The Guardian: I'm boycotting it

[Merchfach]

I've been reading the Guardian since I was 16, so that's 40+ years — and now I'm boycotting it. Every week there seems to be a pro-trans article on the front page of the online version and not a mention of the difficulties WPUK are having holding perfectly legal meetings to discuss changes to legislation. All power to Hadley Freeman and the other feminist staffers trying to raise the issue but it's too little and too late.

I'm looking for an alternative news source and for the first time in my life I'm actually considering the Times or the Telegraph, neither of which have been allowed over my threshold till now. I'm told the FT is good source of well-researched news but I don't think I can afford it.

Any other Mumsnetters in a similar situation? Any recommendations? I don't even want to click on the Guardian on line: it's dead to me and I'm not going to forgive and forget this betrayal.

Just don't read the annoying ones? Proportionally speaking there's probably less of it than there are articles about gender/sex work yay so empowering/oh look there's some guy's navel lint again isn't it fascinating that the Guardian is currently putting out there.

I'm going to have to stop the habit of a lifetime and give up on the quick crossword.

I gave up on it post Cologne NYE, but am now again drawn back to the website to see what bonkers stance they might take on certain issues.
The FT is a great paper IMO - the best. I buy it on Saturdays, and spend the week reading it. That wouldn't work for those who want a daily fix of the news, but once a week is plenty for me.
The journalism is unbiased and excellent quality, with a good balance of foreign and domestic news.

The Guardian is utterly bizarre these days.

My peak Guardian moments include:

The article failing to even mention that a trans prisoner wanting to be moved to the women's prison was arrested for a sex related crime.

Reading an article about consent that had a young you tuber recommending resources for teachers. Clicked through and one was a book with a guest section from Riley J Dennis about how transphobic it would be not to have sex with his lady penis.

This is what I've heard about the FT too. I think there's an element of getting what you pay for.

I'm going to sign up to a four-week £1 trial with the FT and also an eight-week cheap trial with the Times. When those end I'll try the Torygraph and decide which is best. Signing up to the Times in support of Janice Turner feels like an important move.

It's going to be hard to do: I really don't want any of those proprietors to make any money out of me but needs must. And I've just realised that all this is happening on the watch of a woman, Katharine Viner. Talk about the added irony!

Another one here.
I grew up with the Guardian and I loved the women's page. But it's come a long way from its feminist past - pure brocialism. With the honourable exception of Hadley they mostly only seem to give space to women writers who know our place at the bottom of the heap. Cologne was a disgrace, as was the recent coverage of the transwoman prisoner.
Times and Telegraph have a stronger stable of feminist writers and a stronger commitment to representing women even if there are also some awful old sexists in there.

I have been boycotting the Guardian for a while now. I don't click on links to any of its articles. I took out a subscription to The Times, in support of Janice Turner, and I am quite pleased with it. Some of the articles are very far from my personal politics, but I have no desire to live in an echo chamber, and I like to have my views challenged.

I actually used to pay a subscription to The Guardian (just in case they're reading) but won't even look at it now. I have a cheap subscription to The Times, tbh I think they've always been better for arts / health / lifestyle stuff anyway. I just don't read many of the opinion pieces.

let us know what you decide merchfach!

I agree entirely with the comments here. I also no longer read THe Independent for the same reasons.

I still can't get over the Guardian's victim-blaming of Cologne. It really was jaw-dropping.

Funnily enough, since I've become a terf, I've started clicking on DM links, which I would never have done before. Whilst I don't read the DM, they do seem to report on both sides of the trans debate. It's funny how life turns out!

I stopped reading the Guardian when their family pages at the weekend disappeared up it's own arse

The rot set in with that dreadful Living with Teenagers series by Julie Myerson and earlier the series about "Precious" by Michelle Hanson.

Man with a Pram infuriated me and I never even read it.

I liked the 'Living with Teenagers' until I read the aftermath, then I felt sullied.

I gave up when that awful man Tim Lott began his postings in Lifestyle. He gave me the rage every weekend.

I don't bother with any 'news' (said loosely) papers. Hard to know what to believe in ANY of them.

I prefer to research anything that interests me.

I watched C4 news the other night - it made me feel physically sick, it was so fake.

Can't remember the last time I watched ITV/BBC news channels.

Ah, well, Joanna57, I'm clearly not quite as discerning or cynical as you. I don't imagine that I can keep abreast of current events without some input from news media (I mean, where would I get the time to do all that in-depth research from scratch and how would I begin to know what was happening worldwide) so I'll shop around and see what makes the best sense to me in this brave new world in which feminism is outlawed by the left and promoted by the right...

whereas the Guardian has fallen into a clickbait rabbit hole and doesn't even want to get out.

It's one of those things that I suppose the paywall has been able to secure for the Times. The Graun will be very dependant on ad revenue as fewer people buy the physical paper, and will need to generate clicks (much like MailOnline).

My favourite ever Guardian Women headline was 'Who needs a man when you have an electric screwdriver'. It was about power tools, of course.

Oh God, Lass.

I'd totally forgotten about Julie Myerson. No way should the Guardian have published that - totally unfair on the children.

And Tim Dowling. Didn't he have a ding-dong on here about MNers saying true mean things about him?

And Phil Hogan in The Observer writing about fatherhood, which apparently means talking and writing about yourself all the time.

Christ.

You take my stanley max away from my cold dead hands! Re

Another Waitrose shopper here who has stopped getting the Guardian, I always choose the Times now.

I used to like Lucy Mangan...

I can recommend the FT. It does actual journalism - proper analysis, data driven reporting, etc - not endless comment like the Grauniad. The editorial line is somewhat to the right of my own views but I quite like that. Keeps me out of an echo chamber and away from tribalism.

They have some damn fine women journalists as well - Gillian Tett, Merryn Somerset Webb, among others.

I like Lucy Mangan, and Hadley Freeman.
Have never read the FT. Will give it a go. Grauniad really is beyond parody these. The blind date thing, man after man after man. So many more men than women.

I lived on the Guardian website up until 2-3 years ago but was becoming steadily for quite a while before that. Thank dog I found MN!

Now I hardly ever go on there unless it's for the food - I still buy the Saturday edition because of the food section and Observer for Food Monthly (although it can often be a metropolitanfoodiewankfest...)

I feel bad that I still give them money because they are quite simply a fucking disgrace and have been for years.

It's sad though, as the Guardian used to be great.