Zoe Williams is the new Heather Mallick

I adore Heather Mallick's writing. She has a distinctive style that is a pleasure to read, with nearly unending twists and tangents. She faces controversial subjects head-on and isn't afraid of offending her readership or appearing internally inconsistent as she mines the intersection of privilege and conscience. This technique, I believe, serves to improve the quality of discourse because it doesn't rely on pat answers to hard questions. Her sense of humour is rather subtle and satirical which leads inevitably to misunderstandings manifested in the comments section of her "Viewpoints" column on cbc.ca.

I was disappointed when Mallick left the Globe, over a dispute with her editors about an article (reprinted here at rabble.ca) commenting on a piece of poor journalism published in the Guardian. It was in the Guardian's online content the other day that I came across a column by Zoe Williams, whose style of writing reminded me of Mallick's, and who similarly tackles tough topics in op-ed style with wit and occasional righteous ire.

None of which is newsworthy, but if I must lose hours in reading back posts by these columnists, so should you!