Brian Beacom caused online outrage recently when he wrote a column in the (Glasgow) Herald dismissing Kendrick Lamar’s Pulitzer win in the music category. To paraphrase: black people’s music isn’t proper music.

Today, he’s marking mental health awareness week by saying that the cure for mental illness is to “grow a pair”. If you need further evidence for the prosecution, he warmly references right-wing dingbat Jordan Peterson.

I’m not linking to it because that’s the whole point of the piece. It’s an attempt to monetise outrage, to say something horrible in the hope it’ll get traffic and therefore generate ad revenue. Beacom has previously claimed that alcoholism isn’t a disease; I can’t wait for next week’s piece when he explains that people in wheelchairs are lazy.

It’s a business model that’s becoming much more common in our brave new ad-funded world. The online business world used to call its model “clicks and mortar”. Now, it seems, it’s adopted “pricks for clicks”.

(“Your Da” is a Scottish social media meme; it’s our equivalent of “gammon”.)

Update, later that day:

The Spectator lives down to its reputation again. The headline has since been changed.