Jim Jepps!

What I've Been Reading 3 Just the two collections this month, but both are quality.

Two marvellous #poetry collections, reviewed with sample poems and links on #SixtyOdd poets. Both very different, both romantic yet contemporary. Have a break, have a coffee, have a kit-kat (if there are any in the house), and have a read.

Personally I think we should legalise drugs.

Portugal shows it makes them safer, reduces crime and we stop criminalising those who are in need of treatment.

Weirdly it also reduces use and addiction rates. So if you hate drugs you really should be in favour of bringing the trade into the light.

Keir Starmer. Gloves off. The greens are nuts.

Starmer says he’s "taking the gloves off" and that the Greens are "nuts"

Big talk from the PM of vibes based cruelty and trickle down cowardice.

Join.greenparty.org.uk

isn't the issue with hallucinations less about critically minded AI savvy people who might get caught out but that normal people ask for it for a recipe and then poison their kids.

The cover of Lumpen 16. It an illustration of a care home in revolt with various older people protesting with placards readinging "welfare not warfare" and the like.

Check it out!

Lumpen 16 - Class and Care is now available.

Class Work Project ( @classworkproject.bsky.social) have put together a banger and makes for some important (occasionally difficult) reading!

Issue 16:
seditionist.uk/distro/reada...

Solidarity bundle:
seditionist.uk/distro/reada...

ASylum: -Safe routes -Right to work & faster decisions -A not-for-profit accommodation system Migrant workers rights: -Reform labour inspections and close exploitation loopholes -Scrap employer-sponsored visas -Integrate asylum seekers into a points-based system Integration: -A simplified, universal 5-year path to settlement -Reintroduce birthright citizenship & reduce barriers for child integration -Embrace a positive narrative about immigration, diversity and belonging

⏰ It's time for change on immigration policy - We all agree on that much!

Labour so far have got it all wrong, chasing hostile headlines that will only make our system crueller, society more divided & immigrants easier to exploit.

BUT THERE IS ANOTHER WAY!!
My 9-point plan for a system that works👇

not being funny but surely there have been numerous votes on this in the Greens, and there will have been a time when trans rights were first put into official policy (through a vote at conference).

I'm glad everything went so brilliantly today, and to everyone's satisfaction. Jolly good.

I'm impressed Stop The Cavalry made it.

Copying Denmark’s hardline asylum policy a ‘terrible idea’, Danes say Helene Brydensholt of the The Alternative party has urged the UK Government to think again, explaining it’s been a disaster for integration and led to more racism

Copying Denmark’s hardline asylum policy a ‘terrible idea’, Danes say

Helene Brydensholt of the The Alternative party has urged the UK Government to think again, explaining it’s been a disaster for integration and led to more racism

www.mirror.co.uk/news/politic...

Sometimes when you stand up to the far right you have earned a little Schadenfreude.

The cruelty is its purpose.

I don't think Labour are enabling reform.

I think Reform are enabling Blue Labour.

If a Prime Minister is brought down by being too cruel on asylum policy - which is not the most likely option but feels plausible right now, which is new - what does that do the debate? Is it too much to hope that draws some kind of line?

Completely beyond why people try to defend Labour record on treatment of asylum seekers. They are awful.
They have done terrible things the Tories never even thought of, like denying any refugee who came here through irregular means from EVER becoming a citizen & ENDING FAMILY REUNIFICATION. demons.

Sheffield unites against racism and hate. March in Sheffield Saturday 22 November. Assemble 11.30 at Devonshire Greem

Leonard and Hungry Paul - Series 1: Episode 1 After his mother’s death, Leonard begins to open up his world with the help of a new colleague, Shelley. His best friend, Hungry Paul, reluctantly volunteers at the hospital.

Leonard and Hungry Paul is a wonderful book, and now the BBC has turned it into a wonderful six part series.

www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/epis...

I Want You to Understand Chicago Politics Chicago 2025-11-08 I want you to understand what it is like to live in Chicago during this time. Every day my phone buzzes. It is a neighborhood group: four people were kidnapped at the corner drugstore. A friend a mile away sends a Slack message: she was at the scene when masked men assaulted and abducted two people on the street. A plumber working on my pipes is distraught, and I find out that two of his employees were kidnapped that morning. A week later it happens again. An email arrives. Agents with guns have chased a teacher into the school where she works. They did not have a warrant. They dragged her away, ignoring her and her colleagues’ pleas to show proof of her documentation. That evening I stand a few feet from the parents of Rayito de Sol and listen to them describe, with anguish, how good Ms. Diana was to their children. What it is like to have strangers with guns traumatize your kids. For a teacher to hide a three-year-old child for fear they might be killed. How their relatives will no longer leave the house. I hear the pain and fury in their voices, and I wonder who will be next. Understand what it is to pray in Chicago. On September 19th, Reverend David Black, lead pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Chicago, was praying outside the ICE detention center in Broadview when a DHS agent shot him in the head with pepper balls. Pepper balls are never supposed to be fired at the head because they can seriously injure, or even kill. “We could hear them laughing as they were shooting us from the roof,” Black recalled. He is not the only member of the clergy ICE has assaulted. Methodist pastor Hannah Kardon was violently arrested on October 17th, and Baptist pastor Michael Woolf was shot with pepper balls on November 1st. Understand what it is to sleep in Chicago. On the night of September 30th, federal agents rappelled from a Black Hawk helicopter to execute a raid on an apartment building on the South Sho…

Kyle Kingsbury is not a journalist. He is not an op-ed writer.

He is a computer safety researcher.

And he has written one of the most compelling, comprehensive accounts of the ongoing hell in Chicago that you could possibly imagine.

In under 1600 words.

aphyr.com/posts/397-i-...

Claim: Mamdani adheres to an extremist interpretation of Sharia law. False: Mamdani remains honor-bound to the ancient samurai code of Bushidō.

Fact-Checking Claims About Zohran Mamdani https://theonion.com/fact-checking-claims-about-zohran-mamdani/

Siegfried Sassoon

The current mood in Sheffield.

interesting coming from a party about to break its manifesto promises.

Considering how many column inches are being devoted to prisons at the moment I'm surprised [1] there's so little talk about how much of it is privatised, the need for rehabilitation and the sheer dehumanisation that takes place inside.

[1] no I'm not.

Train hero who saved passengers during attack named The rail worker credited with saving multiple lives is named as Samir Zitouni.

What an absolute hero Samir Zitouni is - doubtless he saved lives that day

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Rachel Reeves says everyone 'must do their bit' - on a PR level how different is this from Osborne's 'we're all in this together'?

Conservatives call for 'stop & search' at train stations

Completely impractical

And yesterday's alleged perpetrator was unknown to the police apparently, so facial recognition would not have been of any help

What did help? Was having a guard on the train. A very brave man.

@seditionist.bsky.social thanks for the book, love the pro-postie sticker.

‘Change course now’: humanity has missed 1.5C climate target, says UN head Exclusive: ‘Devastating consequences’ now inevitable but emissions cuts still vital, says António Guterres in sole interview before Cop30

Overshooting 1.5°C wasn't 'inevitable.'

We've been pushed by fossil fuel giants & governments that pander to them.

Every delay, every oil field, every broken promise made this crisis worse.

Keir Starmer, will you promise to leave Rosebank undeveloped?

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Fact check: Do quarter of US’s ‘drug boat’ searches find nothing? A 2024 Coast Guard report found 27 percent of drug boat searches came back empty-handed.

A 2024 Coast Guard report found 27 percent of drug boat searches came back empty-handed.