Jack Monroe #178 I am a human being and I make mistakes

[nicjd1]

Taxis wouldn't drive onto our estate. I had to walk the last half mile. The gun crime and gang culture was, on reflection, really scary. But we just got on with it.

I was in Manto one night, everybody off their heads dancing away. Three guys came in, shooting into the air, everyone dropped to the floor. The guys said they were taking over the door and drug dealing. They left, everyone got up and carried on dancing.

Jack wore stab vest to Glastonbury and was scared of youngsters dancing in a dance tent. She has no idea about poverty and deprivation. Even if she wasn't middle class, she really doesn't have a clue about the lives people live on these estates. Sadly these conditions remain in some areas, despite huge amounts of regeneration money being spent.

Jack certainly didn't have a childhood of poverty like she claims. In comparison to her media friends she may have not had the advantages they did, but in no way was she poor.

Spoiler: Salford/poverty chat

Spoiler: Salford/poverty chat

My partner from an area of Salford close to the precinct where we live now said the same about taxis, they actually wouldn't drive there years ago. Was known as 'little Beirut'. I grew up in a very WC part of Manchester but was shocked by the stories. It's a very proud community with a lot of good but a lot of gang violence and it's still very rough round the edges now but nothing like what it was. We live in a development that took over old terraced houses ( ), and I feel guilty that it drove people out of where they lived their whole lives, my partner included. I just wish Jack wouldn't speak for so many people when she does not have a clue.

 

[Flibbertigibbet]

I want THAT MANchester memoirs from @MancBee @Walkdengirl @Hollaaa et al. Or better still a radio show with crackin choons.

 

[colouredlines]

Twas fairly gobsmacking for me when I went to The Big Shmoke Dublin for university too. I remember some English toffs who went to Trinity because they were too dim for Oxford or Cambridge, and they had no concept of money or manners. I spent an afternoon in a café with a friend who was friendly with a few of them, and a stream of posh came and went, having lunch or coffee with us, and we had the honour of paying the bill.

Not at all surprising, but still infuriating.

Jack would've loved Trinity...as you say, there were tons of Hooray (Go)Henrys she'd have hung out with, then she'd go home in the holidays and tell everyone she was the poorest girl in her year. Heaven!

 

[PoorPatrol]

Just had a book alert. ‘That Man” has a new one out in September. I bet she’s chewing the carpet, no fuss and drama. But, then “That Man” doesn’t spend all day on Twitter.

Yes, new book is called ‘Together’ which I can’t ever imagine mean-spirited Jack ever getting the concept of. She gets no pleasure from cooking, and seems to have nothing but spite for everyone around her. Whatever anyone thinks of Jamie, his love of food, family, and eating are undeniable.

 

[HotesTilaire]

Knowing the difference between a gunshot and a car backfiring or fireworks is the life skill I didn’t know I had...Hulme was still there when I was at uni...so was Dancebacteria

Knowing the difference between a gunshot and a car backfiring or fireworks is the life skill I didn’t know I had...Hulme was still there when I was at uni...so was Dancebacteria

Edit not sure why the double post! Two cheeks of the same arse innit

 

[Hollaaa]

I want THAT MANchester memoirs from @MancBee @Walkdengirl @Hollaaa et al. Or better still a radio show with crackin choons.

Spoiler: Misty watercolour memories

It's not all good, I accidentally met Bono once. Edit: he was not there to save us, at least.

 

[MancBee]

Just out of curiosity - is this the same area that New Order are from? Because Bernard's description of where he grew up is so bloody bleak I actually thought he might have been joking?!? But reading these recollections make me feel differently.

I suggest you Google Hulme Crescents, Fort Beswick, or Fort Ardwick, and 80s Ordsall Estate and look at the images. It was beyond anything you can imagine. Bleak really doesn't come close. Towards the end, before they decided to pull them down, someone knocked out all the walls between 2 flats and created a nightclub. All while tenants still tried to bring up families on the same block. The walkways in the sky were something to behold.

Unfortunately there are still places like this, especially in London. Jack should be all over this. Activist? Not unless it is financially beneficial to her.

 

[coffeeandwine]

Jack is the posh kid at uni having a go at me for “being paid to be here” coz I got a grant and they didn’t, whilst investing their student loans in a high interest savings account because their dad had loaned them the same amount interest free and they wanted to get a head start on repaying him Telling me my part time job was a pointless distraction

Well this took me back! I remember trying to explain that if I had no money for rent and/or food there was no way in hell my mum could bail me out like their parents could. Still 'didn't get it'

 

[Flibbertigibbet]

Spoiler: Misty watercolour memories

It's not all good, I accidentally met Bono once. Edit: he was not there to save us, at least.

I am SCARLET with the shame! Adam Mullins once told my cousin to duck off (she waved at him when he stopped at a crossroads on his motorbike).

 

[Hollaaa]

I am SCARLET with the shame! Adam Mullen once told my cousin to duck off (she waved at him when he stopped at a crossroads on his motorbike).

Spoiler: Bono bants

Consider your cousin partly avenged. I was walking into the Midland Hotel not realising they had played the G-Mex the night before. Being a typical teen I pointed at an admittedly very over-dressed man on the steps outside and commented "this dick thinks he's the Edge from U2, state of him" only to walk in and see Chrissie Hynde and Naomi Campbell deep in conversation with Bono. Ahem.

Being an occasionally gobby teenage head is probably why I find Jack relatable at times. At least I don't do it in subtweets in my advanced years.

 

[moosesauna]

Well this took me back! I remember trying to explain that if I had no money for rent and/or food there was no way in hell my mum could bail me out like their parents could. Still 'didn't get it'

still a bit shocked from hearing two girls behind me on the bus complaining about people who always said they hated their jobs. ''Why don't they just quit and get another one?" Yeah, because it's really easy to get by without work, isn't it /s

 

[coffeeandwine]

still a bit shocked from hearing two girls behind me on the bus complaining about people who always said they hated their jobs. ''Why don't they just quit and get another one?" Yeah, because it's really easy to get by without work, isn't it /s

They probably think everyone has tons of savings or the Bank of Mummy and Daddy to fall back on while you look for your dream job

 

[PoorPatrol]

I suggest you Google Hulme Crescents, Fort Beswick, or Fort Ardwick, and 80s Ordsall Estate and look at the images. It was beyond anything you can imagine. Bleak really doesn't come close. Towards the end, before they decided to pull them down, someone knocked out all the walls between 2 flats and created a nightclub. All while tenants still tried to bring up families on the same block. The walkways in the sky were something to behold.

Unfortunately there are still places like this, especially in London. Jack should be all over this. Activist? Not unless it is financially beneficial to her.

Definitely still many in London. One big estate near to where I grew up has recently been regenerated very successfully, but it was as close to a hellscape as anyone could imagine during the 70s and 80s and beyond. They had those awful walkways/bridges going across, and it was ‘traffic-free’ which essentially made it police free. Nobody had any privacy, the flats and gardens all zigzagged over each other, and when you went into the maisonettes you went in and down deep stairs with no natural light. People and their families were just treated like sardines, squashed together in concrete tins. I had lots of friends who lived in there, and as a kid/teen I didn’t give it a second thought tiptoeing over drugs and running through the terrifying enclosed bridges.

Looking back, I can’t even imagine how it must have felt trying to raise children there, or being elderly or vulnerable. There was always music and screaming coming from every direction.

Jack seriously thinks her stint in a two bedroom flat by the sea, and with outside space, was some kind of torture!

 

[traumatised sideboard]

I think Jack describes her slop photos as being in glorious colour as they aren't in black and white. Simple Jack logic. Such a shame she burnt her bridges to THAT MAN'S house, now she'll never get those nuggets of wisdom. All she can afford now is Asda Smart Price

 

[Sideboard Bob]

Off topic

Spoiler: sorry, more U2

Why did Bono fall off the stage?




Because he stood too close to The Edge.

On topic, “hilariously“ Jack has liked this tweet

 

[HotesTilaire]

Wow @traumatised sideboard with these images you are really spoiling us!

 

[Walkdengirl]

Sorry, more off topic. My nephew's first job was working in the Swinton insurance shop on regent road, they used to have a buzz in entry system to keep the worst out. They all wore clip on ties as when they used to wear proper ones someone had been pulled over the counter and strangled with it.

Peter hook once came and played at the bulls head in Walkden, he wasn't very complimentary about it in his autobiography! It's a wetherspoons now, it's stint as the Amsterdam video 'fun' bar in the 80s was grim, dark and loads of places to hide your stash and weapons. Never wore a stab vest even though they averaged a stabbing a week.

And of course I was mates with Bez out of the happy Mondays(I really was).

You know what though, even though I moved away and married a proper country boy I wouldn't have changed my upbringing and experiences for anything.

 

[Lanie]

I haven't seen her do any news articles or colabs recently, what's going on?

 

[HotesTilaire]

I haven't seen her do any news articles or colabs recently, what's going on?

She’s just bagged spokesperson for Imodium

 

[Legionnairess]

I haven't seen her do any news articles or colabs recently, what's going on?

I like to think most companies won’t go near her with the proverbial barge pole. Her collabs have been awful. They can’t have got their money’s worth.