An anguish of agonies
I wonder at this:
Schools Secretary Ed Balls is getting together with Britain’s agony aunts for a “relationship summit”.
An “anguish of agony aunts” - the collective noun chosen by themselves - will advise ministers on how to support children facing family breakdown.
I won’t contest the benefits of a stable childhood. But consider the role of an agony aunt. They receive letters from those who consider themselves to have a problem. Some might therefore have some insight into those caught up in family breakdown perceive their trouble; but a very specific group of those, who might consider opening their private lives to that most public of forums, the tabloid newspaper.
Nor does the receipt of letters necessarily guarantee that the replies will be of any use. The agony aunt’s position doesn’t require them to dish out advise that’ll work, but that sounds plausible to the reader. And so play to whichever prejudices and conceptions they feel their readers might have of family breakdown. Nor do we have any means of seeing whether any find their Aunts’ advice useful. They hardly make themselves open to feedback forms; and given that most write for a newspaper with wider content, aren’t subject to the vagaries of an open market which might demonstrate how well their advice went down.
So, we’ve no idea whether they’re worth much at all, and have no means of finding out. Way to find a potential cul-de-sac? Listening to those involved in break-ups would seem a surer start…