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Style and beauty

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AA Gill has writtena really charming piece about British Womens appearence

155 replies

CybilLiberty · 03/10/2009 07:52

When I fly back to England, I know that I will notice two things: the old place will look surprisingly and miraculously green, and the girls will look like recycling bin bags full of windfalls, with a relentless, stroppy, obstinate and defiant plainness.

When everything is wet and cold, English girls glower beneath their frizzy split ends, with their baggy pink eyes, defensively regarding the world over broken veins and puce, dripping noses, pursing their thin lips over badly shuffled teeth.

The summer is when those bodies, long held in supine, chip-rich darkness of shapeless unisex comfort clobber, are set free like blind, hairless, albino moles; the grey adipose flesh slops over waistbands and shoulder straps; bunioned and varicosed feet shimmy in shower slippers; arses are sliced by cheese-wire thongs; wobbling, pocked thighs flap and chafe like drunken mates.

But nothing could be worse than English girls when they make an effort, dressed up for a night out: it?s then that they reach the heights of precipitous frightfulness. The clacking cankles. The tortured hair. The evil clown?s make-up. Predatory breasts, like pink water bombs. Flapping arms and glistening chins, and second-division mouths. The farmyard aggression and the zoo sex.

It?s not just a class thing; it?s not only chavvy ladettes in the provinces. Look at the state of the totty tumbling out of Boujis, or waving chipped-nailed fingers at Glastonbury.

Go to any £1,000-a-head charity ball and see the English memsahib, 3st above her fighting weight, swagged in a gypsy?s shower curtain, with a barnet that might have been spun in a sugary centrifuge. The granny jewellery and the blue eye shadow, the unhumpable hell of them all.
.... and so it goes on.

He does later say beauty is not the be all and end all...but did he have to be quite SOO full of vitriol?

OP posts:
ninedragons · 03/10/2009 11:05

Speaking as a foreigner, I find the fact that certain segments of British society simply couldn't give a shit about devoting 45% of their waking hours to their appearance very refreshing.

I'd rather be Iris Murdoch at 75 than some tragic old upholstered queen like Bridget Bardot or Sophia Loren.

ninedragons · 03/10/2009 11:06

And frankly, the idea of dressing for the delectation of AA Gill gives me the dry heaves.

Romanarama · 03/10/2009 11:07

It doesn't take 45% of your waking hours to put something flattering on in the morning and go to the hairdressers every 8 weeks though.

ninedragons · 03/10/2009 11:11

Do you honestly think he would give the thumbs-up to a size 16 45-year-old in clothes that simply suited her?

I think to meet his standards it'd be the full starvation package at the Chiva Som and botox every eight weeks, not a quick trim at the local hairdresser.

becstarlitsea · 03/10/2009 11:13

I've found some of his food criticism amusing over the years - although I really can't understand Prunerz' friend actively seeking AA Gill to come & review it. He's nasty 99% of the time - if it were my restaurant (don't have one, but if I did!) I'd stick a 'closed' sign up if I saw AA Gill approach!

Having lived abroad and also travelled widely in various different countries, I think if you've lived in a city in France or Italy or lived in New York City, Stockholm and sundry other style havens, then you are going to be a bit unimpressed by British women.

But if you've spent time in provincial Australia, or any of the 'states in the middle' in the USA, (I would also argue for regional Greece in this list - have seen some scarey things there) then British women are suddenly visions of stylish slender loveliness.

His writing is always vitriolic, but it's op-ed style, not journalism proper, so I don't mind. And wouldn't give a flying proverbial if AA Gill doesn't fancy me either - wouldn't touch him with a ten foot pole so it ain't no thang (Although for the record am dashed pretty and stylish, and he probably would !)

cyteen · 03/10/2009 11:15

Journalist writes tedious, factless profit-piece shocker.

Habbibu · 03/10/2009 11:18

AA Gill on Dara O'Briain: "The presenter is that moon-faced Irishman who was christened by a dyslexic priest"

No, you twat. It's a forrin' language, innit? He's an arse - the whole, oh, I used to be an atheist because I liked being one of the clever atheists, but now I've found God they're all stupid thing just demonstrated his essential vacuity for me.

TsarChasm · 03/10/2009 11:21

I think it's quite funny. And he has a point..

OrmIrian · 03/10/2009 11:27

But what is hte point of this. Please can someone tell me ?

It's not satire - satire has a worthwhile target, corruption, greed, selfishness. The fact that UK women don't now how to dress is not a worthwhile target of satire. It simply isn't. It doesn't matter! You might argue than any nation that is obsessed with appearance is a worthy target of satire possibly. But I wouldn't dream of suggesting that....

So if it isn't satire it's simple bitchiness with big words. The kind of stuff that teenage girls might say about the unfashionable girl in their class, providing they had the vocabulary and lacked the decency.

So don't laugh with him. Don't 'see his point of view'. Treat him as you would treat a nasty teenage girl. With disdain. And some pity for the unfortunate chip he appears to have shouldered somewhere along the line.

Prunerz · 03/10/2009 11:33

lol at ninedragons and Habb
AA Gill, for example,....

Kerrymumbles · 03/10/2009 11:38

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Kerrymumbles · 03/10/2009 11:39

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UnquietDad · 03/10/2009 11:44

None of it sounds particularly nice, and yet it's hard to argue that most of it is particularly untrue, at least in our major city centres...

mrsruffallo · 03/10/2009 11:48

I don't think he has a point.
AAGill, for example, is a twat
And he is far too clean looking

motherlovebone · 03/10/2009 11:58

i think he needs counselling.

mrsruffallo · 03/10/2009 12:00

If I met a man who spoke about other women like this I would vomit. Honestly.
And I am think with good hair so he probably would talk to me. Prat.

ninedragons · 03/10/2009 12:09

Love affair gets you off the hook for anything, Kerry.

Unless it's with AA Gill.

Kerrymumbles · 03/10/2009 13:00

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

tulpe · 03/10/2009 13:18

Yes, some women in the UK dress badly. But where does this huge misconception that the rest of the world is so chic in comparison, come from?

I spend a lot of time in France and I see plenty of women who look like they could do with a good makeover.

Similarly, I lived in the US for a while and frankly was distinctly underwhelmed with their approach to fashion.

Wherever I have travelled and lived in the world, I have seen women just like British women - some who have innate style, some just good at following "the rules" and others who look appalling.

tulpe · 03/10/2009 13:18

Forgot to add: AA Gill is a misogynistic arse

TheCrackFox · 03/10/2009 13:20

I think his writing has become stale. It is the same over flowery diatribe every week. Yawn.

MarshaBrady · 03/10/2009 13:25

I want to add though if I met him or anyone like him in rl I would think he was a noboid of the highest order and a waste of my time.

Use to attract quite a few of these types way back when, would get all bristly and aloof and disdainful. They were idiots.

pofacedandproud · 03/10/2009 13:28

I thought is was quite funny. And I think he is quite a gifted writer. He is being deliberately provocative, he always is. His girlfriend is English, for a start. He is generalising and knows it, but, er, right.

pofacedandproud · 03/10/2009 13:31

He writes elsewhere in the article that a Frenchwoman is always hot, but tell him she's Belgian and she immediately becomes plain. He just doesn't make the link that he has the same subjectivity when it comes to British women.

MarshaBrady · 03/10/2009 13:36

I like the writing too. So would probably dislike a man like this in rl but can read this without being offended.

(contrary huh, am so tired and weak need a lie down).

What do writers think of the writing style? UQD?