Sunday 11 November 2012

The Delicious Irony of Liz Jones

If one can be almost loathe to do something, I'm almost loathe to write this post because the woman lives and dies by publicity. For those outside the UK or who get their news via reliable news sources, Liz Jones is a veteran columnist for the Daily Mail.

Anyway, On Saturday my Twitter feed was aglow with comments from attendees at the Mumsnet Blogging conference in London. (I'm not a member of Mumsnet and so am not remotely familiar with their activities, purpose etc. but many of my bloggy friends are.) Liz Jones was on a panel to discuss writing about your real life, or something like that. Since all Liz ever does is write about herself, I'd say she was a no-brainer for that session.

After attending the conference, she promptly went back to her lair and wrote this charming piece about the women attending -  entitled "Free? You blogging mums may as well wear burkas.". The purpose of the piece is as usual, unclear and rambling, except that she's at it again - pitching women against each other, or in this case, pitching herself against the rest of her gender. At one point she writes - "These women post pictures of bars of chocolate. Seriously. One even posts pictures of cakes that she will bake for you on demand."

Does no one else get the irony of Liz? She wastes no time in belittling the writing choices of other women, yet spent a good two years boring us to tears chronicling her divorce (writing about a man, almost exclusively), went on to get herself a face lift (and wrote about it ad nauseam) and fills most of her pieces with vicious celeb gossip, photos of herself and other such non-essential tripe. If anyone is entitled to say "Seriously" it's everyone else on the planet.

But the best part is that she closes with this patronizing little gem - "I had no idea blogging could be so lucrative. I wonder, too, what their husbands think of them and their rantings. I imagine it makes them feel like proper men, with little women who instead  of tapping away at the glass ceiling swap recipes and tips for getting a child off to sleep......They might just as well don a burka, and shuffle, so narrow is their vision."

I just had to laugh. If anyone is sending women hurtling back into the 1950's and beyond, it's Liz Jones. Every time she puts trotter to keyboard she slags off a female. Writing about having to move out of her fairytale country house (because she's pissed off so many locals no one will sell her a pint of milk) she can't resist a swipe at the local mothers' "porridge-textured tummies". 

Any need Liz? I assume you have lots of baggage which all the therapy in the world can't fix, but this constant one-woman bitchfest is getting old. And if anyone's turning back the clock on women's rights it's you - but so narrow is your vision that you can't see that can you?

16 comments:

  1. Maybe she's never heard of *Live & Let Live* or *Each To Their Own*.
    Why do some people think that everyone has to be like them?
    Diversity is the spice of life and why does she read blogs that bore her?
    Life is too precious.
    Maggie X

    Nuts in May

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  2. I like a provocative argument but I've read a few of her pieces in the DM and she simply comes across as a total wingnut, someone who will die lonely because she has bullied everyone around her. Sad if you think about it.

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  3. She's invited to be on the panel and then behaves like that afterwards, doubt she will get many more invites.

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  4. The Daily Mail sounds like an ideal 'home' for her! :-)

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  5. I read this article in TDM today and it made me cringe. Poor LIZ,could she have stepped in it more? This is the first time I have actually felt sorry for her. Poor bunny. She has no idea. That is nothing new, but this time she has REALLY done herself in.

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  6. My heart died a little bit reading her article today. I am sure she felt out of place. I am sure her recent move out of the lovely bit of England that I am, an American, live in, left her open to...oh hell, who are we kidding!
    That is suicide by keyboard!

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  7. I try to never read Liz Jones, I have enough aggravation in my life. But this is a telling little piece, that says oh so much more about the author than it does about Mums who blog and who (despicably!) earn a living doing so. Shall we just colour you green with envy Liz?

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  8. I witnessed the event.

    When asked what she does if she has nothing to write about she said she purposefuly generates "something to write about" by writing something that will rile up a load of people then she writes about the backlash... Bingo!

    When asked if she regrets writing so "truthfully" about so many people in her life--friends, family and strangers, she replied "Yes, I regret all of it." Then when asked why she still does it she said simply "that's what I do, it's my job, to sell papers, it's all I know." Sounds like Faustian pact to me.

    Sitting two metres away from her was quite interesting. She was...odd. I left the conference actually feeling sorry for her.

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  9. Good for you Expat! I have personally never read any of her stuff and definitely won't now. I can't stand a woman who isn't a woman's woman!

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  10. Well said. I saw a link to this column on another blogger's page and read it, then regretted that I had wasted three minutes of my life on something so illogical and mean-spirited. If she really does cringe every time she hits send, it's not nearly enough. She needs to hit delete instead.

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  11. I know, - I don't get that. I suppose if it's her job, as she says, then you just have to do it, but really? As Mich says - a pretty pathetic pact.

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  12. Whoa! Well, I can tell her that my husband loves the money I bring in from blogging and he couldn't give a toss what I'm writing about. He just says "Keep it coming hon!" Ca-ching!

    This is the first time of heard of Liz but from what I can gather from your post it sounds like a simple case of sour-grapes. While I'm not a big fan of mummy blogs because some of them seem like they do nothing but pitch products, I don't blame them for taking advantage of an avenue to make supplemental income.

    They (we) are making money, and sometimes decent money without a degree in journalism. Maybe that says more about her than it does us. Really, who are the clever ones in this scenario?

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  13. Oooh, I doubt many of them her age have a degree in journalism. She's older than me (even) and back then, you couldn't even do a degree in the subject. And anyway (snigger, snigger) she says she's an artist.

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  14. I rarely read mum blogs, simply because I'm not a mum. If I were, I'm sure I could learn a lot from the blogging mums. Though I occasionally read the DM, I had never heard of Liz Jones until I read this post. If the article linked to is characteristic of her body of work, I'll probably skip the rest! I don't enjoy associating with mean-spirited people, whether in person or via screen or printed page. I prefer to cultivate joy and peace.

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  15. Who knows who the real Liz Jones is. I'm sure she's paid to be as controversial as possible and maybe over the years she's morphed into a bit of a bitch from hell. Her articles are so funny though that she is a good read although the content is often a load of cobblers!

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