Who'd have thought it?*
*Apart from anyone remotely still connected to their natural environment.
Remote
Nick Peers
@nickpeers@mastodonapp.uk
mastodon 4.6.8Writer, editor, Editorial Director (blimey). Snowflake wannabe who aspires to be woke. #bcfc supporter, owner of questionable music collection and ever-expanding TV/movie library. #BLM #FBPA #FBPE #FBPPR
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632 Following
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Joined November 09, 2022
Editorial Director:
Bringing History to Life, Inside History Collection, Success Guides
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Another beacon of hope - we need to keep restoring these, not just because we've taken so much from nature (particularly in this country), but because these reservoirs don't just give biodiversity a fighting chance in the future, it can help us in the here and now. Wetlands in particular are vital protections against both flooding and drought.
Humans clearly love their artificial constructs more than the natural world that sustains them. It'll end badly for us, but thank goodness nature has the tools to recover - with or (as appears increasingly likely) without us.
Replying to
@HarriettMB@toot.wales @ChrisMayLA6@zirk.us I would also like to think that when the media inevitably tries to make capital from her inland revenue 'scandal', we could point out that if they don't have a problem with Farage's £5m "donation", they really can't complain about £40,000 (particularly now that money has been repaid).
But that would require us to live in a world where it's not "one rule for you, no rules for us".
Once again I'm grateful to my younger self for committing to physical media over digital "purchases".
https://filmstories.co.uk/news/physical-media-playstation-removes-access-to-500-paid-for-digital-movies/
Funny how the more bodies of water he tries to rename, the weaker his country becomes and ths poorer his subj-sorry, citizens become.
What's that stench on the other side of the Atlantic? Come on US, it's way past time you took out your trash.
Replying to
@TimWardCam@c.im @ChrisMayLA6@zirk.us Plus these will be the Tories who told us rather pompously in the 1980s that FPTP was a bulwark against fascism and if we went to PR then we'd open the door for another Hitler. Wonder how that's playing out in their minds (I know, they've long forgotten the argument)?
Replying to
@HarriettMB@toot.wales @ChrisMayLA6@zirk.us Also, apologies for mixing up my use of " and ' for the quotations. My sub-editing persona is alternately cringing and scolding me in equal measure...
Where's a real-life 007 when you need one?
Today's small victory in trying to wean myself off the likes of Google et al:
Replying to on zirk.us
@ChrisMayLA6@zirk.us Time we started calling it "anti-social media" as it's anything but social!
I think it's time we stopped calling people who follow in large groups without thinking "sheep" or "lemmings". Instead, we should start derisively calling sheep and lemmings that go around in large, unthinking groups "humans".
Buried in this entertaining piece is the somewhat sobering fact that Liz Truss appears to have been captured - among other things - by the US gun lobby. Laugh all you like, but her support for bring the US 2nd Amendment to these shores is frankly a frightening one.
In which Mr Pecksniff lays before his readers for their approval certain observations and speculations reflecting on the political life | East Anglia Bylines
https://eastangliabylines.co.uk/pecksniff/pecksniffs-diary-04-04-26/?fsp_sid=8022
But what did people expect? The UAE is not a democracy. Whether a tourist or a permanent resident, you still have to abide by the rules and laws of the country you're in.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/apr/01/uk-citizens-detained-uae-frustrated-government-intervention-iran-conflict?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
I've signed it, I hope you will too. Really this should be getting hundreds of thousands of signatures, not hundreds...
Surely NOT invoking the 25th Amendment makes all those Republicans complicit in treason?
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/apr/05/trump-iran-threats-politician-reactions?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
This is how stealing elections begins.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/apr/03/trump-vance-fraud-arrest-crackdown-california?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
Some more measured analysis from Ian Dunt. And apologies for the barrage of posts today. But we have to fight this pathetic narrative being parroted by the right - that somehow Labour is directly losing votes to Reform. Dunt nails that part of the argument really well.
https://iandunt.substack.com/p/local-elections-2026-some-disparate
Here's the crumb of comfort from today. If you listen to the media, Reform will be painted as an irresistible force. Yet Peter Kellner, whose words matter because he's got decades of experience covering elections, says something different:
https://kellnerp.substack.com/p/yesterdays-elections-the-story-so
According to one poster on Facebook, the reaction of 90% of people who woke up to today’s election results will be ‘meh’.
The next time they’re apoplectic about the state of the roads in their local area, someone tell them (not just the connection between politics and their lives in general, but the fact they should be blaming the county council not the borough council - for the umpteenth time - for said potholes)…
Gulp, Reform has widened its gap in Shrub End, but it could still easily be beaten by Labour and Green voters lending their votes to their hardworking Lib Dem councillor today:
https://www.pollcheck.co.uk/locals-2026#/colchester
Hegseth throwing everyone under the bus in an effort to save his own worthless skin. This is what happens when you appoint unqualified* people to important posts. I’m talking about Hegseth, obviously…
*Never mind the rest.
Perfect, because a nation starved of access to our natural (the clue is in the word, people) environment beset by anxiety needs less biodiversity, not more.
This kind of thinking more than anything else is why we feel that collective sense of doom, because destroying one’s environment is pretty much behind the collapse of all empires and civilisations throughout history. And no amount of exceptionalism will save this one.
Replying to
Update: that part didn’t fit (although I’ve cannibalised some of it). Seems the price of not renovating your kitchen for the 20 years you’ve lived in it is non-standard parts. Waiting for the correctly sized (70mm) plug hole fitting to arrive as we continue to navigate life without a plug hole).
Perhaps the US Vice-President could stop interfering in a European election and go back home to try and get a grip on the situation. After all, if or when something happens to Trump, he'll be in charge (God help us all).
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/apr/08/middle-east-ceasefire-doubt-israel-lebanon-iran-oil-tankers
The UK has been the US's bitch for too long. What Trump sees as weak is actually the beginnings of some kind of backbone.
I'm sure the treasonous right-wing press will happily amplify the Tangerine Todder's remarks as they seek to undermine their own national interest. Perhaps now is the time to bring the spotlight to bear on our corrupt, bought media that serves shadowy foreign interests over those of their own viewers and readers (never mind the rest of us)?
Replying to on mstdn.party
@copter_chief@mstdn.party I think I last heard him use the line 2-3 weeks ago when talking about the Iran war.
So many Welsh people voting for Reform. Suddenly I feel less of a yearning for the place of my upbringing. Sort it out Wales! Reform aren't the friends of the English idiots who vote for them, they're hardly going to be your mates!
When Westminster politicians express bewilderment at why people feel like the country is going to the dogs, this ticks all the boxes for why - Labour has been captured by the techbros, as demonstrated by Mahmood's battle cry for "Police AI".
Revolution will be the only way to stop this lot - unless you're willing to wait for environmental collapse of course, at which point it'll all become moot.
... Or at least until you don't get your way the next time, eh Donald?
In other news, could the United States of America please go to the customer service desk? Your misplaced toddler/president is waiting to be picked up.
Sorry for reposting this excellent article, but Ian Dunt hits the nail on the head with his closing paragraphs, devoted to the need for immediate electoral reform.
Here's a challenge to Labour. If you deliver meaningful electoral reform, whether STV or a workable implementation of PR, in time for the 2029 election I will promise you my vote in that election as a thank you. And unlike Labour in 1997 when it made electoral reform part of its manifesto by promising a referendum on it that was never delivered, I won't break my promise.
https://iandunt.substack.com/i/196901796/by-the-bowels-of-christ-we-need-electoral-reform
"Trump did not foresee them or simply did not care about them. His administration is composed of extremely limited men whose minds are too narrowly defined to understand the complexity of how the world works."
Another excellent piece by Ian Dunt:
https://iandunt.substack.com/p/trumps-war-on-the-global-food-supply-2f2
Rome had a no-kings policy too, but it didn't stop the rise of the emperors. Emperor Trump has quite the ring to it, don't you think?
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/mar/30/donald-trump-palm-beach-airport-ron-desantis?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
Apologies for posting the same story again, but this should make all those idiots who call for us to "look after our own" and eradicate the foreign aid budget sit up and take notice:
"Once refugees arrive on our shore, the cost rises starkly. An in-country refugee in the UK costs 74 times more to support than if we took care of them in their country of origin."
https://iandunt.substack.com/p/trumps-war-on-the-global-food-supply-2f2
And we lose our hardworking Labour councillor in Maypole at the County Council level to a Reform candidate. At least other parts of Colchester stood firm (but not all) - right now if I could live anywhere in the Colchester area it would be Wivenhoe (looking out on to what we affectionately term 'Kitten Woods', or Lower Lodge Farm Colne Nature Reserve as it's better known). Solidly Lib Dem with a strong Green presence at both borough and county levels.
@ItsThatDeafGuy@beige.party No, not yet - I have the Fairphone 4, so no reason not to switch, other than inertia and lack of time (also, did I mention inertia?)... e/OS would probably be my direction of travel - I did get that installed on my old Fairphone 2 a few years ago now.
It's AI-generated, no doubt about it. So why does the media tiptoe around the fact. Let Tice sue - first thing he'd have to do is produce all the 'people' in that photo, at which point his claim collapses.
Lies, grifts, tax dodging = corrupt.
Foreign interference, simple as. Ban his platform and ban him from the country.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/jul/04/elon-musk-uk-race-immigration-spacex-ipo?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
Replying to on c.im
@Glastomichelle@c.im That's beautiful. Thank you for sharing these. Of course, when you titled it "The Gathering" my mind immediately went to Highlander, but I don't think I can see a flash of steel or a lightning burst from a Quickening!
Jellyfin users rejoice, the major (and much-needed) performance improvements branch of fixes has been completed and merged into the upcoming Jellyfin 12.0 release:
https://github.com/jellyfin/jellyfin/pull/16062
Track the progress of all proposed Jellyfin 12.0 changes here: https://github.com/orgs/jellyfin/projects/73/views/1
Shame on all of us for allowing this to happen.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2026/apr/04/masculinity-crisis-brewing-uk-schools-teachers-union?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
Utterly disgraceful. And Labour wonders why it's losing progressive votes left, right and centre...
Reform in a nutshell.
"For too long, the old parties have let Colchester down," it says on the front. "Roads getting worse, streets neglected, residents paying more for less."
"It's time for *real *change."
And how will our Reform candidate deliver this change?
"My priorites
Cut council waste and demand full financial transparency
Stand up for local people and put residents first
Support local businesses and help Colchester thrive."
Typical Reform: talk the area down, but offer nothing but vague, meaningless platitudes other than hacking local services that have no fat left to trim.
No doubt we'll elect this ex-paratrooper, but I wonder if we'll ever see him on social media listening to residents' concerns, or out on the streets talking to residents while clearing up their litter and investigating problems on their behalf as our current councillor does?
Meanwhile, Trump is picking their pockets and making himself rich at their expense - in front of their noses.
The superb - and I don't say that purely because he's a Blues fan - Simon Brew hits the nail firmly on the head. We need more of these plain-speaking 'cut through the b*ll*cks' pieces:
We all know how the right-wing press will frame this, but we must hope Nandy does intervene for all the reasons given by these fine actors.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/ng-interactive/2026/jul/27/tv-cinema-paramount-warner-bros-merger-benedict-cumberbatch-alan-cumming-benedict-wong?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
And now the Pentagon is questioning the UK's sovereignty of the Falklands. And still we're rewarding the Toddler-in-Chief for his never-ending run of tantrums with a Royal state visit. And for what? The threat of tariffs being withdrawn for - say - 72 hours?
Any UK citizen still cheerleading Trump should identify themselves to the rest of us. That way, when the food runs out at the end of the year (if not before), we know who to eat first.