@alexvont.bsky.social
Historian, writer, broadcaster. She/her. Latest book, FALLEN IDOLS, shortlisted for the Wolfson History Prize 2022. HISTORY’S SECRET HEROES and THE LUCAN OBSESSION on BBC Radio 4. One of the Silk Road Slippers https://www.silkroadslippers.com
Psych trained people have known this for a long time.
So that’s that, right? We don’t have to put up with endless drivel about how expensive it is to save the planet abd ourselves ever again? Cool.
someone at the pentagon frantically typing “Claude, open the strait of Hormuz for me, quickest possible strategy, make no mistakes.”
It strikes me that I have no idea what to do after Hormuz is closed because every time we got to this phase in discussions or simulations I read people just said “oh man the economy” and went back up the game tree
Very interesting how out of line the r/w media are on this, given their pretensions to know their readers. I was struck by responses to a very gung-ho piece in the Mail over the weekend where, at a rough guess, 75% or so of them were very resistant to the article's line.
Awful news about Glasgow Central, I'm still hoping the station itself escaped serious damage.
But while we're here, can anyone spot the problem with the news photo below, from thetraveler.org/glasgow-cent...?
We've really got to STOP using AI to fake things.
love how we killed the old, frail anti-nuke ayatollah just to have him replaced with his young, healthy son who wants nukes and who just had his father, mother, wife, and child murdered on the same day by his mortal enemy. surely this will bring peace to the region
Trump's decision to bomb Iran is now the greatest windfall to the Russian war effort on record. If it continues, it might save the Russian war economy.
Things look grim in the markets right now, but at least the U.S. economy wasn’t already being propped up by a massive speculative AI bubble that is highly sensitive to rising energy costs.
Twerkers at the barbeque get priority parking 🫡
gonna be so cool to watch the government try to explain and implement gas rationing by odd-even days to 2026 America
His Instagram is STUNNING
It’s marvellous. I highly recommend it
This is now a Swanky stan account
If you need cheering up, I’ve just watched a season and a half of Young Famous and African on Netflix. It’s exquisite. The cast are all the reality TV dream of wildly needy & emotionally volatile, but the breakout superstar is Swanky Jerry, one of the most fabulously dressed men I’ve ever seen
There was a far-right protest against mayor Zohran Mamdani in New York yesterday and well, that's quite the sign
Oh totally. He could go with “we were trying to do right and by contrast this isn’t even trying to pretend to be right,” but maybe even that isn’t enough to hold it together for him at this point.
Yes. Those of us who protested were right. He was wrong, & his judgment was stupid & abhorrent. I think he’s spent the intervening decades in a profound & tortuous state of denial about this, & it’s fragile enough to need constant maintenance, which is why he’s spoken now bsky.app/profile/jonn...
Aside from all the grift, I wonder if there really is something psychological in Blair, part messianic, part dogmatic, part self protective, that means if he admits his role in the Iraq war was a horrendous error & he is responsible for that, his entire sense of self will collapse like Jenga bricks
It is absolutely insane that the US appears to have targeted desalination plants first – putting them onto the board. Iran seems to have already retaliated against one in Bahrain. This is one of the most obvious ways this could spiral.
Oh thank you! I missed that - will look it up.
Oh sorry, meant to say thanks to @bigbamboo.bsky.social for that link!
Lol. Yeah, this feels a bit beyond “influenced” bsky.app/profile/otto...
Oh for sure. It’s just the similarity of the language.
I’m fascinated to know how many people received the instructions and what they said! bsky.app/profile/alex...
I’d love to see the instructions because they don’t even seem to have done much of “please rewrite this in language that sounds vaguely like you”
I started by noticing a meme on Insta: “you live in [Gulf State], aren’t you scared? No, I know who will protect us”, plus heroic music & slo-mo footage of the relevant absolute monarchs. Lots of parodies - some well-chosen slo-mo footage of Starmer & Merz falling over, etc - but plenty are sincere
I expect this sort of thing from hosted influencers of course, but am struck by it also coming from some people who are usually rather more independent thinkers and/or not political at all.
I have been wondering about the memes/messaging from ordinary people in the Gulf States. A lot of extremely similar language about being “grateful” to “our government who protects us” plus slamming “the west” for “spreading misinformation” etc. Just influenced or more proactively coordinated?
It’s already happening. Iran attacked a desalination plant in Bahrain.
This war has to end immediately. If it turns into a water war we will be dealing with a whole different level of a humanitarian catastrophe across the region.
aje.news/64yl8m?updat...