Are you a wine wanker...?

[Seven]

http://www.smh.com.au/executive-style/top-drop/how-not-to-be-a-wine-snob-20130417-2hzs0.html



perhaps I am...

[camw]

Yeah, but what can you do.

[daz]

No! I don't gargle it! Nor spit it out! Well, unless it'd strip paint.

[Michael McNally]

Sorry, you are either a wanker (aren't we all) or you're not.

If spitting means you are a wanker (let's not analyse that statement too closely) then I am a (wine) wanker (as well as a normal wanker).

Cheers

Michael

PS I couldn't give a rat's arse is someone thinks that examining the colour of a wine makes me a tosser

[burges]

Yep.
Guilty as charged.

[Craig(NZ)]

The only place spit buckets are ever acceptable is at a wine trade show

If wine wnakerism occurs it is for one of two reasons

1. The wine you are sharing is of too higher quality for the company ie. your poor choice for the occasion or
2. You are caring too much about a 'who cares' wine.

save the pontificating for those who care, save the wines worth pontificating over for those who care

[George Krashos]

Yes, yes I am.

[mjs]

This was a question discussed at length at a recent MWC tour to the Coonawarra as per the following link as well as one or two previous tours to the Barossa

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=13124

However, wankery was considered at a much more serious level (eg rocking up to CDs with iPad in hand and then the very fact of the report itself!!), not like the fluff discussed in the piece from Sydney

That was more akin to stuff my now 19yo son would have accused me of when he was fifteeen or so, glass swirling etc. Now his derogatory comments in that resepct are far more serious!! ... "you didn't really bring back two half barrels from Wynns did you?? Dad, you are a bloody wine wanker!!"

[Scotty vino]

I have 4 questions on this subject.
Yeah? And? So? What?

[ticklenow1]

People who know little about wine and think that a good wine is a $6.99 special at their local bottle shop, will always call someone who knows a bit and appreciates wine a "wine wanker". I think if I am being really honest, I remember visiting the Barossa for the first time many years ago and seeing how some people were carrying on at the cellar doors. I thought to myself, "f*^k me, what a tool". But now I find myself doing the similar things.

If enjoying wine and having just a little knowledge on the subject makes me a "Wine Wanker", then it's guilty as charged for me as well!

Cheers
Ian

[mjs]

I have 4 questions on this subject.
Yeah? And? So? What?

+1

[phillisc]

Its funny, but I actually find the term wanker offensive...now that is a first for me to be offended by anything.

(Yes yes yes I tee off at some wine companies for their marketing practices...the government for some of their head scratching decisions and those who want charge $25+ corkage on the seldom occasion when I get out...so yes, I could be perceived as rather offensive at times).

Surely it is a wine snob or snobbery , not wankerism, when people carry on the way they do. Pure and simple if every shiraz in the country was priced the same, then a level playing field eliminates the wankers. What it may do is make a wine perform on the sum of its parts, (around 85% H20, a bit of alcohol and a few tannins, pigments etc). It would change the show circut overnight, bias would be eliminated, and the 10 dollar shiraz is better because of sound viticultural and or winemaking practices. The grapes were picked at the right baume, it was hand picked, it had new oak etc etc...not that my shiraz is better than yours purely because its 100 dollars.

Wankerism perhaps comes down to nothing more than perception, opportunity, jealously, greed and envy... a 50 cent biro versus a $5000 Parker pen, a Rolex vs. something, a Ferrari vs. a Ford...all do what they are intended to do, how they do leads to opinions.

Perhaps its the behaviour that needs to be looked at and the wine itself is largely arbitary...when I see somone carrying on..its ususally because they are an arsehole (no offence intended, just an observation)...which goes far beyond anything to do wine.

Unfortunately the wine world is not a level playing field and thats the opportunity for all to have different opinions, which ultimately reflect the behaviours.

Have a great day
Cheers Craig.

[jafa]

Absolutely!
While not guilty of some the described offences, I've others to compensate.
Like taking photgraphs of wine bottles with a half full glass of wine next to it.
Writing evocative notes about colour and smell and flavours in a little notebook.
I've a stack of empty wooden boxes under the house stencilled with stuff like "Pontet Canet 2009"
A line of empty bottles, with unreadable labels, on a shelf in the garage.
A pinboard note holder made from extracted old corks with foreign mumbo-jumbo stencilled on.
And an ordinary old beer jug which I call a "Decanter" because it eye rhymes with "wanker".
And more. "Now where are my special $100 wine stems? I have to have some, Pinot Noir."

cheers jafa

[Panda 9D]

The whole article was pathetic. An offshoot of the tall poppy issue Australia seems to have. If you are articulate and use words longer than three syllables, you're a wanker. Literature, philosophy, politics can't be talked about in social situations. Don't stand out. Display no more than the lowest common point of knowledge... blergh.

[monghead]

Unequivocally YES.

But I would argue that this question on this forum is purely rhetorical...

[GraemeG]

The whole article was pathetic. An offshoot of the tall poppy issue Australia seems to have. If you are articulate and use words longer than three syllables, you're a wanker. Literature, philosophy, politics can't be talked about in social situations. Don't stand out. Display no more than the lowest common point of knowledge... blergh.

I feel a bit that way, too, I must say, having read the article. It completely fails to distinguish between 'tasting' and 'drinking'; there's a very big difference in the way I approach those two very unlike circumstances.
Although, I've never held a glass against the sky to examine the colour, I must say. Suspect my affectations while drinking are confined to a vigorous-but-hopefully-discreet swirl, and a brief sniff before each mouthful.
Tasting, of course, is a different matter altogether.

The usual shallow, mainstream, dumbed-down approach to journalism these days.
Nothing new, then.
GG

[Michael R]

I've long since embraced my inner wine wanker, and he provides me and my non wine-enthusiast friends with plenty of piss taking fun.
For some reason though, life's general wankers often emphasize their personalities through wine, but genuine people who are interested and passionate about it are easily identifiable, to me anyway.

Perhaps we should get that journo along to a grape mates session, the ensuing article would be hilarious, and would be good for notoriety

[sjw_11]

I dont think swirling a glass and sniffing the wine makes you a "wine wanker" unless done with obvious disdain for those who choose not to do those things

To me the epitome of the wine wanker is a person who feels that their (often supposed) understanding or appreciation of wine makes them in some way superior to others... in much the same way wearing a rolex might mark you as a watch or fashion enthusiast (personally I have never seen a rolex I desired, but thats by the by) while wearing it because you think doing so will show to people you are richer, better, superior to your fellows would make you a wanker...

Everyone needs a hobby, I happen to like wine. Now, hobbies can make you boring to non-enthusiasts, which I think is more what is meant here, but that, I humbly submit, is a different concept altogether to "wine wanker" and we should thus keep the meanings clear.

"'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.'"

[MarKofQuality]

I though that the term was Yanking the cork out ... ?