Maurice Mauve
@samhufton1.bsky.social
Had a blog. Sometimes still write. Do marketing for pubs. Did European Studies at Kings College London. Like cooking. Am Mauritian. Like Ukraine to win. Democracy in Europe. Up the spurs.
Pinned
Maurice Mauve
@samhufton1.bsky.social
· Nov 8
Reflections on the European Idea in theory and in practise
Continued potential for peaceful change is the principal condition; politics must be a process. That is why politics must be transnational,and Europe a transnational democracy.
www.opendemocracy.net
Public service announcement I used to have pinned on the other place
Those interested in reading my contribution in @visionforeurope, here is an extended version I published on oD earlier this year:
Reflections on the European Idea in theory and in practice
www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europ...
Those interested in reading my contribution in @visionforeurope, here is an extended version I published on oD earlier this year:
Reflections on the European Idea in theory and in practice
www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europ...
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
Techbros seem to love Tolkien, so here's an analogy to help you understand what genAI is.
GenAI is The One Ring. You think your use is justified, b/c you don't have evil in your heart.
But it came from evil, it is intended for evil purpose, & anything you do with it will be twisted to that end.
GenAI is The One Ring. You think your use is justified, b/c you don't have evil in your heart.
But it came from evil, it is intended for evil purpose, & anything you do with it will be twisted to that end.
December 17, 2025 at 8:43 PM
Techbros seem to love Tolkien, so here's an analogy to help you understand what genAI is.
GenAI is The One Ring. You think your use is justified, b/c you don't have evil in your heart.
But it came from evil, it is intended for evil purpose, & anything you do with it will be twisted to that end.
GenAI is The One Ring. You think your use is justified, b/c you don't have evil in your heart.
But it came from evil, it is intended for evil purpose, & anything you do with it will be twisted to that end.
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
I'm sure this is going to go well.
Did you know that from tomorrow, Qualtrics is offering synthetic panels (AI-generated participants)?
Follow me down a rabbit hole I'm calling "doing science is tough and I'm so busy, can't we just make up participants?"
Follow me down a rabbit hole I'm calling "doing science is tough and I'm so busy, can't we just make up participants?"
December 18, 2025 at 6:47 AM
I'm sure this is going to go well.
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
how did I not know that Sarkozy met his second wife when he officiated at her wedding as the local mayor en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolas...
December 17, 2025 at 2:57 PM
how did I not know that Sarkozy met his second wife when he officiated at her wedding as the local mayor en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolas...
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
The kind of person who would rightly go 'sorry, are you insane? What does a kosher delicatessen in Golders Green have to do with the Gaza war?' going 'well, look, if someone from Afghanistan gets on a boat, you can't expect people not to start being racist towards black Britons', and vice versa:
Bondi attacks show old hatreds are flourishing again
A permissive environment has been created in which Israel is conflated with all Jews, everywhere
www.ft.com
December 17, 2025 at 12:15 PM
The kind of person who would rightly go 'sorry, are you insane? What does a kosher delicatessen in Golders Green have to do with the Gaza war?' going 'well, look, if someone from Afghanistan gets on a boat, you can't expect people not to start being racist towards black Britons', and vice versa:
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
Good column. Another thing: “if you don’t have rules, you get prejudices” is literally the same argument as “if you have the Gaza war, you have the murder of innocents in Sydney” - an argument that neither of these politicians would make in public!
"When you don't have rules, you get prejudices", Tony Blair and Shabana Mahmood. My Eastern Eye column this week agrees that control does matter to democratic consent - but warns against conflating legitimate concerns with illegitimate prejudices & racist slurs
www.easterneye.biz/shabana-mahm...
www.easterneye.biz/shabana-mahm...
December 17, 2025 at 12:06 PM
Good column. Another thing: “if you don’t have rules, you get prejudices” is literally the same argument as “if you have the Gaza war, you have the murder of innocents in Sydney” - an argument that neither of these politicians would make in public!
I also think most people don't know what a debate really is or how to get things out of it - they aren't up for discussion if it means they're wrong!
Also we've fetishized "debate” in these spaces as some kind of civic good, when what matters is competence, trust, shared purpose. Medicine, engineering, boardrooms aren’t organized around debate or requirements of false balance. We've poisoned public discourse by insisting it be adversarial.
"Bluesky is an echo chamber."
"Bluesky doesn't have enough reach"
"Liberals must return to X to challenge the far right"
I'm not a tech bro or a journalist. Your priorities are not my priorities. Stop telling me I need to do anything other than chat about comics & telly with people who seem nice.
"Bluesky doesn't have enough reach"
"Liberals must return to X to challenge the far right"
I'm not a tech bro or a journalist. Your priorities are not my priorities. Stop telling me I need to do anything other than chat about comics & telly with people who seem nice.
December 15, 2025 at 5:23 PM
I also think most people don't know what a debate really is or how to get things out of it - they aren't up for discussion if it means they're wrong!
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
Matthias Döpfners schockierender Text: Deutschland leide unter einem „nationalsozialistischen Trauma“, will „bloß nicht „exzellent“ sein; Macron ist im „Würgegriff“ von Islamisten und Antisemiten ; Starmer übt sich in „kultureller Unterwerfung”.
Trump hingehen „will ein starkes Europa“.
Trump hingehen „will ein starkes Europa“.
December 13, 2025 at 4:33 PM
Matthias Döpfners schockierender Text: Deutschland leide unter einem „nationalsozialistischen Trauma“, will „bloß nicht „exzellent“ sein; Macron ist im „Würgegriff“ von Islamisten und Antisemiten ; Starmer übt sich in „kultureller Unterwerfung”.
Trump hingehen „will ein starkes Europa“.
Trump hingehen „will ein starkes Europa“.
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
🚨🚨This is worse than we could have imagined: Full version of #Trump's national #securitystrategy reportedly calls for “pulling Poland away from #EU”. 🧵 notesfrompoland.com/2025/12/10/f...
Fuller version of Trump security strategy reportedly calls for "pulling Poland away from EU"
notesfrompoland.com
December 11, 2025 at 10:04 AM
🚨🚨This is worse than we could have imagined: Full version of #Trump's national #securitystrategy reportedly calls for “pulling Poland away from #EU”. 🧵 notesfrompoland.com/2025/12/10/f...
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
wrote about it in my newsletter literally this week (youngvulgarian.substack.com/p/regrettabl...) but god, in what world is it "feminism" to argue that a 30-year-old prominent political journalist can't be held responsible for her actions because..........she's a woman?
Really not trying to dunk on this person, but I just don't think invoking power dynamics works here. RFK had no power over Nuzzi.
She was a star national politics reporter and had the power to shape his public image and help install him in office. This is a story of her abusing power, not him.
She was a star national politics reporter and had the power to shape his public image and help install him in office. This is a story of her abusing power, not him.
December 13, 2025 at 9:55 PM
wrote about it in my newsletter literally this week (youngvulgarian.substack.com/p/regrettabl...) but god, in what world is it "feminism" to argue that a 30-year-old prominent political journalist can't be held responsible for her actions because..........she's a woman?
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
One of the bleakest things about living in the UK right now is that the country is full of people who, if their community is given something nice, will just destroy it for no reason. I really don’t know how you fix that.
Christmas tree chopped down hours after lights switch on
Christmas tree chopped down hours after lights switch on
A Christmas tree that has brought festive cheer to a village for more than a decade has been cut down just hours after its lights were switched on.
news.sky.com
December 12, 2025 at 7:38 AM
One of the bleakest things about living in the UK right now is that the country is full of people who, if their community is given something nice, will just destroy it for no reason. I really don’t know how you fix that.
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
Nuzzi is the type of journalist who treats politics as offering entertaining characters, and zero stakes or substance.
She has had a remarkably successful career within that particular genre.
Her self-immolation, along with this vacuous memoir, illustrates the genre’s limits.
She has had a remarkably successful career within that particular genre.
Her self-immolation, along with this vacuous memoir, illustrates the genre’s limits.
December 8, 2025 at 3:56 PM
Nuzzi is the type of journalist who treats politics as offering entertaining characters, and zero stakes or substance.
She has had a remarkably successful career within that particular genre.
Her self-immolation, along with this vacuous memoir, illustrates the genre’s limits.
She has had a remarkably successful career within that particular genre.
Her self-immolation, along with this vacuous memoir, illustrates the genre’s limits.
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
No, this is wrong, stop reposting this absurd and miscalculated meme.
It assumes Cratchit is working a 40 hour work week (he isn't) and that straight line inflation extrapolations over centuries are valid (they're not) and fails to understand both Victorian class and household finance.
It assumes Cratchit is working a 40 hour work week (he isn't) and that straight line inflation extrapolations over centuries are valid (they're not) and fails to understand both Victorian class and household finance.
December 11, 2025 at 1:54 AM
No, this is wrong, stop reposting this absurd and miscalculated meme.
It assumes Cratchit is working a 40 hour work week (he isn't) and that straight line inflation extrapolations over centuries are valid (they're not) and fails to understand both Victorian class and household finance.
It assumes Cratchit is working a 40 hour work week (he isn't) and that straight line inflation extrapolations over centuries are valid (they're not) and fails to understand both Victorian class and household finance.
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
Anyone who’s ever actually spoken to a single asylum seeker about their experiences in any country in Europe simply could not honestly conclude that what would improve things would be to further reduce their human rights protections.
It’s vile scapegoating unworthy of us & it needs to end #r4today
It’s vile scapegoating unworthy of us & it needs to end #r4today
December 10, 2025 at 7:35 AM
Anyone who’s ever actually spoken to a single asylum seeker about their experiences in any country in Europe simply could not honestly conclude that what would improve things would be to further reduce their human rights protections.
It’s vile scapegoating unworthy of us & it needs to end #r4today
It’s vile scapegoating unworthy of us & it needs to end #r4today
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
Oh my god dude, shut the fuck up
December 10, 2025 at 6:56 PM
Oh my god dude, shut the fuck up
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
How many times do we need to point this out?
By appeasing the far right, you do not weaken it. You strengthen it.
While weakening your own position.
There's a vast amount of academic research showing this.
But Labour will not listen.
www.theguardian.com/law/2025/dec...
By appeasing the far right, you do not weaken it. You strengthen it.
While weakening your own position.
There's a vast amount of academic research showing this.
But Labour will not listen.
www.theguardian.com/law/2025/dec...
Starmer urges Europe’s leaders to curb ECHR to halt rise of far right
Exclusive: PM calls for members of European convention on human rights to allow tougher action to protect borders
www.theguardian.com
December 10, 2025 at 10:56 AM
How many times do we need to point this out?
By appeasing the far right, you do not weaken it. You strengthen it.
While weakening your own position.
There's a vast amount of academic research showing this.
But Labour will not listen.
www.theguardian.com/law/2025/dec...
By appeasing the far right, you do not weaken it. You strengthen it.
While weakening your own position.
There's a vast amount of academic research showing this.
But Labour will not listen.
www.theguardian.com/law/2025/dec...
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
On the one hand, I’ve seen Zarah Sultana with my own eyes. On the other, everything else increasingly suggests she can’t possibly be a real person.
Zarah Sultana voted with the Tories in every vote on the Employment Rights Bill last night.
That includes voting to keep the Lords' wrecking amendments on strike ballot thresholds and to keep the 2016 Trade Union Act's restrictions on unions' political funds.
That includes voting to keep the Lords' wrecking amendments on strike ballot thresholds and to keep the 2016 Trade Union Act's restrictions on unions' political funds.
December 9, 2025 at 12:15 PM
On the one hand, I’ve seen Zarah Sultana with my own eyes. On the other, everything else increasingly suggests she can’t possibly be a real person.
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
Russia, every single day: we might nuke European capitals
European politicians: we might have to defend ourselves against Russia
Tankies: OMG, EU so aggressive, why not peace and love, give Russia what they want
European politicians: we might have to defend ourselves against Russia
Tankies: OMG, EU so aggressive, why not peace and love, give Russia what they want
December 9, 2025 at 10:37 AM
Russia, every single day: we might nuke European capitals
European politicians: we might have to defend ourselves against Russia
Tankies: OMG, EU so aggressive, why not peace and love, give Russia what they want
European politicians: we might have to defend ourselves against Russia
Tankies: OMG, EU so aggressive, why not peace and love, give Russia what they want
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
America is led by a government so out of touch with global realities, basic contemporary history, and rational insight that I wonder if the nation will be able to regain sanity in the future.
Joseph de Maistre was right about at least one thing: “Toute nation a le gouvernement qu'elle mérite.”
Joseph de Maistre was right about at least one thing: “Toute nation a le gouvernement qu'elle mérite.”
🚨🚨 God #America, this is grim and a very stark wake-up call to European political ledaders on the (non) future of the "transatlantic alliance":
December 5, 2025 at 7:33 AM
America is led by a government so out of touch with global realities, basic contemporary history, and rational insight that I wonder if the nation will be able to regain sanity in the future.
Joseph de Maistre was right about at least one thing: “Toute nation a le gouvernement qu'elle mérite.”
Joseph de Maistre was right about at least one thing: “Toute nation a le gouvernement qu'elle mérite.”
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
Anyway, it’s a fascinating study of american incomprehension at rejection and at Europe at large. But is sort of a love letter to Berlin too, just a fully u comprehending one.
December 4, 2025 at 10:53 PM
Anyway, it’s a fascinating study of american incomprehension at rejection and at Europe at large. But is sort of a love letter to Berlin too, just a fully u comprehending one.
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
Labour bearing down on immigration will fix this any day now.
GB News now broadcasting calls to remove the ethnic minority MPs from parliament
December 4, 2025 at 9:57 AM
Labour bearing down on immigration will fix this any day now.
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
This feels personal. My child is in school in Glasgow. She's likely recorded as not speaking English as first language, even though it is basically her first. Everybody I know is extremely impressed that she's fully bilingual (me, too). Now these people are coming after her. Coming after children.
2 in 3 of Nigel Farage’s current and former partners do not speak English as their first language.
December 4, 2025 at 12:16 AM
This feels personal. My child is in school in Glasgow. She's likely recorded as not speaking English as first language, even though it is basically her first. Everybody I know is extremely impressed that she's fully bilingual (me, too). Now these people are coming after her. Coming after children.
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
Nigel Farage’s Legacy — Brexit: the trillion pound ‘mistake’
The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)… confirms the Treasury’s 2016 analysis, claiming a relative fall in GDP of between 6% and 8%.
yorkshirebylines.co.uk/opinion/brex...
The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)… confirms the Treasury’s 2016 analysis, claiming a relative fall in GDP of between 6% and 8%.
yorkshirebylines.co.uk/opinion/brex...
Brexit: the trillion pound ‘mistake’
The recent NBER report suggests the Treasury’s 2016 analysis – slammed by Brexiters as a ‘hoax’– actually understated the impact of Brexit
yorkshirebylines.co.uk
December 2, 2025 at 9:32 AM
Nigel Farage’s Legacy — Brexit: the trillion pound ‘mistake’
The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)… confirms the Treasury’s 2016 analysis, claiming a relative fall in GDP of between 6% and 8%.
yorkshirebylines.co.uk/opinion/brex...
The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)… confirms the Treasury’s 2016 analysis, claiming a relative fall in GDP of between 6% and 8%.
yorkshirebylines.co.uk/opinion/brex...
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
Keir Starmer has said a number of things in his speech today where you look at it and go 'uh, this is complete nonsense that isn't backed up by anything the government is *actually* doing'. All going essentially unscrutinised.
December 1, 2025 at 1:17 PM
Keir Starmer has said a number of things in his speech today where you look at it and go 'uh, this is complete nonsense that isn't backed up by anything the government is *actually* doing'. All going essentially unscrutinised.
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
More of an art installation, really...
November 30, 2025 at 6:06 PM
More of an art installation, really...
Reposted by Maurice Mauve
Except you have, Torsten.
Rail electrification has been slashed to nought because it’s “too expensive” … all while the Chancellor wastes £3bn on the fuel duty freeze - which is ~ twice the cost of completing the MML electrification programme.
Rail electrification has been slashed to nought because it’s “too expensive” … all while the Chancellor wastes £3bn on the fuel duty freeze - which is ~ twice the cost of completing the MML electrification programme.
We’ve refused to copy previous chancellors who’ve responded to any bad fiscal news by slashing public investment - cancelling infrastructure = taking easiest short term political decision with worst long term economic consequences.
November 30, 2025 at 5:34 PM
Except you have, Torsten.
Rail electrification has been slashed to nought because it’s “too expensive” … all while the Chancellor wastes £3bn on the fuel duty freeze - which is ~ twice the cost of completing the MML electrification programme.
Rail electrification has been slashed to nought because it’s “too expensive” … all while the Chancellor wastes £3bn on the fuel duty freeze - which is ~ twice the cost of completing the MML electrification programme.