26 September 2016

Up Yours Belatedly Jane O'Hara



Found an old newspaper clipping inside the gate-fold of "Slade Alive" - one of the pile of well cared for albums given to me by an old friend's brother a short time ago. No date on the clipping but I would guess it is from '77 - '79. The reverse of the clipping includes a small advert for a blood donor clinic in the basement of Woodward's' downtown Dope City location and a large advert for The World On A Silver Platter - video discs and a video disc player.

The clipping itself is of a story about London's warring youth tribes: skinheads, punk rockers, rude boys, teds, mods and rockers. Seems they did not care much for one another's company.

Fucking news that was!

The photo pasted (literally) into the middle of the story is of skinheads putting the boots to some poor fucker in the middle of the street as shocked onlookers gasp from the sidewalk. Skinheads were like Millwall supporters like myself in those days: nobody liked us and we did not give a shit. Skinheads are so much more polite now their hateful outlook on the world has them on the verge of democratically reasserting the white race's superior place in the latest world war of world wars.

Writer Jane O'Hara (a prize winning journalist!) does not reserve her distaste for the skinheads however. She hates all young people - and probably hates everyone else by now - an outlook we have come to associate, if not accept, with prize winning journalism.

3 comments:

motorcycleguy said...

I ran to the shelf, pulled out my Slayed?...alas...no old newpaper clippings, but track 1 on side 2 is "Gudbye T' Jane". Yeah about journalists, even the ones who don't win prizes. I think the good ones that are out there now should invent a new name for their trade so they don't get lumped in with the sorry lot that seem to get published a lot, especially here in BC.

Mr. Beer N. Hockey said...

Perhaps if the real journalists (i.e. the few who can look at themselves in the mirror in the morning without reaching out for or wishing they had bottle of scotch) went back to sticking a PRESS card in their hat bands the public might better say, "To Hell with the rest of them - the real PRESS rocks."

motorcycleguy said...

I think you are on to something...I see a spike in fedora sales. TV friendly too, just like cat stories. I don't think you should intimate that our BC journalists could drink scotch. Though some real journalists did quite well with the stuff, ours just swill the Kool-Aid given to them in their lunch kits.