Comments on: Woman’s Hour

By: editor

editor — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 10:49:51 +0000

I agree. Head on confrontation doesn’t work. Its just sanctimonious. But people dont like being told they are on the treadmill too. They claim to be anti-fashion despite carefully selecting their own particular fashion.

By: BegbiesEvilTwin

BegbiesEvilTwin — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 00:56:22 +0000

Don’t beat yourself up about it. WH has taken a more insular, plodding, middle-class style in the last year or so. Jane Garvey has radically changed her accent and adopted a somewhat frumpish-but-playfully-censorious-mumsie approach. The voxpop that preceded the discussion may have helped Jane to frame the argument in her favour but it’s far from insurmountable.
Instead of starting from the shopping angle and relaying aspects of the ritual that people normally find as part of the pleasure. The only way to circumvent this is to take it from the other end of the arguement and be constructively polemical. Get the costs in quickly and follow on from there. It seems you are trying to avoid the usual anticapitalist tropes but there is no problem in drawing from Noreena Hertz work on the downside of credit. Or researching the environmental costs of a consumer lifestyle. The FT is very good at this.
Perhaps you could augment this by learning how to affectionately take the piss out of your opponents world view?

By: editor

editor — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 08:54:45 +0000

Many thanks for the kind words. When you write a book, and this is my first, you get so close it you cant see it. You remind me of the Ben Hogan quote – the US golfer – “golfs a luck game, the more I practice the luckier I get”.

By: A. Johnson

A. Johnson — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 08:02:19 +0000

I heard you on WH yesterday and thought you argued your case powerfully. Perfectly encapsulated my own feelings anyway. In fact I’m going to read your book and intend recommending it to everyone I know. Good luck.