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General discussion

Mark Flax, Jonah Jones and anyone else with experience in

Mar 26, 2010 11:02PM PDT

the UK. Can you explain to me the seemingly widespread prejudice against reading broadsheet mewspapers as contrasted with tabloids? I fear I attracted a certain amount of scorn for reading the Independent, the Times and the Guardian, when everybody else was reading the Sun or the Mail or the Telegraph.

I was much lower key over there, though it was apparent that I knew a lot of stuff, and I had a Pharmacist Administrator who used to quiz me about drugs, their effects and side effects and uses in front of staff who were actually higher up the pecking order than I was. I think he was trying to help me be recognized as a worthwhile member of the team as opposed to a kind of, why is he here and what does he know about this, attitude. They were happy to use me for customer relations to cool out irate customers though.

rob

Discussion is locked

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That's reverse prejudice
Mar 27, 2010 6:27AM PDT

although I am not sure prejudice is the right term, and I'm surprised anyone noticed or bothered. Snobbishness would be better.

The Times, FT, Guardian, Independent, all the broadsheet newspapers are read by Managers, Royalty, posh people.

The Sun, Mirror, Daily Star, read by the workers. The Daily Express and Daily Mail have split personalities. They used to be broadsheet and alluded to the broadsheet status, but really were the lower middle class person's paper, and now they are tabloid, although so far they have resisted the "Page 3" inclusions that the other tabloids have.

If you are in a group of manual workers and pull out a broadsheet, then you're not one of them. That's the reverse snobbishness.

But all of that went out the window decades ago.

Mark

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It didn't go that far out the window. It was quite clear
Mar 30, 2010 9:28AM PDT

that I was looked at oddly by my workmates, Pharmacy Porters and Pharmacy Assistants. Pharmacists (University educated) on the other hand used to borrow my copies of the Newspapers. I do think that at least some of the strongly accented Essex folks I worked with thought I was toffee nosed and somehow "slumming". I wish I knew how Eric Blair managed it, during The Journey to Wigan Pier, and Down and Out In Paris and London. I don't have his skills. (I can't write as well either).

Rob

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Well, here's a thought . . .
Mar 30, 2010 1:31AM PDT

1. The Wall Street Journal is read by the people who run the country.

2. The Washington Post is read by people who think they run the country.

3. The New York Times is read by people who think they should run
the country and who are very good at crossword puzzles.

4. USA Today is read by people who think they ought to run the
country but don't really understand The New York Times. They do,
however, like their statistics shown in pie charts.

5. The Los Angeles Times is read by people who wouldn't mind running
the country -- if they could find the time -- and if they didn't have
to leave Southern California to do it.

6.The Boston Globe is read by people whose parents used to run the
country and did a poor job of it, thank you very much.

7. The New York Daily News is read by people who aren't too sure
who's running the country and don't really care as long as they can
get a seat on the train.

8. The New York Post is read by people who don't care who is running
the country as long as they do something really scandalous, preferably while intoxicated.

9. The Miami Herald is read by people who are running another
country but need the baseball scores.

10. The San Francisco Chronicle is read by people who aren't sure if
there is a country or that anyone is running it; but if so, they
oppose all that they stand for. There are occasional exceptions if the leaders are handicapped minority feminist atheist dwarfs who also
happen to be illegal aliens from any other country, or galaxy,
provided of course, that they are not Republicans.

11. The National Enquirer is read by people trapped in line at the
grocery store.

12. The Minneapolis Star Tribune is read by people who have recently
caught a fish and need something in which to wrap it.

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(NT) Best answer yet (-:
Mar 30, 2010 2:52AM PDT
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(NT) LOL, so true!
Mar 30, 2010 4:42AM PDT
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(NT) Superb answer from the US perspective. Thanks R
Mar 30, 2010 9:19AM PDT
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broadsheets were very anti-social
Mar 30, 2010 1:36AM PDT

OK if the reader was doing the cross word,
but if he was actually reading it..PITA!!

,.