Every Thursday, I embark on a cross-London journey from South West to North West London, for a jazz choir that I love being a part of. All members are older than me, with the second youngest member of the group being our thirty-something Musical Director, a music teacher at a special needs primary school.  Being the choir baby has its perks, but London’s youth at large are restless. We make up 53% of London, but London doesn’t work for us . Radical political change is unavoid

In recent weeks, eyes and ears have been focusing on the Middle East. Starmer’s hesitancy to go in behind the Americans and Israelis with all guns blazing has gone down well with the public, and his opposition to the right of him have taken a real misstep.  It is a safe bet to assume that he will see a small rise in his favourability ratings in the coming weeks. However, Starmer would be foolish to think that this uptick will steady the ship. Whilst this has all been going on

“I’m not going to start a war. I’m going to stop wars.” These were the words of Donald Trump, the self-described “President of Peace”, as he railed against America’s interventions in foreign lands  instead of “fixing the roads in this country…fixing our highways, our tunnels, our bridges, our hospitals.” America First! He promised his voters, vowing to improve the lives of ordinary Americans above all else. And yet, barely a year into his second presidency, a combination of T

Politics have become quite boring today. This is not to say that the news is uneventful  – five minutes of doomscrolling will quickly put paid to that idea. And the humanitarian cost of it all is mounting rapidly in a crescendo that should alarm us all. But for the most part the politics  in the West today continues to conform to a number of routines and rituals that contain little new within them; they are ripples from stones already dropped into the pond. We can see this in

The epithet “they are all as bad as each other” has increasingly become a mantra up and down the country, much to the dismay of canvassers and candidates alike. Green, Tory, Labour, and Reform voters may individually have starkly disparate grievances, but most seem to feel that politics and politicians don’t seem to work for them. If one word were to sum up the national mood, it would undoubtedly be apathy. It is apathy that has led both major political parties to reach their

There is a pervasive sense of societal fracture these days. Politics has become defined by dramatic narratives of battle  between the Greens and Reform UK based on story rather than rooted in reality. Culture seems increasingly guided by a furious rejection of tradition, establishment, and imperialist pasts, or a righteous confabulated nostalgia for them. Compare Kneecap with a far-right AI generated rapper , or indeed the culture of the Oscars with the culture of “Looksmaxxi

‘In a digital era, entertainment often becomes collective memory. Real names are not       fictional tools. They belong to real lives.’  – that was Daryl Hannah in an essay written in the New York Times last week, responding to Ryan Murphy’s  characterisation of her in his new show ‘Love Story’, which follows the life and death of Carolyn Bessette and John F. Kennedy Junior. Hannah , who gained worldwide attention from her role in the 1982 film ‘Blade Runner’, dated JFK Jr. o

Last week, India’s Supreme Court rejected a repeat petition  for 2-3 days of monthly menstrual leave for female workers and students. Lawyer Shailendra Mani Tripathi had previously filed it in February 2023 and July 2024, and the most recent rejection was filed by Justices Surya Kant and Joymala Bagchi. They had based their decision on the assumption that, if menstrual leave was put into effect, women would face increased barriers in the workplace. Kant stated that  women who

I was driving in the suburban Newtownabbey area just north of Belfast recently. I went up past the Ballyduff estate, on my way to Larne or Carnlough, I forget. My attention was drawn to some flags on lampposts, at a crossroads, which I didn’t recognise. I have learnt to tune out the various assortment of flags. The Union Jack, The Ulster Banner, Orange Order flags, flute band flags, State of Israel, or even Danish flags. However, this flag drew my attention. They were four br

Following in the footsteps of the Australian government, the UK government recently released its research briefing  proposing a ban on social media for children. The report identifies the rationale behind such a ban, citing obvious harms such as exposure to child sexual abuse images, pornography, sexual content, cyberbullying, self-harm, and violent material. It is perhaps surprising that it is only in 2025 that we are beginning to see meaningful legislation that actually reg

Lying recumbent and wrecked, roughly 130 kilometres to the North of the glittering Saudi city of Medina, rests the rusted hull of a century-old Ottoman locomotive. Targeted by British Intelligence Officer T. E. Lawrence and future King Faisal I of Iraq’s small cadre of Arab fighters, the sun-baked cadaver exists as a relic of the First World War guerrilla campaign that buckled the formidable Ottoman Empire’s control over the Hejaz, turning the tide of the theatre’s conflict,

Over the past few months, Westminster has been gripped by an all too familiar kind of speculation. It concerns the election that will decide this country’s next Prime Minister. An election that most voters will not participate in, a potential Labour leadership contest. Murmurings within the Parliamentary Labour Party suggest that should the party perform poorly in May’s local and regional elections, pressure on Keir Starmer will intensify. Anonymous briefings have become a lo

Last month, the BBC reported on a growing cluster of Instagram accounts posting AI-generated images and videos of women with disabilities  – including Down’s syndrome, amputations and even fabricated “conjoined twins” – in highly sexualised scenarios designed to attract followers and direct traffic toward monetised adult platforms. At first glance, these profiles might appear to be little more than another grotesque curiosity of the internet. Yet the phenomenon points toward

International law was created to act as a check on unrestrained power, yet in practice is only effective at controlling states who are willing to conform, leaving those states whom international law was intended to control practically untouched by it. Out of the ruins of the Second World War came the concept of enforceable international law, followed by the creation of the United Nations and the drafting of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights . International law promise

19 th  Century Methods for 21 st  Century Problems  Following the abduction of  Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores, combined with the National Security Strategy (NSS)  release in December of 2025, the Trump Era of “Gunboat Diplomacy” consolidated as the world watched on with morose horror. The Trump “Corollary,” as it were, is to represent an abandonment of international good faith and an embracing of the world's brutal dictators, Vladimir Putin and many more  across th

The Labour government has been cast further adrift this month, perilously overladen with scandal and factionalism. Whilst I don’t doubt that Starmer will go down with this ship, certain members of his cabinet could survive unscathed, and miraculously so. Certain names and policies scattering the headlines are doing an impressive job of diverting attention away from more subdued and insidious acts of party betrayal. Take Shabana Mahmood, the UK’s Home Secretary, whose vision f

‘For any government official or despot, power over his own people takes precedence over everything else’- Jean Baudrillard   In Terry Gilliam’s Kafkaesque black comedy Brazil (1985), Sam Lowry, a low-ranking bureaucrat, joins his affluent, ostentatious mother, Ida, in a restaurant. Their meal is served - at which point - sudden explosions blast shrapnel across the room, saturating the air with shouting, screams, and smoke. The restaurant has been subject to a terrorist attack

James Talarico calls his healthcare plan “Medicare for Y’all”. Four words that tell you everything about how he just won the Democratic Senate primary in Texas – his party hasn't won statewide here since 1994. Whilst his opponent campaigned against Trump, Talarico, the seminarian state legislator and former public school teacher, ran for something: popular progressive policies rebranded to the voters he will need to win over. Whether he manages that in November is another que

Recent weeks have seen alarming headlines  suggest that the UK risks serious strife due to limited  food production capacity, thereby touching on something that makes the public feel vulnerable at a visceral level – literally something we will feel in our gut: the chance we might not have food tomorrow.  But this is not a recent risk, nor the result of a particular policy programme. It is a core piece of the UK’s strategic security puzzle, composed of challenges that cannot b

In my capacities as Deputy Chair of Warwick Labour (a title I’m getting the most out of now, set to lose it as I am in the next week or so), I get to regularly engage with many an interesting Labour figure. It is, therefore, a testament to Mainstream’s National Coordinator, Luke Hurst, that I’ve penned an article inspired by a compelling talk he recently gave.  Before getting to the crux of the issue, it has to be said that Hurst was a courteous and captivating speaker, and t