Ben Evans

Tag yourself, I'm Temperate Forest (which sounds rather like a name that Doglas Adams rejected for HHGTG).

I was born in an Iranian prison. My parents were held in their jails. My uncles lie in their mass graves. Nothing you can tell me about the crimes of the Iranian regime that I haven't lived in blood and bone. That doesn't mean I want my people bombed, maimed, killed, their homes in ruins. If your vision of liberation comes only through the destruction of innocent lives, then it's not freedom you're after. Sahar Delijani, Iranian author

I am pro Iranian people. I stand with them against their own government’s repression AND against the imperial violence in the form of bombs dropped from the sky from Israel & the US who have already killed hundreds.

I support neither imperialism or dictatorship.

Sahar Delijani said it best:

The Girl Guides did a survey of their members last year. The results were shocking - over 2/3 reported that they self-censored in public to avoid attracting unwanted attention from men & boys.

Absolute fucking crickets from the transphobes. They're just authoritarians who want to police women.

The badge of the London Necropolis and National Mausoleum Company. Surrounded by an ouroboros, a skull and crossbones sits above an hourglass and the motto "Mortus quies vivis salus". I washed out of Latin shortly after discovering Caecilius was in the fucking horto, but think it's loosely "peace for the dead, safety for the living". The whole design looks like it was outsourced to a 13yo metal fan, tbh.

Bring back proper railway branding, cowards!

There just isn't a lot of substance to conservative views at the end of the day? It's an unshakeable belief in hierarchy and authority. You can only dress it up so many ways.

🚨 It looks like the UK government is gearing up to upend copyright law in favour of AI companies, legalising the theft of their work.

This is despite creatives' huge protests, and despite previous proposals being roundly rejected by the public.

Please spread the word.

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The migrant workers/slaves who built the city is geopolitics. The dirty money, the sanctions evasion, the uneasy relationships with neighbours, the war UAE funds in Sudan... Anyone living there is exposed to geopolitics. Just now they can't pretend otherwise.

Anyone Else Have Those Weird Dreams Where Sobbing Future Generations Beg You To Change Course? The human subconscious is such an interesting thing. No matter how much you think you’ve got it figured out, it’ll always spit out the most random stuff. Take me, for example. After coming home from a...

Commentary: Anyone Else Have Those Weird Dreams Where Sobbing Future Generations Beg You To Change Course?

Me: surely, he didn't actually say the words in the quotes in that order. this is cartoon villain level stuff...

[looks it up, confirms that he did, in fact, say this]

Jesus Christ.

They should have just added a second lightning bolt.

Same as it ever was.

One of my favourite sides of politics/media.

OK, the Gorton and Denton by-election, I have some thoughts!

Let's take a look at some of the FACTS and burst a few of the more ridiculous takes doing the rounds

But first up, can we acknowledge just what bad losers Reform are?!🤣

Right, let's get started...

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Some of those are absolutely gorgeous!

Turns out I still need to cut like 10 slides from this presentation.

Seems I had rather more thoughts about AI impacts to development practice than I thought.

What's your estimate of 5-10 years based on? Physical spare parts? What about the software, and access to positioning systems, etc?

So is it to be: 1.) another US-dependent solution, more in hock than Trident is ; 2.) keeping the existing system running at vast cost (& the knowledge that it would only keep working for a few months at best if the US stopped co-operating) or 3.) Start effectively from scratch at eye-watering cost?

"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed."

-Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1953

pencil drawing of a wild windswept figure on a small bit of rock in a wild sea. They hold a charmed bit of driftwood.

and a Salt Hag of @hookland.bsky.social .
If you have not yet visited the county you may very well discover (as I have) that it was home all along.

Two cities in Israel, bomb shelter comparison

By the way when you see reports about how Israelis are going to bomb shelters, you should keep in mind that the vast majority of Palestinian *citizens* of Israel (in the 1948 territories, not the oPT) do not have a single bomb shelter nearby due to the apartheid system Israel has implemented.

Jayme Lawson from Sinners hit the nail on the head and said how I felt with the whole BAFTAs situation.

lmao this thread

Most people's reaction to Hannah Spencer is:
- She seems nice
- She is talking sense
- A plumber? Cool
- Nice coat / hair / dog

Columnists and politicians telling us that she's some radical left fanatic honestly makes them sound like they're frothing at the mouth. Arses out all over the place.

Her look just screams: "Even the Emperor's Inquisitors need middle management."

In order to understand UK politics in 2026 you must realise that a plumber & plasterer doesn't represent the interests of the working class because she is left-wing but a wealthy broadcaster & former academic does represent the interests of the working class because he is right-wing. Hope this helps

The cat, or the poop?

Social media created this nonsense idea that not exposing yourself to hatred is isolationist. Choosing to not spend your free time with bigots isn’t living in a bubble. I don’t need to know what’s going on at X. I won’t be smarter or more knowledgeable or empathic by being there. Neither will you.

Brand new sentence: "This is one of those rare days on which I regret that Vidkun Quisling died without offspring".

I have no Middle East expertise, AMA

There's something faintly ominous about an email from the big cat sanctuary with the subject line: "Give her a Mother's Day she'll never forget".

Are they going to arrange for her to meet with an accident as she passes the leopard enclosure or something?