Behind the bewildering transformation of British universities, are management consultants being paid millions Really proud to have this vital piece on our unis are being gutted from the inside by @jheathershaw.bsky.social on Democracy for Sale. Do read democracyforsale.substack.com/p/inside-bri...

Inside Britain's university crisis

As teaching staff face job loss, their bosses have netted pay rises and bought advice from a “vampiric” management consultancy, writes Prof. John Heathershaw of the University of Exeter

democracyforsale.substack.com

Noel Grealish attended ‘anti-woke’ conference addressed by Nigel Farage. Department of Agriculture confirms his attendance at the event but says the Minister of State for Agriculture was present in personal capacity. www.irishtimes.com/politics/202...

Minister Noel Grealish attended ‘anti-woke’ conference addressed by Nigel Farage

Department confirms attendance but says Minister of State for Agriculture present in personal capacity

irishtimes.com

hey #fanstudies folks, come work with me at @journal.transformativeworks.org! journal.transformativeworks.org/index.php/tw...

Ideologically, generative AI is a 19th century technology: the flawed dream that once you have assembled a supposedly total archive of culture via technical media, you can use it to statistically derive new meaning from patterns of the past

If Trump made a speech where he rejected the legitimacy of judicial action restraining the State we’d all know what we were hearing. Just because the ideas are delivered by a character consistently speaking in a tone of watered down milk doesn’t change what it means.

Joe Noonan@joenoonan.bsky.social · 2w ago

Minister attacks Court oversight under the Constitution. Dangerous.

‘Polarization’ has become the master concept for diagnosing our current democratic crisis. But this is not polarization. It is the radicalization of the political right. By misdiagnosing it, we risk becoming complicit in the crisis. 🧵 Just out in Perspectives on Politics doi.org/10.1017/S153...

"Appeals Centre Europe, an Ireland-certified dispute settlement body operating under the EU's Digital Services Act, says it overturned platforms' decisions not to remove reported hate speech 70 percent of the time between April 2025 and March 2026..." www.theregister.com/personal-tec...

EU moderation watchdog says social media giants hate taking down hate speech

Also somehow censoring too much while refusing to hand over account ban evidence for review

theregister.com

Meanwhile @ciaranm.bsky.social has written a brilliant column why the British government (let me take this opportunity to make the same case for the German government) to stop using X. Just leave. There is life after Twitter. I should know. www.thetimes.com/article/e895...

If ministers fear X fuels disorder, they should stop using it

The government voices concern about the social media platform spreading hate but has hundreds of accounts that help make it a success

thetimes.com

📣New working paper📣 Ana Țăranu continues our working paper series by reflecting on the neoliberal convergences of the technocratic centre and far right in the Romanian context. Check it out below! reacpol.net/workingpaper...

Working paper: Austerity Redux: Sovereigntism and Technocratic Centrism as Neoliberal Bedfellows - Reactionary Politics Research Network

Austerity Redux: Sovereigntism and Technocratic Centrism as Neoliberal Bedfellows (Ana Țăranu)

reacpol.net

Desperately hoping we can settle on a better term for the various forms of AI backlash than "AI populism." The Yudkowsky stan throwing a molotov cocktail and the Sierra Club member at a community meeting aren't parts of the same movement at all. davekarpf.beehiiv.com/p/ai-populis...

"AI Populism" is a term that obscures more than it reveals.

Can we just not?

davekarpf.beehiiv.com

As Hungary votes, would recommend this piece about how Viktor Orban has used public money to bankroll an international ultraconservative network - including Roger Scruton cafes and €10k a month for failed Reform candidate Matt Goodwin democracyforsale.substack.com/p/orbans-brits

What happens to Britain's radical right if Orbán loses?

Inside the money, power and patronage connecting Hungary and the British right

democracyforsale.substack.com

This is Apartheid. It's morally disgusting - and comes at the same time as Israel is committing an ongoing genocide. To see the Labour Government defend Israel repeatedly will horrify the British public - it cannot go on like this.

The Guardian@theguardian.com · 4mo ago

Israel’s death penalty bill for Palestinian prisoners moves to final vote

'The Quiet River: The Thames at Chiswick' (1943–4) by Victor Pasmore (Tate)

Really looking forward to presenting on William Blake and James Barry at Cork Public Museum tomorrow as part of the Friends of @crawfordartgallery.bsky.social’s spring lecture series. 12:30pm Friday 6 March Tickets €10, students go free with ID crawfordartgallery.ie/friends-lect...

"The Islamists oppose women getting an education," I mutter, as I aim my missile at the girls school

📣New article📣 'There can be no compromising in the fight against the far right, reaction or fascism.' @aurelmondon.com introduces our new Red Lines series: a space for critical dialogue on how to resist the rise of reactionary and fascist politics. reacpol.net/why-red-lines/

Red Lines: Why we need Red Lines (Aurelien Mondon) - Reactionary Politics Research Network

This article by Aurelien Mondon discusses the need for red lines in the struggle against reactionary politics.

reacpol.net

The RPRN's two new publications are open for submissions! Red Lines is a space for political interventions on resisting reaction. The Reactionary Politics Working Paper series aims to publish cutting-edge scholarship on reactionary politics. Submit your work below! reacpol.net/publications/

My story on Elon Musk cutting safeguards at xAI is on the front page of today's @washingtonpost.com. I’m also among 100’s of reporters laid off. I absolutely loved my job my brilliant coworkers & the thrill of reporting @ the center of forces upending the world: AI & Silicon Valley’s political power

Micheál Martin has been a TD for 37 years. He’s been in government for 25 of those years and in cabinet for 20 of those years. He’s been either Tánaiste or Taoiseach since June 2020. And every time he’s asked to anything other than build a data centre, he acts like he’s just been handed the job

RTÉ News@news.rte.ie · 6mo ago

The Government cannot "wave a magic wand and just deliver" flood relief schemes, Taoiseach Micheál Martin has said, as he visited affected homes and businesses in Co Wexford

A very large thank you to @briony.bsky.social for taking the time to engage with my research and to the folks at @reacpolrn.bsky.social for facilitating this interview!

Reactionary Politics Research Network@reacpolrn.bsky.social · 6mo ago

📣New interview📣 @anthonypkelly.bsky.social discusses how the often antagonistic relationship between reactionary content creators and their audiences mediates exclusionary politics. reacpol.net/antogonism-i...

Imagine if the hype was around the Greens' rise rather than Reform Imagine if instead of putting far-right issues on the agenda, mainstream parties talked about hope, justice, redistribution, public services etc That would put real change on the table and that's why Reform is a safer bet for them

The Green Party of England & Wales@greenparty.org.uk · 7mo ago

Help us make hope normal again. Join the Green Party now.

The idea that journalists, politicians, groups or - you know, women, people of colour, LGBTQ+ people - should "stay on the pitch" doesn't really hold up. Foreign Minister's account has 60k followers - 40 likes, 13k views? Blue ticks straight to the top of the queue with misogyny, bile.

TJ McIntyre@tjmcintyre.com · 7mo ago

This is the 'engagement' that the Irish government has been using to justify remaining on X. These are the top replies to a randomly chosen recent post.

New Gist: The Abuse Factory It shouldn't be difficult to act swiftly and without hesitation when the question posed is "Is it OK to work with the child sexual abuse material factory?" But our state failed this most straightforward of tests this week. www.thegist.ie/the-gist-the...

The Gist: The Abuse Factory

X, the child abuse imagery app, revealed our state has no red lines. This is the Gist.

thegist.ie

New blog post! Joshua Farrell-Molloy explains how Irish #far-right groups use #masculinity and republican symbols to frame themselves as defenders of #Ireland. www.sv.uio.no/c-rex/englis...

Masculinity and Militant Traditions: The Shaping of a Home-Grown Irish Far-Right - C-REX – Center for Research on Extremism

Joshua Farrell-Molloy elucidates how masculinity helps explain performances of militant republican aesthetics by Irish far-right actors, who bind a revolutionary past to contemporary opposition to imm...

sv.uio.no

🚨NEW PAPER The Logic of Connective Faction: How Digitally Networked Elites and Hyper-Partisan Media Radicalize Politics w/ @yunkangyang.bsky.social & @mikecowburn.bsky.social Online radicalization doesn't just affect the public. It also reshapes how elites & parties behave. doi.org/10.1080/1058...

The Logic of Connective Faction: How Digitally Networked Elites and Hyper-Partisan Media Radicalize Politics

Across democratic systems, ideological cleavages increasingly emerge not only between but also within political parties. At the same time, hyperpartisan and digitally networked media ecosystems amp...

doi.org

1. Headlines everywhere today read "Grok apologizes." This is bullshit. A chatbot is not something that can apologize. Pretending otherwise is simple laundering these companies' bullshit about what AI is, while diffusing blame away from the human beings that developed and released this system.

📃 NEW PUBLICATION 📃 I’m very happy to see this article published in the latest issue of @meejatheory.bsky.social. The article conceptualises the generative role of audience antagonism in the mediation of reactionary politics and is available to read open access here: lnkd.in/ew5jr-Yh 🧵

Join us for the book launch of Global South Creator Cultures on Tuesday, 20 January, 17:30–19:00, at King’s College London. Further information and registration details: www.tickettailor.com/events/digit... @kingsdh.bsky.social @digitalculturekcl.bsky.social @mediaindustries.bsky.social

My latest in @lawfaremedia.org: Nihilistic Violent Extremists (NVE) closely resemble two other forms of mass violence that have evaded simple characterization: incels and school shooters. Ambitious efforts to better classify such violence should be applauded. www.lawfaremedia.org/article/a-te...

A Terrorism of Vengeance

Understanding incels, school shooters, and the new category of terrorism, “nihilistic violent extremism.”

lawfaremedia.org