I usually see innuendo everywhere but I have to admit I didn't, and still don't, see it in this. I thought the "heart-melting" comment was designedly contemptuous, perhaps implying a too-emotional response (and if she does make an ally of a hard-line natural opponent like him over one atypical issue, I don't think she's thinking very clearly either. The first thing he'd do in power is cut her funding, I suspect.)
But it never entered my head that the remark might be implying any romantic connection. until she mentioned the possibility. Since then, of course, I have been speculating wildly...
Exactly. As Diane Abbott pointed out, this would not have been said if the head of Liberty was a man. The implication is of course this woman is having an emotional and overwrought response rather than, say, a reasonable and rational anger arising from her years of experience as a lawyer, lobbyist, and activist. No doubt it's because her hormones are all a-flutter.
It seems to me to be a nasty kind of undermining insinuation which can be followed up with an innocent-eyed, "Oh but we didn't mean it like that..."
The implication is of course this woman is having an emotional and overwrought response
If she'd objected on those grounds, I'd have been behind her. But to object as if he'd made an implication of an improper relationship, which I don't think he did, looks either disingenuous or over-touchy.
To put Burnham's remarks into fuller context, the Times parliamentary sketchwriter last week wrote that "there is a rumour that David Davis resigned after being bewitched by Shami. She denied this, but then she would." Bewitched! Andy Burnham followed this up with his comments to Progress magazine about "late-night, hand-wringing, heart-melting phone calls".
The objections are entirely connected. Such comments and insinuations would not happen if Shami Chakrabarti was a man. Dominic Lawson sums it up: "this sort of remark also carries the crude and condescending meaning that it is not through her articulate advocacy that Ms Chakrabarti, a Master of the Bench of the Middle Temple and a former Home Office lawyer, has mobilised political opposition to 42-day detention without charge – no, it's just because she's a babe." (The final paragraph of that commentary is well worth reading.)
New Labour may have pushed through 42 days by opening the chequebook for the DUP (perhaps less likely bedfellows for Labour than Liberty and David Davis) but they have not won the argument. Ergo, smears.
I'm just feeling especially pedantic because I've heard two "the importance of X cannot be underestimated"s in the last three days. Such things shouldn't be allowed on Radio 4.
You're quite right re. Shami C, of course. There'd have been no talk of seduction and heart-melting had David Davis been talking to Jonathon Porritt, say - still less Peter Mandelson.
Well, it does work if you're trying to say that something's really really unimportant. Then, no matter how hard you try, you'll find it impossible to underestimate its importance, because it's so unimportant in reality. But what people usually mean when they use this phrase is the opposite of that: i.e. that the thing is so important that it's importance can't be overestimated.
Maybe what confuses the issue is the apparently-similar phrase, "The importance of X should not be underestimated."
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Date: 2008-06-20 06:25 am (UTC)But it never entered my head that the remark might be implying any romantic connection. until she mentioned the possibility. Since then, of course, I have been speculating wildly...
no subject
Date: 2008-06-20 08:59 am (UTC)Exactly. As Diane Abbott pointed out, this would not have been said if the head of Liberty was a man. The implication is of course this woman is having an emotional and overwrought response rather than, say, a reasonable and rational anger arising from her years of experience as a lawyer, lobbyist, and activist. No doubt it's because her hormones are all a-flutter.
It seems to me to be a nasty kind of undermining insinuation which can be followed up with an innocent-eyed, "Oh but we didn't mean it like that..."
no subject
Date: 2008-06-20 01:44 pm (UTC)If she'd objected on those grounds, I'd have been behind her. But to object as if he'd made an implication of an improper relationship, which I don't think he did, looks either disingenuous or over-touchy.
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Date: 2008-06-20 02:10 pm (UTC)The objections are entirely connected. Such comments and insinuations would not happen if Shami Chakrabarti was a man. Dominic Lawson sums it up: "this sort of remark also carries the crude and condescending meaning that it is not through her articulate advocacy that Ms Chakrabarti, a Master of the Bench of the Middle Temple and a former Home Office lawyer, has mobilised political opposition to 42-day detention without charge – no, it's just because she's a babe." (The final paragraph of that commentary is well worth reading.)
New Labour may have pushed through 42 days by opening the chequebook for the DUP (perhaps less likely bedfellows for Labour than Liberty and David Davis) but they have not won the argument. Ergo, smears.
no subject
Date: 2008-06-20 08:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-06-20 09:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-06-20 09:32 am (UTC)You're quite right re. Shami C, of course. There'd have been no talk of seduction and heart-melting had David Davis been talking to Jonathon Porritt, say - still less Peter Mandelson.
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Date: 2008-06-20 10:50 am (UTC)Ooh, why does that not work?
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Date: 2008-06-20 10:58 am (UTC)Maybe what confuses the issue is the apparently-similar phrase, "The importance of X should not be underestimated."
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Date: 2008-06-20 12:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-06-20 01:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-06-20 01:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-06-20 09:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-06-20 09:02 am (UTC)