UK British News Megathread - aka CWCissey's news thread

https://news.sky.com/story/row-over-new-greggs-vegan-sausage-rolls-heats-up-11597679

A heated row has broken out over a move by Britain's largest bakery chain to launch a vegan sausage roll.

The pastry, which is filled with a meat substitute and encased in 96 pastry layers, is available in 950 Greggs stores across the country.

It was promised after 20,000 people signed a petition calling for the snack to be launched to accommodate plant-based diet eaters.


But the vegan sausage roll's launch has been greeted by a mixed reaction: Some consumers welcomed it, while others voiced their objections.

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spread happiness@p4leandp1nk
https://twitter.com/p4leandp1nk/status/1080767496569974785

#VEGANsausageroll thanks Greggs

7
10:07 AM - Jan 3, 2019

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Cook and food poverty campaigner Jack Monroe declared she was "frantically googling to see what time my nearest opens tomorrow morning because I will be outside".

While TV writer Brydie Lee-Kennedy called herself "very pro the Greggs vegan sausage roll because anything that wrenches veganism back from the 'clean eating' wellness folk is a good thing".

One Twitter user wrote that finding vegan sausage rolls missing from a store in Corby had "ruined my morning".

Another said: "My son is allergic to dairy products which means I can't really go to Greggs when he's with me. Now I can. Thank you vegans."

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pg often@pgofton
https://twitter.com/pgofton/status/1080772793774624768

The hype got me like #Greggs #Veganuary


42
10:28 AM - Jan 3, 2019

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TV presenter Piers Morgan led the charge of those outraged by the new roll.

"Nobody was waiting for a vegan bloody sausage, you PC-ravaged clowns," he wrote on Twitter.

Mr Morgan later complained at receiving "howling abuse from vegans", adding: "I get it, you're all hangry. I would be too if I only ate plants and gruel."

Another Twitter user said: "I really struggle to believe that 20,000 vegans are that desperate to eat in a Greggs."

"You don't paint a mustach (sic) on the Mona Lisa and you don't mess with the perfect sausage roll," one quipped.

Journalist Nooruddean Choudry suggested Greggs introduce a halal steak bake to "crank the fume levels right up to 11".

The bakery chain told concerned customers that "change is good" and that there would "always be a classic sausage roll".

It comes on the same day McDonald's launched its first vegetarian "Happy Meal", designed for children.

The new dish comes with a "veggie wrap", instead of the usual chicken or beef option.

It should be noted that Piers Morgan and Greggs share the same PR firm, so I'm thinking this is some serious faux outrage and South Park KKK gambiting here.

 

[Chunky Salsa]

If you're nearing thirty wouldn't that make you an older gen-z? I assumed Millenials were in there mid 30s-40s, though I can never really understand the official timeline.

Don't do this to me. Don't paint me with that brush. I'm a millenial, I don't have brainrot.

 

[BrownPawsTypedThis]

If you're nearing thirty wouldn't that make you an older gen-z? I assumed Millenials were in there mid 30s-40s, though I can never really understand the official timeline.

I think 1995 -96 is the cut off for millennials, so just about.

 

[BrightonAndHoveAlbion]

I feel like if you're on the border between millenial/gen-z it matters more what generation your parents are. Boomer parents raise millenials, gen-x raise zoomers.

 

[-Jack-]

I feel like if you're on the border between millenial/gen-z it matters more what generation your parents are. Boomer parents raise millenials, gen-x raise zoomers.

What if you're at the cut-off and so are your parents? ((( Should I just install tiktok and start an onlyfans?

 

[SirCliveSinclairdabbing]

What if you're at the cut-off and so are your parents? ((( Should I just install tiktok and start an onlyfans?

It doesn't matter.
Common sense comes from your choice of associates in life.

 

[AssignedEva]

I hate to sound like an old person, but none of them read, none of them have any cultural grounding, and none of them seem to have any real world knowledge.

It's compound interest on the social changes we've seen as a result of the internet, mostly. I did a double take when I remembered that 2015 was a decade ago.

2015 was the year "it's [current year]" started being a meme. For those graduates it was Year 6 or Year 7. Thanks to Netflix (launched here in 2011), YouTube Kids (launched 2015) and TikTok (Musical.ly launched 2014, TikTok 2016) for many of them the majority of their cultural touchpoints were international rather than specific to the UK (vs when everyone used to watch the same TV shows). Smartphones went from 17% of market share in 2008 to 78% of market share in 2018 (when they were in Year 10) so they were immersed in constant distractions - around the time the then-Education Secretary was starting to tell parents needed to limit both their and their children's screentime, and people were already declaring that dating apps had ruined dating - but again, they never knew anything different. Then their A-Levels or university was disrupted by covid and they had to stay indoors, playing on computers. They were still at uni when LLMs began being a problem.

For them, there's little to no differentiation between the "real world" and the internet. We're seeing the children articles like this were written about

“Students, now, seem to find it particularly exhausting to read complex or long text without regular breaks. In the past, students seemed to be accustomed to attending to a text for a longer period of time,” says Erica Swift, sixth-grade teacher at Herman Leimbach Elementary in Sacramento, California, not far from Silicon Valley. “You see their lack of stamina in them asking for breaks, talking to others instead of working, and even some just giving up on longer reading tasks.”

entering the workforce. I suspect these issues will be getting even more pronounced in the coming years as kids who were exposed to internet oversaturation at ever younger ages hit the workplace.

 

[Otterly]

hate to sound like an old person, but none of them read

I think this is it. They don’t read books. I was treated to a conversation at work where two girls were actually proud of this. One had ‘never read a book.’ She had a 2:1 in something biology related from an ok university and she was utterly ignorant of biology, so her grasp of the rest of the world must have been even worse. Sad really

 

[Chunky Salsa]

I think this is it. They don’t read books. I was treated to a conversation at work where two girls were actually proud of this. One had ‘never read a book.’ She had a 2:1 in something biology related from an ok university and she was utterly ignorant of biology, so her grasp of the rest of the world must have been even worse. Sad really

I have noticed that the language, and sentence structure choices, of fresh grads I work with do seem particularly stunted. They aren't accurate with their words, they either waffle, or truncate too much. There's a much fuzzier feel to the way they write, which leads to a lack of precision with the reports they are creating. I've had to ask for clarification on certain terms where I can partially understand what they mean, but because they lack the right terminology, they can't fully express it. It slows everything down, makes it awkward to interact with them, and I imagine it makes them feel bad; no one wants to seem ignorant.

When I was a kid, there were lots of words I never knew how to properly say, because I had only ever read them, and never heard them spoken. Without that sort of experience, I would never have even known what those words meant, or how to properly use them.

 

[Otterly]

There's a much fuzzier feel to the way they write,

Do you notice the way they slur as well? It’s like their mouths can’t form words. It’s very peculiar.

 

[teriyakiburns]

I think this is it. They don’t read books. I was treated to a conversation at work where two girls were actually proud of this. One had ‘never read a book.’ She had a 2:1 in something biology related from an ok university and she was utterly ignorant of biology, so her grasp of the rest of the world must have been even worse. Sad really

This kind of person has always existed, sadly. The internet used to be awash with stories of ignorant boomers who proudly declared that they had never read a book, or who can't concentrate on reading for more than a few minutes. I know of people of all ages who suffer this and think it's some sort of virtue. It makes me think this sort of attitude comes in waves and we're just seeing a particularly heavy one this time around.

 

[Monopolywheel]

2015 was the year "it's [current year]" started being a meme.

It started being a meme around that time but people had been saying that shit since the early 2000s
Something about the beginning of a new millennia caused people to incorrectly believe that they had reached the end of history

 

[Chunky Salsa]

Do you notice the way they slur as well? It’s like their mouths can’t form words. It’s very peculiar.

Mush mouth is something I have noticed as well, it's very strange. I don't even understand why it's happening? Surely you're done learning how to speak correctly by the time you're 10-11ish? None of them should have been locked up inside where they can't have their odd speech corrected by peer interaction during that age.

 

[SirCliveSinclairdabbing]

It started being a meme around that time but people had been saying that shit since the early 2000s
Something about the beginning of a new millennia caused people to incorrectly believe that they had reached the end of history

Earliest I remember is the TV show young ones where they kept claiming it was a different decade than it was.
Current year goes back to 2000 because aughties was a shit name for a decade.

 

[-Jack-]

Do you think the issue arises from changes in higher education compared to when you studied? I imagine if you graduated in the mid-2000s compared to those who are freshly graduated the teachings are probably different and the intake of information too (technology, learning from home, etc). But I guess it just depends, part of my degree was through covid and it was fucking shit.

 

[QE65]

If you're nearing thirty wouldn't that make you an older gen-z? I assumed Millenials were in there mid 30s-40s, though I can never really understand the official timeline.

I think the most charitable cutoff for Gen-Z is 1996, so a nearly 30 year-old would be a late millennial. Depends where the cutoff is I guess.

 

[Treasure Champs]

As opposed to a male mare? The absolute state of current year journalism. The person writing this doesn’t know what a mare is, yet thinks they are qualified for a job using the English language to describe events

That wasn't what made me most surprised about that sentence. What's all this "had sex with"? Horses cannot consent. That poor little pony wasn't giving him bedroom eyes. He raped it. He raped the pony. Can you not legally 'rape' an animal in the U.K. or something?

 

[QE65]

Do you think the issue arises from changes in higher education compared to when you studied? I imagine if you graduated in the mid-2000s compared to those who are freshly graduated the teachings are probably different and the intake of information too (technology, learning from home, etc). But I guess it just depends, part of my degree was through covid and it was fucking shit.

It probably has an impact. I left school/college before social media really kicked off properly but there are still plenty of specials in my age group.

Spoiler: Rant about the state of education and critical thinking...

There was some worrying statistic that many children/teenagers can't really hand-write anything very well and the ability to read cursive is essentially a dying art. Education transitioning towards touchscreens and becoming increasingly computerized contributes to how people learn and retain information. It's easier than ever to offload your brain power and memory into the digital world, which (alongside an abundance of slop content) contributes towards attention spans being horrifically poor. "Why do I need to remember how to wire a plug if I can just look it up".

School should teach people how to think and find out what's true from first principles. I think being around before the internet really took off gives older people more of an insight into where to get reliable information from. There are exceptions. How many boomers do you know who believe weird things?

It also doesn't help that objective truth isn't trusted just because of who reports it. Institutions aren't trusted on anything they say but people believe whatever they hear/read on 4Chan, Reddit, YouTube or Rumble. Partly because of the push for "gender identity" by said institutions and the morphing of various "X studies" research centers into nonscientific, unchallenged garbage. A damaged reputation is hard to fix, even if 95% of what you produce is robust, verifiable, and true.

If you don't know how to work out what's true then you're not in a good position to contribute towards anything meaningful, or solve any real problems.

 

[Jimmy Dean Bowl]

A friend is an early years teacher, or whatever they're calling them these days.
She says that every year, without fail, a lot of the children don't have the fine motor skills to hold crayons or pencils, but put a tablet in front of them and they can do a 9 piece jigsaw.
Put a physical 9 piece jigsaw in front of them and they have no idea what to do with it because they have never worked in three dimensions.
She said that the parents are generally in their teens/early 20's and are staring at their phones the whole time, even when staff are trying to talk to them. Phone obsessed zoomers having kids doesn't end well. These kids are fucked.

 

[Mound Dweller]

The actual pseudo-retards and the slow-in-the-minds used to get tossed into the fire that is life to meld and adapt or just fucking die, nowadays they get housing benefit and healthy start vouchers and are actively encouraged to cultivate further generations of cabbage.
It's dysgenics in action and is the consequence of 50+ years of welfare state induced misbreeding, I'm not too worried because it's the sort of thing that fixes itself just so soon as the grain dole gets cut off.

 

[BrightonAndHoveAlbion]

Note taking is one area in which I noticed one of these generational/educational differences as well. I'm planning a trip soon with a family member a few years younger than me who is still in uni while I never even went. Naturally being older means that I have half a brain so I've been making some notes on things like costs and schedules, which I have made on paper with a pen.

When said family member asked me to 'share my notes' I sent him pictures of what I had written. He couldn't believe I hadn't just used a computer program to do this. We are both under 30 yet just by me leaving school so much earlier than him, we have completely different concepts of how to do things of which this is one example.