@vsdawson.bsky.social
Freelance historian and interdisciplinary researcher for hire. Working class. Radical feminist. Socialist. Anti-fascist. Northern powerhouse. Learning German. PhD: Women and Rugby League: Gender, Class and Community 1880-1970.
Reaction & analysis from the #spycops public inquiry at the end of 4 days grilling officer Carlo Soracchi who infiltrated socialist groups 2000-06 & deceived 3 women into relationships. Incredible scenes this week, he's been caught out lying over & over.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_Vr...
www.goodreads.com/book/show/56...
#spycops public inquiry at the end of 4 days grilling officer Carlo Soracchi who infiltrated socialist groups 2000-06 & deceived 3 women into relationships. Incredible scenes this week, he's been caught out lying over & over.
Misdemeanour?! It wasn't an accident!
04.03.2026 07:34 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0War and mass casualties are never a "distraction". They are an abomination. But saying the war on Iran is a distraction from Epstein is especially ridiculous:
28.02.2026 17:58 — 👍 301 🔁 96 💬 13 📌 0
Here you go: youtu.be/sFC6YE8zLmY?...
02.03.2026 03:50 — 👍 3 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0You only need to do it if you are going to use direct messages. Turn off direct messages in your settings so no one can send you messages you cannot read.
02.03.2026 03:45 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0The issue here is not simply how mocking disabled people has become normalised in the name of antiracism, but the seeming failure to understand that black people also suffer from Tourette’s and that this only makes the situation worse for them… 1/
01.03.2026 21:47 — 👍 20 🔁 3 💬 1 📌 0
Black and white image of women workers.
Join us this #WomensHistoryMonth in amplifying women’s voices past and present.
Our website is a wonderful place to start learning more. Spread the word!
womenshistorynetwork.org
#WHM2026 #WomensHistory #GenderHist
Image: Pit girl brow workers, Wigan, 1900. COPY 1/445, The National Archives.
Women's lives were infiltrated by a police unit, they were deceived and raped by the state for years, and you flippantly suggest that it's their fault? Go and listen to the women's evidence to the inquiry then come back and apologise for victim blaming.
01.03.2026 09:18 — 👍 10 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0Quick point on some of the framing of the Gorton and Denton result and sectarianism. It’s commonly posed as Gorton (or strictly, the wards in Manchester part of the constituency) being the Muslim part and Denton (or, the part of the constituency in Tameside)… 1/
28.02.2026 15:40 — 👍 29 🔁 11 💬 2 📌 4This will come as no surprise to anyone following the #Spycops inquiry, and is exactly why the inquiry should have covered the whole UK.
25.02.2026 19:35 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0Listen to @donnamclean.bsky.social sum up her powerful evidence today with these crucial points about #consent and women's bodily autonomy. #spycops
24.02.2026 19:23 — 👍 6 🔁 6 💬 0 📌 0
New: this app warns you if someone is wearing smart glasses nearby.
Meta plans to add facial recognition to its Ray-Ban smart glasses. A 404 Media reader made this app after we showed men filming people w/o their consent, and DHS officials were wearing the glasses www.404media.co/this-app-war...
That sounds like a great booklet to be in possession of! There you go, @workingclasshistory.com, the country's leading expert is on it!
23.02.2026 22:28 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0Perhaps @railwayhistorian.bsky.social can point you in the right direction?
23.02.2026 19:11 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
Instant summary from the morning break at the #spycops inquiry on its day questioning officer HN3 'Jason Bishop'. He was deployed 1998-2005 infiltrating eco, anti-war & anarcho groups.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=0s0B...
Yet another rugby union club claiming a history that isn't theirs! Berry wouldn't have been allowed to play for them when they were formed in 1911!
21.02.2026 17:08 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
With the news that Carling Black Label is returning, read our blog on the origins of Carling beer which goes back to the Carling family of Etton, 12 miles from Hull tinyurl.com/yc5mhum6
@hulllibraries.bsky.social
@uniofhull library
📢NEW article by 'Alison' in @telegraph.co.uk
"My priority is not to mine the psyches of Machiavellian, state-sponsored, narcissistic conmen but rather to prevent this from happening to other women.” #spycops
www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/91245e4...
We no longer watch the news: the news watches us. Stories written by robots are posted on websites that suck personal information from our phones and hand it to data miners controlled by oligarchs. “Journalists” brag that they rely on AI to map the child rape networks that they once denied existed; the networks that include the very oligarchs breeding the AI. They dig humanity’s grave and stagger back out of it. “Fake news” used to mean propaganda or inconvenient truths that Trump deemed lies. Now fake news is news written by non-human entities hallucinating a counterfeit reality. It is fake without motive, fake for the sake of being fake and making you lose confidence that anything can be real. It is zombie news for zombie consumption. Click link for full piece
sarahkendzior.substack.com/p/shipwreck-...
18.02.2026 17:12 — 👍 222 🔁 93 💬 4 📌 5
Proportion of non-pensioner below-middle income families in different tenure types: GB/UK
We’ve seen a *massive* swing away from homeownership into expensive private renting.
Mortgaged families dropped from 30% to 17% of Unsung Britain, while private renters nearly doubled. Almost as many people live with parents (15%) as own with a mortgage (17%).
Gender pay gap won't close for another 30 years.
Myth of equality used to hike women's state pension age.
Women hold 69% of low-paid & insecure jobs.
Women hit first by benefit cuts, wage freezes, two-child benefit cap. More likely to be unpaid carers.
Why are govt policies loaded against women?
Fucking Thatcher.
15.02.2026 10:29 — 👍 4 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
A graph showing the Gini co-efficient for Great Britain (1961 - 2020) showing inequality before and after housing costs and showing a huge rise in inequality in the 1980s which has never been reversed since. It is now entrenched.
📢 INEQUALITY GRAPHIC OF THE WEEK (No.3) 🔽
The surge in inequality in the 1980s ripped the UK apart. No govt since has reversed it (or even tried). It is entrenched.
Source: Prof. Danny Dorling
Shattered Nation: Inequality and the Geography of a Failing State
www.dannydorling.org/books/shatte...
The answer, as always, is @sarahkendzior.bsky.social!
13.02.2026 21:33 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
A London North Eastern Railway rail chair from 1947 in Eastfield Yard, Peterborough
A London North Eastern Railway rail chair from 1940 in Eastfield Yard, Peterborough
A London North Eastern Railway rail chair from 1938 in Eastfield Yard, Peterborough
A London North Eastern Railway rail chair from 1934 in Eastfield Yard, Peterborough
A bit of road learning today. Eastfield Yard at Peterborough.
There’s some old kit still going strong in there. Rail chairs from 1947, 1940, 1938, 1934.
Surprised at how quickly people forget how much of a bastard Brian is. His rap sheet is quite long. The man's moral compass has been broken for years. #TheArchers
13.02.2026 00:03 — 👍 16 🔁 2 💬 3 📌 0
This couldn’t be clearer. Bannon’s texts to Epstein in mid July 2018 - “overthrowing May right now” and in “London with Boris” as well as his appearance on LBC with Nigel Farage are prettying damning evidence of a cross party plot with foreign backing
11.02.2026 12:18 — 👍 1523 🔁 792 💬 43 📌 52
The Heritage Foundation has released a 250-year roadmap to “save America.”
The document is a how-to guide for subjugating girls & young women: a detailed plan to push them out of college, funnel them into early marriage and motherhood, and then trap them there.
jessica.substack.com/p/theyre-com...
