This looks like a lot of fun! The 7th annual 100-word Microfiction Challenge by @nycmidnight.bsky.social kicks off on March 20th! Learn more at nycmidnight.com/100

Mehr Gerechtigkeit, mehr Geld: Am 4.11. ist „Tag der betrieblichen Entgeltgleichheit“. Die GEW fordert Baden-Württemberg, Rheinland-Pfalz und Saarland auf, endlich die Lehrkräfte an Grundschulen und in der Sek I nach A 13 / E 13 zu bezahlen. #bluelz

Lancaster University threatens to unnecessarily make a quarter of its staff compulsory redundant (i.e. to sack them). Our @lancasterucu.bsky.social branch has now a democratic mandate for strike action. Here is our branch's Open Letter to students. tinyurl.com/bdfe83re

Now this sounds like a lot of fun! Join me in the @nycmidnight.bsky.social 250-word Microfiction Challenge on December 5th! Learn more at nycmidnight.com/250

Germany's chancellor rejects calls to relax 'firewall' to work with German far-right AfD party

Signed! Please sign the petition below. I only just saw this. Halting the collection of this extremely important data on food insecurity would be a tragedy! There is no alternative source of this data. How are policymakers in the US going to alleviate poverty with no data on it?

Check out the upcoming events in the @femquant.bsky.social online seminar series, bringing together researchers from across the #socialsciences who explore the combination of #feminist research commitments and #quantitative research methods ⬇️ @bspsuk.bsky.social @populationeu.bsky.social

As a former nurse, the developments in the US hospital sector sadden and terrify me. Trump's policies will have terrible impacts on public health & will cost lives (where they haven't already). The American people deserve so much better.

I don’t think anyone is prepared for what they just did w/ ICE. This is not a simple budget increase. It is an explosion - making ICE bigger than the FBI, US Bureau of Prisons, DEA,& others combined. It is setting up to make what’s happening now look like child’s play. And people are disappearing.

The #strike in CFM, the outsourced services of Berlin hospital chain Charite continues as management refuses insourcing gesundheit-soziales-bildung-bb.verdi.de/mein-arbeits... One team in health #solidarity to workers in @social.verdi.de @epsu.bsky.social @strikemap.org @unionnews.bsky.social

I wrote about the connection between two big recent stories in AI: the sudden increase in sycophancy from ChatGPT and the growing evidence that AIs can be hyper persuasive. First we shape our tools, then they shape us. www.oneusefulthing.org/p/personalit...

Seems like a great opportunity to communicate to parents and students that Trump is cutting higher education and scientific research in Alabama aldailynews.com/nih-funding-...

Some artifacts and exhibits are being removed from the National Museum of African American History and Culture. It comes a month after President Trump’s executive order to remove what he calls “improper ideology” from Smithsonian museums. www.dcnewsnow.com/news/local-n...

The tragedy unfolding in the US under Trump. Healthcare funding slashed, pre-schools, child protection and support services, all gone ... I have no words.

The staff of a program that helps millions of poor families keep the electricity on, in part so that babies don’t die from extreme heat or cold, have all been fired

Important work on the UK & international far-right network by Harry Shukman. An example of outstanding journalism. I'm linking his documentary, the article is based on, below. www.theguardian.com/news/2025/ap...

Out now! My new paper "Access to transport, life satisfaction & the mental wellbeing of rural older people in England under austerity" online in JRS: lnkd.in/eV8df6rJ It's part of the special issue 'Contemporary Rural Gerontologies' edited by Mark Skinner & Rachel Winterton.

Great to be at the #BSA2025 Sociology conference, despite the crisis UK Higher Ed is in. Great keynote by my colleague from Lancaster University, Dr @aaronwinter.bsky.social "What can Sociology say about right-wing extremism and the mainstreaming of racism & the far-right?".

We have had nearly two decades of panic about Free Speech on Campus and not a single case, not even the ones they made up, were as bad as what's happening now

Welcome to all our new followers! 💚

Badar Khan Suri, a Georgetown post doctoral fellow who is a legal immigrant, was detained solely for sharing pro Palestinian views on social media. He was detained under the same provision as Mahmoud Khalil. He's already been moved to Louisiana. www.politico.com/news/2025/03...

Join the Alternative Open Day at Coventry University this Saturday ✊ Staff & students unite to protest disgusting fire and rehire tactics 💪 Poetry 🎭 Art 🎨 Speakers 🎤 @drjogrady.bsky.social @zarahsultana.bsky.social Experience the REAL Coventry University 👇

The British Society for Population Studies (BSPS) published a statement joining @popassocamerica (PAA) & @IUSSP in expressing deep concern over the removal of key public health & demographic data by US Federal Agencies. Devastating for public health & social care! www.lse.ac.uk/internationa...

📢 Funding opportunity 📢 We’re accepting applications for the Basia Zaba Scholarship for the MSc in Demography & Health @lshtm.bsky.social 🎓 The scholarship covers full tuition fees for a UK home student for the 2025-26 academic year. Deadline 26 March. For more information 👉 tinyurl.com/3j7esk22

“A document authored by an anonymous group of [Silicon Valley] whistleblowers accuses Elon Musk of attempting to spearhead a private hostile takeover of the US Government on behalf of an extremist anti-democracy philosophy known as the ‘neo-reactionary’ movement...” 2/7/25 1/

Thousands out in Madison for Friday’s STAND FOR SCIENCE March. Scientists are sending Musk a message: “No Science. No Future!”

OUT NOW: Palestine: A Sociological Issue A new Special Section in issue 73.2 The Sociological Review journal featuring contributions from Michael Burawoy, @cairsti.bsky.social @kirsteen-paton.bsky.social, Aseel Baidoun, Rafeef Ziadah. thesociologicalreview.org/announcement... #palestine #gaza

What explains housing inequality? Join us 5 March when @norawaitkus.bsky.social will scrutinise data from 35 countries. Register to attend in person or online. www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe/events/2...

Reminder that "free speech" champion Niall Ferguson, as a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, commissioned "opposition research" on an undergraduate whose politics he didn't like...😉 archive.ph/gJwoL

What a wonderful Radical Statistics 50 year anniversary conference it was! Brilliant talks, & keynotes by John Bibby, Alison McFarlane, Nazneen Ismail, & one me. Being able to still do this is empowering, given the crisis the HE sector is in.

This is American diplomacy in 2025. Trump and his sycophants have shown themselves to the entire world as the cynical bullies they are. Utterly disgraceful.

🚨 The University of Cambridge has failed at the High Court in its attempt to restrict pro-Palestine protest for five years. This is a major victory for our democratic rights. Our statement 👇

Apply to be an editor for Sociology of Race and Ethnicity! ASA’s Section on Racial and Ethnic Minorities is looking for editor applications from individuals and teams. Applications due March 28. Read the call here: https://bit.ly/4jsHxZN #ASA #journals #sociology #research #editor

Last call to register for the Radical Statistics conference 2025 "Using Data Accountably", which takes place this Saturday at Manchester MMU! This is a wonderful conference, Stellar line-up & programme. I'm delighted to give one of the keynotes. Register here: www.radstats.org.uk/2025-confere...

German election: The CDU can just about get a coalition with SPD together (together getting 328 out of 630 parliamentary seats), but it's tight. High turnout of c. 80%, but they're still counting. 21% voting for the fascist AfD is a national disgrace.

The German exit poll. Centre-right CDU set to win, challenges ahead. They need the (liberal) FDP to get 5% to enable a CDU-SPD-FDP coalition but this looks unlikely. CDU won't work with the fascist AfD, but also not with Greens or Die Linke. The AfD's >20% vote share will be a national disgrace.

Absolutely awful treatment of my colleagues at Cardiff University! The level of managerial incompetence, cynicism and brutality is shocking. Solidarity with everyone at Cardiff!!

"The level of access DOGE possesses means that the organization may already be able to siphon data that Musk or his agents could hold on to forever, long after his time as a government liaison, or even after a potential falling-out with the president."

Liebe Freunde in Deutschland, bitte vergesst nicht, zu wählen! Der letzte Tag, um die Briefwahl Dokumente zu senden, ist heute! Zusammen am 23 Februar Faschisten verhindern! F*CK AfD!

Calling the next generation of inequality scholars! Apply now for our Summer School on Socioeconomic Opportunity and Inequality with @ucstonecenter.bsky.social and the Institute for Applied Economic Research. 🔗 https://buff.ly/4gMFvBs 📅 Deadline: 30 April 2025

UK Higher Ed is in the worst funding crisis in its history, tens of thousands of job losses. The UK's Oxbridge educated political leadership ignores it in cowardly silence. Their children won't be affected when there will be no other Universities left to go to. www.theguardian.com/education/20...

So, a far right white nationalist Eugenicist, who was fired in 2018 for speaking at a white nationalist conference, was appointed the US Undersecretary for diplomacy & public affairs? The US is going down a very dark path. www.theatlantic.com/technology/a...

A new UK All-party parliamentary group report finds that 80 out of the N=3,605 child deaths in England between Oct 2023 & Oct 2024 (c 2.2%), ocurred in temporary accommodation. Most were Babies who never knew what it's like to have a home. householdsintemporaryaccommodation.co.uk/reports/chil...

Rural families, not what everyone thinks. Sociologists @shelleydclark.bsky.social and @ruraldemography.bsky.social in WaPo: www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/202...

The British trade union Unison reports on rampant exploitation & maltreatment of migrant care workers in the UK. I feel deep solidarity, as used to be a care worker myself, but far more privileged because I was employed in the country I am a citizen of. morningstaronline.co.uk/article/work...

What an interesting read on gender & work-family (unpaid care labour?)-conflict from colleagues in Iceland! ☕📰 I just taught a session on this topic to my 2nd year UG module last week.

Germany is preparing for General Elections on 23rd February. The far right AfD is set to make big wins & the political centre does not hold.The mainstream parties argue like a bunch of bickering teenagers at a prom. Does it not remind you of the (pre-WW2) Weimar republic? We all know how that ended.

Breaking news: The Trump administration cut billions in biomedical funding. Researchers say it imperils work on cancer and other illnesses.