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AIBU?

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Original poster

to not understand appeal of Caitlin Moran writing for The Times?

315 replies

ARealDame · 30/06/2013 11:37

She always has at least a couple of articles in The Times on Saturday, including her TV reviews, and seems to be heavily promoted there at the moment.

But I often find her writing cringeworthy e.g. this Saturday TV reviewing The White Queen headlines "She Makes Ingrid Bergman look like Someone Stuck Tits on a Turnip". Last Saturday, reviewing exactly the same programme (did anyone at The Times notice Hmm?) the review headlined Battles, Castles and Tons of Fruity Historical Humping. Is she just being crass/offensive for the sake of it? And I find so much of her writing self-adulating plus impossible to make any sense of, a jumble of thoughtless sentences stuck together ... almost like a teenager on speed.

It seems a shame when The Times on Saturday has some enjoyable journalism e.g. the often brilliant Janice Turner, Matthew Paris, Giles Coran, plus some great review stuff of the Arts.

My heart just sinks when I see her bylines and picture. AIBU ?

OP posts:
valiumredhead · 02/07/2013 17:38

Ooooo random cross face sorry!

LadyClariceCannockMonty · 02/07/2013 17:51

Sorry HandMini, as I said, I can't help it. I don't do guilt, but if I did he would be my guilty crush along with all the others !

Thurlow, the Restoration one with the breeches and flouncy lacy cuffs made me go all funny in my tummy. Blush

Darkesteyes · 02/07/2013 17:56

Giles Coren is a sexist hypocrite. In last months Red there was an article by 4 writers about how much they loved their wives.
Giles started off his section about his wife by basically listing her body parts .
And yet in last months Easy Living he wrote an article about how he was sick of the objectification of men. Hmm Confused

Lottapianos · 02/07/2013 18:00

I would do him too, even if he is a massive tosser. I would like to be mates with his sister too.

HandMini · 02/07/2013 18:13

Oh my lord. Mind bleach. I could never have seen him as an object of lust. I read the Easy Living piece and boked too. He's such a hypocrite.

PoppyAmex · 02/07/2013 18:48

He looks greasy

EarthtoMajorTom · 02/07/2013 22:36

yuck. an arse at university, and still an arse.

Southeastdweller · 02/07/2013 22:45

Thanks MT for that link to that illuminating bathroom chat with C.M and S.H. Could only manage five minutes.

'Eminent psychologist' indeed Grin

Cutitup · 02/07/2013 23:01

I liked most of the columnists mentioned in this thread until I read them on Twitter. Now I don't. It put me off reading their columns. Specially India Knight with her 'cunt-this' and her 'cunt-that'. I just think they come across as a self-involved group of twats and its damaging their careers as journalists.

limitedperiodonly · 02/07/2013 23:34

Misplaced confidence in his attractiveness; or possibly not, judging by the number of women here who'd do him.

He posed with his shirt off for a trite 'I love my new baby' piece on the front of the Times magazine a while ago. It was an utterly bizarre thing for a flabby bloke to do and speaks volumes about his delusions or eyesight.

Though it didn't turn my stomach, he's not going to give David Gandy any sleepless nights.

Darkesteyes · 02/07/2013 23:49

An arse at university...ooh please spill.

reelingintheyears · 02/07/2013 23:52

I like Caitlin Moran.

mignonette · 03/07/2013 06:08

He is fat isn't he? I saw him waddling around North London a few weeks ago and he is a bit of a chubster isn't he? Not a problem until you read his columns denigrating the overweight and recommending social cleansing of. He is despicably vile about them. A little bit of projection eh Gilesy?

And his wife could do with losing a bit too both pre and post gestation. He is always wittering on about hotness = slenderness yet it has all gone a bit awry for them hasn't it? Again, practice what you preach mate.

TobyLerone · 03/07/2013 06:14

I really like her.

If I didn't, I wouldn't read her stuff. It's not rocket science. I'm sure there are several articles in the Times which are written by other journalists.

mignonette · 03/07/2013 06:31

I do not read her stuff any more. But we cannot escape the blanket coverage of her in The Times especially when she is on the cover of the supplements, has an op ed column, a three page spread, TV reviews and has books constantly promoted by The Times who are clearly putting her through the mangle to extract their pound of flesh.

TobyLerone · 03/07/2013 06:34

You still don't have to read it, though! Just turn the page. Or if even the fact that she's in it at all bothers you that much, buy The Daily Mail a different paper instead.

Badvoc · 03/07/2013 06:41

I used to like CM.
Then she was on here for a web chat and was just juvenile and the fawning...god, it was awful. She also used a vile word to describe disabled people in her book (twice) and her excuse was vapid and pathetic. I have zero tolerance for that shit.
I think her appeal will fade pretty soon. She is everywhere ATM.
I loved the supersizer programmes, but for sue Perkins not GC.

Badvoc · 03/07/2013 06:44

....but, yes. Her article on library closures was very good.
And as for nepotism...twas ever thus.

mignonette · 03/07/2013 06:45

I do turn the page FGS. But as I said. Still IYF. I buy The Guardian, The Times and The Observer (For Food Monthly especially and she was bloody well in that too!).........

SuiGeneris · 03/07/2013 06:55

YANBU. Have been wondering that for a while myself. I cannot stand the woman or her articles. They all seem to be a variation on "you cannot possibly understand the world unless you have had the same life as me", with lots of inverted snobbery. I do wish they would get someone with something interesting to say. To see her columns next to Melanie Reid's always makes me cringe.

mignonette · 03/07/2013 06:56

Sui Yes, yes, yes. Perfectly put. MR may well be a fan of hers but the contrast to the readers is a painful one.

NutcrackerFairy · 03/07/2013 07:55

Oh yes, the oh so witty Giles, his hot wife Esther and adorable baby.

I personally would like to see a lot less of the lot of them.

Now they are parents and have a baby they have an opinion on everything family related, albeit in their Hampstead/Islington/Notting Hill enclave.

Smug, smug, smug.

So GM got the writing gig basically through family connections... now we have to suffer reading his wife's guff on her cooking and selecting a buggy for baby.

Truly will be baby's brilliance at finger painting next Hmm

GrimmaTheNome · 03/07/2013 08:08

Mostly I like Caitlin Moran and not just because it was a relief to hear that someone else can only run at a fast walking pace. I usually only read her bit in the Saturday times mag - rarely the TV review because I don't watch much TV and sat. is the only day we get an actual paper.

GC is sometimes amusing, sometimes annoying. Part of his problem is that he can never be his dad who was in another class of humour altogether.

Trills · 03/07/2013 08:19

Saying that a woman who has just had a baby could do with losing a bit? Hmm

Is that what we've sunk to mignonette?

HandMini · 03/07/2013 08:29

Cutitup makes an excellent point about Twitter.

I started following lots of writers because I (on the whole) liked their books or columns, but seeing their petty vengeful backbiting and in-jokes on Twitter has put me right off.

The worst thing of all is how stupid their tweets are, often along the lines of "you're an ugly twat" as opposed to any reasoned argument. Fair enough, they're not getting paid for their tweets, but come on people - it's ALL public! We are judging you on this.