Not stuffiness really. Amitage won because he was northern, lefty and the darling of the Guardian readers. But they are philistines, fashionable philistines, so I suppose it is stuffiness of a sort.

A woman is the Poet Laureate here. You must have noticed. Her poetry has gone downhill IMO BECAUSE she is so intent on being a woman poet. Alicia, by contrast, is a fine poet who happens to be a woman.

I don't know, John. If Soyinka had won I'm guessing you'd have said it was because he was a black African, an attribute which you've previously claimed conferred a considerable advantage in this election, but which I now learn (somewhat to my surprise) is trumped by being a left-winger from the north of England.

The vote was pretty much restricted to Oxford graduates who'd bought an MA, so for any of this to work the majority of these graduates would have to be left-wing Guardian readers with a preference for northerners, black Africans (and female candidates). But surely Oxford also produces plenty of right-wingers (check out the present cabinet), not to mention racists, nationalists, centrists, apoliticals, xenophobes, sexists, misogynists etc?

If the outcome can be reduced to issues of skin colour, nationality and gender etc., who's to say that Armitage didn't pick up votes by virtue of being white, male and British? Looking back through the recent past post holders, being white, male and British does rather seem to be the norm. So, if I wanted to make a case for systematic bias among the electorate, I reckon I could make a far more compelling case in that direction.

-Matt

Now look, Matt. John has given it the usual two minutes of thought, made his mind up or made up his mind (whichever you prefer) and - would you believe it - belched out another anti-Guardian, anti-lefty post. Don't bother him with the facts. They just get in the way.

What Matt said (very well). And yet perhaps this one time John is to be forgiven since what he was really saying, in his own inimitable way, is that we all wish Alicia had won.

Come, come, Michael. What do you know about the Guardian? Or any English newspapers, come to that. The Guardian ran a campaign for Armitage not because he was a good poet, but because he was ENGLISH and not (aargh!) American i.e. a bastion of all that's wicked in the world.

I do not need views attributed to me chaps. I don't think Soyinka is primarily a poet, but a playwright. However, so was Shakespeare. . I can only ssure you that his blackness is irrelevant to me. But of course we Tories are all anti-black, aren't we? Of course we are. Not that I voted Tory at the last election, but hell, I SHOULD have done, shouldn't I?

John,

I haven't suggested that you are anti-black or that all Tories are. I don't see how you've come to that conclusion.

You seem to be suggesting that the majority of the Oxford electorate is pro-black African, pro-lefty, Guardian readers, pro-women candidates, and pro-northerner. That's the claim I'm arguing against. I'm suggesting that your analysis of the Oxford electorate is flawed and isn't borne out by the available evidence.

My belief about what you would have said had Soyinka won is based on you saying that:
Such a claim doesn't make you a racist, and nor does my disagreeing with it mean that I'm accusing you of racism either.

All the best.

-Matt

I'm glad to hear it, Matt. I stand by my remark which is so obviously true it doesn't need saying.

The sort of person who has an Oxford M A (i.e. has spent a tenner getting one) and wants to vote in this election is generally as I said it is. IMO of course.

If I had my way the word 'racist' would not be used in serious conversation about people who do not belong to a party which SAYS it is racist. I mean I would not describe Marie le Pen as a racist, since she says she is not. Her father is one, since he says he is.

My same reasoning of course means that Nigel Farage is not racist whereas the members of the BNP are.