Owen Jones

He won't suddenly be able to pretend that he supported the feminist argument all along Didn't he do a volte face about Corbyn ?

Yes his recent tweets give away his motivation here. He wants to be "the chap who supports minorities". There's no thought to it. Obviously women don't count as we're not a minority so he doesn't get any self-affirmation from thinking about us.

I agree he would have been the sort of person who supported PIE back in the day. [Note, Owen, if you are reading, I have not said trans people are paedophiles]. It's just the sort of male-centred minority interest that he would endorse without giving it any thought.

Had a rather sad moment listening to the wonderful Paloma Faith being interviewed by Jeni Murray on Womans Hour re her including Owen Jones on her new album and what a good all round feminist chap he is with a good heart ... Oi ! Paloma! Come and read this lot !!

Well someone's linked this thread on Twitter so I anticipate the arrival of Owen, disguised as a breastfeeding, sorry, chestfeeding mum of twins!

He is vile. It's the sanctimonious that gets me - oh look at me and how right-on I'm being, unlike you terrible terrible terfy women.

I've noticed that with all this trans stuff, he doesn't engage with the arguments at all. He just talks pompously about being on the right side of history and how being opposed to transactivism is just like being opposed to gay rights.

The one satisfying thing about all this is that in 10 or 15 years time, when feminists will have been proved to be right, and adults are suing the NHS for pumping them full of hormones as children, we'll have a full written record of everything Owen Jones said now. He won't suddenly be able to pretend that he supported the feminist argument all along.

Some of his best friends are women with penises.

I look forward to another mansplanation about how he’s much more feminist than us inconveniently female people who keep disagreeing with him. (He has survey results about what women think, you know! Some of his best friends are women!)

how he hates mothers etc
And some of us that hate him are not even mothers! Just run of the mill women.

He does vanity search his name so no doubt there’ll be another article/twitter rant about how mean MNetters are and how he hates mothers etc etc

Hi Owen.

It's always good to hear others were equally nonplussed cuirderussie and OneFlewOverTheDodosNest. Even now, many years later, I still find myself realising that I perceived university in a way which was very different to those who were there as a directly following consequence of their upbringing and education.

John Harris is excellent.

Haha nauticant that is so true. I had the weird experience of feeling like I wasn't working class because my family didn't live in a council house when most of my wider family did, but then being told I had to be because my parents had no qualifications, did non-office jobs, and I came from the north...

nauticant that was my experience coming from a manual working background- when I got to college the socialist groups were mainly clueless posh twats. This was around the time the Left abandoned its reason for existing (workers' rights) and jumped on every identity politics bandwagon, faraway political conflict and favoured "oppressed" groups. It never recovered from that and Owen Jones is the result. John Harris in the Guardian is far better, he actually talks to people and even better, listens to them.

I'm expecting Owen along soon, it'll be like "Candyman" if we say his name often enough

Bet wee Owen isn't short of a bob or three even if he is faux working class. But of course he would claim that's different....

I meant average wage of builders is above the average wage. Class has changed a great deal.

Yes, generally builders don't get to choose to be self-employed, it is just the way the building industry works. And there is a lot of exploitation within it, which is why most socialists do see builders as working class.

Anyway, if builders shouldn't be listened to, what about journalists with columns in broadsheets? Are they somehow working class when skilled manual workers aren't?

Owen Jones reminds me of going to university as a bog-standard working class person and finding all of these posh people from privileged backgrounds telling me what working class people think and what they should be doing.

Yes I get that, but that's not all builders by any means - the vast majority work as contractors on building sites, but Owen's point was that because SOME of them can be wealthy, then builders shouldn't be listened to as a working class voice. Which is absurd seeing as it's a key working class career.

Also, there's a question on how much choice individual builders have over being self employed when most building companies now insist on having contractors rather than employees because of saving on NI and pensions etc.

I’ve seen the way he likes to incite pile-ons on female journalists who have the temerity to disagree with him. He’s a nasty misogynist with the critical thinking and self-reflection skills of a gnat.

The only reason he has a column is the grauniad feels it has to dish out the odd sweetie to token representatives of the northern working classes.
How nasty!

Homity pie! I'd forgotten about that. I wonder if the head shop still sells patchouli?

I agree with him to some extent about builders. They earn above the average wage. It is part of sexism that they are seen as working class when women on far lower wages are deemed middle class because people think it is acceptable for women to be on lower wages.

At first DH was amused but then it all got too tactile and the man wouldn’t stop despite DH asking politely and firmly many times. Eventually three men had to drag the man off DH while the he shouted that i should go to bed and leave them alone

Good Lord! What an abusive twat. Clearly one of those gay men who hates women. I thought they'd all grown up (I knew a few in the late 70s). What an old-fashioned throwback.

I responded to his latest series of tweets asking him not to use the term 'cis' as I found it offensive. NO response, but an interesting series of debates.

The number of little tween tweeters who have no idea of the importance of making the distinction between sex and gender baffles me. They think they're soooooo progressive.

Bring back 70s Women's Lib, I say! even the homity pie & smelly hair and patchouli.

To be fair OneFlew that is not his idea. Historicall socialists considered anyone running a small business part of the petty bourgeoisie. It's a fairly divisive philosophy really.

Owen Jones once said that builders shouldn't be listened to as voices of the working class because they tend to be self employed and can have high earning potential. So not just a misogynist but just an all round idiot.