I teach at Iowa, so I enjoyed the Caitlin Clark piece. I have a lot of athletes in some of the courses I teach, so the focus on student athlete and team culture was fascinating.
Many faculty are now suddenly REALLY interested in women's basketball (many of my friends/colleagues now have season tickets, when I doubt they'd ever attended an athletic event here prior to Caitlin Clark), something I think is a little funny considering how indifferent and often disdainful they have been of college sports in the past.
The Hooven piece is terrific - I admire how she puts up hypotheses one after the other, gives them the very best evidence she can find, and then knocks them down. Certainly about as far from the traditional pyramid news story structure as it’s possible to be.
I don’t know how you find this stuff but thanks for pointing it out. The Iannucci/Morris 2002 piece was fantastic, mixing tasteless, brutal and funny in the very best traditions of satire. My favourite was the one about the substitution of Diane Keaton in the remake of Manhattan.
Sadly, I think this is true. It's why I'm glad most of Private Eye is in paper form only --- satire relies on a shared sensibility and the ability for people to opt in.
Imagine how Swift would be received on teh Interwebs these days. (And yes I saw that Greg Wallace-fronted attempt at modernising A Modest Proposal - I didn’t think it was possible to defang it and make it into a high budget April Fool’s joke, but they managed it.)
Caitlin Clark is a wonderful case. Worth getting to know better, though if Wright Thompson’s done a piece on here there’s probably not that much more to know.
When I listen to you speak I detect irony about 50% of the time. Not complaining! I'm including your reference to Jordan Peterson (attractive? charismatic?) into your much smaller ironic written output.
I teach at Iowa, so I enjoyed the Caitlin Clark piece. I have a lot of athletes in some of the courses I teach, so the focus on student athlete and team culture was fascinating.
Many faculty are now suddenly REALLY interested in women's basketball (many of my friends/colleagues now have season tickets, when I doubt they'd ever attended an athletic event here prior to Caitlin Clark), something I think is a little funny considering how indifferent and often disdainful they have been of college sports in the past.
The Hooven piece is terrific - I admire how she puts up hypotheses one after the other, gives them the very best evidence she can find, and then knocks them down. Certainly about as far from the traditional pyramid news story structure as it’s possible to be.
Yes, I liked that aspect too. I do actually feel better informed and like she followed the evidence wherever it led.
I don’t know how you find this stuff but thanks for pointing it out. The Iannucci/Morris 2002 piece was fantastic, mixing tasteless, brutal and funny in the very best traditions of satire. My favourite was the one about the substitution of Diane Keaton in the remake of Manhattan.
And the best bit is you know no-one would write anything like that now, let alone put it in a national newspaper.
Sadly, I think this is true. It's why I'm glad most of Private Eye is in paper form only --- satire relies on a shared sensibility and the ability for people to opt in.
Imagine how Swift would be received on teh Interwebs these days. (And yes I saw that Greg Wallace-fronted attempt at modernising A Modest Proposal - I didn’t think it was possible to defang it and make it into a high budget April Fool’s joke, but they managed it.)
Are you sure Chris Morris didn’t do the CCHQ attack ad on Sadiq Khan?
Caitlin Clark is a wonderful case. Worth getting to know better, though if Wright Thompson’s done a piece on here there’s probably not that much more to know.
When I listen to you speak I detect irony about 50% of the time. Not complaining! I'm including your reference to Jordan Peterson (attractive? charismatic?) into your much smaller ironic written output.
Great piece on Taki. I was slightly surprised at Neil’s quotes - elsewhere he has been much more critical of Taki. See for example this tweet - https://x.com/afneil/status/1083755599442165763?s=46&t=CS0iWXYuamF-99jvSRSB2Q - but there’s somewhere else he said a bit more I think. Couldn’t find that in my Google searching but did find this re Neil which I find a little insufficient, to say the least … https://amp.theguardian.com/media/2004/apr/21/sundaytimes.pressandpublishing
Is that critical? It seems pretty mild to me.