Book reviews, book store and commentary
What a performance. Come on, get down off it whichever of this week s righteous-fury news stories we re on. Anyone who s a professor or an MP or anything else that gets you money, prestige or a platform they re there because they agreed to play the system. And it s hell for autistic people because, on [ ]
I was not where I said I’d be on the night of the eclipse. I did some messaging, tried to mitigate complications it may have caused but wasn’t one hundred percent successful. That happens sometimes. I know my limits, and on the whole, I function – that’s what decades and decades of practice in coping [ ]
Guest blogger Simon Edge was horrified to find a far-right bookshop on his doorstep. He was even more horrified to discover it was backed to the hilt by some prominent gender critical figures. The Suffolk village where I live is a well-known destination for day-trippers and prides itself on its quirky range of independent shops. [ ]
I have deleted my first few attempts to write about this opportunity to address the climate crisis. It s so enormous, and comes after so many frustrations and failures. The faux left are still out there shouting “one struggle, one fight!” meaning anyone who’s discontented enough to be out on the streets must agree with [ ]
I’m very fortunate I suppose, that I stayed with Unite despite its political failures in recent years I had been wondering about switching to a union that s kept faith with socialism but this week, I found myself very glad I m in Unite. Four unions ASLEF, the Musicians’ Union, USDAW and Unison have stated [ ]
I thought Magdalen Berns was our queen. Heroes don’t die just because they die. She gave her life for us. She did. She knew she didn’t have much left, but she used it – with stunning energy, to teach us to rediscover our voices, after the trans lobby thought they had successfully cowed women into [ ]
Or: what happens when your playbook doesn’t work any more This week, the big story amongst women’s and lesbian and gay campaign groups was that Amnesty report, that labelled some of our favourite organisations as ‘anti-rights’ groups. The report was very quickly withdrawn when the letters and emails from the slandered organisations started flying around [ ]
I m told Amnesty have taken down the offending lists but, apparently, not before several targeted organisations have prepared to sue. I hope they go ahead. The lists are out there, with all the others that aim to bully women into silence. Recompense should be required and the story needs to go far, so that [ ]
*** addendum to Amnesty post*** I wrote recently about the founding conference of a group I joined, called For A Materialist Left. It was all about how socialism has been defanged and led astray by identity politics. One of the speakers, Chetan Bhatt, spoke about how identity politics leads inevitably into division and hate, and [ ]
Good news! We are united! One of the startling things I learned at the excellent People’s Emergency Briefing event held in Bexhill (St Peter’s Community Centre, 3rd July) was that 86% of the population want the government to take urgent action to deal with the climate crisis. I mean, to deal with the climate crisis. [ ]