The quality of writing on the BBC News website

[Cuellar]

It's not the website but I was delighted to see a piece about Hugh Grant and Nicole Kidman's new Sky Atlantic series on the news at 10 just now. Really good to know that this is happening, at this time. Very important to highlight a new Hugh Grant/Nicole Kidman series on Sky, right now. I think there was some talk about people being ill beforehand? Some sort of illness? Not sure. But thrilled that Nicole Kidman and Hugh Grant have a new series on Sky Atlantic.

[idunnosomename]

what's it about

[Cold Meat Platter]

Has this blog been posted re. Peston?

https://brokenbottleboy.substack.com/p/bring-me-the-head-of-roberto-peston

[Fambo Number Mive]

Jared Kushner, senior White House adviser and Ivanka Trump's husband, is making headlines today for the way he tried to promote the president's policies to African Americans.

Spoiler: Some on social media aren't pleased.

I think that bolded sentence could have been removed from the story, especially as some people on social media will be unhappy about anything.

When you look at Kushner's actual comments, they are pretty bigoted.

[touchingcloth]

The suspects were detained on board the Nave Andromeda (in the middle of the three boats).

Left to right or front to back, you turds?

[Keebleman]

A poll from YouGov finds that about 80% of people in the UK say they would vote for Joe Biden if given the chance, while the remaining 20% say they would support Donald Trump.

The poll, conducted for online gambling company Betfair, was taken one week before election day.

It found that 38% of Brits who voted leave during the 2016 Brexit referendum would vote for Trump if they could.

Among Labour and Liberal Democrat supporters, a whopping 99% said they would vote Biden. About 39% of Conservative voters said they support Trump.

In Scotland, the birthplace of Trump's mother, only 12% of people say they would re-elect him. In London, 19% of the city said they support Trump.

There is also an interesting gender disparity - nearly one in five men said would vote for Trump, but fewer than one in four women said the same.

That last paragraph, it's not just me being thick, is it?  Nearly 20% of men, less than 25% of women.  There is no gender disparity there, interesting or otherwise.  (And they've missed a'They'.)

And I'm not one to whine on about political incorrectness, but fucking hell, look at the accompanying graphic!



I can understand OAPs being ticked off with that, but how about 19(huh? were all 18 year olds out?) to 24 year olds?  I think bewilderment rather than offence would be more appropriate.

And when it came to representing generational differences between the two middle cohorts they clearly couldn't be arsed to even fucking try.

[idunnosomename]

young people have headphones and pockets on their limbs, old people have shitty spines and walking sticks

tropes as old as time.

[touchingcloth]

Ah, the nineteen-year-old with nicotine patches on his knees, a tale as old as time.

[Bazooka]

In Scotland, the birthplace of Trump's mother, only 12% of people say they would re-elect him. In London, 19% of the city said they support Trump

The campaign team for Trump clearly didn't push the facts about his ancestry hard enough, otherwise all the Scottish voters would have voted for him in this pointless and bizarre study.  Would the Irish vote for Duterte, we need to know?!!

[Keebleman]

Just checked back - that gender disparity paragraph has gone.  It's not a CaBber writing that feed is it?

Author's name is Boer Deng, which certainly sounds like a pseudonym.

[The Cloud of Unknowing]

old people have shitty spines and walking sticks

Playing with a yo-yo and having a fine old time actually.

[dissolute ocelot]

I'm guessing that's a YouGov/Betfair graphic rather than a BBC one, but good of the BBC to give some free publicity to a gambling company.

Surely the 25-49 should be covered in vomit and Lego, the 50-64 fat and smug (possibly in yachtwear), and the 65+ slightly smaller, greyer, and also smug? (I suppose at least they've not done the 19-24 as genderqueer holding an avocado).

[NoSleep]

Do 19-24 year olds generally plaster their body with nicotine patches while wearing ear defenders? Everyone bald after 24?

[the]

That particular 19-24 year old appears to be working on the deck of an aircraft carrier

[idunnosomename]

Shakespeare considers drastic rewrite on the seven ages of man

[Fambo Number Mive]

The Yougov poll is a total non-story and shouldn't be on the BBC, especially as it helps promote a gambling company as others have said. BBC clickbait.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Clicked that sombre story about a copper choking his wife in that other thread and this was in the sidebar.

[sevendaughters]

Clicked that sombre story about a copper choking his wife in that other thread and this was in the sidebar.

it's proper client journalism this. no one thinks lobbing one off if you have a partner is wrong. just so happens Allen has a new line of dildos to flog.

[touchingcloth]

Clicked that sombre story about a copper choking his wife in that other thread and this was in the sidebar.

You can't blame the writers for that, it's just the algorithm latching onto choking/choking the chicken. Which is what I imagine women would also call masturbating, if they ever actually did it.

[The Cloud of Unknowing]

It's weird the recent trend of female celebs bringing out their own range of sex toys. As well as Allen, there are two of the Spice Girls and... others, I can't Google it now. They can't really be that invested in it, can they?

Could a male celeb ever announce his own brand of sex toys for men and be taken seriously? (David Dimbleby moved on to someone else when I asked that on Question Time.)

[buttgammon]

It's weird the recent trend of female celebs bringing out their own range of sex toys. As well as Allen, there are two of the Spice Girls and... others, I can't Google it now. They can't really be that invested in it, can they?

Could a male celeb ever announce his own brand of sex toys for men and be taken seriously? (David Dimbleby moved on to someone else when I asked that on Question Time.)

He's just bitter because his range of buttplugs didn't take off.

[dissolute ocelot]

A lot of male people have produced their own sex toys, but they all seem to be aimed at women who'd rather fuck a piece of metal than their diseased knob. Dave Stewart of the Eurythmics brought out a promotional vibrator; Rammstein, Motley Crue, Marilyn Manson, Machine Gun Kelly, and some K-Pop dudes have also done dildos/vibrators; several male pop groups have had their own condoms (e.g. JLS); and I think some male porn stars have sold dildos of their penises. You can buy a Donald Trump butt blug, but I'm unclear if it's official merch. I'd imagine Rammstein and Manson are ok with a man using their sex toys, but overall the answer is probably no. (I stopped searching when I got an article by Roger Scruton.)

[idunnosomename]

Roger Scruton tried a buttplug shaped like a corinthian capital but he could never get it out for the rest of his life.

[MrMrs]

crusty

[Norton Canes]

From their Connery obit:

Saltzman and Broccoli lured him back for Diamonds Are Forever in 1971, meeting the actor's demand for a then record $1.25 fee. Hi @laurenConnery used it to set up the Scottish International Education Trust, supporting the careers of up and coming Scottish artists

Hi Lauren!

[touchingcloth]

From their Connery obit:

Hi Lauren!

She supported the careers of up and coming Scottish artists with $1.25? I know they say the cost of living is cheaper north of the border, but even so that feels miserly.

[sevendaughters]

not terrible writing in terms of quality, but a different kind of hagiography of active fascists

He'd followed the news and been incensed at reports about the increasing number of boat crossings, with 1,880 migrants arriving in September alone - compared to 1,800 for the whole of 2019.

"I've been watching it every day and I've been fuming. I just got fed up with it. People were saying to me, 'Well, instead of screaming at the television, do something!'"

So he launched a new group, Littleboats2020, inspired by the "little ships of Dunkirk" - 850 vessels that went to rescue 336,000 British soldiers stranded in northern France in May 1940.

https://www.bbc.com/news/stories-54756575?xtor=AL-72-%5Bpartner%5D-%5Bbbc.news.twitter%5D-%5Bheadline%5D-%5Bnews%5D-%5Bbizdev%5D-%5Bisapi%5D&at_campaign=64&at_custom1=%5Bpost+type%5D&at_medium=custom7&at_custom3=%40BBCNews&at_custom2=twitter&at_custom4=24FB36D8-1BDC-11EB-9466-C98A4744363C

[Rizla]

not terrible writing in terms of quality, but a different kind of hagiography of active fascists

https://www.bbc.com/news/stories-54756575?xtor=AL-72-%5Bpartner%5D-%5Bbbc.news.twitter%5D-%5Bheadline%5D-%5Bnews%5D-%5Bbizdev%5D-%5Bisapi%5D&at_campaign=64&at_custom1=%5Bpost+type%5D&at_medium=custom7&at_custom3=%40BBCNews&at_custom2=twitter&at_custom4=24FB36D8-1BDC-11EB-9466-C98A4744363C

Utter cunts. Unbefuckingleivable. These cunts published that. Scum. https://www.bbc.co.uk/contact/complaints/make-a-complaint/#/Complaint

[imitationleather]

Urgh what an absolute disgusting cunt.

[Zetetic]

" He wears a Union Jack face mask"

That's not a Union Jack in the photo, incidentally.