I've written an essay on juries as a "civic shield against the Damoclean sword of state power" via @quillette.bsky.social quillette.com/2025/12/23/t...

I've written an essay on juries as a "civic shield against the Damoclean sword of state power" via @quillette.bsky.social quillette.com/2025/12/23/t...

I wrote an essay for @unherd.com on the roadman archetype unherd.com/2025/12/cons...

I wrote an essay for @unherd.com on the roadman archetype unherd.com/2025/12/cons...

"The liberal idealist ethos based on the earnestness of ordinary people that ran through all his best films will endure." I've written a tribute to the late Rob Reiner for @unherd.com unherd.com/newsroom/rob...

"The liberal idealist ethos based on the earnestness of ordinary people that ran through all his best films will endure." I've written a tribute to the late Rob Reiner for @unherd.com unherd.com/newsroom/rob...

Christopher Hitchens on Noam Chomsky: "He forgets he's an anarchist just when it might do him some good." (via @buffsoldier96.bsky.social on the other site)

One can get very addicted to Ghost of Yotei's photo mode.

One can get very addicted to Ghost of Yotei's photo mode.

My latest piece for @unherd.com on the tensions between 'Christian nationalism' & the universalism of Christianity (supposedly being revived) vis-à-vis immigration. unherd.com/newsroom/is-...

Is Christian revivalism at odds with nationalism? By Ralph Leonard @buffsoldier96.bsky.social unherd.com/newsroom/is-...

Playing Ghost of Yotei

Playing Ghost of Yotei

I recently wrote an essay on Denis Villeneuve's Sicario & it's relevance a decade on, especially in Trump 2.0 for @thelastdvd, a new online journal about world cinema set up by Indian cinephiles thelastdvd.com/land-of-wolv...

I recently wrote an essay on Denis Villeneuve's Sicario & it's relevance a decade on, especially in Trump 2.0 for @thelastdvd, a new online journal about world cinema set up by Indian cinephiles thelastdvd.com/land-of-wolv...

‘Being Anglo-Nigerian myself, I'm just about old enough to remember when British blackness was Caribbean in character’ | Ralph Leonard unherd.com/2025/10/why-the-right-mythologises-windrush/

By @buffsoldier96.bsky.social who ought to cross post on here. I don’t read enough right wing stuff to know if it’s true or not, but when someone of Caribbean heritage is in the local paper for some crime, the comments are still poisonous. unherd.com/2025/10/why-...

"It is crucial for human freedom, indeed for a civilised society, to acknowledge that human beings aren’t simply political or communal animals." I reviewed Tiffany Jenkins' illuminating history of privacy/private life via @quillette.bsky.social quillette.com/2025/08/29/s...

Portrait of a Young Spanish Woman by Anton Ebert (1880)

www.compactmag.com/article/the-... The Right Doesn’t Deserve the West | Compact @buffsoldier96.bsky.social

"Jubilee’s Surrounded is a warped caricature of modern debate. It’s more of a game show than a forum for political dialogue." I've written about Mehdi Hasan going at it with semi-literate fascists on Jubilee's "Surrounded" via @unherd.com unherd.com/newsroom/the...

That time when the Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann was followed by a policeman in Genoa because they thought he was Lenin (he got that comparison a lot). Source: his autobiography

I wrote something on the argument over whether Britain should ban the Muslim face veil via @unherd.com unherd.com/newsroom/bur...

I wrote something on the argument over whether Britain should ban the Muslim face veil via @unherd.com unherd.com/newsroom/bur...

"the BBC permitted Lineker to criticise the human rights record of Qatar when the World Cup was held there; why should the line be drawn when he publicly takes issue with Israel’s human rights abuses?" My take on the Gary Lineker situation via @unherd.com unherd.com/newsroom/gar...

I've written for @unherd.com on Trump's proposed tariffs for "films produced in foreign lands" and how if it actually happened it would backfire, and, if it led to counter-tariffs, create a big problem for Hollywood. unherd.com/newsroom/tru...

He really is a just bitchy showbiz guy at heart — and his populism stems from being rejected by pop culture elites

I've written for @unherd.com on Trump's proposed tariffs for "films produced in foreign lands" and how if it actually happened it would backfire, and, if it led to counter-tariffs, create a big problem for Hollywood. unherd.com/newsroom/tru...

I wrote about the Dave Smith-Douglas Murray debate on Joe Rogan's podcast via @unherd.com unherd.com/newsroom/dav...

Israel – ein siedlerkolonialer Staat? Der Zionismus basiert auf dem ethnischen Nationalismus Europas. Doch auch die linke »Dekolonisierungsthese« ist problematisch Ralph Leonhard @buffsoldier96.bsky.social , 07.04.2025 www.nd-aktuell.de/artikel/1190...

I wrote about the Dave Smith-Douglas Murray debate on Joe Rogan's podcast via @unherd.com unherd.com/newsroom/dav...

Der britisch-nigerianische Autor Ralph Leonhard hat ein großartiges und differenziertes Stück über "Israel - ein siedlerkolonialer Staat?" geschrieben. Unbedingt lesenswert. Auf Deutsch heute im ND. www.nd-aktuell.de/artikel/1190...

I've written my thoughts on Slavoj Zizek's Christian Atheism for @thefreethinkermag.bsky.social freethinker.co.uk/2025/03/can-...

I sometimes think I left school at just the right time. Like I was part of the last generation to still have had a somewhat 'normal' education just before smartphone dominance, teachers turned into glorified day care workers, & then ChatGPT being a cheat code.

I sometimes think I left school at just the right time. Like I was part of the last generation to still have had a somewhat 'normal' education just before smartphone dominance, teachers turned into glorified day care workers, & then ChatGPT being a cheat code.

Fastenzeit Lektüre

I've written my thoughts on Slavoj Zizek's Christian Atheism for @thefreethinkermag.bsky.social freethinker.co.uk/2025/03/can-...

Today in the Freethinker, Ralph Leonard reviews Slavoj Žižek’s recent book on 'Christian Atheism'. @buffsoldier96.bsky.social freethinker.co.uk/2025/03/can-...

Here is my review of Steven Soderbergh's Black Bag. A film I rather enjoyed and in its own way is a very pro-marriage film. Black Bag; Suave, Sexy and Smart blackjacobin.substack.com/p/black-bag-...

Here is my review of Steven Soderbergh's Black Bag. A film I rather enjoyed and in its own way is a very pro-marriage film. Black Bag; Suave, Sexy and Smart blackjacobin.substack.com/p/black-bag-...

I have written about the recent US-Israeli plans to try to 'transfer' Gazan refugees to various African countries for permanent resettlement & the neocolonialism behind it. Via @unherd.com unherd.com/newsroom/wil...

I rather liked the Spanish black and white silent adaptation Blancanieves from 2012.

I have written about the recent US-Israeli plans to try to 'transfer' Gazan refugees to various African countries for permanent resettlement & the neocolonialism behind it. Via @unherd.com unherd.com/newsroom/wil...

"All are cruel whose power is so newly won." Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound

Wrote a piece for @telegraphnews.bsky.social on attempts to snuff out protests against the English monarchy & the fact of republicanism being crucial to English liberty. www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/03...

Wrote a piece for @telegraphnews.bsky.social on attempts to snuff out protests against the English monarchy & the fact of republicanism being crucial to English liberty. www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/03...

This is also one of my most conservative views. The reason to get a liberal classical education is not to make you into a person who is better at a job but because becoming more intellectually well rounded with an understanding of the ideas of your progenitors promotes for intellectual growth

Jonny Greenwood's score for There Will be Blood is magnificent and helped make that film so atmospheric & evocative. Try listening to some of the songs while reading Blood Meridian. They are congruent with each other.

Wrote a column for The Telegraph on the question of free speech and the workplace www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2025...