Dr Stefan Lawrence

Okay, the Iran news is big. But the sheer media fanfare beforehand — building the Gorton & Denton by-election up as this massive Reform UK moment — and then to barely engage with the actual Green victory on #BBCLauraK when they’ve got @zackpolanski.bsky.social sat in front of you is wild.

When Blatter has a point you know it’s bad.

A strong, simple message from the Real Madrid fans tonight 🤍

Debord gave us the spectacle: isolation disguised as mass participation.
Claustropolitanism names its mutation—life lived in tight, competitive, hyper-visible enclosures, where attention replaces freedom and exposure distorts agency.

This is the insanity of the current Labour approach. You are kneecapping the economy by slashing immigration to appease voters who hover between Tory and Reform, and yet they don’t even believe your numbers anyway…plus you’ve just alienated your actual supporters

I’m pleased to share the publication of my new article in Leisure Studies:

From Cosmopolis to Claustropolis: Accelerated culture and the case for a claustropolitan sociology of leisure

📄 Open access article: lnkd.in/eE8u_SpD

#LeisureStudies #DigitalCulture #Claustropolitanism

This wild take epitomises Labour’s detachment from reality. They hate the left with such an intensity it completely blinds them.

BCA have got this one horribly wrong.

Good progressive politics builds coalitions. Bad politics tells people with very little to fight over scraps. Would like to hear more from @zackpolanski.bsky.social on HE policy, too.

This is a political choice masquerading as economic fact. It accepts scarcity as inevitable while avoiding harder conversations about:

• taxation
• wealth concentration
• capital gains
• corporate subsidies

This is austerity with a kinder vocabulary.

Child poverty policy and higher education funding operate on different timescales. One is immediate welfare and support; the other is long-term social mobility and productivity. Serious governments do both. Pitting them against each other is an admission of fiscal and political failure, not realism.

Undermining universities entrenches inequality by ensuring higher education becomes safer and more accessible only for those who already have capital.

The young people most harmed by cuts to universities are not the wealthy. They are:

• first-generation students
• working-class students
• students from racialised and regional communities
• those without family safety nets

Framing this as “children in poverty vs universities” is intellectually lazy and politically dangerous. Universities are not elite playgrounds detached from poverty — they are one of the main routes out of it. You don’t tackle child poverty by shutting the door at 18.

"No money left”, so let’s continue to undermine one of the few genuinely world-class sectors we still have?

Pitting kids in poverty against aspirational, working-class students isn’t progressive — it’s unserious, cowardly, lazy austerity.

Maybe Starmerism can be defined after all. #politcslive

FSE Statement: Historically high world cup ticket prices - FSE calls for immediate halt to ticket sales

FIFA's World Cup ticket prices are a betrayal to the most dedicated fans. At least $6900 to support your team from the first match to the final - nearly 5 times more than in Qatar.

FSE calls for the immediate halt to ticket sales.

🔗 Statement: bit.ly/44Sqx9G

Emile Heskey: ‘Gone are the times when you just ignore abuse. No. Why should we?’ The former England striker tells Sam Cunningham about stepping up to tackle racism, protecting his sons and Liverpool’s woes

Emile Heskey: ‘Gone are the times when you just ignore abuse. No. Why should we?’

Whenever Rory is confronted by the left, he turns into a swizzle-eyed loon and loses any sensible grasp on reality. Yes, Zack will have to learn the numbers but the reaction was completely disproportionate. Someone’s afraid of being taxed more on their assets it seems.

Rory was truly at his worst. Appalling show. If only he’d have applied the same degree of rigour to George ‘History Degree’ Osbourne ay?

Wow. If #LauraK actually paused and listened to the Chancellor, she might hear what’s being said. I’m no fan of this Labour government, but compare this interview with the soft-focus, meek and mild treatment she gave Nigel Farage on this show a few months ago the difference is night and day.

This single performance by Labour’s Rosie Wrighting is enough to make anyone on the left vote Green. Wow she was out of her depth.

This single performance by Labour’s Rosie Wrighting is enough to make anyone on the left vote Green. Wow she was out of her depth.

This single performance by Labour’s Rosie Wrighting is enough to make anyone on the left vote Green. Wow she was out of her depth.

This single performance alone by Labour’s Rosie Wrighting is enough to make anyone of the left vote Green. Wow she was out of her depth.

Infantino is the integral accident of Blatterism: not the clean-up job, but the logical end-point that makes the whole claustropolitan edifice visible. The system didn’t break — it fulfilled itself.

No disrespect to Celtic but Tierney has still got so many more years in a top European league. Great strike.

Game’s gone if that’s a second yellow

Why isn’t Rebecca Long-Bailey pushing back on the claim asylum seekers are living in “four-star luxury”? Hotels used for contingency accommodation offer the bare minimum, and people receive around £9 a week for essentials. They aren’t eating a full English every morning! #PoliticsLive

It used to be the case that media were the ones that built an individual up to tear them down, but Mary is doing this to herself all by herself. She must have had some very strange advice on how to handle losing the number one spot and then what to put in this book.

Can’t help some people!