Another day at the Telegraph and another attack on Laurie Penny, this time for writing a
short piece describing how she had received excellent treatment at a New York hospital. While she was on her sickbed, she reflected that in the States, ‘Those who are wealthy enough to afford decent healthcare have their
needs met in relative luxury, while those who are poor live in fear of getting ill, worrying that one misadventure might leave you with yet more debts to pay off.’
This humane thought inspired one Daniel Knowles of the Telegraph to pen a whole column condemning Penny . ‘I have no intention of defending the American healthcare system,’ he says, and then excoriates Penny for not defending it either. He depicts her as a dogmatist and a bore. ‘This article isn’t interesting, it won’t change anyone’s mind about anything,’ he claims – an accusation I would be careful of throwing around if I were in his shoes.
Why is he bothering to waste energy on a damning a fellow writer, who has produced an unexceptional piece by using a personal experience to draw wider political lessons, as writers do every day? Perhaps it is an unconditioned reflex; a conservative version of Tourette syndrome.
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