ten years ago) link
xp Yeah obviously I don't like that review. I wasn't "problematising" your comments though. I made one comment, which was that Ezra's looks were being discussed in that thread more, and more negatively, than Warpaint's were. It's not like I was angry - someone else brought it up.
― Deafening silence (DL), Monday, 27 January 2014 15:47 (ten years ago) link
idk 2 wrongs don't make a right, the guardian is terrible but ilx doesn't need to sink to its level
― Mordy , Monday, 27 January 2014 16:25 (ten years ago) link
nobody gets paid to post on ilx tbf
― ^ 諷刺 (ken c), Monday, 27 January 2014 16:30 (ten years ago) link
*keeps shtum about sponsorship deals*
― schlager top (Noodle Vague), Monday, 27 January 2014 16:31 (ten years ago) link
I know this is getting off the point, but I would have thought Sheryl Crow was too young for 'someone your dad has the hots for' jokes, but then it occurred to me that if this guy is 20yrs old then All I Wanna Do came out within a year of his birth, and now I feel old
― soref, Monday, 27 January 2014 16:38 (ten years ago) link
depends how old your dad is i suppose?
― ^ 諷刺 (ken c), Monday, 27 January 2014 17:18 (ten years ago) link
tbf i have no idea what specific quality one needs to become a queen of dad boners
― ^ 諷刺 (ken c), Monday, 27 January 2014 17:19 (ten years ago) link
The guest-writer-reviews-the-singles bit of The Guardian has been consistently terrible for years. I don't know whether it's down to the brevity of the reviews or a reflection on the declining importance of the single as a format but, more often than not, it's just a vehicle for lower-rung bloggers to throw out some lazy, unpleasant zings. Thankfully, the rest of the music section is different.
Not wishing to get into the meat of the complaint but if a good poster has outlined why they're uncomfortable with a particular line being taken in a thread, that's usually a decent reason to think twice - irrespective of how many times worse some clown who writes for Vice may be.
― Ramnaresh Samhain (ShariVari), Monday, 27 January 2014 17:53 (ten years ago) link
There are plenty of outlets for that kind of drivel w/o the Graun getting in on the party. At least do it somewhere I'm not likely to see it, pls.
― ineloquentwow (Craigo Boingo), Monday, 27 January 2014 18:50 (ten years ago) link
Guide single reviews have always been mean-spirited - this isn't a new development.
― Deafening silence (DL), Monday, 27 January 2014 18:55 (ten years ago) link
This is his schtick, he's a bratty 20yr old who takes the piss out of everything cunt
fixed. Or what you said, basically. #bantz
― wins, Monday, 27 January 2014 19:03 (ten years ago) link
wins and lex otm
― My god. Pure ideology. (ey), Monday, 27 January 2014 19:49 (ten years ago) link
I don't think anyone itt is objecting to mean-spiritedness, irreverence etc, just thick lumpheaded #LADBANTZ
― ineloquentwow (Craigo Boingo), Monday, 27 January 2014 19:54 (ten years ago) link
The worst Guide revisw I've read was a couple of years ago, for a Tulisa single, where the reviewer saw fit to take the piss out of her allegedly deficient blowjob technique, which he'd watched on the tape that had just been leaked without her consent.
― mike t-diva, Monday, 27 January 2014 20:14 (ten years ago) link
The vibe has always been snark and sometimes it's funny and more often it's cheap shots and strained obnoxiousness. It's been like that as long as I've been reading it.
― Deafening silence (DL), Monday, 27 January 2014 20:26 (ten years ago) link
"Bratty 20yr olds who take the piss out of everything" is a respectable school of writing, or comedy writing, when it's done well.
― Chuck_Tatum, Monday, 27 January 2014 20:51 (ten years ago) link
I recall one that was like 'This, this is what grey-skinned council estate children are listening to' in a singles review for a popular girl band
― cardamon, Tuesday, 28 January 2014 18:53 (ten years ago) link
Also guardian book review section only reviews poetry books from a small list of high-profile uk poetry publishers and they are always puff-pieces, not reviews
― cardamon, Tuesday, 28 January 2014 18:54 (ten years ago) link
think there's probably a stepping-off point between snark and misogyny but maybe i am just trying to score Marc Loi points
― rock nobster (Noodle Vague), Tuesday, 28 January 2014 18:58 (ten years ago) link
http://www.cjr.org/the_audit/the_trust-fund_newspaper.php
Add it all up and GMG would have a nearly $1.9 billion pile of cash or, conservatively, somewhere around $1.6 billion after taxes (UPDATE: if they apply. See above update). Even if that cash were to get zero return and The Guardian isn’t able to cut its $51 million annual loss, it could fund the paper until about 2045.
― j., Thursday, 30 January 2014 15:01 (ten years ago) link
Charles Foster Kane: "You're right, I did lose a million dollars last year. I expect to lose a million dollars this year. I expect to lose a million dollars *next* year. You know, Mr. Thatcher, at the rate of a million dollars a year, I'll have to close this place in... 60 years."
― koogs, Thursday, 30 January 2014 16:34 (ten years ago) link
the level of quality one would expect of an extended january transfer window deadline day liveblog might not be very high but it's still worse than anything in recent memory on the guardian site including rhiannon lucy coslett's blog about onesies
― Pedro Mba Obiang Avomo est un joueur de football hispano-ganéen (nakhchivan), Friday, 31 January 2014 23:49 (ten years ago) link
I refuse to actually read the article but its existence was enough to upset me:http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/feb/02/delete-candy-crush-saga-from-phone
― the Shearer of simulated snowsex etc. (Dwight Yorke), Monday, 3 February 2014 14:32 (ten years ago) link
let's just agree to never read anything by stuart heritage
― fresh from zone one through zones A-D (c sharp major), Monday, 3 February 2014 14:48 (ten years ago) link
The Guardian is excruciating when it acts like yr fuddy parent. Be that wincing about modernity or trying to sell u £300 kitchen scales.
― ineloquentwow (Craigo Boingo), Tuesday, 4 February 2014 08:31 (ten years ago) link