Jamie Hates You: Part One

“I now reckon that 60% of packed lunches are worse than school dinners. The number of kids as young as five with reheated McDonald’s meals and Red Bull [energy drink] in their packed lunches is appalling,”

Jamie Oliver speaking at the Hay-on-Wye book festival.

Our fave chef was on top tosh talking form at the recent toffs’ gathering on the Welsh border. In the bosom of his true constituency- Jamie could speak freely about his contempt for…well, basically, everybody.

When Jamie Oliver strays into the arena of politics- his views have three consistent threads running through them.

A]

They have no factual basis whatsoever.

B]

He has a deep disrespect for ordinary people. This includes all sections of society, but is most evident when he talks about the working class.

C]

Everything he does or says is motivated by self promotion.

Take the example at the top.

“I now reckon that 60% of packed lunches are worse than school dinners.”

In what way? Nutritional value? Calories? Taste? Smell?  Like most Jamie facts (A.K.A. fiction) this is based on…nothing. The 60% is a made up figure. There is no research sample and no criteria of what is good or bad.

Don’t worry- Jamie’s got some killer evidence to back up his claim.

“The number of kids as young as five with reheated McDonald’s meals and Red Bull [energy drink] in their packed lunches is appalling.”

Shocking, disgraceful. These people are scum. Something must be done.

That’s the knee jerk reaction you are supposed to have.

I have spent a lot of time in and around schools, both primary and secondary, in the last five years. In that time, I have got to know many staff, pupils and parents very well. I have never, repeat never, seen or heard of anyone taking a cold McDonalds meal to school as a packed lunch.

I don’t even know what he means by “reheated McDonald’s meals”. Do parents heat them up in the morning then stick them in a rapidly steaming up Tupperware box? Or do these five year olds strut over to the dinner ladies, hand them a Big Mac and fries and say: ”Whack these under the grill for a minute Love while I nip out for a Benson.”

Please tell me. I’m anxious to know.

Oh. You don’t know either. You’ve never heard of this going on. You must have. Apparently- the number of kids eating this kind of lunch is “appalling”.

It is possible (although unlikely) that this kind of thing happens once in a blue moon. We tend to ravenously gobble up anything that confirms our prejudices. When it is spouted by a self appointed authority on the subject- it is lapped up by a trusting audience. 

Oliver was talking to HIS people. The predominantly middle class target audience who buy his books and watch his shows. If there’s one set of people the middle class hate- it’s everybody who is not middle class (And most other middle class people).  Reheated McDonalds and Red Bull in a packed lunch- custom made to get the heads shaking. Repeat it often enough and it becomes the conventional wisdom. Exactly the kind of thing THOSE people do.

We all hear such lies every day. In the press, I have read separate stories about Asylum Seekers kidnapping donkeys to eat and killing swans for food. Neither scoop contained a single corroborating fact. I am constantly getting told about how the DSS give immigrants free cars, mobile phones, designer clothes and hand job vouchers (redeemable at all good Attercliffe venues). Once you’ve established a stereotype- it sticks. It’s the kind of thing THOSE people would do.

The drip, drip, drip of misinformation leads to the call. Something must be done!

Immigrants: Send ‘em back.

People with an imaginary diet invented by Jamie Oliver: Send Jamie Oliver to make an entertainment show and write a book about it. He solved the problem that he invented with school dinners. OK, some studies suggest he actually made things worse- but we enjoyed watching it. Oh how we laughed when those kids didn’t know what a carrot was.

Thanks to a racist political agenda- people of foreign descent are routinely blamed for the ills of the nation. Any immigrant who complains about negative stereotyping is dismissed as a moaner with chip on his shoulder. Thanks to the pocket-lining agenda of a hamster faced tool; Rotherham will be depicted as a town full of McDonalds reheaters. No doubt- acres of follow up newsprint will show us with chips on our shoulders, plates and cold in our kids’ lunchboxes.

People of Rotherham: This is how it feels to be hated by the ruling class.

Ich bin ein Ausländer in meinem eigenen Land

Je suis un étranger dans mon propre pays

No Blackmail