Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 2h

...what exact year is this supposed to be?

Alistair Coleman @alistaircoleman.bsky.social · 7h

Regret to report that there is now a second, woke, version of Corned Beef of My Childhood doing the rounds. The corned beef is now cheese, and there’s a whole section about corporal punishment and eating disorders missing, but it’s still the worst poem in the world. #FacebookNews

I'M SURE SOME WILL RELATE TO THIS I remember the cheese of my childhood, And the bread that we cut with a knife, When the children helped with the housework, And the men went to work not the wife.
The cheese never needed a fridge, And the bread was so crusty and hot The children were seldom unhappy And the wife was content with her lot.
I remember the milk from the bottle, With the yummy cream on the top, Our dinner came hot from the oven, And not from the fridge; in the shop.
The kids were a lot more contented, They didn't need money for kicks, Just a game with their mates in the road, And sometimes the Saturday flicks.
I remember the shop on the corner, Where a pen'orth of sweets was sold Do you think I'm a bit too nostalgic?
Or is it...I'm just getting old?

Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 9h

Genuine q: do they publish the logic it will use in a complex situation where injury or death are possibilities? ie will it deliberately put your life at risk to protect one or more other motorists or pedestrians? Or is this just a total non-issue?

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 1d

I'm not really a big R&B fan in general but D'Angelo's albums were mesmerising to me. Strange how someone can die and leave behind so little work but also at the same time so much.

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 2d

They won't be talking about religion when they attempt this.

Tom Scott @tom--scott.bsky.social · 2d

Right-wingers who think tactics they've used to criminalize abortion in the US will have the same kind of traction in the UK fail to grasp that religious fundamentalism is widely viewed as nuts in the UK, & has been for many decades, if not centuries.

As much chance of abolishing UK gun controls.

Henry Mance @henrymance.ft.com · 2d

The right-wing campaign group that helped topple Roe v Wade in the US is now working to roll back abortion laws in the UK, with the help of Nigel Farage.

Its first step? Trying to create a debate around "free speech"
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/13/w...

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 2d

It's incredibly hard. Esp on the health stuff, they have papers from credible-sounding people making all sorts of claims. Even if you can find the evidence to refute them, you're going through these things line by line. They're a mix of half-truths, misintepretations, lies and some actual facts.

Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 2d

This is really cool, Severndroog Castle is super-cool, as follies go.

ianVisits @ianvisits.co.uk · 2d

Severndroog Castle, a tall folly in southeast London that offers clear views across the city, is going to trial an evening opening of its rooftop viewing platform.

www.ianvisits.co.uk/articles/tic...

Tickets Alert: Evening opening of Severndroog Castle

Severndroog Castle, a tall folly in southeast London that offers clear views across the city, is going to trial an evening opening of its rooftop viewing platform.

www.ianvisits.co.uk

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Reposted by Charles Williams

Kasey Gifford @kaseygifford.bsky.social · 2d

We should be asking this
c o n s t a n t l y.

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Reposted by Charles Williams

Alex von Tunzelmann @alexvont.bsky.social · 2d

I bang on about this a lot: I think the combination of a global pandemic, underregulated internet/SM, collapse/corruption of trustworthy media, plus now unregulated genAI, is a wildly toxic environment for radicalisation & mental health. We see the results of that in our politics & lives every day

James Austin @jamesdaustin.bsky.social · 3d

Everyone knows at least one person (normally, but not exclusively, a guy) whose gone properly mental due to net rabbit holes.

We see public figures regularly go mad and destroy themselves.

And we have, at a policy level, just decided to put our fingers in our ears and go nahnahnah

Alastair Meeks @alastairmeeks.bsky.social · 3d

Last night I heard of another friend of a friend who has been lost to a rabbit hole of online propaganda. We need to start treating this as a serious public health concern.

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 3d

Oh my god, this drove me berserk.

Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 5d

And in the same week as the Discord age verification data breach, this is an interesting choice to say the least.

Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 5d

Look, I can see the arguments for digital ID even if I don't agree with them, and many reasonable people are in favour of it, but... come on. Govt has apparently never met a situation where it doesn't look to see how it can further reduce its levels of support: www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Government to consult on digital IDs for 13-year-olds

There has been a backlash to the announcement a UK-wide digital ID scheme will be introduced by 2029.

www.bbc.co.uk

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 6d

For various reasons, I was briefly embedded with the Tory campaign in a marginal seat that they narrowly lost in 1997. I met a lot of young Tories then. They were really, *really* weird. But tbf I have not spent a similar time with other parties and maybe they all are.

Gabby HC, but a ghost, hiding in a corner @scriblit.bsky.social · 6d

Butterfield Voice: Nerd. Second Nerd. American. Buzznusswoman.

Dr Mark | 北马克 |🍉🇦🇺🇲🇾🇹🇭 @ajaanmark.bsky.social · 6d

Are they hoping to start a Young Tory cosplay trend on TikTok
www.thetimes.com/article/8c9a...

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 7d

Oh my god, Bateman talking about music is so ChatGPT, that's amazing.

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 8d

It's all a bit of a shadow war really. If the Tories were reduced to c.40 MPs and 4th biggest party, I have no doubt that 75% would defect to Reform immediately.

YouGov @yougov.co.uk · 8d

Latest YouGov Westminster voting intention (5-6 October 2025)

Reform UK: 27% (-2 from 28-29 Sept)
Labour: 20% (-2)
Conservatives: 17% (+1)
Lib Dems: 17% (+2)
Greens: 12% (+1)
SNP: 4% (+1)

yougov.co.uk/topics/polit...

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 9d

They do for flu!

Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 10d

I can sum up Marvel's current problems by pointing out that I, a Marvel Comics superfan from childhood, who would have cried tears of joy to know what was coming, can't really be arsed with all their output anymore.

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 10d

I haven't seen any Jurassic Park film. I've seen the clip with the shaking cup and the velociraptors. I get the general idea.

Hannah Fearn @hannahfearn.bsky.social · 10d

Inspired by a post I just saw in which someone admitted they hadn’t seen a single episode of Friends nor the film Love Actually… what cultural hole do you have that’s a bit weird for your generation?

I’ll go first: I haven’t seen Dirty Dancing.

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 11d

Located somewhere just before The End Of Time.

Five / #2137 @five.yiff.ie · 11d

The end of history is real but it’s localized entirely in the doctor who fandom, where it is eternally 2008

Doctor Who Production News @doctorwhopn.bsky.social · 14d

Both David Tennant and Billie Piper are enthusiastic about the possibility of starring together in a Doctor Who movie.
cultbox.co.uk/news/david-t...

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Reposted by Charles Williams

MiMi Aye @meemalee.bsky.social · 11d

Author and filmmaker Justine Bateman on generative AI

"They're trying to convince people they can't do the things they've been doing easily for years - to write emails, to write a presentation. Your daughter wants you to make up a bedtime story about puppies - to write that for you." We will get to the point, she says with a grim laugh, "that you will essentially become just a skin bag of organs and bones, nothing else. You won't know anything and you will be told repeatedly that you can't do it, which is the opposite of what life has to offer. Capitulating all kinds of decisions like where to go on vacation, what to wear today, who to date, what to eat.
People are already doing this. You won't have to process grief, because you'll have uploaded photos and voice messages from your mother who just died, and then she can talk to you via AI video call every day. One of the ways it's going to destroy humans, long before there's a nuclear disaster, is going to be the emotional hollowing-out of people." - author and filmmaker Justine Bateman from a piece by Emine Saner for the Guardian

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 11d

Insofar as this made-up thing means anything, that was the way I understood it/it was explained to me! Because otherwise it's just "things that aren't fun" which is <waves hands> an extremely large category relative to the other two.

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 11d

Someone recently explained the scale to me and it clicked for me around the sport example because sometimes you wonder why you do it, and the idea of a kind of fun that isn't fun at the time or in retrospect is the only real answer.

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 11d

Type 2 is fun looking back on it but hard at the time (eg love having written a thing, like pulling teeth to write it). Type 3 isn't fun but is still a voluntary activity that you did because it might have been fun (eg watching a sports team you love playing badly in a heavy defeat).

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 12d

Love the thumbnail of you looking happy rolling dice when presumably neither of those things happen in this one.

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Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 13d

I don't think lack of policies is their problem.

Charles Williams @nicander.bsky.social · 13d

If you put this into Electoral Calculus (I know, I know), the LDs are *the opposition* with these numbers, which is also quite funny.