I’ve often thought you can hear an eye roll over the airwaves.
The other day dolly did a AMA on insta. Someone asked what her favourite thing was about
. She said that pandora never
witches about people behind their backs. That may be true or may be a dig at this thread but she definitely makes snide remarks.
I keep thinking about the niggles I have around their privilege. Several people have highlighted how P and D do acknowledge it more than others and that they are good are sharing their platform with less privileged normos. I do agree but something still irks me and it’s not just the giant chip on my shoulder.
It’s not just P and D but they do have a huge platform and their USP is basically ‘Posh but Woke AF. I am increasingy disappointed by how much they are selling out (the merch, the sly promos and puff pieces that are not adequately flagged, the endless live events)
I’ve also been surprised by some things they’ve recently said and some things I’ve read on this forum. I was really shocked by Dolly’s ‘even my cleaner was disgusted’ (paraphrasing) comment on twitter.Also, when they were discussing ‘Such a Fun Age’ on the podcast they said some things which I found a touch racist (I’d be interested in others’ opinions, maybe I need another listen).They were discussing the part in the book where the wealthy white character Alix was hiding her privilege from her black babysitter, Amira (cutting tags off clothes and pretending to eat leftovers). I read the book and read that as a class thing. The way they Discuss it on the podcast is as a race thing From the assumption that black equals poor. I feel that that whole scenario in the book could be flipped with a wealthy black employer and poorer white nanny of you see what I mean? While so much of that book is about race I don’t think that part necessary was and I found their discussion of it jarring. I also found it interesting that Dolly said she found bits of it very uncomfortable reading (fair enough) and how she cannot imagine ANY of her (presumably white) friends reading it without discomfort around privilege when a lot of the privilege in the book is also surrounding wealth.
I maybe need to re phrase this message When I’m less tired. Does anyone get what I mean?
Just want to add that when they addressed the BLM movement on the podcast (I seem to remember a whole episode being dedicated to it for extra WPWP) they recommended a wealth of books and resources. They mentioned that someone (I think it was Reni Eddo-Lodge) had voiced discomfort about the huge rise in sales linked to the recent BLM events. They suggested various ways of sharing the books that were being suggested e.g getting them second hand or borrowing them from a library (groundbreaking ). Now I know this was in current Covid uncertainty around jobs and economy but FFS it made me so mad on behalf of the authors. They never suggest scrimping on books (Pandora makes a point of mentioning the enormous amount she lets herself spend on books and magazines). They also plug away at their own books. Don’t recall them suggesting people pass around a copy of their book EVER. Instead they bang on about the importance of pre ordering for authors and paying for ‘good’ journalism (regular Times Online plug and The Pound Project - Dolly’s mate). Maybe it was very unfortunate timing and maybe it was a genuine push to get those books read by as many people as possible but it seemed like the work of those authors and academics was not worth paying full price for.