Food 'n' Class
- Thread starter josef k.
- Start date
slim jenkins
El Hombre Invisible
I'm not talking about racism per se - but the social behaviour of Brits compared to what I've seen in European bars and restaurants. Race relations are too complex to reduce to simply 'tolerant' or 'racist', I think.
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Certainly not Eastern Europe, not by a long shot.
crackerjack
Well-known member
CHAOTROPIC
on account
My family on my mother's side is from Rotherham. All former coal-miners who worked at Silverwood Colliery until Thatcher shut it, along with all the others. The Flint of 'Roger & Me' represents about 1% of the unemployment & loss of pride suffered by entire generations in Sheffield when the pits closed, & it hit Rotherham & the little villages of Thrybergh etc really hard. Almost every man in the place worked down the mines. I've got uncles & cousins, in their 30s when the pits were shut, who never found any other work. Just resigned themselves to 30 years of unemployment. Shitty situation & a very very depressing place to live. I remember visiting her as a kid & seeing all the boarded up shops.
Racial mix. My grandma met a non-white person once. I know, because she told me. (He was her doctor & "very nice", apparently, "although he was dark".) Maybe it's not quite such a cultural backwater now, with the growth of Sheffield as a university town, but the little satellite towns like Rotherham are still seen as proper fucking shitholes by most residents (Arctic Monkeys aside).
Comment in the Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2008/oct/03/jamie.oliver.ministry.food.government
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2008/oct/03/jamie.oliver.ministry.food.government
well, many of those criticisms are valid, i think, not least the central problem that a viral, word of mouth approach is absolutely NOT the best way to tackle the problem....BUT i do think that this kind of program can be useful in drawing attention to the problem, which might, just might, eventually force government to do something about it. a program in which he sat down and posed a series of questions to government ministers would never attract as much attention as this series is. this is also why jamie oliver, for all his irritating mockney pretensions, is actually the right man for the job, as he is able to stir up a huge amount of media interest...
Why not, would you say? Or - what would be the best way?
i just can't see it happening without either state regulation of some sort (compulsory cooking lessons in school, tax on packaged junk food etc), OR a decision by food retailers to change people's shopping habits. the latter certainly could happen - they've done it before of course by pushing packaged convenience food...but they're not going to do that without some sort of incentive, or the belief that it's in their own interests...
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Hffff, it's the same old reflex apologetics, the same tired fallacy that convenience foods and takeaways represent the most economical way to feed your family.
The point about school dinners is well made, though. If the government were serious about the whole issue then school dinners could be the most effective and perhaps also the cheapest tactic available. It'd certainly help treat the causes of childhood obesity rather than the symptoms, and a decade down the line there'd be lower adult obesity too.
Wouldn't it be great to have kids coming home from school and saying "Mummy, we had [X] for lunch today, it was great, can we cook it for dinner tomorrow?".
mistersloane
heavy heavy monster sound
I really like the fact that he's inventing his own governmental organisation in the wake of indifference on the behalf of the Party to his endeavours. I think the fact that he's ending up having to use the force of his own identity in order to carve out a niche for the greater good of the people (and, by that nature, himself) is a fantastic thing; by having learnt that he can't rely on the government to solve what he perceives to be the problems, he's now taking matters into his own hands - and therefore also transferring that power into the hands of the people the chooses to mediate with. I think it's quite radical from that perspective.
Found this http://jamiegohome.com/
"Let’s start by dealing with the elephant in the room.
Obesity, obesity, obesity: the keyword that has headed up all the pre publicity.
Jamie’s “non cooks” are not obese. The girls are slim; the men run the gamut from skinny to Adonnis.
Those who are put forward as cooking role models are all carrying a bit of timber.
Without the voice over- the whole thing would be confusing. If you were deaf and wanting a hot, holiday body- you would be out buying Maltesers, cheesy chips and 20 Bensons."
It's actually worth reading the whole page at the link. Think the bit that narked him most was Oliver asking the council to pay for starting up a food shop, which esentially was promoting a tv show, which was promoting a book, which has just been released in time for Christmas, which will undoubtedly net Jamie more millions, which all the Rotherham council tax payers are unlikely to get a cut of. Sainsburys sponsoring the show too and running the "good food for a fiver" campaign.
"Let’s start by dealing with the elephant in the room.
Obesity, obesity, obesity: the keyword that has headed up all the pre publicity.
Jamie’s “non cooks” are not obese. The girls are slim; the men run the gamut from skinny to Adonnis.
Those who are put forward as cooking role models are all carrying a bit of timber.
Without the voice over- the whole thing would be confusing. If you were deaf and wanting a hot, holiday body- you would be out buying Maltesers, cheesy chips and 20 Bensons."
It's actually worth reading the whole page at the link. Think the bit that narked him most was Oliver asking the council to pay for starting up a food shop, which esentially was promoting a tv show, which was promoting a book, which has just been released in time for Christmas, which will undoubtedly net Jamie more millions, which all the Rotherham council tax payers are unlikely to get a cut of. Sainsburys sponsoring the show too and running the "good food for a fiver" campaign.
don_quixote
Trent End
it's not 'good food for a fiver', it's 'feed your family for a fiver', and i really can't see the problem with that beyond 'they're a company so OBVIOUSLY theyre doing it for profit'
educational advertising is quite nice actually, so long as it's not pentapeptides or witch doctors
educational advertising is quite nice actually, so long as it's not pentapeptides or witch doctors
don_quixote
Trent End
or baby milk formula.
but i think this is quite legit
but i think this is quite legit
It wasn't so much the sainsburys bit, more the way that JO's "philanthropic" gesture has been co-funded by the local council and thus local taxpayers who due to the sensationalist marketing now look like a town of clueless, depressed, lazy fuckwits and paying for the pleasure to boot.
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Yeah, while I think it's certainly worth bearing in mind that someone doing something like this - Jamie Oliver in this instance, it was Hugh Fearnly-Whatshisface a year or two ago - *may* be doing it for cynical reasons, to just blindly assume that it's the case is extremely, well, cynical.
And to be honest, if a few more people buy The Naked Chef because of this show, is that really so terrible? I mean, if people are going to start cooking, it might be an idea for them to buy a book on the subject, no? Doesn't have to be his, but if it is, so what?
I think there's a wider sort of reflex cynicism at work here that automatically assumes that anyone who is fairly well-known and wants to help other people is invariably doing so for wholly ulterior motives, almost to the point where you have to wonder if having a public profile and a bit of money makes you morally ineligible to try and do anything altruistic. Maybe it's all Bono's fault, who knows. But in the end, someone who's a household name and appears on telly a lot has the capacity to help a given cause far more than Joe Bloggs who sends his two quid to Oxfam every month.
And to be honest, if a few more people buy The Naked Chef because of this show, is that really so terrible? I mean, if people are going to start cooking, it might be an idea for them to buy a book on the subject, no? Doesn't have to be his, but if it is, so what?
I think there's a wider sort of reflex cynicism at work here that automatically assumes that anyone who is fairly well-known and wants to help other people is invariably doing so for wholly ulterior motives, almost to the point where you have to wonder if having a public profile and a bit of money makes you morally ineligible to try and do anything altruistic. Maybe it's all Bono's fault, who knows. But in the end, someone who's a household name and appears on telly a lot has the capacity to help a given cause far more than Joe Bloggs who sends his two quid to Oxfam every month.
I don't doubt it's not going to do some good, but he is clearly going to make a lot of money from this so it's certainly not purely philanthropic either. You don't get a fortune of £20million just for being a good bloke, he's a clever businessman.
I also have issues with the bastard for somehow making me now think of extra virgin olive oil as a necessity - worse than crack dealers these tv chefs
Mr. Tea
Let's Talk About Ceps
Haha, I can't live without the stuff and I'm not ashamed to say it. Tell you what though, a fiver's worth of olive oil lasts a good deal longer than a fiver's worth of crack.