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Just Tom... 🐁
@tompearce49@mastodon.scot
mastodon 4.7.2AvPD (according to my therapist), Antifa, Lefty Anarchist, radically Green, and still somehow a believer in the essential goodness of mankind. Baritone and tenor sax, #music, #reading and occasional #blog writing. GM8YUG. A lover of high latitudes, ice and snow. Gardener, woodworker and owned by two affectionate cats. Still trying to make sense of an increasingly senseless world.
1824 Followers
651 Following
50 Posts
Joined November 05, 2022
Music:
An eclectic mix of all sorts but primarily Classical (esp. J S Bach.)
Country:
An independent Scottish Republic
Pronouns:
All of us together
Website:
www.tompearce.co.uk/wp
Is it just me, or is the Fairford Terror Plot" fizzling out like a damp squib (no, fingers and spellcheck, NOT a damp squid)?
Boosted by @trending@homestead.social
"Phil Piratin was a Communist Party activist and organiser in Stepney, East London who played a key role in the Cable Street people’s blockade which successfully stopped Sir Oswald Mosley leading his British Union of Fascists (BUF), from marching through the East End ninety years ago, 4th October 1936."
https://bellacaledonia.org.uk/2026/10/02/an-eyewitness-account-from-cable-street/
Owen Jones restating the bleedin' obvious:
"...all the evidence suggests that money wins votes. A recent peer-reviewed study examined every British general election between 1857 and 2017, and found a strong relationship between relative campaign spending and votes. Rich donors really do shower political parties with money for a reason. Reform’s mega-donations underline that democracy is for sale."
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/sep/14/reform-72m-donations-nigel-farage-super-rich
"Democracy for Sale" email me to tell me that cash for access is operating again, this time it's the Tony Blair Institute, and without even the pretense of brown envelopes:
"We’ve obtained internal documents showing that Tony Blair’s think tank charges corporate members from $25,000 a year for “networking” opportunities with politicians at party conferences and more. Members include BP, Uber, Amazon and Microsoft."
I am unsurprised. Sadly.
"Legitimate concerns" over the housing of refugees and asylum seekers - fine. Legitimate concerns about the genocide in Gaza and our government's complicity in the genocide - definitely not fine (according to Shabana Mahmood.
Replying to
There is no going back to the status quo ante - the glaciers and ice caps won't refreeze, the ocean circulation will be different, weather systems will bring rain where there was drought and deserts where there was rain. We are only just at the beginning of seeing the consequences of our actions. 2/2
Boosted by @trending@homestead.social
At my age I can afford to be mildly amused (or irritated depending on context) by age verification by a staff member at supermarket checkouts. At my age I'm furious that I might be required to have my age verified by a commercial organisation, my details held on a (quite likely insecure) database "to protect the children". The emphasis must be on forcing tech giants to clean up their act, not on compulsory age checks for everyone.
Boosted by @trending@homestead.social
I was looking for some good news to brighten up a grey and soggy morning and, hey presto - it arrived:
"It was understood the far-right activist, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, was stopped and had his phones seized under section 3 of the Counter-Terrorism Border Security Act 2019."
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/jun/13/tommy-robinson-detained-at-heathrow-under-counter-terrorism-laws
Boosted by @trending@homestead.social
RE: https://mas.to/@therightarticle/116848783162226925
This is absolutely shocking. Keir Starmer spinelessly acquiescing when bullied by Trump and his administration. And the cost of the "deal" to be borne by the sick and disabled.
On a day like today it's worth remembering Dorothy Parker :
"I hate almost all rich people, but I think I’d be darling at it. At the moment, however, I like to think of Maurice Baring’s remark: “If you would know what the Lord God thinks of money, you have only to look at those to whom he gives it.” I realize that’s not much help when the wolf comes scratching at the door, but it’s a comfort."
Boosted by @trending@homestead.social
"About 3.3% of maternity bookings made within NHS trusts across England involved a disclosure of current or non-recent domestic abuse.
Applying this proportion to national NHS maternity bookings activity suggests there are approximately 20,000 disclosures of domestic abuse made within maternity services in England every year."
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2026/sep/20/thousands-of-pregnant-women-in-england-are-reporting-domestic-abuse-midwives-are-struggling-to-cope
Replying to
@Brad_Rosenheim@climatejustice.social - I am very much with @sundogplanets@mastodon.social on the abuse of space around earth, So much is being done with a scandalous disregard for any consequences by people with more money than sense.
"Astronomers are deeply worried" - the understatement of the year. This is a dreadful escalation of the pollution of low-earth orbit with satellites - this one worse by far. Environmentally damaging (animals and plants that need darkness), polluting the dark skies needed for astronomy and once again tech bros messing up the planet for their own selfish ends. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-026-02218-9?utm_source=Live+Audience&utm_campaign=7558629e58-nature-briefing-daily-20260720&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_-33f35e09ea-49717696
Replying to
@Silversnapples@mastodonapp.uk When I drive from here (Nairn) to Carrbridge I drive through a part of last year's wildfire - all blackened trees and undergrowth. It's heartbreaking that it happens and to see the consequences, so often, of human stupidity. Caveat - I don't yet know the cause of the current wildfire around Nethy Bridge.
Replying to
@ChrisMayLA6@zirk.us Private medicine is a parasite when it comes to training as well - they (the organisations) pay nothing toward the training of the staff that they poach from the NHS. From the first day that I stepped on a ward I swore that I would have no part of it.
Three good things today :
A comment on a book (thank you @artemis@dice.camp) that took me to a review by Annie Wright and dawning realisation
Thirteen miles of cycling, on which ride I met
An otter in the middle of the road.
So Starmer seems safe (for now) only because his potential challengers are hated even more than he is? There's nobody even half decent waiting in the wings, is there?
Boosted by @mattsheffield@mastodon.social
Replying to
@kevpeirce@aus.social Such a (for me) desperately sad place where somehow the stones seem to hold a memory of all those who were held there. Hard to visit and to feel, as much as to see, such inhumanity.
"Way back in 2020, the late great David Graeber laid it out:
"The Labour Party under Keir Starmer will abandon its core idealism and principles and won't even gain tactical advantage. It will be a party which gives no one a reason to vote for it, and no one will, in fact, vote for it."
Mike Small continues the analysis of the political events of the past few days (with particular reference to the Celtic nations). There's a lot to celebrate.
https://bellacaledonia.org.uk/2026/05/09/from-glory-days-to-building-a-better-future/
Replying to
@DavidBridger@writing.exchange Yes, it comes down to that doesn't it. We elect the self-publicists and the narcissists, the power-hungry and the wealthy, and then wonder why it all goes wrong...
Replying to
@MikeFromLFE@cupoftea.social
Yes, the "celebrity culture" has a lot to be answerable for. So often it promotes those with little talent, those who "look good".
@DavidBridger@writing.exchange
As Oscar Wilde famously said: "I can resist anything but temptation". Three books currently on the go ATM - dare I risk another? https://www.theguardian.com/books/2026/jul/29/alive-by-melanie-challenger-review-a-maverick-study-of-what-it-means-to-have-a-body
Replying to
@Tattie@eldritch.cafe
Thank you for a thoughtful Sunday morning read. I ought to be washing breakfast dishes and instead find myself in the company of all those in this thread, people who think about (and are critical of) their own thoughts, something Dawkins signally fails to do.
Oh yes please. Bring on the anarchist piano!!
Replying to
@Remittancegirl@mstdn.social - For people who are so fond of parading their Christian credentials to justify their actions, the simple commandment "Thou shalt not kill", surely one of the foundational instructions in the Bible, seems to have become "Thou shalt not kill - unless..." (here follows a list of exemptions)
Replying to
@UkeleleEric@mstdn.social
Ah, "The beast of Bolsover", yes. And most definitely Tony Benn. Neither of them would be permitted in today's party.
Replying to
@czarbucks@vmst.io - The depths to which some people will sink seem greater every year. At the moment these people are deeper than the sub "Titan". I wish that they would implode and let the rest of us get on being more normal human beings.
Replying to
@bmacDonald94@hostux.social Oh, I have so much time for Ursula Le Guin. A truly wise and compassionate woman and a remarkable author.
Replying to
@BackFromTheDud@mas.to That may be the only answer. I had long given up watching QT , the TV might not be missed...!
RE: https://kolektiva.social/@Herbivore/117018959729246148
About time. Yet another example of how we treat magical sentient creatures with whom we share this planet. So utterly different from the vertebrate brains we think of as possessing (differing degrees of) sentience and intelligence. Thomas Nagel speculated about what it must be like to be a bat - how much more intriguing to try to imagine what it's like to be an octopus!!
Replying to
@ClickyMcTicker@hachyderm.io
Today I learned something. Thank you.
@spacelizard@aus.social @smsm1@mastodon.green @sundogplanets@mastodon.social
Replying to
@HarriettMB@toot.wales @Nonilex@masto.ai
The more I see the POTUS and his cabinet, the more I feel that they are all like the little boys who pull the wings off insects because they obtain pleasure from the destruction that they cause. It is a pathology, and denying others the opportunity to use the equipment is just destroying something for the sake of destruction itself. There is something dark at the heart of these men.
Replying to
@HarriettMB@toot.wales
Such is Trump's narcissism, I suspect that he is quite incapable of seeing the political message that the Chinese leadership is sending as anything other than another "wonderful victory" for himself. He is being outplayed (and doesn't even understand the rules of the game) by an administration in China who are experts in playing "the long game" and who have an understanding of politics that goes back to the ancient philosophers like Sun Tzu and Lao Tzu,
@Nonilex@masto.ai
Replying to
@Tattooed_Mummy@beige.party One of whom represents the infamously anti-trans J K Rowling in the Scottish Parliament. A delicious irony.
Replying to
@Lamb@libretooth.gr @LeslieBurns@esq.social
...and the very term "hysteria" refers to the (implausibly "wandering") womb:
"The first mental disorder attributable to women, and for which we find an accurate description since the second millennium BC, is undoubtedly hysteria.
The first description referring to the ancient Egyptians dates to 1900 BC (Kahun Papyrus) and identifies the cause of hysterical disorders in spontaneous uterus movement within the female body" https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3480686/
Replying to
@vagina_museum@masto.ai - Just Wow! I don't know whether to laugh or cry! Generations of anatomists are turning in their graves!
Replying to
@LordCaramac@discordian.social
@Strandjunker@mstdn.social
I have always thought that this thesis, put forward by Tainter, to be entirely plausible. Our problem is that unlike the Roman or Pueblo civilisations, ours is global and has nowhere else to go when the collapse inevitably occurs. It will be a very rough ride.