Kate Spowage

JK Rowling tweeting got a boycott of M&S, stretching facts to the breaking point, and making the world a worse place for absolutely everyone.

The employee asked the girl and her mother if they needed help shopping. That’s it. That’s all. The misinformation, the insinuations (because the facts are inconveniently benign) are EXACTLY what was done to lesbians in the 80s. This is the product of hate and fear, not reality.

Radical stickers seen in Seattle, Washington

2 in 5 arrested over last summer’s riots had been reported for domestic abuse Police data indicates overlaps between public violent disorder and domestic violence and abuse

The far right terrorising asylum seekers in hotels love to spread the lie they’re worried about the risk of sexual assault. But here’s the truth: Two in five men arrested for last summer’s riots had been reported for domestic abuse. www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

The trans rights stitch-up: How the government plans to silence parliamentary debate on the most far-reaching restriction of minority rights in our lifetime open.substack.com/pub/iandunt/...

“You Feel Like Your Life is Over” The 92-page report, “‘You Feel Like Your Life is Over’: Abusive Practices at Three Florida Immigration Detention Centers Since January 2025,” documents that people detained at Krome North Service Proc...

A new report by Human Rights Watch and partner nonprofits released today confirms that migrants at the downtown Miami ICE facility were indeed shackled with hands tied behind their backs, forced to kneel, and made to eat from styrofoam plates “like dogs.”

New research published in @languageeducation.bsky.social, available open access here (tinyurl.com/bdf262jp) and a short thread on the work below. Many thanks to the reviewers & editors for their feedback and to @leverhulme.ac.uk for funding support.

The EHRC is meant to protect everyone’s rights. But internal documents reveal a different story: repeated meetings with anti-trans lobbyists, legal bias, and secret coordination. We filed the FOI. Here’s what we found.

tacc.org.uk/2025/07/01/f...

There's a lot to be said about identity, solidarity. But a simple place to start: the people who are willing to fight for their neighbors when their neighbors have different problems have a very, very good chance of having neighbors to fight with when you all share problems

Entirely on brand photo in the 90s diorama at the Computerspielemuseum Berlin, on the day Against the Game was published (🔗 👇)! Playing something linked to my upcoming project with Adrienne Mortimer and @openlibhums.bsky.social ... Any guesses!? 💥🚗|🩹🥺 #Dingbats 🐶

www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Graphic with a blue background. On the left side there are pink textboxes with black text which say "Email the Minister for Equalities and your MP" "scottishtrans.org/emailfortransinclusion". On the right is an illustration of a placard that says "No Segregation! Trans Liberation!" with hearts in the trans flag colours.

The EHRC consultation on their draft code of practice closes Monday at midnight – if you want to fill it in, now’s the time!

The consultation closes on Monday (30th June) at 11:59pm, so don’t leave it until 11:58 to fill it in - get it out the way now!

www.scottishtrans.org/supreme-cour...

One of the problems of post-industrial capitalist societies is how to generate sufficient knowledge and expertise to produce profits without letting that knowledge overflow into critical thinking that could disrupt the system--the ruling class sees AI as a solution to that problem.

“Powerlessness I would say is the defining political emotion of our age” (25:43), while “conspiricism is a... response to this feeling… a rage and response to powerlessness’. (26:26-27:12) Spot on analysis I’d say @graceblakeley.substack.com

‘I was one of the few people able to document it’: shooting the Black Panthers – in pictures From bustling Free Huey rallies to private moments smoking with Angela Davis, Stephen Shames’s photographs tell the revolutionary organisation’s incredible story

Amazing photos - and hard to imagine a better author photo than Angela Davis smoking a cigarette during her trial in 1972 🔥

www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

That's not what we should be hearing. There is virtually no low-quality research that gets discussed at funding panels, or gets anywhere near being funded. The problem is that not enough high-quality research is funded.

maybe doctors could save money by treating fewer patients | maybe firefighters could save money by choosing the fires they put out more judiciously | maybe the bbc should save money by limiting broadcasts to 4 hours per day. in fact why don’t we all do the most cost-effective thing & simply give up

"Within the mainstream discourse, the concept of a society that prioritises collective values over economic power is now such a marginalised idea that it seems almost absurd to many people. The result is that collectivist proposals for the economy are either patronised, dismissed, or critiqued."

Graphic with a purple background. On the left side there are blue textboxes with black text which say "Email the Minister for Equalities and your MP" "scottishtrans.org/emailfortransinclusion". On the right is an illustration of a placard that says "Trans People Belong" with a trans symbol.

Do you have 10 minutes to spare for trans rights?

Our guide to responding to the EHRC’s consultation on the draft Code of Practice explains how to respond and gives ideas about what you can say for each question.

More info: www.scottishtrans.org/emailfortran...

New research from MIT found that those who used ChatGPT can’t remember any of the content of their essays.

Key takeaway: the product doesn’t suffer, but the process does. And when it comes to essays, the process *is* how they learn.

arxiv.org/pdf/2506.088...

Look at what was taken in “sweeps” of homeless encampments.

projects.propublica.org/impact-of-ho...

Writing about #TheLastofUs while reading fascist attacks on America's (quite mild) institutional Left and finding it a little too easy to argue that cordyceps might be preferable to capitalism 🤔👑

Do you want lower rates of "crime"?

Do you want increased childhood development and well-being?

Do you want lower rates of homelessness?

Do you want to reduce overdose deaths?

Do you want these things cheaper than ever?

Then give people housing, food, schooling, medicine, and support, for free.

I gave a talk on witchcraft and feminism today at the Buckingham literature festival. I was asked who I thought were witches to today’s society. Easy question. Transgender women.

Glad you liked the final version! Your spectre looms over the work 👌

The Secretary of Homeland Security just said the feds are there to remove democratically elected officials in California and then had a Senator detained. Why is that not in every headline? It's what happened.

For anyone who doesn't know "Article 8" is the European Convention on Human Rights right to a private life

This is the head of the EHRC saying that she does not believe that *anyone* has the right to privacy when it comes to being trans or cis

Brazenly immoral, legally untrue

America has never been broke. It’s just violently anti-poor. Troops in LA cost $134M — the price of 44 million school lunches.

But sure, let’s keep pretending the issue is lazy parents and not a government that eats kids for breakfast.

Super late to the party on this, but I don’t think it matters what kind of bullets that cop shot the Australian reporter with. Cops have no business shooting reporters in the first place.

Fantastic theme for next year's issue of Key Words - 'Foreclosure'! Read the CFP below 👇

Hiring a dream team in linguistic diversity and social participation Visit the post for more.

We are hiring a dream team of doctoral and post-doctoral research fellows in applied sociolinguistics, education and related fields to work on "Linguistic Diversity and Social Participation across the Lifespan" @uni-hamburg.de

www.languageonthemove.com/hiring-a-dre...