Laurence Cooley

I want to see all the muppets around the laptop trying to get it to connect to the projector 😂 Elmo - ‘I have a cable!’

Opinion | This Is Just Who Trump Is

"For years, a cottage industry of political observers has contorted itself to obscure and occlude the obvious. That regardless of what others see in him, Trump’s entire political career...cannot be understood outside the context of his bitter, deep-seated racism." (gift link)

‘Silent decoupling’ under way as Elsevier talks near crunch point York and Swansea latest to decline publisher’s offer, with latter also walking away from Springer Nature deal

'The University of York and Swansea University have became the seventh and eighth universities to confirm they will not take up a three-year deal with the world’s biggest academic publisher'. Sheffield, Lancaster, Surrey, Kent, Essex and Sussex have already opted out.

I think we easily underestimate just how many fronts have been simultaneously opened up in the attack on democracy. This is one of two lawsuits out there now running attempting to radically alter census counts to exclude some categories of noncitizens in violation of 14A.

Trump officials propose testing a citizenship question amid a push to alter the census The Trump administration proposes to include a question about U.S. citizenship status in this year's field test of the 2030 census, as Republicans push to alter the counts behind voting maps.

My latest @npr.org story: The Trump administration is proposing to include a U.S. citizenship question in this year's field test of the #2030Census in Huntsville, Ala., and Spartanburg, S.C., as Republicans push to alter the counts behind voting maps

We have been waiting a long time for the council to take flags down. Stirchley has shown how it is done.

Something so bitterly ironic to have transitioned to the position that PhD students do indeed deserve a "living wage", at the point where institutions are faced with never being able to recruit any of them for a permanent job afterwards.

‘If I think about what this means, I want to cry’: what happens when a city loses its university? When Essex University’s Southend campus opened, it was a message of hope for a ‘left behind’ UK seaside town. Its closure will be felt far beyond its 800 students, some of whom will not get their degr...

'When it opened, the campus housed a GP surgery and a new dental clinic offering free treatment to local people. This was followed later by the forum – a library and art gallery shared by the university and local people.' 1/2

"It's just people. People who are organized."

"It works because people in pajamas and crocs will scream at fascists at seven in the morning and take a face full of pepper spray for their effort and just keep doing it day after day."

📚For a few brief decades, Birmingham had a bookshop scene that reflected the city back to itself: diverse, political, practical, trade unionist, academic and scientifically forward looking.

Thankfully they're almost all down again now, but no thanks to the council.

this just in from a supposedly social democratic politician

The number of huge pickup trucks on our streets is worrying.
They’ve got massive blind spots and are far more dangerous for children - I see it every day where I live.
This didn’t happen by accident. Tax rules helped encourage them.
#suvalliance #carspreading @cleancitiescampaign.org

Black and white photo of large crowd at a Civil rights march in Newry with banner “remember Derry”

Vanessa Redgrave at the civil rights march in Newry 1972

Civil rights march photo with “O’Neills Avenue” banner and “O’Neills women’s action group” banner

I know the English pundits & media have forgotten the army shooting their own citizens dead here - on camera, but am watching Minnesotans bravery and reminded of how a week after Bloody Sunday, protestors (including narrator of Call The Midwife - Vanessa Redgrave) marched again defiantly in Newry

Genetic Data From Over 20,000 U.S. Children Misused for ‘Race Science’

Everything old being new again all at once is not a coincidence

Birmingham reprimanded over management of work-related stress Investigation by Health and Safety Executive found institution ‘does not have appropriate arrangements in place’ to manage burnout among staff

HSE found UoB failed to follow its own stress policy, had inadequate stress risk assessments and no effective monitoring of stress. This is about legal duties, not ‘wellbeing extras’.

Union condemns continued docking of staff pay following strike action at University of Sheffield The University and College Union (UCU) has today condemned the lockout and withholding of staff pay at the University of Sheffield following lawful industrial action

The University of Sheffield has stopped paying staff.

Not for striking but for refusing to work unpaid to make up for strike days they were already docked for.

This is punishment, not negotiation. And it’s completely reckless.

www.ucu.org.uk/article/1438...

How the new Irish Free State counted the population in 1926 The first major administrative act by an independent Irish government, what was involved in compiling the census 100 years ago?

How the new Irish Free State counted the population in 1926. Gregory Walls National Archives @tcddublin.bsky.social @researchireland.ie on what was involved in compiling the census 100 years ago, the first major administrative act by an independent Irish government www.rte.ie/brainstorm/2...

So far the "Board of Peace" is Trump, Orban, Lukaschenko and Netanyahu.

Which if you wrote in a satire would be considered too outlandish and sent back.

Photo of Pete Devery, Friends of the River Pang, sampling water by the Berkshire chalk stream, made famous by Wind in the Willows, "The proof will be in the river. Do the rivers around the country improve? That's the end result. Doesn't matter what you call that regulator. It doesn't matter how many regulators there are. If the difference isn't made in the rivers, they will have failed."

Interesting developments in water white paper: we know from NI, sewage treatment plants who meet targets during announced inspections, often fail when inspections are unannounced, so a promising move. As @petedevery.bsky.social says "the proof will be in the rivers".

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
🧵

On Monday 26 Jan. we'll be joined by Dr Connal Parr (Northumbria), who will speak on 'No borders? The Irish Anti-Apartheid Movement and its legacies' (hybrid format; all welcome) www.qub.ac.uk/schools/Iris...

Reads: What is trans-exclusionary data activism? And the logo for the Gender + Sexuality Data Lab.

New research maps the campaign to erase trans people from UK data 🔢

This peer-reviewed article offers the first detailed account of how UK campaign groups have sought to define sex as strictly biological across the census, policing, healthcare and digital ID.

doi.org/10.1080/0958...

Grokipedia vo.2 Family Origins and Childhood Julia Carrie Wong was born to a Chinese immigrant father and a white Jewish mother, resulting in her biracial Chinese-Jewish heritage and brown skin tone. 181

is it normal for encyclopedias to include “skin tone” or just when they’re generated by a white nationalist’s ai?

Ed Zitron on big tech, backlash, boom and bust: ‘AI has taught us that people are excited to replace human beings’ His blunt, brash scepticism has made the podcaster and writer something of a cult figure. But as concern over large language models builds, he’s no longer the outsider he once was

Ed Zitron on big tech, backlash, boom and bust: ‘AI has taught us that people are excited to replace human beings’

The Age of Academic Slop is Upon Us what happens when AI automates "normal science"?

I just finished a three-year term as an editor at an international relations journal. I began at the start of the LLM era but ended right in the middle of it. Our volume of submissions tripled and our desk reject rate rose to 75%. I have some thoughts.
open.substack.com/pub/hegemon/...

Beyond excited that the world’s best bookstore, No Alibis is offering a special edition signed copy of #FewAndFarBetween with fancy endpapers, an extra essay and a bespoke print of the Lough Neagh archipelago. Pre-order the hell out of these beauties, when they’re gone, they’re gone.

Research article, 'Nationalists and unionists in a northern town (1914-1922): Lisburn, the Rising and the Swanzy Riots', by Ciaran Toal, is now available through the following link:

@universitypress.cambridge.org

France bans 10 British 'far-right activists' over anti-migrant activity French officials said actions by members of the Raise the Colours group were likely to cause public disorder.

Some good news here. When not drowning our streets in flags, "Raise the Colours" have been in France, driving to the living sites of Calais and Dunkirk to scream racist abuse at and harass refugees, filming all the while to make monetisable social media content. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

IPSA Research Committees Colloquium: Minorities under Siege? Plural Societies Facing Plural Challenges
www.ipsa.org/na/call-for-...

Renee Macklin Good’s wife says she nurtured kindness On Wednesday, Renee Macklin Good was fatally shot by a federal ICE agent. Becca Good, her wife, shared the following statement with MPR News.

"We honor [Renee's] memory by living her values: rejecting hate and choosing compassion, turning away from fear and pursuing peace, refusing division and knowing we must come together to build a world where we all come home safe to the people we love."

www.mprnews.org/story/2026/0...