Media landscape / Acid rain

[hirez]

I dunno that it's worth the wear on fingers, brain and keyboard to fulminate about the supreme uselessness of Guardian journos, but I may as well get it out of my system here rather than gesticulating outside the newsagents. And, really, the Guardian motoring section is more of a tick-list inclusion in one or other of the Saturday throw-outs, along with 'Me and my spoon', 'Pictures of rich people you don't know', 'Useless man's opinion', 'Useless woman's opinion', 'Advert for bicycle-shaped objects' and 'Advert for very mildly pervy underwear'.

So. Guardian mithering section. This week's mithering was one or other of the blokes that write the 'What I watched and you didn't you hopeless pleb god I wish I was as good as Charlie Brooker.' They'd given him some oil-burning Jag and presumably told him not to Troy Queef the thing because it might make George Monbiot cry. Thus him + sig. other beetle off up the M40. And get stuck in the snow. So have to spend the night in Stokenchurch.

How on earth do people that useless manage to live in towns and not get run over by milkfloats or mugged by pensioners?

Obviously, the Guardianista agenda is that large cars are just icky and any opportunity to cast them in poor light must be leapt upon, but that's kind of expected to be the sort of subtext that requires attentive reading. It's a bit bloody desperate when the entire article boils down to 'I can't drive and cars smell of poo!'

Meanwhile the other utterly useless tellybloke is interviewing Simon Pegg and is so completely wet that a Young Ones reference has to be carefully explained.

Lest anyone get the idea that I'm about to start jabbering about Men's Rights and sod off to join a drumming circle peopled by useless bastards... Actually, fuck it. Men's Rights and drumming circles? Useless bunch of bastards. You wouldn't catch anyone who was, y'know, actually any good at stuff having owt to do with that malarkey.

Oh. Hold on. Bit of a leap there. See, what I think is going on is some broken thinking about equality through abdication of competence. There was an article in the same Guardian a couple of weeks ago about some bloke feeling like he didn't measure up because his dad did DIY (to the level of extension building), plumbing, sparking, car-mending and presumably the rest of the Heinleinian competency checklist. And none of these things went badly wrong enough to require the appearance of a smirking Nick Fucking Knowles to make a Heartwarming Documentary.

So anyway, it seems to me that competence and knowing stuff is seen as inimical to equality, which is so far beyond fucked up that I don't know where to begin with it.

And I think that's kind of the thing. It's a massive point-missing exercise, just like their AssangeWikileaks 'coverage'. They're trying to make it all about his personality (hacker - it's either missing or impenetrable to that lot) rather than the sodding data. And the silly bastard should totally go to Sweden and do his bloody time rather than bleating about being caught. Jayzus. (Although, scene-whores, right? Let's not pretend they don't exist.)

Further lest: Stewart Lee nails what's wrong with Top Gear. It is well worth fifteen minutes of your time. Who knows, while you're occupied with that, one or more useless 'celebrities' will have used up their Warholian allotted time and will have been shot by sandmen for attempting to evade Carousel. It's win-win.

Comments

[ellen-fremedon.livejournal.com]

some broken thinking about equality through abdication of competence

Oh god this. It's such a toxic idea, and you see it everywhere.

It mostly seems to come down to what I've seen described as subtractive masculinity, or oppositional masculinity-- the notion that manhood is being everything women aren't, or maybe more accurately being nothing that women are.

Which tends to lead to frantic attempts either to deny that women are competent people with agency, or to deny that men are. Either way, it's pretty horrid.

[hirez.livejournal.com]

Ha. Not just me then. Good. Well, not 'good', but You Know What I Mean. I wasn't entirely sure I'd quite identified what I was seeing and was being a bit of a bloke about it.

However, yes. Quasi-essentialist idiocy of the highest order.

[quercus.livejournal.com]

I was invited to a mens' drumming circle last weekend (hippies). Obviously I spent it polishing the cat instead.

Tell me more of this Carrousel for celebs. Have you sold the TV rights yet?

[hirez.livejournal.com]

"The thing about the drumming makes them real easy to hit with a high-powered rifle..." (Should have been Bill Hicks, but probably Dennis Leary.)

I hadn't thought about it too hard. Obviously we need it to be presented by Jenny Agutter.

[quercus.livejournal.com]

That Hicks / Leary confusion is a tough one. With hindsight, Hicks clearly invented it all, but Leary does do it better.

[reddragdiva]

Oh! Oh! You know what's particularly fun with these people? Intimating the existence of homosexuality. Particularly in regards to oneself. The dears' heads EXPLODE. It's marvellous.

[quercus.livejournal.com]

Homosexuality?

These are people who wear lumberjack shirts because they're fecking lumberjacks. There really is nothing deeper to it than that.

[reddragdiva]

No, I mean:

"You need to release your manly emotions, through hugging and stuff."
"Oh, really? I do that a lot. I have a boyfriend."
*head explodes*

[easterbunny.livejournal.com]

Hilarity achieved. Fine post, sir.

[s0b.livejournal.com]

The full SL rant is 40 minutes long - it gets funnier each time I watch it

[inulro.livejournal.com]

There was an article in the same Guardian a couple of weeks ago about some bloke feeling like he didn't measure up because his dad did DIY (to the level of extension building), plumbing, sparking, car-mending and presumably the rest of the Heinleinian competency checklist.

My dad did all that. I spent most of my childhood assisting him, so I have a pretty good idea how a lot of stuff works (more with the building, less with plumbing and electricity, even though I spent New Year's Day when I was 16 helping him re-wire the basement; in my defence I was hung over).

As a result, I have decided that I have better things to do with my non-work time than fix the bloody house. There's a few things I don't mind doing, but I have no guilt whatsoever about paying someone to do everything else.

Interestingly, it is not my dad who has a go about this, but my mother, whose helpfulness in all the renovation work at home was measured in negative numbers. (Shouting that we're doing it wrong and are making a mess is Not Helping).

[reddragdiva]

My girlfriend does all that. And used to go hunting to feed her kids. At least I'm good with computers.

[steer.livejournal.com]

And the silly bastard should totally go to Sweden and do his bloody time rather than bleating about being caught.

Hum... No really... that would be silly wouldn't it.

If he has done it (or is likely to go down for it anyway) the best thing for him would be to stay here and hence avoid the charge and associated increased probability of being yoinked over to America and then whatever thing might happen at the hands of the US justice system.

If he has not done it same applies.

If he WAS silly then he'd be on the plane going "I must clear my name" to stand "not trial" (apparently no jury for this one) in Sweden.

[quercus.livejournal.com]

AIUI, he has already "done his time" in Sweden, and they binned it as "no case to answer". It took a second investigation, spurred by Swedish politicos, spurred by goodness knows what sort of spookery, to get it back onto the radar.

Given our past track record though, I'd see the UK as being appreciably closer to Guantanamo than Sweden. I think that Sweden might inconvenience him for some time, possibly have him doing hard time in a Swedish nick, and would thus keep him off the Wikileaks agenda for a while. However if they plot was to stick him in the stockade at Leavensworth, he'd be better avoiding Northolt, not Stockholm.

[steer.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure what to believe myself. If you believe the Swedish authorities it's quite normal for one prosecutor to say "no case" someone to say "O'Rly?" and another prosecutor to say "we will pursue this will the full force of Swedish justice".

if they plot was to stick him in the stockade at Leavensworth, he'd be better avoiding Northolt, not Stockholm.

I wouldn't know myself but it's certain that's not the case his defence team are making and they are presumably legally trained. If it was complete and obvious bullshit the judge and opposing lawyers would surely spot it as such.

Edit: Hmm... it maybe the judge has just said exactly this.

Edit to edit: My mistake it was the prosecutor and he said that he believed that 'it would be impossible Mr Assange could be extradited without a media storm'". Note the careful choice of words (it's true but it's 100% misleading) -- were I Mr Assange I would find this scant reassurance.

[reddragdiva]

He has Geoffrey Robertson defending him, which I suspect is as good as it gets. I am starting with the assumption that anything Mr Robertson says is competent and to the point in the courtroom, until proven otherwise.

[steer.livejournal.com]

Indeed my opinion too -- what he says is likely to either be true or not trivially detected as untrue.

[zotz]

"Trial" seems a bit harsh. Juries are far less common outside English-speaking countries, and my now-lawyer then-girlfriend used to tell me very definitely that juries were overrated. She got a first, so I assume she knew what she was talking about.

[steer.livejournal.com]

Hmm... I'm not sure I'd find the reassurance "juries are over-rated" quite so comforting if it was me facing "trial" in a non-public session by a single judge and with a large and influential country rather pissed off at me. Maybe I'm just paranoid about these things.

[zotz]

Apparently these systems generally work better than people accustomed to widespread jury trials tend to expect. Jury trials, on the other hand, don't work nearly as well as people accustomed to widespread jury trials tend to expect. It's not like juries haven't done their bit to create miscarriages.

[steer.livejournal.com]

I think you're missing the point of my objection which is not jury trial versus non-jury trial but the combination of non-jury trial, behind closed doors trial and defendent who has pissed off major world governments.

[zotz]

Non-jury trials are generally held to be less susceptible to public pressure than jury trials. Again, that's from what I recall from living with a law student. A trial in camera is still a trial, not a "trial". We have them here too, of course. I don't know what proportion of rape trials in Sweden are held in camera - articles about this case seen to disagree, and I can't find anything else in English. The Swedish situation certainly doesn't sound ideal, but then it's fairly well-known that things aren't ideal here either, and I'm starting to weary of Assange's team arguing that justice will be impossible simply because it's not done the same way as it is in London.

Maybe they'll defeat the prosecution, but they sound a little desperate to me.

[steer.livejournal.com]

Non-jury trials are generally held to be less susceptible to public pressure than jury trials.

And if you were Julian Assange is it "public" pressure you'd be worried about?

A trial in camera is still a trial, not a "trial". We have them here too, of course.

Um... I think the actual thing is going to be *not* on camera, not in public and with no jury. Now, can you seriously and honestly say that this wouldn't worry you in the slightest IF you had upset major world governments.

Remember I'm not talking about the general case I'm talking about the specific case. So all the "in general secret trials with no juries are very fair" stuff aside (and really, you really believe that? I'm surprised -- not questioning the principle, I'm just surprised to hear you say it), even if you are convinced that's true would it be what you wanted in this specific case if you were J. A.?

[zotz]

And if you were Julian Assange is it "public" pressure you'd be worried about?

Yes, actually. As are his lawyers - they've been going on about information leaks and publicity.

*not* on camera

"In camera", not on camera. And whether it will be, as I say, I don't know. Like I say, there is much assertion and little information.

Notably this is also not necessarily the same as secret - as I understand it transcripts are released if there's not a particular reason not to, which doesn't happen in trials in camera in Britain.


you really believe that? I'm surprised -- not questioning the principle, I'm just surprised to hear you say it

Well, as I say, I had this argument some years ago, with me putting forward all the objections you are, and I lost the argument heavily. I have tried to draw a lesson from that, and it is this:

Other countries' legal systems work differently, and have found different solutions to the problems that all legal systems tend to face. Objecting to the fact that their procedures differ, without asking whether their different procedures are capable of doing the job, is actually to miss the point entirely. To take that approach is to fail to actually address the issues, and indeed to recognise what the issues are.

The question is not whether it's safe to extradite to somewhere without juries, it's whether the mechanisms used instead in trials there are likely to result in a fair trial. And to discuss that meaningfully you need to know more about the Swedish system than just that it doesn't use juries.

And I don't notice from the reports that his lawyers are really doing that. They seem to be throwing everything they can think of at the wall in the hope that enough of it sticks. I don't think I'd want to be relying on that approach, although it is sometimes known to work.

would it be what you wanted in this specific case if you were J. A.?

No, I'd want the whole thing to go away, whatever had actually happened. Personally I think that the concerns about the Swedish system are being stressed greatly by his legal team because they're his legal team and that's their job. I do admire their chutzpah, incidentally, in arguing that he can't have a fair trial because the prosecutor is biased against him.

[steer.livejournal.com]

And to discuss that meaningfully you need to know more about the Swedish system than just that it doesn't use juries.

I do. I know also that the trial would not be public (or at least that everyone has said this and nobody has said otherwise). But there's really not much point in continuing this as you seem determined to argue the general case of juries versus not juries and english system versus not english system which I don't care to contest.

[zotz]

Fair enough.

nobody has said otherwise

That's another problem. "Would" is an absolute word, whereas as far as I can tell from reading around the correct phrasing would be "sometimes but not always". Doesn't increase my faith in the argument much.

[quercus.livejournal.com]

I'd take a French non-jury trial over a US jury trial with a sharp prosecutor cherry-picking the jurors.

[steer.livejournal.com]

See reply to zotz.

[nemesis-to-go.livejournal.com]

It's not Giles Smith (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lost-Music-Giles-Smith/dp/0330339176/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1297161217&sr=1-1) doing the Grauniad's motoring column now, is it? I can't find anything online by him past 2008.

He was like the anti-Jeremy Clarkson. He often went off at whimsical tangents, but I'm sure he was more in tune with the way most people think about cars than any bout of Clarksonian drooling over performance figures.

There was always at least one line that made me laugh out loud, such as in this one (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/may/03/motoring):

"White and brown? It would be like driving around in one of Joan Collins' handbags."

My all-time favourite line came in a review of some vast MPV. Surveying the wide open spaces of the back end with the seats folded down, Giles Smith remarked...

"I have danced in smaller church halls."

[hirez.livejournal.com]

I fear not. 'Lost in music' is a splendid book which made me haul out the Cleaners from Venus LP on the off-chance that it or my ears had matured. It still wasn't terribly good. Perhaps I should try it again.

[reddragdiva]

"So anyway, it seems to me that competence and knowing stuff is seen as inimical to equality, which is so far beyond fucked up that I don't know where to begin with it."

See my recent entry on typing. I shudder to contemplate the responses to the forthcoming one on decluttering.

You need a column, commentating on commentators. FOR MONEY!