Tim Waterman

Angela Rayner gives councils green light to sell off allotments Labour's Angela Rayner has approved the sale of eight allotment sites in England since the party came to power, according to a report in the Telegraph. The move has been branded a "kick in the teeth" to Brits

Shocking decision!🤬
This Labour government is now flogging off allotments to plug council budgets.

Here's an idea, why not end austerity, restore local council funding, and actually PROTECT the green spaces that we cherish.

YouTube video by Vilosophe Lee Hazlewood - No Train to Stockholm

Someone said 'train to Stockholm'? www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZvC...

Investors keen on takeovers as universities turn to private funds Co-branded campuses and partial mergers expected to become more common in face of higher borrowing costs

'More universities could look to private investment to cope with their growing money problems, but it could be too late for non-elite institutions, financial experts have said.'

It is cold comfort to know that the far right can't stand up on its own, but that it is simultaneously dependent for its existence on the knowledge gained from classical institutions and the way it postures an opposition to them and breeds fear. Its own collapse is assured if it 'wins'.

Home | New Saint Andrews College New Saint Andrews College in Moscow, Idaho is a classical Christian college offering rigorous liberal arts education that equips students to shape culture and live faithfully under Christ’s lordship.

You'll struggle to find the curriculum on the website of his brainwashing 'college' but I'm willing to bet those bible-focused classes in Latin and Greek are dependent on the proximity of a real university and parasitic upon it. nsa.edu

Towns like Moscow, Idaho, which is totally dependent on its university for economic activity, will be devastated. Moscow happens to be where extreme right pro-slavery Xtian nationalist Doug Wilson and his toxic cult church is based. He's a friend and ally of JD Vance.

Very powerful stuff from the President of Ireland on stopping the starvation in #gaza

Headline from Harvard Crimson: "Harvard President Garber Tells Faculty He Is Not Considering a $500 Million Deal With Trump."

Text of story: Harvard prez Garber says report of a deal "was apparently leaked to the press by White House officials." NYT ran with it as a story.

Important details from this story:

1) Yet another news-break by student journalists (this time @theharvardcrimson.bsky.social) www.thecrimson.com/article/2025...

2) Harvard saying "see you in court," not "let's make a deal."

3) Per Garber, WH/MAGA leaked news of a "deal." NYT then ran with it.

The problem is far bigger than Jeffrey Epstein | Rebecca Solnit Treating the scandal as an aberration misunderstands the global epidemic of violence against women

The problem is far bigger than Jeffrey Epstein | Rebecca Solnit

Peaked? :)

‘London was in his veins’: Andrew Saint (1946–2025) Gillian Darley remembers an architectural historian of great wit and erudition who was always keen to share his enthusiasms, which included a deep love of the capital

‘London was in his veins’: Gillian Darley pays tribute to the erudition, wit and open-mindedness of the architectural historian Andrew Saint, who has died at the age of 78.

Enough of the billionaires and their big tech. ‘Frugal tech’ will build us all a better world | Eleanor Drage Titans like Musk would love us to believe innovation means top-down solutions that only enrich the wealthy. In fact, we all have the power, says Eleanor Drage, research fellow at Cambridge University

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre... interesting and hopeful

This is a billionaire-funded Tony Blair lobbying project being funnelled unchallenged onto the front page of a national newspaper.
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AI thrives where education has been devalued | The Observer A culture that views knowledge as a means to an end invites the misuse of new technology

'It is less that AI is the cause of degradation in reading and thinking, and more that the creation of a culture that views knowledge primarily in an instrumental manner has made it easier to misuse AI.'

YouTube video by Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew Thinking in tree time | Kew

Kevin Smith, Head of Tree Collections at Kew, talks about planting for climate change. www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZXf...

Columbia: 'an anti-university, a gated security zone with electronic entry controls, a place of fear and loathing, where faculty and students are told from on high what they can teach and say, under penalty of severe sanctions.' (Rashid Khalidi)

Interesting phrasing. I wonder if there's a more succinct way of saying "backlash against antiracism"

Planetary Futures: Rethinking Extinction and Conservation in the Anthropocene Conference, 18-19 September 2025, at the University of Manchester. Call for Papers

Conference registration now open: Planetary Futures: Rethinking Extinction and Conservation in the Anthropocene, Manchester blogs.manchester.ac.uk/chstm/2025/0...

12 funded PhDs in "Aesthetics of Democracy" at the Goethe University Frankfurt. Perfect for anyone who has absorbed my book 'The Landscape of Utopia' ;) aesthetics-of-democracy.de?lang=en

I'd do more!

I'd love nothing more than the luxury of the time to write all the books I want to.

You are wise.

When I open a book or paper for research I write down the citation in a document called 'cumulative bibliography' (which is huge) and then I paste it into a new word doc where I make notes and write down page numbers. That's it. That's all it takes.

Mellon Foundation The Mellon Foundation makes grants to actively unlock the power in the arts and humanities that helps connect us all.

“American Academy of Arts&Sciences reports 96.3% of humanities grads age 23-32 fully employed. Earnings in humanitiess comparable to social/life sciences, job satisfaction levels too. A serious mismatch bw actual employment for hum grads +general perception."
www.mellon.org/voices/human...

Wrote a thing about the Department of White Homeland Security, Making America Manifest Destiny Again

Carving out a space for intellectual autonomy in dangerous times: Theory and Social Inquiry launches at the Open Library of Humanities We're thrilled to announce the launch issue of Theory and Social Inquiry has been published at the Open Library of Humanities. As we reported in May 2024, Theory and Social …

The first issue of Theory & Social Inquiry is out via @openlibhums.bsky.social! Successor to Springer’s Theory & Society, the journal is now #DiamondOA / no APCs, no paywalls. Scholar-led & free from commercialisation, at a time when academic freedom needs defending: www.openlibhums.org/news/844/

CFP: Water Management and Environmental Change in Central Asia and the MENA Region: Politics, society, and transnational connections since 1945 (Padua, 5–6 February 2026) networks.h-net.org/group/announ...

Everyone posting that Samuel L Jackson wind farm ad but this is the classic of that particular category

This one's a real horrorshow!

CFP: Decay Without Mourning: Future Thinking Heritage Practices, 14-17 April 2026, Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study (STIAS), Stellenbosch, South Africa
Deadline: 15 Oct 2025 www.decay.proj.kth.se/conference-2...