With thanks to Darby Saxbe, Professor of Psychology at University of Southern California: neuroendocrinology of close relationships, particularly plasticity across the transition to parenthood. Writing the book ‘Dad Brain’ for Flatiron Books, about the neurobiology of fatherhood. Darby got this information from a program officer at the National Science Foundation ((NSF): a list of keywords […]
Asif Kapadia’s dystopian drama explores where current events and politics could lead over the next few decades. It’s the year 2073 and the worst fears of modern life have been realized. Surveillance drones fill the burnt orange skies and militarized police roam the wrecked streets, while survivors hide away underground, struggling to remember a free […]
Just over ten years ago, I wrote a biography of the British diplomat and writer, Harold Nicolson. Nicolson was an acknowledged expert on the theory and practice of diplomacy. In his 1939 study of the subject, called simply ‘Diplomacy’, he wrote: “The dangers of vanity in a negotiator can scarcely be exaggerated. It tempts him […]
This week, MPs debated the Ten Minute Rule Bill on dark money, put forward by APPG for Fair Elections Member Manuela Perteghella. The bill, which passed its first reading unopposed on Wednesday, would: Put a cap on political donations; Launch a review into where this cap should be set; Restrict donations made by foreign nationals through […]
I am an American. I wake up each morning to a country I barely recognize, gripped by a fear that no longer fades with the dawn. The streets aren’t filled with tanks, yet we are under siege. The attack is quieter, but just as ruthless. It marches with every presidential executive order that tears at […]
Numbers don’t lie – but the way we use them can. On January 27, 2025, a Channel 4 poll claimed that 52 per cent of Gen Z in the UK believe the country would be better off under a dictatorship. The media pounced. Headlines screamed about young people abandoning democracy, painting us as naive, radical, […]
Let’s break down a few things, both about ID cards and Labour’s ill-advised tactics on “fighting Reform”. First off, I personally don’t think ID cards would work in UK, because we are objectively bad at things like this, but they work elsewhere so this isn’t about them per se. Fairly obviously ID cards have zero […]
Campaigners from Devon were among around 1,000 people who staged a peaceful protest outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London on Thursday 30 January. The Strand was closed to traffic as a 90-minute mass sit-in took place, patrolled by large numbers of police officers. Inside the building, judges were hearing an appeal against the […]
The UK faces serious challenges: the cost-of-living crisis, which has been with us since the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) is showing no signs of abating; poverty is on the rise; the NHS and other key public services are struggling to provide the services we need; our economy is stagnant; our infrastructure is crumbling; and our […]
Elon Musk doesn’t like it. Stronger legal measures are in the pipeline to rein in the spread of dangerous lies and misleading claims on social media platforms including X, YouTube, Facebook, TikTok and Google. The racist riots last summer, following the Southport murders, didn’t only show how social media disinformation can provoke real-life violence on […]
Editor’s note: We are reproducing this briefing sent to MPs so that you can see and share the information they have been given. One of MP Watch‘s aims is to counter disinformation and misinformation, which has a nasty habit of sticking in minds more than the facts. We face crises on numerous fronts as a […]
Could there have been a more topical time to focus on social media disinformation? The day after Donald Trump was sworn in (again) as US President, a live online event on the issue took place, co-organised by West Country Voices. We saw how Elon Musk’s X became a MAGA mouthpiece during Trump’s 2024 election campaign, […]
Totnes Make Votes Matter (MVM) group are participating in the national MVM’s action day on Saturday 1st February between 10.00 and 13.00. We shall be outside the Mansion in Fore Street, Totnes with a huge Valentine’s card saying how much we would all love proportional representation (PR) for Westminster elections. We hope to fill […]
Which way is the wind blowing for little Britain? Little? Yes. We are a tiny, isolated, island in a corner of the North Sea, now quite alone in the world, lost, and lonely. We’ve turned away from our closest allies, our neighbours on our continent, with whom we used to enjoy a close affinity, and […]
It’s beginning to look as though Labour are either determined to demonstrate either that they are a) metrocentric (as opposed to London-and-wealthy-donor-Conservatives) or b) that they simply do not have any understanding of what goes on in the lower population-density rural areas of England. First there was the more-than-clumsy mishandling of the farmers’ inheritance tax […]
The past few days have seen a new low in British politics, where one of the most sensitive and most troubling crimes – child abuse – has been politicised by two parties, the Conservatives and Reform. Any person with an iota of common decency will acknowledge that child abuse, in any of its forms, by […]
Just before the EU referendum, the then USA President, Barack Obama, visited the UK and said he hoped that Britain would stay in the EU. Nigel Farage was having none of it. An American President, he said, had no right to meddle in British affairs. The President, in short, should “butt out”. The Daily Mirror […]
Going on the evidence of the Daily Mail’s behaviour over the festive season, the answer to the question is not looking good… On the ‘Betwixtmas’ weekend, I happened to find myself in WHSmith’s in Bournemouth. Walking up the stairs from the book department, I could hear a family near the newspaper stand, which is next […]
Starmer, baby, just slip a few new bills under the tree… The Climate and Nature Bill…second reading January 24. Please back it and give us a future – a GREEN future! Embrace the petition calling for a public consultation on freedom of speech and disinformation! If you aren’t up to speed with what disinformation is […]
I believe Keir Starmer when he says that under Labour we will not be joining the EU again, or its Single Market, or customs union. He has been saying that since he became Labour leader and now since he became Labour Prime Minister. He had quite a different view of migration and FOM back in […]
Back in 2019, David Milliband delivered the annual Fulbright Lecture at Pembroke College, Oxford University. The speech was titled ‘The New Arrogance of Power’ and he argued people were no longer protected from abuse by their leaders by international law and standards of behaviour and that this, in turn, had led to appalling humanitarian horrors. […]
May Puckey is a 17-year-old from East Devon who is passionate about the environment and politics. We are very keen to encourage young citizen journalists, so please get in touch if you want to have your writing considered for publication. The media has focused on what Donald Trump’s second term of office as president will mean […]
Some context: “Starmer wins backing of billionaire BlackRock chief: ‘He offers hope to British politics’ The Independent’s headline from October 2023 Dear Editor, The Bank of England base rate is 4.75 per cent. Effectively the UK can borrow slightly below this.BlackRock private debt fund currently advertises a yield (gross profit) of 8.4 per cent, which […]
On the wet weekend of November 23-24, 2024. a parliamentary petition demanding the government ‘Call a General Election’ really took off, and has been getting many people, especially those on the right, very excited! The petition states: “I would like there to be another General Election. I believe the current Labour Government have gone back […]
If the last ten years or so have taught us anything, it should surely be that the era of the ‘good chaps’ theory of government is well and truly over, and ‘it’ (authoritarianism/oligarchy/fascism) could very easily happen here – if we don’t take steps to prevent it. It is, frankly, dewy-eyed to think otherwise and […]
Petitions did not get very far under the Conservatives, but maybe Labour will be different? Let’s see! Here are some petitions that at least seek to raise the profile of some of the deep concerns we have about the direction of travel in the UK and suggest ways to address them. Please sign if you […]
The profound and relevant insight in the title is from American poet, Robinson Jeffers (1887 – 1962). Does this explain one current issue; the inability of a section of UK voters to see and hear that our self-harming Brexit vote continues to bleed our economy and to warp our society? All reliable economic institutions including […]
A few days ago, George Monbiot posted that he was considering leaving the site and suggested that maybe we all leave in a co-ordinated fashion. We agreed and the original thought was that a mass exodus on Inauguration Day might make a point. But….and it’s a big but… the idea of hanging around a moment […]
Dear Editor I cannot thank you enough for your ongoing support over the years for 3.8 million UK taxpayers who were excluded from parity of Covid-19 financial support by the previous government. There are so many ExcludedUK members, like me, who are still far from recovered from the pandemic and are still struggling to claw […]
Tomorrow, Americans may elect a fascist president. Tom Scott explores the disastrous impacts this would have on the world beyond the US. Last month the astute American commentator and expert on authoritarian kleptocracies Sarah Kendzior posted a hauntingly brilliant essay to her Substack. It included this memorable passage, which may well prove – like much […]