With this there would have been no Mo Farah. No Freddie Mercury. No Lenny Henry. No George Michael. No Meera Syal. No Sadiq Khan. No Sajid Javid. No Salman Rushdie. No Hanif Kureishi.

What’s in a name? I should’ve called this article ‘Othello’s African Mother, or, The “Wonder in the Handkerchief”’. Not just’ The “Wonder” in the Handkerchief‘. Missed a trick there. #Shakespeare

An extraordinary article

This is the most alarming story I’ve read today. Giving up the fight before it’s started

#FoxOfTheDay @chrisgpackham.bsky.social @cubotanicgarden.bsky.social

When is *a ceasefire* not a ceasefire at all? When it is a Trump- Netanyahu one

Lots of good advice to the Beeb here.

"The first sighting of a pine marten in Studland, Dorset, in more than a century!" swanage.news/rare-and-end...

'Many of the campaigners and organisers giving speeches at the march said they felt the recent rise of the far right had led to people feeling “more confident” in racially abusing women – and men – on the streets.'

Working on my sunburst skills.

But who paid for this trip, and why would one take a taxi for a journey of this length rather than a train? Unless someone else was paying I suppose. I sincerely hope it wasn’t the taxpayer footing the bill?

C’mon @norfolkpolice.bsky.social The attack resulting in significant injuries only occurred a week ago ”because there’s no CCTV at the scene” However did we manage when there was NO CCTV? By old fashioned police work. It rather looks as if you don’t even want to try.

There’s a special place in hell for anyone who can watch this and feel joy. And for the ones just standing there doing nothing, you’re not much better…

#90sTop30 #MusicChallenge #MusicSky Day 1 R.E.M. - Losing my religion

Some good news about Eastern Australian humpback whales.

Some good news for a change

Amazing, beautiful photographs

‘As well as the dukedom, he will also now no longer use the other titles given to him on his wedding day – the Earl of Inverness and Baron Killyleagh.’ So utterly ridiculous. When are we going to dispense with all this nonsense?

‘Sayra Tekin, legal director of the News Media Association, said: “There are no circumstances in which an institution such as a university should be granted anonymity in this way. To do so represents a gross breach of the principles of open justice.“‘

‘“I am concerned that the compact by its nature and by various provisions would restrict academic freedom and undermine the autonomy of Brown’s governance, critically compromising our ability to fulfill our mission,” [Brown’s] president, Christina H. Paxson, told Trump administration officials’

Brown rejected the compact! www.brown.edu/sites/defaul...

‘Creating Horrid Henry’s gang of characters with alliterative names (Moody Margaret, Anxious Andrew, Sour Susan, Lazy Linda), each with a unique characteristic, was directly inspired by the medieval concept of the four humours: sanguine, phlegmatic, choleric, melancholic.’

US President Donald Trump told Israel’s parliament that PM Benjamin Netanyahu had often asked him for weapons during the Gaza war, including “some I’d never heard of.” More than 67,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces in Gaza.

Unbearably sad, like so much of the news these days.

Anyway. Free Palestine and End Antisemitism. These are not remotely conflicting statements.

The following is REAL footage from Portland, 2025. Viewer discretion is advised.

Absolutely disgusting

Great to see this cross-community response to Mr Jenrick

English ceramics designer Clarice Cliff, her Art Deco Diamonds Conical Pattern Tea set, 1930 #womensart

This article manages to name her husband before it names… her.

On National Poetry Day, the greatest poem I have ever read

❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

‘any time a university is attacked, there should be 500 university presidents standing up together, or 1,000 boards of trustees standing up together and saying, ‘We’re in solidarity.’ And that would send such a different message.”’

‘Kennedy said: “We cannot accept language that pushes destructive gender ideology …[or] claims of a constitutional or international right to abortion …” There is no mention of reproductive rights or gender in the declaration except in reference to specific challenges facing women.’

“In the Celtic Sea fishermen were permitted to take almost the entire remaining population of cod — 644 tonnes out of an adult population thought to weigh 645 — so long as they were caught as “bycatch” in the search for other fish.”

How to Medical... youtube.com/shorts/RxDKW...

What could possibly go wrong? 🧪

Finally. Why did it take the Royal Society so long? It is not as if they were not lobbied, again and again and again, to take a principled stance on this issue.

RIP Desi the Praying Mantis, taken too soon. He died doing what he loved best.

Vuelta a España cancelled as pro-Palestinian protests engulf Madrid.

This Is What Malnutrition Does to Children’s Bodies www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Everyone on the right, left and centre of British politics should utterly condemn these dangerous words from Elon Musk

Composer Hans Eisler is not so well known now, but worth thinking about. Before composing the East German National Anthem he fled the Nazis to the USA. A decade later he was on a plane in the other direction, hounded out by the McCarthyites as the ‘Karl Marx of music.’

But… he literally did not say that? Did anyone actually watch the clip?

#HannahEinbinder #FreePalestine #StandingTogether

‘We ask people to share the mission [on social media] …because this brings us visibility, not because Israel does not want to kill us – because they want to do with us the same thing that they do to Palestinians – but …they cannot afford to pay the political cost of that,” he said.’

“Singling out a Black leader in this way is not only unprecedented but also deeply troubling,” the university chapter of the American Association of University Professors said in a statement last week.”

‘Sir Keir’s attempt to anchor Labour as a party of managerialism has created an ideological vacuum. He has offered no moral project, no radical agenda, no post-crisis settlement. In response to Nigel Farage’s rise, he has chosen not to confront Reform rhetoric but to adopt it as his own’

Are you young, highly educated and driven, and want to contribute to our stagnant economy with its aging population and low productivity? Well out you go