"Well that's the law and we just have to work within it" from an organisation whose whole thing is lobbying politicians and decision makers is a policy of near total abandonment.

Crowsa Luxemburg@quendergeer.bsky.social · 16h ago

the official position of the largest LGBT charity in the UK is that trans women are legally men. That's the only conclusion you can draw from this statement

New ep! Listen to it! If you want!

would note as a UC alum that they check your clothes before you go on so the BBC’s statement on this is bullshit. editing it out is either part of some homophobic new policy or a bizarre ad-hoc response to anti-trans abuse against a contestant

Leicester Gazette@leicestergazette.leicester.news · last wk.

Two University of Leicester students speak out over ‘absurd’ and ‘Orwellian’ decision by the BBC and ITV Studios to edit out pride pins worn on University Challenge

James Blunt’s instincts are so unerringly wrong that I’m beginning to think that the person ‘You’re Beautiful’ was about must be ugly and horrible.

When you hear about musicians, comedians, writers from the 70s/80s who lived in squats, made contacts, had time to work on their stuff, get it all good n nice, it sounds like a dream. We were so close to democratising housing in this country before neoliberalism went "WE'LL TAKE IT FROM HERE, LADS!"

violet allen@blipstress.bsky.social · 2w ago

People don't realize how necessary cheap rent is to the arts.

It’s helpful to have an actual Labour MP saying right out that it’s not what transgender people do or say that is the problem: it’s their presence that she objects to, their existence. Yes, this is what it always was, and these people just keep winding each other up and up to ever more extreme views

Toby Buckle@polphilpod.bsky.social · 2w ago

labour mp clarifies: yes, trans people must be banned from hospitals

A political and media class that has gone insane. None of this shit came from the public, it is entirely our leaders and media friends who did this.

How Long…? Episode Two, coming Thursday!

Clive is of course correct, and the key thing here is not that Watson has succumbed to temptation: he was a bullshit artist and a crook ten years ago too. This is just what the system looks like when there is no longer any need to pretend these people work for you, not their future employers.

Tom Watson’s move to Palantir is the latest sign of how far the rot has spread in UK politics | Clive Lewis

When a former Labour deputy leader joins a firm built on surveillance and military targeting, it deepens public cynicism – and democracy depends on trust, says Labour MP Clive Lewis

theguardian.com

What I reckon.

A new long read that took a lot for me to write.

Me, Kate Middleton and the medical meat machine

Why women in the healthcare system will always feel like chopped liver.

juliaraeside.substack.com

Ed Sheeran has strongly held moral convictions, but they go to another school.

Just a reminder as the new academic year kicks off - the UK government has deliberately, ruthlessly, throttled the recruitment of international students, solely to pander to racists, and the resultant 25%+ fall in numbers can and will only accelerate some universities into bankruptcy.

They all do this: they leave the BBC talking about how glad they are to be free of the corporation’s stifling restrictions, and then it turns out all of them have the same boring-as-fuck, driving gloves Tory opinions about everything.

Mic Wright@brokenbottleboy.bsky.social · 2mo ago

‘Can I just shock you? I’m actually very right-wing.’

We’ve got to the ‘attacking the RNLI for not letting people drown’ stage of radicalisation without the media offering one shred of reflection over whether they may be responsible.

It’s not a mistake. The problem here is not a failure to understand. They all know, very well.

This has been presented to the public as Sensible, moderate, centrist, common sense politics.

The black outfit mask guys have had years of politicians fighting each other to win their approval, with all-channels unanimity that they are justified and correct. The granny and the vicar have had a decade of incredibly hostile screaming hatred from the very top of politics and media. Thus

Centrist Dad Pinup Marina Hyde making it unequivocally clear who she is.

The media could have not platformed Nigel Farage and discredited him 15 years ago. Instead Farage got them what they wanted - Cameron agreeing to a Brexit referendum, Labour and the Tories dragged to the right. Now they want two party politics back with the Tories in power. He’s served his purpose.

Channel 4 reporter: Hello. I am Mr. Alias and this is my extremely suspicious comically large donation that i can only make in the form of a bag of money with a dollar sign on it. every other reform guy: seems legit! let me tell you every single way in which i and my boss have broken the law

Thrilled that Valerie Cherish is finally competing on drag race.

this, more than anything, is why the elite have continued to back him even as he plunges into historical levels of unpopularity “we can be complete assholes without consequence” is the best thing that ever happened to them and they will fight to the death to protect that right

Better Things Are Possible@internethippo.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Trump's main contribution to our culture was showing other rich guys that they can be as odious as they want if they don't back down on their own volition. Much like a lot of laws, social opprobrium just doesn't apply to them

Also since Orr is an academic at Cambridge who has actually been caught lying I look forward to the month of hounding on a deeply personal level and strokey chin pontificating about whether any white men should even get to be professors

Ah smashing, someone has decided to do the latest round of Noticing. Bring it.

Hey! Us guys at Cheese n Pickle have got a brand NEW podcast series JUST FOR YOU! How Long? With @jnraeside.bsky.social & @jondrytay.bsky.social boggling at the passage of actual time. It’s very funny and will boggle you too, if you too think 1996 was about 15 years ago. pod.link/6805050407?v...

How Long?

Listen to How Long? wherever you get your podcasts!

pod.link

Absolutely incredible that all of this is being done under the narrative of "independent review of studies." The studies find significant benefits and no harms! Children are not being rushed into irreversible procedures! An entire government and media apparatus buying in an urban legend

Comjng September 1st. Let me and @jnraeside.bsky.social make you feel old. Like, subscribe, share!

There are exceptions but I’ve found the lads are mostly thunderstruck at the most predictable shit imaginable; bizarrely confident in people of limited ability; wholly unable to understand members of the public who don’t behave or react as expected, and unable to think outside their own experience.

That feels absolutely right to me, and I’ll go you one further: increasingly, and for the last five years in particular, legacy media no longer seems to *understand* the world. They can’t explain what’s happening to themselves and each other, never mind to the public.

Jonathan Shainin: Legacy media no longer explains the world

Podcast Episode · Media Confidential · 17 August · 39min

podcasts.apple.com