GOD being ill is boring. Any recommendations pls. I’ve already read two excellent chicklitty type novels, watched Amadeus on Netflix and Katherine Ryan’s new stand up: that’s the level - I want high quality/entertaining but not too heavy or concentratey cos head feels like it’s in a jar of water.

I love how everyone is replying to this like ‘we had that before Christmas!’ As though it’s a lily Allen album I forgot to download and have an opinion on 😂

Have finally had to concede defeat to this coldy-fluey-sickness bug thing. Was the last person in London who hadn’t had it and now it’s well and truly got me. Terrible timing as not well enough to present on lbc later or for blues gig in Essex tomorrow 😫😫. Now to take to my bed like Austen heroine.

This is literally what the Telegraph campaigned for.

Hope you all had yourself merry little Christmases, btw, and also realised that this lyric is an instruction…..

My most read/interacted with Substack this year is entitled Time To Ban X in the U.K.? Most of the comments simply read ‘yes’. tashthinks.substack.com/p/time-to-ba...

Natasha is always bang on with this stuff!

"The number of young people seduced by Reform’s populism has also been exaggerated. The brilliant Zoe Grunewald wrote recently about how, statistically, it is middle aged men who are most at risk of far-right radicalisation."

Last Substack of the year (probably). Wrote about how - without wishing to sound like Badenoch/a Times columnist and diminish VAWG perpetrated by British men and boys - the kids are (mostly) alright - tashthinks.substack.com/p/the-kids-a...

In my mind the pink gloves represent women and their allies everywhere….

The Times appears to be ambivalent about whether to go after rapists - there might not be space in prison for them. Scratch a transphobe and a misogynist bleeds.

‘The incel movement was once fringe. It’s absolutely not, it’s mainstream.’ Soma Sara, @everyonesinvited.bsky.social founder, explains how children are ‘falling victim to harmful misogynistic ideas about what it means to be a man’ online. @natashadevon.bsky.social

Join me from 6pm on LBC (Sat 20th December) - What do you make of the government’s VAWG strategy? - What will Erasmus give back that was robbed from young ppl by Brexit? - Are you spending less this Xmas? Is that a good thing?

It’s a great time of year to genuinely love bounties. Just came into the office to find a celebration’s tub full of discarded ones. Poor rejected bounties. Come and live in my tummy!

Labour does so badly in this poll mainly because, as the tables show, they lose 29% of their 2024 vote to the Lib Dems and Greens. Only 8% goes to Reform, just ahead of the 6% to the Cons. Those Lab–Con switchers push the Tories over 20%, despite them losing a quarter of their 2024 vote to Reform.

Will never not enjoy the speech where Hugh Grant tells the US President to do one, though, even if that is inspired by him having the horn for definitely-not-in-any-way-fat Natalie.

My Mum did her annual traditional forcing me to watch Love Actually last night. The more time goes by, the more it watches like an incel’s paranoid fantasy whereby ‘nice guys’ feel entitled to have sex with women they’ve never spoken to. Also about 1/3 of the film is characters being fat shamed.

Of course am totally in favour of any steps the government can take to reduce VAWG. There’s something about them saying they want to ‘halve it in ten years’ though that doesn’t sit right. I’m not entirely sure why it bothers me…. But it does. Anyone else?

Theory - no one is ambivalent about Fairytale of New York. People either EFFING LOVE IT BEYOND ALL THINGS or it makes them want to fork their own eyeballs out. I need one data point of someone who is ‘meh’ about it to prove me wrong….

New Substack - Are Reform UK hiding? tashthinks.substack.com/p/are-reform...

It was only a matter of time before terrible people started claiming the terrible words they said/terrible things they did were AI generated.

Freeze Peach, tho.

Apparently, no one in media can get hold of anyone from Reform for comment on Nathan Gill, their dismal performance in local councils or Farage’s alleged conduct at school. They appear to be practising a technique which attempts to silence criticism by refusing to provide a right of reply.

Turns out all the flag waving and shouting isn’t for King and Country. Well ours anyway… So just which country is Yaxley Lennon and his buddies in Reform working for?

Two beautiful human beings

I passionately feel voting intention polls should show the percentage of ‘don’t knows’ instead of removing/adjusting for them. Right now with the two party system being in flux & tories/labour being unrecognisable for their traditional bases ‘don’t knows’ could be v high. @markpackuk.bsky.social

I am a journalist (of sorts) and I don’t think X is a good way to temperature test the nation (neither is bluesky tbf). If you’re a journalist who wants to know what people are thinking get out there and talk to them.

If you’re using what happened on Bondi Beach to either argue for less gun control or to justify the Israeli government’s actions in Gaza then you’re worse than pond scum.

What a horrific attack on bondi beach - thinking of and sending love to everyone affected. news.sky.com/story/police...

Thanks to @natashadevon.bsky.social on LBC, I checked Reform’s constitution and it does not say members have to be UK citizens or residents reformuk.org.uk/wp-content/u...

I’m not claiming to know more than a professional theologian but I am saying Wikipedia confirms my belief that Jesus never said nowt about homosexuality specifically…. And even if he wasn’t a fan of gay marriage I don’t think he would have condoned active persecution of lgbtq people. Just saying.

A theologian coming on my show to argue that Jesus was a right wing homophobe was not on my 2025 bingo card.

This is the brilliant CofE short video I was talking about on air earlier. Genuinely made me want to go to church this Christmas - youtube.com/shorts/Uqk2p...

Join me from 6pm on LBC (Sat 13th December) - Should the UK abandon any notion of the US being our ally, following document leaks this week? - Should the resident docs call off their strike? - What’s it like to work in, or receive, nhs maternity care?

Also unquestioningly repeating this line, despite people who sign up to Reform not having to confirm they are UK citizens, as is required for membership to other parties…..

Murdoch’s Times apparently think baking the deeply racist replacement theory conspiracy into official government policy is a good thing…..

It’s REALLY fun living in a society where no one is allowed to explicitly express what we all know to be empirically and evidentially true because about 30 sociopathic and incredibly litigious men are hoarding 95% of the wealth *glugs gin*

Was a pleasure to join the wonderful @alexvont.bsky.social for The Bunker weekly news roundup. We talked Trump tearing up the world order, Lammy coming for the ECHR and a bloke in New Zealand ‘squatting over a colander’. Listen here - open.spotify.com/episode/2CE6...

I wonder how the antivaxxers feel watching this superflu crisis the nhs is enduring right now…. I wonder if they give a damn?

This is a really appalling editorial error on BBC Question Time "Apparently one in three children don't speak English as a first language, why does this matter?" Chair says "have English as a second language" Caption changes the meaning entirely "Don't speak fluent English"

👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽

In August over 100 women’s rights groups in UK wrote to Starmer calling for urgent action against the weaponisation of violence against women & girls by far-right groups & mainstream MPs to further a racist, anti-migrant agenda. Instead of listening to women this is the PM’s response 🤦‍♀️..

My most optimistic interpretation of this is that Labour haven’t realised that you can’t just tell each individual news channel what you think their audience want to hear without other people seeing it, in the social media age. 🤮🤮🤮

Children given correct information at school SHOKKA.

Pro tip - make your advent calendar seem more grown up and sophisticated by announcing that throughout the month of December you will be micro-dosing chocolate.

🔴 REVEALED 🔴 The Institute of Economic Affairs – the anti-state, anti-climate pressure group that "incubated" Liz Truss – was bankrolled by oil giants and Rupert Murdoch’s media empire. 📝 Exclusive findings from @desmog.com 👇

Unless you're reading this from your private jet, the same system is oppressing us all. linktr.ee/boldpolitics

Seems like the (not at all paid I am sure) Reform bots have all been directed to go to footage of Farage’s alleged former victims and write in comments underneath that they ‘work for the bbc’.