Woolwich murder was perverse, not merely extreme
Last Thursday, the two men who murdered the soldier Lee Rigby in the street outside an army barracks in Woolwich and then paraded on camera with bloodied hands and a meat cleaver, were found...
Category: Politics
The danger of knee-jerk closures of NHS units
A couple of weeks ago, a Care Quality Commission report was published that revealed that two NHS units for people with learning disabilities on the same site in Oxford were dreadful — they failed...
Maajid Nawaz plays to groundless fears over niqaab
Why I, as a Muslim, believe the veil must be barred in our schools: A provocative view from Islamic thinker fighting for Glenda Jackson's seat Maajid Nawaz, the former member of Hizb-ut-Tahrir who was...
Rachel Reeves’s “toughness” will strengthen apathy
Labour will be tougher than Tories on benefits, promises new welfare chief (from the Guardian) Rachel Reeves, “Labour” MP for Leeds West, former economist at the Bank of England and now Shadow Secretary for...
Quilliam out of their depth with Tommy Robinson
This week Tommy Robinson (real name Stephen Yaxley-Lennon), the erstwhile leader of the English Defence League, announced that he was leaving the organisation he helped found to start some kind of new anti-extremism organisation...
Roman Polanski raped a young girl. Not much nuance there.
Roman Polanski and the sin of simplification (in today's Observer) Victoria Coren Mitchell tries to make a case that the situation of Roman Polanski, the subject of a book published by the woman he...
Letter to the Guardian on Niqaab
I wrote this letter last Thursday after seeing a series of very hostile letters in the Guardian following Kira Cochrane's article in which she interviewed women who wear the niqaab (who had been conspicuously...
Coalition is not “Britain’s new normal”
Coalition Governing Could Be Britain’s New Normal Despite Liberal Democrats’ Troubles (from the New York Times) This article claims that the "successful" Tory-Liberal Democrat coalition that was formed after the 2010 election has changed...
Outbreak of media splaining over niqaab
The recent wave of media interest in niqaab that resulted from the Birmingham College and niqaab-in-court affairs has, as previously noted, featured a lot of opinionising from almost everyone except for wearers — plenty...
No basis for attack on niqaab
My veil epiphany | Victoria Coren Mitchell | Comment is free | The Observer Last Thursday a major further education college in Birmingham, the Birmingham Metropolitan College, backed down on a decision to ban...
Why do you believe her?
Last Tuesday a British soap actor, Michael “Le Vell” Turner, was found not guilty of multiple counts of rape and sexual assault on a child (now 17). There has been some suggestions that his...
Ariel Castro’s suicide is no tragedy
Ohio captor 'needed suicide watch': http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-23967581 Ariel Castro, the man who kept three young women captive in his house in Ohio for several years, was found hanged in his cell on Tuesday. According to...
Ukraine and Drugs: the vapidity of Stacey Dooley
Europe's Dirty Drug Secret: Stacey Dooley Investigates (viewable in the UK until next Sunday) Last Monday I saw a programme featuring Stacey Dooley, the British “investigative journalist” whose efforts at understanding the divisions in...
Don’t mind the monkeys
Carers and care workers are the best kind of people. So why are they treated so disgracefully? Yesterday the Guardian published the above article by Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett, best known for co-founding Vagenda magazine...
Benefits Britain 1949: yes, the world has changed since then
Currently Channel 4 is running a series called Benefits Britain 1949, in which people are invited to live on benefits at 1949 levels (supposedly adjusted to inflation) for a week. The Daily Mail has...
No, it’s not fascism
Recently there has been some well-deserved condemnation on blogs and Twitter feeds that I read about the British government’s attacks on immigration, which took the form of vans telling people who are in the...
Young people’s mental health: failed by the system
BBC Three: Failed by the NHS Last night there was a documentary on BBC Three about young people whose mental health conditions went untreated for months or years by the NHS mental health services,...
Are the Tories evil? What is evil, anyway?
Owen Jones: Cruel? Certainly. Unforgivable? Beyond doubt. But the Tories aren't actually evil – Comment – Voices – The Independent Last week Sunny Hundal posted an article on Liberal Conspiracy in which he made...
Why compulsory school dinners are a bad idea
Ban packed lunches, head teachers urged (from BBC News) The government has commissioned a report by two founders of the Leon restaurant chain (!) that says that take-up of school meals is low (43%)...
Review: Don’t Call Me Crazy
Recently a series called Don’t Call Me Crazy, set inside an adolescent mental health unit in Manchester, the now-closed McGuinness Unit, was screened on BBC Three, apparently the first time cameras had been allowed...