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Why I’m No Longer Celebrating on Social Media

I wasn’t meant to write this article.        Nope. I was going to write a witty political satire entitled “Cummings: Return of the Messiah” but then a couple of things happened: ­­firstly, I remembered that I’m not funny. I think binge-watching comedy stand ups during lockdown gave me some unearned confidence. Secondly, I found out on Friday (4 th May) that after weeks of applications, writing personal statements, completing exercises and what not, I had secured a place to study an MA in Journalism at university. Yippee! I felt like someone had plugged me into a mains and then attached that mains to some gargantuan Star Wars inspired electricity-producing monstrosity (can you tell I don’t do physics?).           I felt more alive than I had for some time. You know the feeling, right? The sun seems to pulsate with more energy, more vibrancy than it usually does. The air around you feels lighter - you feel like if you allowed yourself to become any giddier you’d swell up like a balloo
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We need a 4-day work week, and we need it now

  Paganism and protest.  These two things twirl around the recent bank holiday like ribbons on a maypole. On the one hand, the 1 st of May is associated with Beltane, an ancient Celtic festival which rejoiced at the arrival of summer. It was celebrated with bonfires, and is linked to fun, fertility and renewal. The early May bank holiday is also associated with the flame of political conflict. On 4 May 1886, a bomb detonated near Haymarket Square in Chicago, after police came to break up a rally held to support striking workers. Many citizens and police officers were killed or injured. The protests and strikes occurred from 1 - 4 May to advocate for an 8 hour work day. In 1889, the International Socialist Conference decided that, in commemoration of the Haymarket riot, the 1st of May would be a holiday known as “International Workers’ Day”. It was moved to the nearest Monday in 1978 by the Labour party. Both concepts, radical socialism and a spring pagan festival, seem to have littl
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Salmond v Sturgeon - A Shakespearean Tragedy?

       One of our greatest bards said that the world is but a stage and the people merely actors upon it. If Shakespeare was right, then Alexander Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon are putting on a virtuoso performance. The back and forth of this narrative would make a quality play or TV series: a clash between the mentor and the protégée, scandal, potential treachery and intrigue and a shock political comeback.   When you zoom out and look at the bigger picture, you see the full ramifications. If, one day, the SNP succeed in gaining independence for their country, they will terminate a structure that has been in place for over 300 years.       The United Kingdom, which has already had to reconsider its identity after Brexit, would be left fragmented, with its place in the world in jeopardy. The conflict between Salmond and Sturgeon has done damage to the SNP cause, and this damage has been exacerbated by the dire economic consequences of COVID but nonetheless, in May, we will find out wheth
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On David Lammy's Response To Racism

   I was scrolling through twitter on the 29th of April (procrastinating) when I saw that David Lammy was trending. I decided to follow this up and was intrigued by the positivity that was being channelled towards him. Politics is a brutal business, and few MP’s have received as much vitriol and sheer savaging as the MP for Tottenham. We know him as a passionate campaigner, a seemingly lone voice crying out against the injustices that blight our commonweal. Few can forget his condemnation of the Windrush scandal, the agony that gripped his voice as he expressed the sense of betrayal felt by ethnic minorities across the UK who were wrongfully deported in what Lammy titled the “national day of shame.” However, lone voices are an easy target for the opposition, and Lammy's defiant stances have earned him the burning hatred of many right-wingers in the UK. I soon discovered that Lammy's surge in popularity was the result of his performance in an LBC video, in which he challe
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