Ric Crossman

(Though maybe this is me being childless talking.)

It's comparatively new, I think. Certainly it wasn't the case when I was a kid, and I only learned of this rule myself a couple of days ago.

Ric posts his ballot, and looks damn good doing it.

Got my voting done, comrades. If there's one thing the last half decade has proven, it's that UCEA won't listen unless we *make* them listen. Chalk one more up, @ducu.bsky.social

Just in case anyone is listening, please note that UK universities cannot operate successfully on the basis of continuous reduction of academic staff and academic staff pay. No amount of staff wellness sessions will change this.

Have just learned I've been getting Victoria Derbyshire and Delia Derbyshire confirmed. Please bear with me while I die in a corner from shame.

Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.

I welcome our corvid comrades to our collective struggle.

Posted! @ucu.org.uk @ducu.bsky.social

(This is also why we've spent so much time talking about the high correlation between transphobia and Islamophobia. The common core is maintaining white cis-women's cultural dominance in the face of those they might have to cede their privilege to.)

We've been saying for a quite a while now that the "gender critical" haven't just been recycling homophobic talking points, they've been reusing "won't someone think of the white women?" guff from white supremacists as well. This is just them tearing the new label off.

(Or rather, it might matter in terms of how to respond - that is, it might matter TACTICALLY in terms of considering ANTI-racist actions. But the extent to which you feel your motivations differ from how others respond to the expressions of your motivations through action? Don't give a shit, pal.)

(An act that makes immigrants and those from minority ethnic groups uncomfortable, even scared, is a racist act. Maybe you don't KNOW it's racist act, but that' often difficult to believe, and irrelevant in any case. What you thought and how you felt while performing the racist act DOESN'T MATTER.)

(Pathos and logos are held to be irrelevant. Worse than irrelevant; *unfair to even recognise as existing*. We return again to the idea that racism is a conscious motivation that it's outrageous to claim has been detected, as oppose to observable *behaviours* that must be called out.)

(This of course is just a small slice of my broader position that one way white supremacy retains its hold is through pushing the idea that the harm one's actions do is irrelevant, only the admitted motives of those acting. To put it in rhetorical terms, all we're allowed to discuss is ethos.)

Something that I think would make a huge difference would be if people who support Reform had to prove they don't think like Pochin, rather than it being considered beyond the pale for us to even imply they potentially might.

BREAKING: morgan mcsweeney has started briefing against lucy powell

I've lost all faith in Labour, but it is good at least that Bridget Phillipson has not been rewarded given her abysmal record on trans kids' right and her total failure to address the crisis in universities.

this is important - as much as I am against using competitive/punitive approach to funding (i.e. REF) to foster research quality, the concept of 'research culture' has drawn wider attention to the (for most researchers well-known) fact that some institutions are absolutely crap at supporting them

My absolute God

Screenshot of a WhatsApp message. The message reads “let’s get those votes out, people!” And it has a picture of a ballot paper duly going into a red postbox.

YESSSSS! Let’s do this thing. #WeAreTheUniversity

Please read Jonathan’s review of The War on Science. It’s incredible how there’s almost no crossover between our reviews. It’s a dense text, in the sense that everything surrounding the text produces a gravitational well of pure, unadulterated bullshit, and there’s a whole lot of it to critique!

If Harry Potter is more popular than trans people, that's an indictment of society, not trans people.

"Give up this hobby that is literally bankrolling our extermination" isn't a big ask tbh.

"The pay cuts will continue until morale improves."

You all do understand the British Government is effectively waging war on migrants, is that clear?

The thing about living rent-free on someone's head is that you often don't much like the look of the head you're living in.

“Surrendering is unimaginably more dangerous than struggling for survival.”
-Leslie Feinberg, Stone Butch Blues

Wrote to my MP using this as a template (with some various extra bits and pieces because *of course*).

Absolutely, but as always, no-one who says "I can only be fired for my speech if it violates the law" actually believes it. It's just them working the most workable refs of the 21st century. It's them revelling in their privilege, and demanding you watch those revels.

Finally got round to responding to the Hampstead consultation on access to their men's pond and ladies' pond. It's open to everyone in the UK, but I assume those more southern than me would find their opinions carrying more weight.

hampstead-heath-bathing-ponds.commonplace.is/en-GB/propos...

Nothing about us with Suzanne O’Sullivan Photograph of two people at a protest holding a banner with images of various disabled people and slogans including “Disabled people fightback”, “Nothing about us without us&#8221…

I turned this post into a blog: rejoiceandcomplain.wordpress.com/2025/10/18/n...