I don’t recall precisely when Private Eye became a tedious parody of itself, but knowing my own exquisite taste it was undoubtedly just before I stopped buying it, some years ago. So prior to today, the last time I read an article was when someone forwarded me something nasty it said – I can’t remember what – when the Free Speech Union was founded. But then, a satirical anti-establishment magazine would be against free speech, wouldn’t it?
This apparent campaign against free speech advocacy continued this week with an attack on Triggernometry, which (as most readers will know) is a pro-free speech podcast and YouTube channel hosting a variety of speakers of all political stripes discussing controversial topics. It’s not clear why the Eye decided to launch its attack now, but is it a pure coincidence that the most recent episode – at the time the piece was likely written – featured a couple of prominent Jewish guests being critical of Hamas? I wonder about this, because the Eye’s editor Ian Hislop has always taken an anti-Israel line, and for instance a current featured article makes false quasi-legal claims about Israel breaching humanitarian law by, for instance, advising civilians to get out of the IDF’s area of operations. And notably, in the last few days a Jewish cartoonist quit the magazine after receiving a death threat for criticising the Eye’s anti-Israel line.
But anyway, the piece begins with a contradiction. It notes that Triggernometry skyrocketed in popularity after one of the hosts, Konstantin Kisin, gave a speech at the Oxford Union that was widely shared online. But then it attempts to portray Triggernometry as unknown or irrelevant (“What the f**k is Triggernometry, you might ask.”), which is ironic given the considerably greater audience enjoyed by Triggernometry compared to the Eye, which has a circulation of around 230,000. Triggernometry’s Hamas episode has garnered 680,000 views as of the time of writing, almost three times the Eye’s circulation (while podcast downloads are likely many times this number). “What the f**k is Private Eye?”, many of the half million people who’ve seen Kisin’s tweet about their article might be asking.
The author then complains that the format of Triggernometry is the “longform interview podcast”, which is bad because it’s “the preferred format of anti-woke warriors”. Perhaps you can hear more about the dangers of the longform interview podcast in Ian Hislop’s recent longform interview podcast.
But seriously, there’s a problem with longform interviews now? Should we criticise Thomas Paine because he published in pamphlet form? Or catalogue books according to size and colour? Pace Wilde and his “three-volume novel”, it’s pretty desperate stuff. What matters – or ought to matter – are the ideas being presented. But the author of this quasi-review never once refers to any substantive content from an episode of Triggernometry, except once when we’re told that the hosts, Konstantin Kisin and Francis Foster, said they wouldn’t “expect their wives to obey them”. That’s right, they take the astonishing view that women shouldn’t be subservient to men. We are then treated to a gag about Kisin being someone who would “meekly compl[y]” when interrupted, mid-monologue, by his wife and told to put out the bins: a gag that would probably work better in a country like Saudi Arabia.
What piffle.
And there’s plenty more of it, including how the hosts are hoping to do even better in the American market, because that’s “where the real nutters […] can be found”, and some of the usual weak stuff about how free speech is really a cover for racism (predictably, they resurrect Bernard Manning). The author also suggests that when Kisin had to cancel a show because he was required to agree to a ridiculous contract preventing him saying anything that might be “anti-religion or anti-atheism” (amongst other things), he cynically exploited this merely to advance his career. (And we are invited to think of the children, without a trace of irony.) But Kisin would have gotten away with it, were it not for the pesky Eye, who did some digging to reveal that this supposed contract was, in fact, merely a “non-binding agreement”. That’s not true – and it’s not the only lazy inaccuracy – but never mind. And never mind about all the people who’ve lost their careers for holding perfectly lawful views – they’re all just failed attention-seekers, no doubt.
It probably goes without saying that this kind of petty, snobbish in-group spite is not intended to inform – although it was presumably intended as biting satire. But here’s the rub. I have no issue whatsoever with wickedly scabrous reviews that barely touch upon the subject matter in a serious way, as long as they’re funny. And I understand the instinct to mock what we despise.
But the thing about satire is that, at its heart, it’s puerility making an appeal to the intellect. Good satire makes the author seem more worldly-wise and judicious than they really are – which is why it’s beloved of young (particularly male) scribblers who don’t yet know very much about the world, but who want to show off how clever they are nevertheless. Bad satire, on the other hand, makes the author seem ill-informed and childish (and worse: petty and spiteful). That’s fully on display here.
But perhaps the deepest irony of the piece is the fact that the author, in the custom of the Eye, uses a pseudonym: “Aphra”. Pseudonyms, of course, have an honourable and storied tradition, including in satire, the main purpose being to give the writer freedom to speak without repercussions. But writers like “Aphra” are enforcers of fashionable cosmopolitan orthodoxy, if not outright anti-free speech warriors, and have nothing whatsoever to fear – unlike Jewish staff who criticise the Eye, apparently.
Of course, the other purpose of using a pseudonym is to give oneself an air of inscrutable mystique; which, when the satire is done this badly, is mere pompous affectation.
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I’ve bought the Eye for years but got increasingly annoyed with its endless focus on Brexit badness. By that time, I generally agreed with the stance of the magazine on that but eventually, one has to accept a certain debate is over. When they additionally started to publish COVID fearporn and the usual cries for Earlier! Harder! Longer! More! Corona measures, I stopped reading it.
Peter Hitchen said of them “private eye is a played out rag”. He said it after they tried to smear him over his principled stance over COVID lunacy.
Hislop became deeply irritating on HIGNFY and now I never even look at Private Eye.
When Hislop grows up he might become less irritating.
If!
I bought my first copy of ‘The Eye’ at Uni in 1968, along with ‘The Beano’. The latter has been infinitely more readable for the last decade. The foetus lookalike Hislop has disappeared up his own fundament since he found fame on HIGNFY. In the old days, their lampoons were original and humorous and their exposes, cutting and telling (forecasting power shortages two decades ago). Alas, no longer. RIP The Eye.
Can anyone enjoy such a long period of employment with the BBC not be part of the establishment?
Yes he thought he was so clever (which he probably is) but his arrogance put me off the whole programme.
I like Triggernometry a lot but what I dislike a lot is useful idiots and antisemitism. Or should I say, *useless idiots* legitimizing their bigotry while they simultaneously enable and support a terrorist organization to carry on terrorizing, both Israelis and their own people. But this is all about ”Free Palestine”, right??. ( 3min )
https://twitter.com/NYCGreenfield/status/1719784857247625510?t=7iq3k5nFI7SycKMYN6Tekw&s=19
Palestine eh?
https://rairfoundation.com/exclusive-robert-spencer-unveils-the-religious-roots-of-the-israel-hamas-clash-decoding-the-islamic-threat-interview/
I would love to see undoctored evidence for two things; firstly the damage wrought by these Hamas squibs, which appear to be no more than smoke bombs, and also evidence for these 1400 jews supposedly killed by Hamas. I have seen a lot of Jewish film crews arranging limbs artfully, and applying lots of fake blood and gore, but nothing else. The only thing that astonishes me is why they aren’t claiming six million dead. The whole thing is simply well-planned genocide by these criminals.
Well here’s a taster to whet your appetite, but I guess delusional sickos like yourself ( oh don’t tell me, you’re merely being *sceptical*! ) will always maintain these are all actors or mannequins. I suppose the 220+ hostages in Gaza are also complete fabrication to bolster the propaganda and paint the Hamas ‘freedom fighters’ as the bad guys?
https://twitter.com/ImMeme0/status/1720580063916130624
I wrote this years ago.
HIGNFY and Private Eye are part of the media “Establishment”. Private Eye has been edited by Ian Hislop since 1986 who is the epitome of an Establishment gatekeeper. He was head boy at his private school, an Oxford University graduate who went straight from uni to Private Eye, a devout Anglican and a regular for the BBC where he did a program praising the Rothschild bankers. He totally rubbished the report on the sinister organisation Common Purpose on Have I Got News For You and uses the programme to mould the opinion of it’s viewers just like he moulds the opinion of the infantile Private Eye readers.
Being pilloried by Private Eye should be regarded as a badge of honour.
Agreed. Last night on HIGNFY Hislop produced a juvenile comment about GB News, which was taken up by Merton. They must be running scared at their increasing lack of relevance.
No, they are laughing all the way to the bank as are all those long term BBC sinecures whose programmes have been boring for years and years.
Couldn’t agree more. I have read the Eye for decades but began to be turned off during the COVID madness when I started skipping the MD column.
This now is the final straw for me and I have cancelled my DD.
Won’t bother writing to tell them.,.
“….and Become an Enforcer of Fashionable Metropolitan Orthodoxy”
LOL!….oh the irony……how does it go…?
o wad some pow’r the giftie gie us to see oursels as ithers see us!”
Cancelled my subscription about ten years ago when I realised that by continuing to pay I was taking the piss out of myself.
Viz is far more entertaining.
It’s interesting you should say that. I used to subscribe to Private Eye – I had read it since I was a child in the 60s (liked the cartoons) and my father used to buy it regularly. I cancelled because I couldn’t stand the stance of MD on vaccinations, and the snide digs that were made elsewhere in the mag against people who disagreed with the current narrative. I still subscribe to Viz, but I have detected some elements of wokeness there as well, sometimes in the letterbox pages, and occasional comments in some of the cartoons. Perhaps I have become hypersensitive to it, I don’t know, but I do feel the odd stab of annoyance while reading it. However, the art work is superb, so I can forgive them a lot.
Thanks Tob.
Sad demise of a once relevant, edgy and bitingly-funny satirical magazine. I had been a subscriber for 2 decades but cancelled it mid-way through the Rona scam when it became clear they were practically sponsored by Pfizer and had lost its libertarian heart.
For me it was Covid wot done it.
Their medical expert, “MD” I believe, was in the beginning, actually on our side as it were “- covid not a lot to worry about”. Then wow, how he changed, probably following Whitty when he sensed which way the MSM would be told to blow.
Never bought the dam thing since, mainly because MD spouts utter rubbish re covid/and the miracle jabs.
Oh and Hislop pissed me off, for no particular reason. Just don’t like him anymore.
The main man for me was Richard Ingrams, and I believe he and Hislop fell out decades ago. Says a lot really.
My husband buys PE but I can no longer bear to read it. Once centre but now woke left, yet still sneers at the working class and has a satirical female journalist called Slagg.
Then there was their cancellation of Andrew Wakefield, after having been supportive in the early stages.
About 25 years ago, I used to buy it, but not now.
About ten years ago, when I really did, permanently cancel my multi year subscription. The editor seemed to sell out to the Beeb, the columnists seemed to get stuck in ruts of little interest and critics of the elite were treated the way the Gnome used to treat the Establishment.
Hislop is and has always been a member of the Establishment, he is a snob, and has the look of someone with a permanant bad smell under his nose. I think the last time he was amusing was circa 1997. Since then he has just become a rather bitter, and nasty person.
The latest Private Eye front page is diabolical, as shown below. Inferring that it is Israel that wants to kill everyone in Gaza, as ‘revenge for Hamas Atrocities’, when no such intention has ever been expressed by Israel. The Nazis tried to wipe Jews off the face of the Earth and the innumerable Middle East Muslim Arabs have openly expressed the same desire. How should someone respond to such death threats, especially when those making those threats have demonstrated repeatedly that they will kill you, and in any way they desire? In addition, much like Nazi Germany, Hamas et al have been quite clear that they do not want peace of any kind and are perfectly happy to die in (un)holy war so they can eventually get some sex with 72 virgins.
Private Eye can go to hell.
100%! This guy nails it, imo. He’s got the same attitude as me, albeit with one or two more F-bombs. ( 4mins )
https://twitter.com/GoldsteinBrooke/status/1720462154485080369
Karl Kraus once coined the term die verfolgende Unschuld (the distressing damsel) for imperial Germany during the first world war. At that time, this was a politically motivated lie by an Austrian left-wing jew. But it’s a very apt fit for the present-day government of Israel as depicted by its own propaganda.
What propaganda are we talking about? Have you seen the Hamas body cam footage? A lot of it was viewable before it was censored, perhaps because it was all in Arabic. What is the comparison with Imperial Germany and Israel because the former were not subject to mass terrorist attacks?
It’s truly like going back in time. Can you believe Jews and Israelis are now being warned not to travel and to hide outward signs of their Jewish identity. Crazy. Mind, looking at the state of play in many countries just now, with all of these demonstrations going on and antisemitism having gone viral then I’d be surprised any of them want to go far. How off-putting must it be for Jews to watch all of this footage?
https://twitter.com/EylonALevy/status/1720479098017829193
Such as equating the situation of the state of Israel with its 634,500 soldiers (both acitve and reserve personal) and its plentiful modern military equipment vs its self-acquired arabic enemies with German citizens of Jewish descent in 1930s vs the Nazi state. This isn’t even laughable anymore, it’s ouright insanity.
As you apparently missed the joke, I’ll try to explain it more clearly: German die verfolgte Unschuld, literally the persecuted innocence, is the same as the English damsel in distress, Kraus turned that into die verfolgende Unschuld, literally the persecuting innocence, which I rendered in English as the distressing damsel, ie, the damsel which isn’t in distress but distresses
others. The German was supposed to express that imperial Germany claimed it had been forced into a defensive war (correct) but had really attacked the others (Also correct, the German strategy for a successful defensive war against the triple-entente England, France, Russia was try to beat the French army decisively with the overwhelming majority of its forces before the overwhelming numbers of the Russian army could bring its full weight onto the fairly weak German forces supposed to defend the eastern borders. This means Germany was fighting strategically defensive but tactially offensive).
It’s a much better fit for Isreal because the government of Israel, despite all its We are the oppressed victims! howling, commands the by far most powerful militarty force in the region and what its opponents can muster is really akin to nothing compared to that.
Joke? Does Israel want to kill everyone in Gaza?
They want to kill around 2% and the rest to flee to Egypt and eventually be settled in the West.
Really? Considering how the Jewish people in the West are being targeted and attacked already why would Israel send Palestinians to the West?
Palestinians in the West are clearly less of a threat to the existence of Israel and Israeli Jews than Palestinians in Palestine.
I have absolutely no idea of the plans of the current government of Israel wrt the present situation in Gaza because I don’t really care. But that’s not related to the two texts I wrote.
Are the bodies of those killed by Israeli shells and missiles presentable? Unmarked and with smiles on their faces?
Chunts.
It is comfort within comfort, a life so cossetted over many years that you couldn’t possibly speak against it, This type of corruption of the human soul is very familiar and human all too human. You hear criticsm of the baby boomer generation from both sides of the political spectrum and you could argue that there is a codified sociopathy in their creed. But I take a different view in that the baby boomers were subject to major psychological experimentation. You would’ve noticed that all the anti-family sentiments expressed in post-war philosophy were never really adopted by their authors. The upper middle class had enough self-preservation instinct to keep family strong as a matter of survival. It was the poorest families that were poisoned and destroyed by this poisonous ideology
I was a child in the 1980s and onwards and they were never really very edgy. They were play is safers from very early on. It is just that the power dynamics have changed in terms of Anglo-American discourse. You would’ve noticed a narrowing of the discourse in mainstream media for a long time but especially since the late 1990s. It is a blessing and a curse of our times that we look back just a couple of decades ago and see how naive and accepting we were as a culture. On the other hand that meant that we felt we had at least some level of trust in leadership. In a sense it is a great victory for us to have reached the point where the British masses are more than happy to join our side because it accords with their reality. This only came about through frank exchange of ideas.
Before the internet it was a way of contacting intelligent women.
‘Have I got news for you’ has become unwatchable. Supposedly satire, however just a bashing if any views contra establishment. And Ian Hislop comes across as sanctimonious and smug.
I gave up with anything Hislop is involved in years ago. He’s a pompous little prat.
Kisin, on the other hand, is a very erudite and interesting man. Second only in my opinion to the wonderful Douglas Murray.
“When Did Private Eye Cease to be Anti-Establishment and Become an Enforcer of Fashionable Metropolitan Orthodoxy?”
Years ago.
Next?
“False quasi-legal claims about Israel breaking humanitarian law by advising civilians to get out of the IDF’s area of operations” – which they are an invasion force in anyway. This is a bit like telling the Russians to get out of Moscow because Kiev wants to bomb it. No mention of all those who cannot get out because they are in hospital, old, or sick, and have nowhere to flee the terrorists to. Besides, fleeing them is no hindrance to them shooting you in the back with their high powered sniper rifles. As PE rightly states, this is a war crime by the jews.
‘…false quasi-legal claims about Israel breaching humanitarian law’. What’s quasi legal about it? The IDF can’t hear Hamas for 2 years during planning and yet can now pinpoint Hamas to a single ambulance – a strike which killed mostly children. Maybe study the UN Declaration on Principles of International Law (193 nation states signed up to this), The Rome Statute, The Nuremberg Code and the ICC Criminal Court Act 2001 – all clear on the laws of war, genocide and ‘collective punishment’. As for pseudonyms – you’re hardly a stranger to these yourself, are you ‘Monroe’ (and the rest). You can hide the name, just not the grandiose narcissism.