Ben Wyer

You're welcome

Inside a Cello
Charles Brooks Photography

It’s racist, it’s extremist and it’s immoral The right is still calling for deportations, and the government is still being cowardly about it. Also: London’s first green belt; some notes on a shark; and some news, on my next book.

"The idea of deporting people with settled status is disgusting, and anyone proposing it should be immediately drummed out of polite society. Breaking promises made in good faith to our friends and neighbours is racist, extremist and immoral."

I'm basically shouting at the sky here, but still.

Have been reminded of the time my girlfriend met a chihuahua called Death Row on her dog walk who turned out to actually be called Jethro.

1 Nurse: It’s become a real problem in this area 2 Nurse: We’ve seen the whole community lost to addiction 3 Show a building sign posted: Westminster ‘X’ Addiction Clinic With various Westminster people or looking at their phones outside it Nurse: Ministers, Spads, Researchers… 4 Nurse: Most mornings we’ll get a call about someone acting strangely [Nurse on phone taking a call] Ok - we’ll be right over 5 Nurse: We just have a gentle chat [Nurses approach a minister –Robert Jenrick? - standing in the Palace of Westminster Minister: I understand your concerns… 6 Nurse: Are you OK love? Minister: Yes I’m just hearing legitimate concerns from real voters 7 Nurse: That’s a robot, a Nazi and a poorly-disguised Russian [Show that the people he is talking to are precisely these characters] Nurse 2: Give us your phone, love 8 Nurse: At the clinic we put them in a Grass-Touching Pod, with a real voter to talk to [We see them back at the clinic, holding the minister's head and pushing him into a glass isolation booth with a grass floor. And it is a baffled looking woman, on a chair, ready to talk to him.] 9 Minister: YOU MUST BE WORRIED ABOUT THE COMING CIVIL WAR [woman looks baffled] 10 woman: I just want a bus service Minister: LOOK AT MY FLAG [produces a St George's flag] [ends]

‘It’s a bit clandestine, a bit punk’: the guerrilla scheme letting skint artists mass-share gallery membership cards Now 600 strong, the Artist Membership Project is helping young artists see exhibitions while dodging hefty entry fees at top British institutions. We meet the founder of the scheme

‘It’s a bit clandestine, a bit punk’: the guerrilla scheme letting skint artists mass-share gallery membership cards

OK guys, post your best signs from today for entry into my Top 15 No Kings Sign Contest.

This is what democracy looks like. #NoKings

🏆

Today is a day when arts degrees are worthless, but the product of those degrees is so valuable it would kill an entire industry if they were made to pay for it.

I cannot understand what these people think the purpose of human life is?

It is *not* "pursue joy, deal justly, love well, try to understand as much and see as much of this beautiful world and of the deepness, richness and variety of human culture and experience as you can before you die"?

Incredible footage of a rarely filmed large 3 dimensional school of circling Cownose Rays. I was really psyched to have captured this. The 3 dimensional school was circling on a horizontal plane and also on a vertical plane.
#nature #amazing #animals #awesome #ocean #wildlife #mesmerizing

lots of pain in the world but sometimes you stumble on a stranger’s obsessive wikipedia table. michelangelo had the sistine chapel, this guy had the “guess who” article. perhaps both sacred

YouTube video by BBC Archive 1972: 84-year-old woman has an INDOOR CARAVAN | Nationwide | Classic BBC Clips

There are no words to describe how happy shit like this makes me. Absolutely masterful set-up and reveal from 1:07. I howled

BBC Proms - 2025: St. Vincent at the Proms The multi-Grammy-winning singer joins an orchestra for this one-off gig at the Royal Albert Hall, with incredible new arrangements of some of her most-loved songs.

I can't remember who I was chatting to about this but the St Vincent BBC Prom was apparently on BBC4 last night and will be available on iPlayer for 11 months www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/epis...

I get that the news cycle is packed right now, but I just heard from a colleague at the Smithsonian that this is fully a GIANT SQUID BEING EATEN BY A SPERM WHALE and it’s possibly the first ever confirmed video according to a friend at NOAA

10 YEAR OLD ME IS LOSING HER MIND (a thread 🧵)

Might as well put this up again as Duolingo is in the news.

a bald stick figure in a chair with his arms out in front like he’s typing on a keyboard, and he’s got the biggest angry frown imaginable and eyebrows that express frustrated bemusement

my daughter really captured my essence in this portrait of me “at work”

Worth remembering this when you hear Reform talking about swans, autism and ‘science never being settled’.

Great egret, wood stork, and three roseate spoonbills doing a photo shoot for their new album at the Coffee Cup Ponds.
Bexar, TX
Sept 21, 2018

Taking the easy choice of a white bird to convert to mono… Here’s a great egret, taking off from a fishing spot at Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge

Great Egret
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#BirdOfTheDay
#ClassicMono #Monochrome
#birds #photography

Iain Banks: the final interview Iain Banks died last Sunday, just before the publication of his final novel The Quarry. Last month he talked to Stuart Kelly about writing, politics and all the things still left to do . . .

“I mean, your society’s broken, so who should we blame? Should we blame the rich, powerful people who caused it? No let’s blame the people with no power & no money & these immigrants who don’t even have the vote, yeah it must be their fucking fault.”

—Iain Banks
www.theguardian.com/books/2013/j...

PHOTO OF THE DAY: The 2 people used in American Gothic by Grant Wood stand next to the iconic painting. They were Wood’s sister, Nan Graham, and his dentist, Dr. Byron McKeeby (1942). 📷 Cedar Rapids Museum of Art Archives

6 photos. 1. man with woman on right, but looking at the other woman. Man labeled Catalyst, each woman (one smiling, the other aghast) labeled Reactant. 2. Man holding woman while looking at the other woman. Same labels. 3. Man with one one woman, and the 2 women are happy to see each other. Man labeled Catalyst, both women labeled Reactant. 4. One woman kissing the other on the cheek, both seem happy. Both labeled Reactant. 5. The two women in wedding gowns kissing, single label: Product. 6. Man alone, staring into space, labeled Catalyst.

Chemistry explained

Closest thing we have to a real life Hitchhiker's Guide

Good afternoon, this is your captain speaking. We are currently cruising at an altitude of 33,000 feet at an airspeed of 400 miles per hour and with good weather ahead and helpful tailwinds we’re expecting to land in London approximately 15 minutes ahead of schedule. #TalkLikeAPilotDay

This remains one of the underappreciated transformations of our lifetime:

Line chart showing that there's been a rapid escalation in how quickly the world installs a gigawatt of solar power capacity.

Time for the world to install a gigawatt of solar power capacity
2004: A year
2010: ~ a month
2015: ~ a week
Now: A day
ourworldindata.org/data-insight... 🧪