Withering attack by Grauniad hack. Who knew “foodie” was first cited from 1980 by the OED?

(Cockney geezer Jamie Oliver’s Proper Bloke’s Sausage Fusilli sounds quite toothsome as long as HP or Daddies sauces are involved. In the States would this be Regular Guy’s...?)

Good lord.  At first I thought “Another lazy hack with a few column inches to fill and nothing to write about—ah, yes, making fun of some subculture is always good for an easy rant—throw a dart at the list: OK, foodies it is,” but then I scrolled down and down and down and there was no end to it.  Either he really has a bug up his ass about this or he had just taken some uppers and couldn’t stop typing.  At any rate, I’m not sure why the 1980 date is surprising; it fits with my mental image of when the word started being bandied about.

Ah well, I suppose journalists have to make a living. It’s not as though there’s anything happening in the world to report on.

I switched off slightly after his mis-spelling (or trendy alternative spelling) of “swath”, and completely after five paragraphs.  But like lh said, they have columns to fill, money to make.  (Note to self: always be succinct.)

He also misstates the 1980 citation. It’s from New York magazine, not the New York Times Magazine. A seemingly minor error, but a world of difference.

Dave Wilton - 17 October 2012 02:56 AM

He also misstates the 1980 citation. It’s from New York magazine, not the New York Times Magazine. A seemingly minor error, but a world of difference.

Obviously, there is work available for editorial and fact-checking staff.

Of course, with that sort of expertise, the article is unlikely to have survived in all of it’s majestic splendor, if at all.

I found many of the comments on the article to be humorous.

Clearly they pay freelancers by the word which I believe is how Henry James learnt his trade early on.

Briefer foodie crap here presumably by a salaried staff writer, with more idioms by readers after.

The article posted by venomousbede brought home to me just how deadly tiresome a rant - particularly a long, long rant - can be. I cannot promise never to rant again on this forum (if we’re to believe the Bible, even God enjoys an occasional rant - look at the way he lets his prophets grumble on and on ;-)—but I promise hereafter to keep my rants as laconic as any true Spartan. As for criticizing a rant ---- four letters are often enough (for this particular rant, I’d say “tosh!”, and I’ve coarser FLW’s that would serve just as well, if not better).

I promise hereafter to keep my rants as laconic as any true Spartan.

So you’ll just yell, “This is Sparta!” and kick the offending party into the pit of death?  That will definitely save time and bandwidth.

edit: typo

Fair enough. I have no problem with the Administrator deleting my posts or links if nothing of interest can be found therein. One hopes some might lead to interesting discussions which occasionally happens. Dismissing entire sections of the Old Testament relating to the rantings of Jehovah and hairy, unwiped prophets as “tosh” seems a bit harsh to me, though, Dr T! (just kidding). Poor old Job. I always felt for him.

Dismissing entire sections of the Old Testament relating to the rantings of Jehovah and hairy, unwiped prophets as “tosh” seems a bit harsh to me, though, Dr T!

You seem to have me confused with someone else.  At the least, you have me confused.

Edit: this is not a request for an explanation.

Edit: this is not a request for an explanation.

Dave, I can’t find the “like” button.

Dismissing entire sections of the Old Testament relating to the rantings of Jehovah and hairy, unwiped prophets as “tosh” seems a bit harsh to me,

Correction:

1) Nobody dismissed the Biblical prophets. “Tosh” was a comment on the “foodies” rant alone. My remark about the prophets was actually more of an apologia for ranting than anything else.

2) “Hairy, unwiped” is a bit unfair to prophets. “Hairy”, OK - but nowhere is it stated, to my knowledge, that Biblical prophets were not attentive to personal hygiene (at least one of them recommends washing, as being extremely salutary - 2 Kings 5). “Unwiped” may be used, much more accurately, to describe an entire other class of holy men - to wit, medieval Christian saints. Not washing was a well-attested part and parcel of a holy man’s stock-in-trade - an aspect of “mortifying the flesh”.

“When…the monks bent over the body [of the murdered Thomas à Becket] and stripped off his Cistercian’s habit…they found to their amazement a covering of filthy sackcloth and a horsehair shirt, long-worn and alive with lice. Beneath it they saw the festering weals of repeated self-scourging”. —Arthur Bryant, The Story of England, ch.ix: “The Holy Blissful Martyr”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tosh_(Hasidic_dynasty)