Matthew Bradford
@matthewbradford.bsky.social
Former Mui Wo Pirate & Water Buffalo Wrangler. Music Head. History Buff. Bookworm. Wino. Wannabe Stoic. 香港人加油. COYS! “We’re feeding strawberries to pigs”. - Chef Brian Moore.
Defending the indefensible. ‘Kemi Badenoch has defended her party’s decision to allow a former neo-Nazi who was jailed for subjecting a prominent Labour politician to antisemitic abuse to stand as a councillor’.
Badenoch defends decision to allow man jailed for antisemitism to stand as councillor
Tory leader praises Joshua Bonehill-Paine’s ‘contrition’ but says she has higher thresholds for MP candidates
theguardian.com
It cost me just shy of £100 to fill up yesterday. Now I know why. ‘Eight of the biggest oil companies amassed profits of more than $90bn (£67bn) in just three months as the Iran conflict sent energy prices soaring’.
Revealed: major oil firms make $93bn profits amid war and climate crisis
Iran conflict windfall over three months reignites calls for companies ‘cashing in on human misery’ to pay for environmental damage
theguardian.com
CRINK in effect.
Dr. Mark P. Barry ☯︎@drmarkpbarry.bsky.social · 17h agoA large missile attack on Kyiv has just taken place, with reports of up to nearly 3 dozen missiles being used, including a number of North Korean supplied KN-23s, also known as Hwasong-11a t.co/p0b6qwtcPv by @FaytuksNetwork (Faytuks Network) twitter-thread.com/t/2084762545...
It's extremely neat that the scientific volumes prepared for the British Association for the Advancement of Science's 1901 Glasgow meeting had covers in the ultra-cool Glasgow Style. Just stumbled across this, so I don't know which artist is responsible.
this is not true. there was no conspiracy. it didn't matter whether the streetcars were publicly owned (seattle, detroit) or private (los angeles, atlanta). a thread (because i wrote a whole-ass book on this): 1/?
David Ho@davidho.bsky.social · 3d agoIs everyone aware of the General Motors streetcar conspiracy? In the mid-20th century, auto and oil interests bought up electric streetcar systems across the US and systematically replaced them with bus routes and paved roads, funneling commuters toward private cars.
“Citizens should not have to live in fear simply for expressing personal opinions or possessing publications that haven’t been ruled illegal by the courts,” he wrote in Chinese.
Gov't refusal to release banned book list is 'abuse of power,' Christian NGO says
The Hong Kong government’s refusal to release a list of banned books amounts to an “abuse of power," a conservative Christian NGO has said.
hongkongfp.com
Of course the correct answer is ‘Rattus Norvegicus’, ‘No More Heroes’, and ‘Black and White’ by The Stranglers.
Mia Murphy 🏳️⚧️@miamurphy.com · 4d agoWhat's the best three album run from a band? (the correct answer is Moving Pictures, Signals, and Grace Under Pressure by Rush, but I'm excited to learn second place)
I think the one thing we can learn from Rod Liddle is that we should aim to be the person that, when the time comes, people celebrate your life, rather than celebrating your death.
THREAD/ORIGINAL ART GIVEAWAY This hare linoprint is by my mum, Jo. I'll be sending an original of this to one randomly chosen person who reposts this link to my recently updated website & pops a reply below. www.tom-cox.com The offer is open worldwide. I also have some more art to give away...
For all the recent buzz about the fiction of @dj-acid-reflux.bsky.social (2 books on Blackwell's bestseller list including the no.1 "Everything Will Swallow You"), don't neglect the non-fiction "21st Century Yokel", "Notebook", and the hare-infused "Ring the Hill". Plenty of more at www.tom-cox.com
Tom Cox@dj-acid-reflux.bsky.social · 2d agoTHREAD/ORIGINAL ART GIVEAWAY This hare linoprint is by my mum, Jo. I'll be sending an original of this to one randomly chosen person who reposts this link to my recently updated website & pops a reply below. www.tom-cox.com The offer is open worldwide. I also have some more art to give away...
Piece from me on why Andy Burnham’s decision to excuse Diane Abbott’s support of Putin’s propaganda is a grim omen for our future The European far left and the Trumpian far right unite against Ukraine
Why Westerners hate the West
The horseshoe in theory and in practice
open.substack.com
Oh my goodness. I play her music to every one of my Chinese classes. Her Carmen is just jaw-to-the-floor awesome. www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqI4...
葛蘭 - 卡門 王天林電影《野玫瑰之戀》Carmen [GeLan / Grace Chang]
YouTube video by MrHuang HK
youtube.com
Dylan Cheung@dylancheung.bsky.social · 2d agoIt's been reported that Grace Chang, Hong Kong's preeminent Mandarin screen diva of the 50s, passed away this afternoon, one day shy of her 93rd birthday. Watch Mambo Girl and The Wild, Wild Rose to see her at the height of her powers.
A second cherry blossom painting that I always forget about because it was a private commission. The closest I’ve come to pointillism!
Is King Arthur just a legend? ⚔️ From Welsh battle poetry to 6th-century royal genealogies, Ken Dark makes the case for a historical Arthur in @HistoryToday. Read the article: www.historytoday.com/archive/hist...
The Case for King Arthur
Often dismissed as a myth, was there a real man behind the legend of King Arthur?
historytoday.com
Want a book about the end of the southern British Iron Age, the Roman invasion and the greatest king of this island has ever had? If only such a thing existed...🤔 www.bloomsbury.com/uk/caratacus... @bloomsburyacademic.bsky.social January 2027 #Archaeology #AncientBlueSky 🏺
#MusicChallenge #DavidsMonthOfMusic Day 3: a song with a name in the title by a solo artist. Sanchez ‘Rosemarie’.
SANCHEZ ROSEMARIE
YouTube video by 7ep 45rpm g
youtu.be
Morocco instigated the Ceuta crisis to hit Sánchez for his energy deal with arch-enemy Algeria (over the Western Sahara). Meloni seized the opportunity to hit Sánchez as well. Few remember that Meloni is a supporter of the Sahrawi cause and visited refugee camps in Algeria twice in the early 2000s.
2nd August 1980, the worst terrorist attack in post-war Italian history is carried out by neo-fascist group NAR. A bomb hidden in a suitcase explodes in the waiting room of Bologna Station, causing the partial collapse of the station structure. 85 people die and 200 are injured [Thread] >> 1
#BookSky I wasn’t disappointed 🩵🧡 @dj-acid-reflux.bsky.social has perfectly drawn an area of country I love and added his characters seamlessly. I want to go back there now to look for Eric & Carl and Mel & Penny and all the rest. I didn’t want it to end. I might just read it again now actually.
‘Lam Wing Kee’s life was “a story of struggle, resistance and defiance against the Chinese Communist Party,” Premier Cho Jung-tai told dozens of people gathered at a Presbyterian church in Taipei’ Rest In Peace.
Taiwan hails late Hong Kong bookseller for 'resistance' against China
A Hong Kong bookseller who fled to Taiwan in 2019 after being detained by China was hailed for his "resistance and defiance" at a memorial service on Friday.
hongkongfp.com
“Beijing thinks this judgement is the final word. It isn’t. The appeal is already in the works, if they expect us to roll over and allow our own capital to become a CCP power centre, they have completely misjudged the strength of opposition to this mega embassy”.
UK court rejects challenge against new Chinese embassy in London
An English court on Friday threw out a challenge against planning permission for a Chinese "mega" embassy in central London.
hongkongfp.com
New EU rules stipulate that people must be told when they’re interacting with AI or looking at AI-generated or -edited content, leading to fear of “disclosure fatigue.” www.wired.com/story/europe...
Europeans Are About to Find Out How Entrenched AI Is in Their Daily Lives
New EU rules stipulate that people must be told when they’re interacting with AI or looking at AI-generated or -edited content, leading to fear of “disclosure fatigue.”
wired.com
I am quoted in @theguardian.com discussing Taiwan’s symbolic versus substantive support for Hong Kongers. www.theguardian.com/world/2026/j...
‘A statement of freedom’: T-shirt slogan goes viral and book sales rocket in Taiwan after Hong Kong raids
Taiwanese people look on with concern at fate of Hong Kong’s independent booksellers, after series of arrests in recent months
theguardian.com
When China stepped up its crackdown on human rights activists in 2019, lawyer Wu Shaoping thought he found a safe haven for his family The United States Instead, it's America's ICE that's imprisoned this asylum seeker after a traffic stop My column on this outrage www.inquirer.com/opinion/wu-s...
Wu Shaoping escaped China’s repression, only to get busted by ICE in Pa. | Will Bunch
The U.S.’s reputation as a safe haven for the world’s dissidents takes another hit with Pennsylvania’s arrest of a Chinese human rights lawyer.
inquirer.com
I’m so moved that this story about Auckland’s Nowhere, a Chinese-language bookstore with Cantonese books, banned books, and others, features our book Decolonizing Chinese History www.asiamediacentre.org.nz/a-library-bo...
‘And I do still read. Compared with many people, I probably read an enormous amount, but I know it’s not as much as I used to read. And I know where the time has gone. It is, of course, the damn phones’.
Could a couch-to-5k for books get you back into reading?
With smartphones stealing our attention, we’re picking up fewer books than ever. A novelist shares her eight-week scheme to get you back into the habit
theguardian.com
If your elected representatives aren’t saying this then time to vote for ones that do. 🕰️ 🌎 🔥 “Climate change kills: it kills people, as we’ve seen; it also kills our ecosystem, our biodiversity, and it also destroys the things we as a society hold dear – our houses, our businesses, our livestock”.
‘Climate change kills’: Pedro Sánchez speaks plain truth to Spain’s deniers
PM has long history of speaking out on realities of global heating but political opponents remain unnmoved
theguardian.com
Hoisted by their own historical petard. ‘Amid unwanted chatter about the significance of 1644, the film’s positioning of Qing conquerors as heroes of national unity has been problematized by a countervailing narrative casting those same conquerors as illegitimate outsiders’.
Taiwan Conquest Film Shelved
A Chinese blockbuster dramatizing the 17th-century Qing conquest of Taiwan has been abruptly postponed. Why are China’s authorities so uneasy about a film that was meant to celebrate “unification”?
open.substack.com