Category Archives: Media

Oct 07 2013
16 Comments
Media

Bad Taste Or A Fitting Legacy?

clark kentI’m not known for being ultra politically-correct but seeing this advert in a couple of the weekend newspaper magazines left me feeling ever so slightly uncomfortable.

My first thought was, ‘ew, yet another company using a dead celebrity to sell something.’ Always leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Did Christopher Reeve really agree to put his name to a car from beyond the grave? And if not, who’s cashing in?

My second thought was, ‘what do I think about Audi using an actor who spent the last nine years of his life as a quadriplegic (and therefore would have been highly unlikely to drive the car) in an advert with the strap-line ‘Power from a less obvious place’?

Is this an empowering but at the same time patronising and misguided statement that yes, even disabled people can be powerful despite what society may think?

Well, apparently I’m completely wrong. When I saw my boss and brandished the advert under is nose, he said, ‘ahhhh, Christopher Reeve, the best Clark Kent ever. Wicked ad.’ Seeing my blank expression, he slowly said, ‘D’uh, Superman? You know, the office geek who changes into a superhero?’ Ah. Well, that explains it then. I’m also not known for being clued up about Batman or Spiderman either.

So the point of the Audi advert is that their new car is not on-the-surface powerful, but really it’s more powerful than it looks. Right, got it. Just like Superman.

Christopher Reeve had a riding accident in 1995, leaving him paralysed from the neck down and needing a respirator to help him breath for the rest of his life. He became very active in campaigns supporting handicapped children and paraplegics, and founded the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation in 1998 to promote research into spinal cord injuries. He died of a heart attack in 2004.

I’m still divided. My boss thinks it’s a brilliant legacy to a great actor. But to me, it boils down to being an advert for a car and Audi’s primary aim is to make money; they’re not using Christopher Reeve’s image for altruistic reasons. They’re simply hitching their wagon to a greater presence.

If I had a superpower, I’d choose invisibility. That way, I could be a fly on the wall in ad agencies so I could see just how they come up with these ideas…

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Oct 01 2013
28 Comments
Media

An Unlovable Frump

high heelsIt is a truth universally acknowledged that a woman in flat shoes will forever remain a frumpy, dumpy singleton. According to Amanda Platell anyway.

The journalist and previous press secretary to William Hague when he was leader of the Conservatives, has been reduced to bashing out sexist tosh in an article ‘How a week in flatties left me feeling SO low‘ (how the mighty have fallen, eh?).

The piece is disguised as an ‘experiment’ of a life-long high-heel addict testing flat shoes for a week. In reality, it is a two-pronged call to arms for women to a) attract a man and b) strive to appear slimmer (to attract a man).

Amanda’s verdict – in suitably childish, petulant language, ranges from ‘….he looked at me as though I was Frodo’s mum: a short, portly hobbit with weird feet’ to ‘(I was) walking flat-footed like a duck – and looking like one too’ to ‘flatties make you a fattie’. Incisive journalism at it’s best.

To ram the point home, she descends into even more offensive language. After testing a pair of £149 black velvet slippers from Pretty Ballerinas and being teased by a friend more used to seeing her in heels, she writes, ‘The ignominy, the shame. A slut who leaves home in her slippers! Move over, Vicky Pollard.’

So according to Amanda, if you wear flats, you’re not only a frump, but a frumpy slut. Furthermore, women in flat shoes have no hope of ever finding love. We must put our own needs to one side and strive to revert to the bad old days of dressing for men. Amanda is clear on this – ‘while women might love the comfort and stylish insouciance of flat shoes, men hate them. They’re just not sexy. There was never a pair of ‘kiss me quick’ or ‘fancy me’ flat shoes. They don’t exist.’

Who is this more offensive to – men or women? I’d be seriously worried if I met the man of my dreams and he spent the entire time looking longingly at my feet, rather than gazing in to my eyes and actually engaging in conversation.

She can keep her pathetic Cinderella fantasies, forever waiting for her Prince Charming to turn up, stiletto heel in hand. As for me, flats may limit my clothing choices, but they certainly haven’t dulled my brain. Jog on, Amanda. If you can….

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Sep 09 2013
16 Comments
Media

Let Them Eat Quinoa

fish and chipsJamie Oliver is waging war on working-class people who eat junk food in front of gigantic flat-screen TV’s, with his new cooking programme ‘Jamie’s Money Saving Meals’, showing now on a, er, TV, near you.

In yet another round of the scurrilous ‘let’s bash the poor’ game, Oliver (worth an estimated £150 million), who built his reputation and fortune on his ‘cheeky chappie, one of the lads’ act, has demonstrated just how much he has lost touch with reality.

Does he honestly not realise why some people have large TV’s? He may be able to take his kids on exotic foreign holidays, day trips to farms, indoor play parks, etc but when your budget is severely squeezed and these are a distant dream, the TV dominating the room is a window on the world. Hemmed in by lack of transport and no money, how else are people supposed to entertain their families?

And when your only local shop is a Happy Shopper, with a restricted range of food selling at premium prices, where are we supposed to buy Jamie’s suggested ‘basic store cupboard ingredients’ (total price £150) which includes quinoa, sesame oil and kaffir lime leaves?

For someone who is supposedly championing cheap, wholesome food and a return to basic cooking skills, he’s certainly cashing in. Twenty recipes in his obligatory book to accompany the series require a food processor. A basic one is around £60. His branded version comes in at £150. Nice one, Jamie. And the cook book? That’ll be £26.

In addition, essential equipment includes three types of graters, a pestle and mortar and a griddle pan, and yes, he sells them all too. The graters alone will set you back £40. So much for saving with Jamie. He states, ‘the Sicilian street cleaner (has) 25 mussels, ten cherry tomatoes and a packet of spaghetti…and knocks out the most amazing pasta’. Oh spare me the middle-class vision of our European cousins. Patronising, offensive twaddle. His hypocrisy is breathtaking. The people he’s really targeting are the chattering classes who think austerity chic is an amusing distraction, not a grueling way of life.

I used to admire Jamie Oliver, but the only person laughing all the way to the bank is him.

p.s If you really want to, you can buy his new cook book for a heavily-discounted £9.99 at www.thebookpeople.co.uk

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Aug 26 2013
12 Comments
Media

The Daily Fail

fifties housewifeAfter a cup of strong black coffee, I force myself to look at the Daily Mail every morning.

Before you start pelting me with rotten tomatoes, I read it to keep up with what the fabled Middle England thinks of benefits ‘scroungers’. And disabled people. And single mums. And mums who only have one child. I could go on. Knowledge is power.

Anyway, my particular gripe today is their ‘Femail’ section, published each Thursday. Here’s a selection of last week’s illuminating articles:

  • The couple who say the secret of a happy marriage is NOT having children – selfish and deluded or just honest?
  • The nun who ached to have a baby.
  • Would you let your man pack your holiday case?
  • I’m anorexic but love Bake Off. 
  • Simple tricks to look 10 years younger.
  • The real reason you’re stressed….SUGAR.
  • The new parenting fad experts fear could KILL your baby. 
  • The five shoes every woman should own. 
  • Quicker chores. 

If this is a snapshot of today’s modern woman, just hand me a bottle of Fairy Liquid and chain me to the kitchen sink in protest. Apart from the fact it’s truly astounding we even have a dedicated women’s section in a national newspaper (we can’t handle the proper news, eh?), this section consistently rams home the same old dreary message week after week: all women (even nuns) want children, and if they don’t, there’s something wrong with them. All mothers need expert guidance, or we could kill our babies.

We also all want to lose weight (either that or we’re at the anorexic end of the spectrum), look younger, need tips for whizzing through the housework faster, presumably to allow us more time to affectionately tease our ‘men’ when we let them pack our suitcases for us only to sigh at their helpless, endearing incompetence. Men, eh?

The subtext message is even more sinister than just wanting to keep us in a Prozac-ed version of the 1950’s. The paper consistently pits women against each other – who can forget the Samantha Brick ‘I’m so beautiful’ furore? We might laugh at this ridiculous newspaper, although their ‘experts’ could quite feasibly claim too much laughter leads to cellulite (here’s 10 top tips to deal with this orange-peeled menace!), but the fact is, The Daily Fail has a daily readership of over 4 million and their website has over 100 million unique visitors a month.

Don’t ask my opinion though, I’m far too busy whipping up a tasty meal for my man. Oh. I don’t have a man. Maybe it’s the cellulite?

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Jun 26 2013
23 Comments
Media

The Peasants Are Revolting

Mark LittlewoodMark Littlewood, Director General for the Institute of Economic Affairs, a free market think tank, wrote an inflammatory article for the Mail on Sunday last week, urging the government to publish the names of every benefits claimant and exactly how much they each receive.

He would like a full list on a publicly accessible website for everyone to inspect, as ‘taxpayers have a right to know exactly who is claiming what and how much they are getting…this wouldn’t be ‘naming and shaming’…after all, if you are legally entitled to a particular benefit, what is there to be ashamed about?’

Sticking the knife in, he says that ‘anyone ashamed to claim money from the State maybe shouldn’t be claiming it.’ Mr Littlewood, I claim benefits and yes, I am ashamed to be in that position but what is my alternative to not claiming benefits? Most of them top up my minimum wage. I work, I study, I am bringing up a healthy and happy child but I am also living with a disability. Are you advocating bringing back dark, satanic mills and workhouses for the poor and needy?

Yet again, the most vulnerable and weakest members of society are being put in the village stocks and blamed entirely for this country’s financial woes. So let’s investigate a little further.

Mr Littlewood pleads, ‘I’m simply asking, on behalf of all those who pay for the welfare state, for a bit more information and transparency.’ Strange, that. The IEA is a registered charity. In 2011, Guardian journalist George Monbiot requested their sources of funding. The IEA declined to reveal these. Transparency? Furthermore, the American Friends of the IEA, whose sole purpose is to provide funds for the IEA, has received $215,000 from two secretive funds as of 2010.

Mr Littlewood attempts to fan the flames further by writing, ‘surely no one needs worry about violent retribution against claimants. The British are far too reasonable to start taking up pitchforks and burning torches and assaulting imagined benefits cheats.’

An interesting choice of words – I imagine that’s a scenario he would love to see transpire, which would at least deflect attention from the £89.5 million paid to MP’s in expenses a year, to top up their wages (is ‘expenses’ a posh word for benefits?) and the £1 trillion or so in bankers bailouts over the last five years. Benefit fraud is apparently £5 billion a year. Tax avoidance and evasion? £120 billion a year.

It’s much more fun to pin the blame on those with no voice though, isn’t it, Mr Littlewood?

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