The Guardian: Greatest Hits

I think most of them constitute rather poor journalism apart from the third (the Laurie Penny article), where I think she's making an important point.

Which one? The Nick Lezard one?

Marco Pierre White is racist for cooking a Jamaican dish on TV:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/30/marco-pierre-white-jamaican-dish-knorr-advert

Cupcakes and the middle class people who eat them are secret Fascists:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/08/beware-of-cupcake-fascism

Oversized breasts on female superhero's are sexist and misogynistic:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/03/wonder-girl-breasts-sexism-comics

Marco Pierre White is racist for cooking a Jamaican dish on TV:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/30/marco-pierre-white-jamaican-dish-knorr-advert

Cupcakes and the middle class people who eat them are secret Fascists:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/08/beware-of-cupcake-fascism

Oversized breasts on female superhero's are sexist and misogynistic:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/03/wonder-girl-breasts-sexism-comics

.....

TBF I can agree with that last one. It's as almost if people with a passion for superheroes also have an obsession with large breasts

As well as big strong men in tight Lycra?

There is only one cultural hegemony which is being forced onto the population, and its not twee middle class ideals. It's political correctness.

Would you agree political correctness is fascist?

Political correctness is the inquisitional thought process of the Marxist ideologue, who has a strict and unchanging opinion of the world. What does that remind you of?

The Marxist ideologue who wrote the piece about cupcake fascism implied that the white people who cleaned their streets after the riots of 2011 were the fascists, and not the rioters themselves. ( he forgot to mention the non-white people who also cleaned their communities streets )

Marxists are fascists. Just fascists who hate different people form other fascists.

The Guardian is just a load of simpering drivel written by mindless swine. They desperately try to act as left as possible, but rather then acting under the actual defined terms of what is supposed to be left-wing, they just go along with whatever trend that is currently considered right-on among North London champagne socialists who have spent so long in their cosy little bubble they've completely lost touch with reality.

It only appears as though it is being 'forced' onto the population because it comes from a starting position of disadvantage. Naturally those who believe that consideration of various types of discourse are worth analysing and critiquing will need to be vociferous and, yes, occasionally strident in trying to make themselves heard. Such is the nature of being at a disadvantage.



In the very broad sense of fascist that I disavow above, yes. However, insofar as the strict meaning of fascism requires the fascist party to be of the ruling class, no, I wouldn't, because those who argue for a greater consideration of cultural discourse are certainly not in the ideological ascendency.



I think I'd try to move away from the phrase 'political correctness', as its hijacking by Daily Mail bigots has bestowed upon it far too many negative connotations. I don't think that the general premise of Tom Whyman - that the individual receiver of culture, and indeed the individual creator of culture, has a responsibility to consider the ways in which their forms of discourse encode certain views, is tantamount to fascism. Intransigence =/= fascism.



I think he was being rather tongue-in-cheek here. Again - fascism doesn't simply mean 'violence', it connotes and denotes rather more than that. As Whyman says on his blog, fascism in this sense refers to the reduction of possibilities to a prescribed minimum number, and this is why he objects to things like 'Keep calm and have a cup of tea'. He would not have any objection to the sense of camaraderie and community involved in clearing up the streets. Equally, obviously I have colossal problems with those who rioted, but calling them 'fascist' is just wrong.



Again, 'fascism' implies being in an ascendency, which those on the left are certainly not. There is little hate in Tom Whyman; just a sense of general disdain and disappointment in the way in which capitalist ideology undermines human agency and potential. The Communism of the fascist Soviet Union is a world apart from the Marxism of Tom Whyman.

I keep wondering what would happen if the Guardian and the Daily Mail came together as a joint publication... The concoction would become unstable, react violently and explode in a mushroom cloud of white hot, vaporised bull****.

How old are you?

I ask this question because the society I have grown up in is dominated by a politically correct hegemony. Political correctness is the establishment. I suppose it didn't used to be but it most certainly is now.

The fascism of Tom Whyman is no different from the fascism of all other modern Marxists. There are no modern Marxists who are pure 'karl Marxists'. Modern Marxism has removed itself almost completely from the ideas of Karl Marx.

Modern marxists are like nazis, only instead of blaming white Jews for everything wrong in the world, they blame white Gentiles -- Modern Marxists are either Jews who hate white Gentiles, or white Gentiles who hate themselves, or non-whites who hate both white gentile and white Jews.

Working class people are just bystanders, watching this yuppie hate fest play itself out.

Twenty-one.

I think we're coming at this from different angles, perhaps. There is a difference between public political correctness, which is the sort of thing that involves criticising Michael Macintyre for mocking those with disabilities, say, and the sort of criticism Tom Whyman performs. Regarding the former, I'd agree with you. Regarding the latter, I wouldn't. Those arguing the link between culture and zeitgeist-formation are still generally a shouted-down minority. Also it's still far more acceptable in most circles of mine - and most circles around, I'd conjecture - to make a rape joke than criticise someone at a social gathering for making a rape joke.

As a result I still cannot see Whyman's viewpoints as fascist. Especially not since they refer to an increasing of human potential and possibility, not a reduction of it. See the article on his blog about Cupcake Fascism again.

Despite our disagreements above, I totally share your reservations of the last sentence. I feel that the Left overburdens itself with theory and jargon that make its criticism and value-system inherently elitist and exclusionary. Some of this theory is necessary, but much of it is, perhaps, not. I feel that certain strands of feminism only serve to alienate working-class females. But this is not, however, something which Whyman can be accused off, and my discomfort with certain left-wing concerns does not invalidate their entire enterprise.