Americanisation of BBC Radio 4

[doversoul1]

Thank you for correcting my mistake - I meant FREEDLAND when I wrote 'Franzen'. Senior moment (and I'm not that senior yet!)

But I feel my point holds - the female hacks (I'm afraid the word is appropriate here - though I will add, unnecessarily, that there are more hacks who are male) you name are not serious journalists or commentators. Their copy is reliably fluffy and pink-hued, so much so that I've stopped reading anything that appears under Marina Hyde or Zoe Willimas' byline. They sound like they desperately want to be writing for Jackie magazine instead of a 'serious' newspaper.

Very glad to hear this from someone who is not that senior.

[Conchis]

That is indeed a fair point, and it was an interesting part of the overall storyline, but the cynic in me suggests that potential sales to the US were also a factor at an early stage of the development of the series.

The whole concept was deeply reactionary and basically a clever ruse by Lord Fellowes to put insidious right-wing propaganda in a prime-time television slot: English toffs as basically decent sorts who justify the caps that are doffed to them and the humble good folk who live below stairs. No wonder the Americans fell for it so hugely.

Edited to add: Elisabeth McGovern has been resident in Britain for many years and is probably better-known here than she is in America.

[LMcD]

Nobody has yet mentioned the appalling Americanization (yes, that's how I spell it) of British orchestral life over the last 40 years or so. How may aeons will it take to undo the inestimable damage caused by Andre Previn, Leonard Slatkin and Marin Alsop? Previn's blatant ignoring of Vaughan Williams, in particular, was quite outrageous.

[Conchis]

I can understand male readers being irritated by women journalists. Just think how annoyed we get with the relentless macho fare we are drenched with daily...

Tbh, I'd struggle to name an op ed journalist/commentator of either sex who doesn't annoy me: the Guardian hacks, with the exception of John Harris (whose lonely task is to press the flesh of the great unwashed in Barnsley and Boston) all evince an 'N1 mindset' that suggests their pub crawl doesn't extend beyond Upper Street. The Telegraph's crowd are unspeakable, as are the windy chauvinists who pasture in the Fail and the Excrement (Express). If papers are looking to save money, they could follow the Huffington Post model, get rid of these creatures and throw the field open to talented amateurs who can do the job just as well without asking to be paid.

[Conchis]

Nobody has yet mentioned the appalling Americanization (yes, that's how I spell it) of British orchestral life over the last 40 years or so. How may aeons will it take to undo the inestimable damage caused by Andre Previn, Leonard Slatkin and Marin Alsop? Previn's blatant ignoring of Vaughan Williams, in particular, was quite outrageous.

I don't think his tenure of the BBCSO was a particularly happy one.

[doversoul1]

I can understand male readers being irritated by women journalists. Just think how annoyed we get with the relentless macho fare we are drenched with daily...

Do you mean female readers may not be irritated by women journalists?!

[Conchis]

Do you mean female readers may not be irritated by women journalists?!

Strident reactionaries like Frau Gove, Oakeshott, Hartley-Brewer, Mel ('the heretic') Phillips, Daley, et al.

[LMcD]

Strident reactionaries like Frau Gove, Oakeshott, Hartley-Brewer, Mel ('the heretic') Phillips, Daley, et al.

You make a good point - I never had that partner of 'her indoors' down as a socialist.

[jayne lee wilson]

Admittedly, that was a serious piece but I never read Sports journalism as I've no interest in sport. Is Sport where Ms. Hyde's true interest lies? If so, that's what she should stick to. Her op ed pieces are just fluff and gossip and I won't waste another second of my valuable time reading them.

More er, fluff from Marina Hyde.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/15/rees-mogg-robot-sidekick-steve-baker-brexit

Honestly Conch I could pull up many such excellent, satirical-analytical pieces. Why not just admit that you are
a) unashamedly sexist, and
b) that you haven't researched Hyde's work nearly enough.

But if you really do consider this piece "fluff" put your explication where your mouth is and analyse why...

Perhaps you think that I "should stick to".... what - Sport, Music...? Jess Cartner-Morley?

[jayne lee wilson]

I can understand male readers being irritated by women journalists. Just think how annoyed we get with the relentless macho fare we are drenched with daily...

Sorry greenfinch, but this is in itself sexist in its confirmation- bias of sexual stererotype... "Ooh, Men!" etc.
It takes, in 2018, a CERTAIN KIND OF MAN to be irritated by female journalists JUST BECAUSE THEY ARE FEMALE.
What a shame there are one or two trollish versions on this thread...

[jayne lee wilson]

Nobody has yet mentioned the appalling Americanization (yes, that's how I spell it) of British orchestral life over the last 40 years or so. How may aeons will it take to undo the inestimable damage caused by Andre Previn, Leonard Slatkin and Marin Alsop? Previn's blatant ignoring of Vaughan Williams, in particular, was quite outrageous.

Er, sorry LMcD but I mean, this was intended ironically wasn't it?
Because I don't think our interlocutors on this thread will have understood that...so, please confirm?

Just in case....

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=sr_nr_n_0?fst=as%3Aoff&rh=n%3A229816%2Ck%3Avaughan+williams+slatkin&keywords=vaughan+williams+slatkin&ie=UTF8&qid=1550523439&rnid=1642204031

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Dpopular&field-keywords=vaughan+williams+previn&rh=n%3A229816%2Ck%3Avaughan+williams+previn

[Bryn]

Er, sorry LMcD but I mean, this was intended ironically wasn't it?
Because I don't think our interlocutors on this thread will have understood that...so, please confirm?

Just in case....

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=sr_nr_n_0?fst=as%3Aoff&rh=n%3A229816%2Ck%3Avaughan+williams+slatkin&keywords=vaughan+williams+slatkin&ie=UTF8&qid=1550523439&rnid=1642204031

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb...illiams+previn

Well, let's face it, Slatkin was all at sea when it came to RVW, too, and he did not like women baring arms.

[Serial_Apologist]

More er, fluff from Marina Hyde.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/15/rees-mogg-robot-sidekick-steve-baker-brexit

Honestly Conch I could pull up many such excellent, satirical-analytical pieces. Why not just admit that you are
a) unashamedly sexist, and
b) that you haven't researched Hyde's work nearly enough.

But if you really do consider this piece "fluff" put your explication where your mouth is and analyse why...

Perhaps you think that I "should stick to".... what - Sport, Music...? Jess Cartner-Morley?

As one who doesn't read newspapers or therefore know those who write for them (except Ms. Toynbee, who's often on the telly) I was getting on well with Ms Hynde's article, until, that is, she laid into Corbyn, for... what, below the rhetoric, exactly??

Because they all do? Let's all have a nice groupthink bonding larf at shabby old Corbyn eh? Huh huh huh: from BBC reporters to Radio 4's News Quiz making heavy weather with not very funny stories from the previous week all presumably in the name of unsubstantiated balance. What have they got against the bloke apart from his looks? Antisemitism? Ah yes, that one we can't talk about here because it's either off-topic, too political or too sensitive. Never mind - the "moderates" will gather a few to their non-existent political stance, just in time for the Tories to win another General Election. Read it here. Told you so.

[Conchis]

More er, fluff from Marina Hyde.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/15/rees-mogg-robot-sidekick-steve-baker-brexit

Honestly Conch I could pull up many such excellent, satirical-analytical pieces. Why not just admit that you are
a) unashamedly sexist, and
b) that you haven't researched Hyde's work nearly enough.

But if you really do consider this piece "fluff" put your explication where your mouth is and analyse why...

Perhaps you think that I "should stick to".... what - Sport, Music...? Jess Cartner-Morley?

Sexism is one of those charges that can made against literally anybody. It's a question of perspective, though I probably do fit certain definitions of 'sexist'. I once did an online survey which concluded that I was 'not conspicuously sexist' - but what do I know?

[Conchis]

More er, fluff from Marina Hyde.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/15/rees-mogg-robot-sidekick-steve-baker-brexit

Honestly Conch I could pull up many such excellent, satirical-analytical pieces. Why not just admit that you are
a) unashamedly sexist, and
b) that you haven't researched Hyde's work nearly enough.

But if you really do consider this piece "fluff" put your explication where your mouth is and analyse why...

Perhaps you think that I "should stick to".... what - Sport, Music...? Jess Cartner-Morley?

Sorry - forgot to 'analyse' Ms. Hyde's essay, as per your request.

I found myself antagonised by it from the the first sentence, where she basically announces that this will not be a serious article. The use of teenage phrases like 'geeky' show her hand somewhat and it's hard to resist the feeling that she's taking an inappropriately light-hearted look at at very grim subject. I fear Ms. Hyde is often undermined by her own 'sense of humour', which has been the downfall of so many British writers, by no means all of them women. George Orwell once praised George Gissing for not suffering from this besetting national flaw.