It’s not all about Brexit
Last Friday the Guardian printed a letter from a number of famous people who informed us that because of ‘concerns’ about anti-Semitism, they would be ‘unable’ to vote Labour in the forthcoming (12th December)...
Category: Politics
Tu quoque
Tu quoque (you too) is a type of argument that is classified as a logical fallacy, that is, an argument that does not offer evidence of the point the arguer is trying to make...
As election nears, the witch-hunt steps up
So, the week before last, the date for a forthcoming general election — 12th December — was finally announced and parliament was prorogued (dissolved) for real, after months of wrangling so as to stop...
Homesickness and nostalgia, and why they make bad politics
I’ve lived away from home for two prolonged periods in my childhood and young adulthood. The first was boarding school, near Ipswich. The second was university, in Aberystwyth. The first was two hours from...
Expel Keith Vaz
Today the Labour MP Keith Vaz was suspended from the House of Commons for six months for offering to buy cocaine for male prostitutes in August 2016 in an encounter at his flat recorded...
Riots don’t start; people start them
There is a video going round on Twitter of the American representative (from Hawaii) Tulsi Gabbard responding to a question about the Indian prime minister’s role in the 2002 Gujarat pogrom, in which hundreds...
Equality feels like oppression
There is a saying in social justice circles that when you are used to privilege, equality feels like oppression. Earlier this week I saw a thread on Twitter which demonstrates this experience very nicely....
Brexit and how ignorance has become a ‘virtue’
Over the weekend, we were reminded of how far Tory Brexiteers were willing to go to make sure we leave the EU, come what may: an article from the London Evening Standard from last...
What kind of violence is this again?
Every time there is a prominent mass shooting in the US (or elsewhere, but it’s usually the USA), you can bet that there will soon appear a white feminist with access to the mainstream...
Reality check for BBC’s Brexit reality check
Yesterday the BBC News website published a “reality check” feature on what might happen at Britain’s sea ports in the event of a no-deal Brexit this coming October (or any other time), which the...
“Fake news” and the lay-offs at the Canary
Last week The Canary, a pro-Corbyn activist ‘news’ and comment site, announced that it was “leaving the gig economy”, reducing its staff to a core of seven full-time editors and writers (smaller than their...
Yes, it can be done (borders and Brexit)
Yesterday, I saw a video posted on Twitter by the Brexit Party MEP Ben Habib (for London region) in which he and a bunch of his colleagues stood on the Irish border and pointed...
It’s not self-doubt
So, last week the news many of us had been dreading for months finally arrived: Boris Johnson, the inveterate liar, bigot and money-waster who has a trail of diplomatic incidents behind him, became leader...
Why this isn’t rape
Yesterday a teacher in Havant, Hampshire (a small town near the south coast of England) was jailed for 12 years for engaging in sexual relations with four girl pupils, ranging in age from 13...
Review: The Left Behind
The Left Behind is an hour-long BBC Three drama in which a young man who is facing homelessness as a result of his family’s eviction and gets very rapidly groomed into racist violence, leading...
Public interest?
So, last week the British ambassador to the USA resigned after Donald Trump wrote tweets denouncing him after his emails were leaked, thought to have been done by a Brexiteer mole who is out...
Anti-Semitism in context
There was a piece by Gordon Brown, the former chancellor of the Exchequer and prime minister, in the Guardian last Saturday demanding a “more radical” approach to the issue of anti-Semitism in the Labour...
Restorative justice is no substitute for prison
Recently I came across a long thread (starting here) arguing against ‘carceral’ (prison-based) responses to serious crimes and, in particular, rape. The argument is that the justice system serves the state’s purpose, which is...
It’s in the Times.
Last week a detailed report into three stories ‘researched’ and written by Andrew Norfolk, the Times’ chief investigative reporter, was published, all of which involved Islam or Muslims, painted them in the worst possible...
My Jewish friend, your Asian friend
Yesterday I came across the outgoing edition of the Spectator at Smith’s and there were about four articles hymning Boris Johnson in anticipation of his crowning as prime minister, as was expected when it...