House prices in the West Midlands
At the top: a big glam photo of Emma Harris in a puffy-sleeves dress with flowing blonde hair. Caption: “Emma Harris says the fact that she can’t save for a deposit to buy a house makes her want to cry”
Only one in eight renters can afford to buy in the area in which they live, research suggests. High rent, bills and house prices mean it is more difficult for renters to buy their first home than it is for existing owners to move on, according to Skipton Group. Its new index, compiled by Oxford Economics, claims renters are four times less likely to be able to buy than homeowners.
Software engineer Emma Harris earns £50,000 a year and said the cost of renting and bills takes up about two-thirds of her salary. “I am not likely to ever own a house and it’s just depressing,” she said. She lives in Birmingham, and last year the average price of a first-time buyer home in the West Midlands was £215,000.
Ms Harris said: “I feel completely trapped in the situation I am in. The chances of me owning my own house are pretty much non-existent. I want to cry. I want to scream. I want to shout, and do various other things but none of them solve the issue – that I don’t have the money to put away each month to scrape together the money for a deposit.”
Slightly weird reporting, it seems to me. Strange emphasis on her wanting to cry and scream.
It turns out there’s a reason for that.
Ohhhhh. That explains it.
I saw the BBC story before I saw rip’s tweet, and it didn’t occur to me that “Emma Harris” is a man. I didn’t look carefully at the photo because one doesn’t, does one – we assume the respectable news outlet we’re reading doesn’t lie to us. Even after all this time we assume that. The Beeb nowhere says that “Emma Harris” is a trans woman, it just calls him “Emma Harris” and “she” – in short it lies to us.
So all the blither about wanting to scream and wail and sob and shriek is to ram home the message that this is a delicate fragile emotional maudlin WOMAN god damn it.
The BBC is really in the sewer.
This is how far they have to reach in order to find the “oppression” under which TiMs suffer.
It seems to me that there is a comfortably broad middle ground between classifying this as the sort of helpless, entitled whingeing that characterizes of a misogynist’s idea of a woman and demanding that every strong, independent real woman must sound like Ben from Life of Brian.
PS: Thanks for the promotion ATL and, more broadly, for grace with which the forum is hosted.
Well, 215k is about what an “average” house costs in my town also, and if I were making 50k/yr that would probably be out of reach unless a parent or someone was willing to help with the downpayment. But first of all, an “average” house may well be a lot fancier than a first-time homebuyer (who doesn’t happen to have an above) income can afford. Adjust your expectations to line up with reality!
And second, maybe “Emma’s” artificial hormones are interfering here, but someone needs to take “her” aside and point out that this showy reaction won’t make any difference. The housing situation is a fact, and Emma errs in taking it personally. As if, what, the housing situation will take pity or something?
*snorts in urban/suburban Canadian*
Where’s that Loki meme? “Yes, very sad. Anyway…”