"Inadequate, pimpled and single"

Andrew Marr, lightweight writer and political journalist (he used to have a Telegraph column supposedly written by his hamster) doesn't think much of bloggers.

He calls blogging

the "spewings and rantings of very drunk people late at night"

and suggests that

"Most citizen journalism strikes me as nothing to do with journalism at all.

"A lot of bloggers seem to be socially inadequate, pimpled, single, slightly seedy, bald, cauliflower-nosed young men sitting in their mother's basements and ranting. They are very angry people," he told the Cheltenham Literary Festival. "OK – the country is full of very angry people. Many of us are angry people at times. Some of us are angry and drunk".

which suggests he's missing the point rather. I hate to disagree with the great man, but most bloggers aren't trying to be reporters - they're more like comment-piece journalists, only without the expensive training (private school, Cambridge, BBC) and multibillion-pound resources of a news organisation. Bloggers tend to have jobs, and to be expert in a narrow field. I am indeed often angry and drunk (has he ever read the Daily Mail?), but that doesn't make my opinions about The Klaxons, Paul Uppal Tory Scum and The Hegemon less valid. Does it?

Perhaps he doesn't like the fact that it's easier to serve a super-injunction on his fellow Big Media, whereas bloggers - who may indeed be angry and nasty - are harder to silence (read the comments, though it's not something I care about one way or the other).

Oh, and Marr seems not to understand the differences between blogging, news/politics blogging (most of us want to talk about books, music and in Ewar's case, mediocre tennis starlets) and anonymously commenting on news websites. If you want real pointless angry stupidity, try the comments section on any George Monbiot piece - such as this one.