Never mind the quality, feel the width
The wonderful people who brought you 'the meeja is biased against Muslims' report (which just so happened to take as its 'average' week one where the report on the 7/7 bombers was released) have come up with an 'audit' that proves that London is bigger and better, culturally speaking, than gay Paree, Noo Yawk, Tokyo and Shanghai.
I have been reading through it with increasing irritation, and may yet do a full blown demolition of it, but even the most cursory skim shows the fatal flaw in its method - it does not compare like with like. So, for example, the report writers are agog that the Great Wen has more art galleries than Paris at 92 to 59. If an 'auditor' reckoned that something of the size and grandeur of the Louvre could be compared with some odd back street gallery in Hoxton - as these people seem to regard as legitimate - he or she would have the ICA cutting them off at the knees.
And the nonsense goes on. And on. Numbers of major theatres, for example. No indication as to size, and forget that London's theatres seem to show little beyond 'musicals' concocted from the songs of defunct pop groups. Mama Mia and the Comédie-Française are not exactly on all fours with each other, are they? Forget also that the outer borough's theatres would be DOA without the annual injection of cash from the panto season. And 'number of music performances' per year, which groups Wembley stadium with the pub at the end of my road.
Still, Bonnie Greer says it is 'totally forensic', so that's all right....
Note that I have lived in London or its immediate orbit my entire life, and work in the media (after a fashion) and am quite fond of the place, but could do without this nonsense on day-glo orange stilts masquerading as hard fact.
I have been reading through it with increasing irritation, and may yet do a full blown demolition of it, but even the most cursory skim shows the fatal flaw in its method - it does not compare like with like. So, for example, the report writers are agog that the Great Wen has more art galleries than Paris at 92 to 59. If an 'auditor' reckoned that something of the size and grandeur of the Louvre could be compared with some odd back street gallery in Hoxton - as these people seem to regard as legitimate - he or she would have the ICA cutting them off at the knees.
And the nonsense goes on. And on. Numbers of major theatres, for example. No indication as to size, and forget that London's theatres seem to show little beyond 'musicals' concocted from the songs of defunct pop groups. Mama Mia and the Comédie-Française are not exactly on all fours with each other, are they? Forget also that the outer borough's theatres would be DOA without the annual injection of cash from the panto season. And 'number of music performances' per year, which groups Wembley stadium with the pub at the end of my road.
Still, Bonnie Greer says it is 'totally forensic', so that's all right....
Note that I have lived in London or its immediate orbit my entire life, and work in the media (after a fashion) and am quite fond of the place, but could do without this nonsense on day-glo orange stilts masquerading as hard fact.
Labels: Livingstone, London, popular culture, The arts
This entry was posted
on Tuesday, March 11, 2008 at 2:13 pm.
You can skip to the end and leave a response.
You've got more patience than I have. It started well, with a nice totty on the first page, then when I got to the text (page 3?) there was the grinning buffoon himself staring out at me.
Sorry, I couldn't get much further. I assume the authors acted as judge and jury, deciding what they believe makes London best, and then graded it best using these criterion.
Junk logic, if this is how they did it.
I miss London, having lived there for five years in the 1970's, but I bet the things I miss would not be the things they think makes London great.
In my capacity as an ocassional visitor to London, I am happy to confirm that I can think of at leat a dozen other places I would rather be!
...occasional.... a bloop like that would have landed me with a week's detention from my English teacher!
(Them woz the daze, innit?)
» Post a Comment