I’ve been a Guardian reader, for over fifty years, but as they presumably increasingly target a much younger reader with clickbait opinion pieces, I become increasingly irritated and can now get through the whole paper in a couple of minutes.
Anyhow, to answer my own question, the section of the paper that irritates me most is the one where twenty somethings seek a jury of readers to vote on some minor irritant in the person’s private life like ‘should my flatmate/partner take off his/her/their/its hat before his/her/their/its jacket when entering our shared space?’
A tough call! Where do I start? Probably almost any article under its Lifestyle section. The rest of the world may be worrying about wars, authoritarian leaders or extreme climate events, but The Guaridan’s Lifestyle section will have a lengthy article on vaginas, or breathless accounts of meals between people who’ve never met before or similar.
The one consolation is that - rather like on SF - you can mute entire sections ie:- (in my case)
So which paper/s do people read? Times subscribers are always complaining that there are too many clickbait articles and too many about the royal family and that is turning into the Daily Mail.
The FT still seems to be offering serious journalism but it’s quite expensive.
I have a digital sub to the NYT (it was ridiculously cheap), which seems serious and fairly balanced to me, and one to the I paper, because we both enjoy their puzzles. The I’s journalism is pretty poor, and the paper is full of lifestyle nonsense.
Maybe the problem is that these papers need to appeal to scrollers in their 20s and 30s, who are used to short, snappy bits of reading?
I have a subscription to it, it seems only fair as I skim-read it every day. It’s a paper that’s nearly always on the warpath about racism and sexism, to such an extent that even though I’m pretty woke, I probably don’t often read the articles. I never read Adrian Chiles! However, it has John Crace and Marina Hyde with coruscating political commentary, and Barney Ronay and Jonathan Lliew on football, along with David Squires’ wonderful cartoons.
All in all I think I get good value from it. What would I read in its place?
I do look at the Guardian almost every day and usually find a few articles that interest me but there is an awful lot of guff, starting about 20% down the main page and rapidly increasing in frequency. Some of the in depth articles are good and I do often like the ‘In Pictures’ bit right at the end. There is enough that interests me to keep me reading frequently but I just ignore most of the guff now and don’t usually bother to even skim it. I do agree about Adrian Chiles. A particularly annoying twit.
Edit: In fact there seem to be several regular articles by certain contributors that seem to only dwell on aspects of their own lives. As if we should be interested is such self absorbed twaddle.
I have a free (for two months) sub to Ouest-France - it seems they’re doing an offer - but it’s not the same as a national/international paper in my native language.
I had a sub to the New Statesman before we moved, and that has remained interesting. Prospect is good, too, but of course they’re both magazines.
I only ever read the news now on websites, sadly never via hard copy newspapers any more. I’m also v reluctant to pay for news, so I particularly value the following:-
AP (Associated Press) - superb, almost real time, authoritative coverage, especially of US news
New York Times front page - specifically made available, free of charge, as a high resolution image so it can be properly read
We have subscriptions to the Guardian (so can tailor what we get to our tastes), the Obs, Libé and our local newspaper. I don’t mind paying since that helps support better reporting and a freer Press.
I like the Long Reads from the Guardian plus the other subscription elements such as being ad free. And if sections of the main paper irritate me then I just don’t look at them.
I also follow and support journalists like Carole Cadwalladr
I get what little news I want to hear from the BBC News website.
We buy the Daily Telegraph for my mother on Saturdays as she likes its TV supplement, but she does read the whole thing and then flags up articles that have got her worried, for me to read.
So I generally spend part of Sunday debunking the Telegraph’s latest piece of inflammatory nonsense along the lines of “the Government is going to tax into oblivion your entire wealth, houses, cars, underwear, garden tools and Star Wars miniature figure collection”…
(and of course the small print in the article reveals they are talking about (say) an extra 10% tax on people with a net worth of about £5m and up, or who have homes in London, the Cotswolds and Monaco…)
the most irritating bit is when I try to open a Guardian link, offered on this forum… and the G won’t let me read it… and I mumble rude words and wonder why I had bothered to even try it…
Apart from that… English language (or American language) newspapers no longer interest me - vive La France
In my Mum’s case there will probably be a bit to pay but I don’t begrudge that too much - all four of her children are in OK financial shape thankfully.
the most irritating bit is when I try to open a Guardian link, offered on this forum… and the G won’t let me read it… 
and I mumble rude words and wonder why I had bothered to even try it… 