Grief, anger and elections: Israel marks three years since October 7 attacks as nation prepares to vote
The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and leading opposition figure Gadi Eisenkot took to social media as their country marked three years since the devastating Hamas attacks of October 7. As the country mourned, the rival politicians played the blame game. Eisenkot is the man widely thought to be most likely to beat Netanyahu in […]
Andrew Garfield plays a ploughman in The Uprising – but the real medieval rebels weren’t all peasants
The Uprising is the first film inspired by the peasants’ revolt of the summer of 1381 – the largest popular rebellion in medieval England. The revolt was triggered by the heavy-handed administration of a poll tax that required a fixed sum to be collected from all adults. The tax was levied to finance a faltering […]
Social media provides valued community spaces for autistic young people
Dejan Dundjerski/Shutterstock Autism is a neurodevelopmental condition which influences how people communicate and process information. A significant proportion of autistic children do not speak, or only speak a few words. Many find it difficult to communicate face to face, especially when interaction is fast moving or dependent on interpreting bodily cues. Social media offers what […]
Hospital appointments can make greener travel harder
Vinokurov Yury/Shutterstock The timing of a hospital appointment does more than tell you when to see a doctor. It can also shape how you get there. For some older patients, an early appointment can fall before their concessionary bus pass, which provides free bus travel, becomes valid. An unreliable bus service can mean having to […]
Kemi Badenoch is gearing up for a ‘battle of ideas’ with Labour
Kemi Badenoch’s closing conference speech to the Conservative party conference sought to galvanise the membership by framing the coming years as “a battle of ideas” over how Britain is governed. The Conservative leader employed a combination of emotions, evidence and narrative in the speech. As a way of setting out the tone, these are effective […]
Five ways to enjoy fashion as a hobby without indulging in overconsumption
You can enjoy fashion without constantly buying new things. Anh V/Unsplash Fashion lovers are generally associated with bursting wardrobes and chasing the latest trends. But that reputation is beginning to shift. In the last few years, market surveys have found that around a third of shoppers are now buying second hand clothing. For gen Z, […]
Russian plague scare: an expert explains what we know so far – and why there’s no need to panic
The woman worked in an anti-plague research facility. PeopleImages/ Shutterstock A laboratory worker at the Irkutsk Anti-Plague Research Institute in Siberia, Russia, has died just days after falling ill with an undisclosed illness. While reports of suspected plague have been circulating in the media, Russia’s consumer health watchdog has described the illness as pneumonia of […]
French student riots: comparisons with 1968 will only serve the political extremes
The student demonstrations that have spread across France in recent weeks are not unprecedented. Indeed, commentators have been quick to point to comparisons with the events of May and June 1968, where, at their peak, more than 10 million students and workers took to the streets. In 1968, as now, there were legitimate reasons for […]
Energy price cap: the cost of your coffee could be about to go up
Rawpixel.com/Shutterstock This autumn, the cost of gas and electricity for a typical UK household is expected to rise from £1,663 to £1,723 a year. The change, due to higher wholesale gas prices, will be easy enough to spot on a household bill. But those rising costs can also affect people in less obvious ways, through […]
Inside the industrial incinerators tasked with ‘respectful disposal’ of anatomical waste
Awkwardly smiling, a chemist at a waste site is telling me about industrially incinerating corpses. We are crammed into a claustrophobic funnel at the entry point to a rattling shed with high-vis-jacketed workers scurrying to and fro. The air smells oily and mechanical. With our voices lowered, the conversation is not flowing smoothly. There is […]