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OH WHAT A CIRCUS, OH WHAT A SHOW!
Oh the hullabaloo. Nothing can stop us now. “Liverpewl, Liverpewl”. We’re European Capital Of Culture! Next, the World!
And all fanned and encouraged by the Merseyside media. Did you ever see such a pathetic display of parochialism in your life?
And local millionaires and celebrity nonentities: what they know about Culture is summed up in a city centre outdoor concert that looked more like a building site, complete with boiler suits and hard hats.
A multi-millionaire pensioner, perched on the roof of St George’s Hall - who can’t and never has been able to - sing, cynically using the event to line his bulging pockets with loads more bucks.
And Phil Redmond’s sentimental nonsense and ready-made fable about it all being like a “Scouse Wedding?” Never heard that one before. And I was born and bred here.
And media sycophants of A to X celebrities like a certain editor of a certain local newspaper? How much egg has he got on his face after that fawning piece he did about “our” Ringo, who, a few nights later on Jonathan Ross, boasted he couldn’t give two f…s about Liverpool?
And what about “Liverpewl’s” international prestige as European Capital of Culture? There are two other Liverpools - in America and Australia. How would world-wide TV viewers know which one it was? There wasn’t a Union Jack to be seen anywhere. Come to that, not even a European one. That’s the extent of the CoC Quango-ites PR nous.
George Skelly
Other articles at lxnews.co.uk
AN ENGLISH GIRL IN MARBELLA on May 13th, 2008
BACK TO THE FUTURE on April 17th, 2008
DROPPING OUT AND MOVING ON on April 12th, 2008
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If he’s a multimillionaire then he won’t be drawing a pension. Used here “pensioner” is entirely negative and belies a prejudice.
First Liverpool wants to take over the world, then they’re being parochial. Which is it?
“fanned and encouraged”? Don’t mix metaphors.
The alphabet goes a-z rather than stopping at x.
I’m fairly certain that anyone concerned or aware about which city was European Capital of Culture will also be aware that australia and the U.S. are not part of Europe but are, in fact, on entirely different continents.
Don’t start sentences with “and”, at the least not all the time.
The final sentence is nonsense, like a small child was given Daily Mail clippings to paste together. Why is it necessary to have Union Jacks visible at all?
If this event had worldwide television coverage then perhaps they know a thing or two after all…
So the writer’s prejudiced against the elderly cos he figuratively uses the word “pensioner”? Come off it Gav! How do you know Ringo the multi-millionaire doesn’t draw his pension? Members of the Royal Family like Princess Diana used to draw their Child Benefit.
You can be parochial and still scream out to the world about how and great you are. There doesn’t have to be any contradiction in that. And Liverpool does sometimes think it’s a City state!
Sorry Gav, “encouraged” is not a metaphor so where’s the mixing?
The alphabet may go from A-Z but celebrities names don’t necessarily!
By your silly,fashionable denigration of the Daily Mail,you’re obviously on the trendy Loony Left bandwagon.
Get a life Gav!
That article was right on the money!
no, i said it’s usage here is negative, and, therefore, belies prejudice. Why is it important that we are told Ringo Starr is a pensioner? Is the subtext that being old means that you don’t have a place in the capital of culture? my point is that there was no need to say he was a pensioner unless it is intended to be derogatory.
you can fan flames, you encourage a person, metaphor was probably the wrong word but you see my point.
Catherine Zeta-Jones
Billy Zane
Frank Zappa
Renee Zelwegger
Zach Braff
Zoe Ball
Zinedine Zidane
does Ziggy Sardust count?
You can read the mind of an entire city? whoah.
Whats silly about disliking a paper which is nationalist, xenophobic and reactionary?
no, the article wasn’t right on much at all.
Gav, since you are doling out lessons about English grammar to the writer of the piece, (”Don’t begin sentences with And”) maybe you could take a few yourself by managing to start your sentences with a capital letter!
As for the pensioner Ringo: surely the writer was simply illustrating the absurdity of the spectacle of a 68 year-old millionaire perched atop St George’s Hall trying to sing and being indulged by the Liverpool public and media simply because he had been the Beatles drummer 40 years ago.
I too take offence at this Gav. As news editor I would not allow any article to be published that is nationalist, xenophobic or reactionary. Please list to me any articles in the news section over the past three issues which you feel falls into any of the above categories. I sincerely doubt you’ll find any whatsoever! If you can find any and I feel that you have a point then i’ll offer you an apology, if not then I expect one back for making false defamatory claims against LX News.
Woah woah woah Fran and James, if you read the comments, Gav is calling the Daily Mail ‘nationalist, xenophobic and reactionary’, not us! Toys back in the pram boys.
Thanks Nic, i was referring to the Daily Mail not LXnews. Having the opportunity to write for and be printed by LX is as important to me as i’m certain it is for everyone else; however I think it’s beyond question that the content of the DM is as i said.
Don’t forget the great work Ringo Starr did on Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends, perhaps the formative experience of my early childhood. He is a legend in his own right, long may he live to draw his pension.
If you’ll excuse me, i’m going to go practice my capital letters.
And pick my dummy up…
So, “The “great work Ringo did on Thomas The Tank Engine” was the formative experience of Gav’s childhood! Well, that helps to explain his childish, puerile views on world matters and the Daily Mail!
As for his views on that paper being “beyond question”, isn’t he aware of it’s regular penetrating questioning and criticism of the most bureacratic, reactionary “Labour” government for decades. Or it’s numerous social campaigns such as “Dignity For The Elderly”? Or is it that he prefers the Guardian for its endless adverts for professional and academic non-jobs at the expense of us taxpayers?
In my humble opinion, your reviewer is spot on, both in his critisicism of the event and of the local media. While pedants pick up on grammar - give the lad a break! - the Town Hall is seething with corruption, power is routinely abused, incompetent fat cats are paid off with huge cheques and millions of pounds in public money is wasted by a bankrupt city council which is £60million in the red and is now officially ranked as the worst in the country. And people still can’t get their windows fixed! Methinks the student populace should be told….
And i like beginnning sentences with And…
Sorry for my over reaction Gav, you have my humble apology.
You don’t deny that the Daily Mail is reactionary and xenophobic then? perhaps we are in agreement on that. Without being overly cynical the primary reason that the DM ran it’s “Dignity” campaign is because they are it’s target demographic.
I am aware of it’s criticisms and consider this to be par for the course, if a paper were not to be critical of our current government it would be a serious anomaly.
I prefer the guardian because it’s not outright racist, though it has it’s flaws. To begin with it’s coverage of defense, security and anti-terrorism is biased, heavily so, and it is at times contradictory on the issue of islamophobia. Furthermore, there is some work by Chomsky where he makes a strong case that the G was implicitly building public opinion in favour of either the iraq war or an invasion of Iran, I forget which possibly both, both of which i am opposed to.
The difference for me is I can normally stomach reading the G with a critical mindset whereas I’d sooner snort soggy cornflakes than read the Daily Tripe.
Perhaps you missed the note of sarcasm when discussing Thomas the tank engine. And yes I am quite childish.
If George was being critical of the council then he should have been explicitly critical of the council, rather than the quango or those councillors or ministers with influence over the quango. If he was being critical of the concept of a quango, quasi-autonomous non-government organisation (a name both Orwellian and oxymoronic), then he should have been explicitly critical of quangos rather than staging a brief attack on it’s PR knowledge.
There are ways of being openly critical of our representatives in local and national government, if this is how we intend to do it then they needn’t worry about allowing us freedom of speech…
Gav, if we can cut through your verbal diarhohea for a moment to reach some clarity. How much space do you think LX columnists have to put across their point?
You are now accusing George of not including or specifying every item under the sun!
The clarity being that you have almost- via the old “guilt by association” trick - accused this columnist of being racist and reactionary, by linking him with the Daily Mail. May I therfore humbly suggest that before you next don your armchair,leftist self-righteous hat, you read his book, The Cameo Conspiracy, which succeeded in exonerating 2 men (one of whom was hanged) 53 years after their convictions for murder. You will then discover how completely wrong you are. There couldn’t be a more anti-racist, anti-reactionary, anti-establishment writer in the world - and that includes yourself.
Thats quite a broad statement considering the number of revolutionary movements, radicals and liberal thinkers across the globe and throughout history. I sincerely doubt your ability to defend that claim.
No,i’m not trying to imply guilt by association, just as i have not accused LX news of being xenophobic or nationalistic i have not tried to accuse George Skelly of being so either.
If you’ve only so much space to put across your point then you had better know exactly what you want to say and be concise. There are more than a few people around liverpool who would love to have their work printed in LX and probably have as much expertise on the Capital of Culture event as George Skelly. Furthermore, if Mr Skelly has already had his work published on a level where it has had such a major impact on the judiciary then perhaps the space to contribute should be preserved for those of who have not had the opportunity to demonstrate their ability to write at all.
As much as I enjoy spending my days moderating this increasingly pedantic debate, perhaps it’s time to put it to bed. As far as I’m concerned, what started as a perfectly acceptable criticism of a columnist’s style (which occurs all over the website, without incurring such defensive diatribe) has spanned into some ideological debate, which when you consider the vehicle, a column on the Capital of Culture opening ceremony in a student newspaper, seems faintly ridiculous.
In response to the last two comments, I would like to stress that LX News is an opportunity for students and recent graduates, and in that respect, I do agree with Gav. However, it is of course flattering to have a writer who has enjoyed success wish to write for us.
It seems to me that the pair of you are both pre-occupied with having the last word. May I suggest, before we start getting back-bench type heckling going on, that you allow me that honour.