Alex MacDonald
@alexjaymac.bsky.social
Middle East Eye, reporter/commentator. Mainly talk about Iraq, Iran, Israel-Palestine, UK and Turkey. Folk musician. He/him. DM any story tips!
Pinned
Phone seizures denounced as latest 'inhumane' asylum seeker policy in UK
Refugees and rights groups warn new legislation increasingly undermining Britain's status as a safe haven
www.middleeasteye.net
I asked an Iranian refugee living in the UK, who crossed the English channel some years ago, about the latest legislation by the Labour government targeting asylum seekers:
'Making asylum harder does not remove the reasons people flee - it only increases the risks they face'
'Making asylum harder does not remove the reasons people flee - it only increases the risks they face'
Reposted by Alex MacDonald
In news which should be shocking to absolutely no-one with an ounce of commonsense or humanity, providing gender affirming care to trans young people reduces risks of harm.
Preventing trans young people accessing treatment has never been about "protecting children"
www.advocate.com/health/trans...
Preventing trans young people accessing treatment has never been about "protecting children"
www.advocate.com/health/trans...
Transgender youth who receive hormone therapy are less suicidal: study
"Suicidality significantly declined" among trans youth who receive hormone replacement therapy, a new study has found.
www.advocate.com
January 12, 2026 at 8:23 AM
In news which should be shocking to absolutely no-one with an ounce of commonsense or humanity, providing gender affirming care to trans young people reduces risks of harm.
Preventing trans young people accessing treatment has never been about "protecting children"
www.advocate.com/health/trans...
Preventing trans young people accessing treatment has never been about "protecting children"
www.advocate.com/health/trans...
You would not.
If Kamala were president today:
You'd be waking up reading about Grok and X being removed from app stores and investigated by the FTC and DOJ.
You'd be waking up reading about Grok and X being removed from app stores and investigated by the FTC and DOJ.
January 12, 2026 at 11:42 PM
You would not.
There were famously no protests over policing before Trump.
Before Trump, law enforcement were trained to behave professionally. At a traffic stop they would start with words such as "Mam, may I see your drivers license and registration."
ICE evidently trains their goons to start a stop with screamed profanity, quickly followed by violence.
ICE evidently trains their goons to start a stop with screamed profanity, quickly followed by violence.
January 12, 2026 at 11:17 PM
There were famously no protests over policing before Trump.
Reposted by Alex MacDonald
It is very telling that I had forgotten Nandy was culture secretary because she has basically made no intervention over the social media site the govt uses posting child porn.
don't really understand how this article alone hasn't shamed Nandy into, y'know, appearing
If the UK government had a Culture Secretary, that person would be in a position to take a view about whether child porn on demand was a good thing, or a bad thing. thecritic.co.uk/brin...
January 12, 2026 at 11:05 PM
It is very telling that I had forgotten Nandy was culture secretary because she has basically made no intervention over the social media site the govt uses posting child porn.
Reposted by Alex MacDonald
Told @FRANCE24 that when we zoom out and look at the evolution of protests in Iran over the course of the past 20 years, we can see a dramatic radicalization, which ultimately is a reaction to continued repression and the failure to deliver change.
www.france24.com/en/absence-o...
www.france24.com/en/absence-o...
'Absence of credible alternatives' has allowed Iranian regime to survive, analyst says
www.france24.com
January 12, 2026 at 11:00 PM
Told @FRANCE24 that when we zoom out and look at the evolution of protests in Iran over the course of the past 20 years, we can see a dramatic radicalization, which ultimately is a reaction to continued repression and the failure to deliver change.
www.france24.com/en/absence-o...
www.france24.com/en/absence-o...
Its because the people touting the idea that London has become a crime-ridden hellhole equate the presence of non-white people with a rise in crime.
In our new Frontline series, Symeon Brown has been granted rare access to see how the Met Police’s elite teams are tackling crime, as new statistics today show a fall in London's murder rate.
📩 Read the full newsletter:
📩 Read the full newsletter:
Met Police winning fight against serious violent crime in London - but losing information war
In our new Frontline series, Symeon Brown has been granted rare access to see how the Met Police’s elite teams are tackling crime, as new statistics today show a fall in London's murder rate.
channel4news.substack.com
January 12, 2026 at 7:53 PM
Its because the people touting the idea that London has become a crime-ridden hellhole equate the presence of non-white people with a rise in crime.
Reposted by Alex MacDonald
Ultimately it’s not a hard question, or shouldn’t be: if there were a website called creepywank dot org, where you could upload any picture or screengrab of anyone and get AI to produce a photorealistic picture of that person, regardless of age, in a state of undress…should it be legal in the UK?
Stephen has been bang on with this aspect of Badenoch's leadership from the start, and it has culminated in a position of being squeamish on banning a site mass-producing CSAM images because something something "Labour might ban it"
The premise of everything Kemi says and does is “if Labour are doing it, it must be bad”, and everything else is about her making intellectual pretzel shapes around that.
January 12, 2026 at 7:26 PM
Ultimately it’s not a hard question, or shouldn’t be: if there were a website called creepywank dot org, where you could upload any picture or screengrab of anyone and get AI to produce a photorealistic picture of that person, regardless of age, in a state of undress…should it be legal in the UK?
Bluesky is obviously less of a cesspit than Twitter these days, but there is also a certain sense that you can replace "immigration" with "Putin" as the source of all the world's problems on here.
January 12, 2026 at 11:32 AM
Bluesky is obviously less of a cesspit than Twitter these days, but there is also a certain sense that you can replace "immigration" with "Putin" as the source of all the world's problems on here.
"In the UK there was rising fury from women’s rights campaigners at the govt’s failure to bring into force legislation passed last year that would have made this creation of non-consensual intimate imagery illegal.
"Officials were unable to explain why the legislation had not yet been implemented"
"Officials were unable to explain why the legislation had not yet been implemented"
‘Add blood, forced smile’: how Grok’s nudification tool went viral
The ‘put her in a bikini’ trend rapidly evolved into hundreds of thousands of requests to strip clothes from photos of women, horrifying those targeted
www.theguardian.com
January 11, 2026 at 9:29 AM
"In the UK there was rising fury from women’s rights campaigners at the govt’s failure to bring into force legislation passed last year that would have made this creation of non-consensual intimate imagery illegal.
"Officials were unable to explain why the legislation had not yet been implemented"
"Officials were unable to explain why the legislation had not yet been implemented"
Reposted by Alex MacDonald
I asked an Iranian refugee living in the UK, who crossed the English channel some years ago, about the latest legislation by the Labour government targeting asylum seekers:
'Making asylum harder does not remove the reasons people flee - it only increases the risks they face'
'Making asylum harder does not remove the reasons people flee - it only increases the risks they face'
Phone seizures denounced as latest 'inhumane' asylum seeker policy in UK
Refugees and rights groups warn new legislation increasingly undermining Britain's status as a safe haven
www.middleeasteye.net
January 10, 2026 at 10:11 AM
I asked an Iranian refugee living in the UK, who crossed the English channel some years ago, about the latest legislation by the Labour government targeting asylum seekers:
'Making asylum harder does not remove the reasons people flee - it only increases the risks they face'
'Making asylum harder does not remove the reasons people flee - it only increases the risks they face'
Everything is ideological. Just a reminder.
January 10, 2026 at 6:52 PM
Everything is ideological. Just a reminder.
I quite like David Bowie. I do not understand the fanaticism he seems to inspire.
‘The Beethoven of our day’: Fans on what David Bowie meant to them 10 years after his death
‘The Beethoven of our day’: Fans on what David Bowie meant to them 10 years after his death
At the annual gathering at the Starman memorial in south London devotees talk about the immense impact the artist’s life and death had on them
www.theguardian.com
January 10, 2026 at 6:04 PM
I quite like David Bowie. I do not understand the fanaticism he seems to inspire.
Reposted by Alex MacDonald
Indonesia has banned Grok - the AI created by Elon Musk which has been used to make CSAM.
Indonesia temporarily blocks access to Grok over sexualised images
Indonesia temporarily blocked Elon Musk's Grok chatbot on Saturday due to the risk of AI-generated pornographic content, becoming the first country to deny access to the AI tool.
www.reuters.com
January 10, 2026 at 9:34 AM
Indonesia has banned Grok - the AI created by Elon Musk which has been used to make CSAM.
Reposted by Alex MacDonald
once again we are all tapping the sign
January 9, 2026 at 11:45 PM
once again we are all tapping the sign
Reposted by Alex MacDonald
We go live to the Protect our girls crew, unsure what they are doing
January 10, 2026 at 1:59 PM
We go live to the Protect our girls crew, unsure what they are doing
I asked an Iranian refugee living in the UK, who crossed the English channel some years ago, about the latest legislation by the Labour government targeting asylum seekers:
'Making asylum harder does not remove the reasons people flee - it only increases the risks they face'
'Making asylum harder does not remove the reasons people flee - it only increases the risks they face'
Phone seizures denounced as latest 'inhumane' asylum seeker policy in UK
Refugees and rights groups warn new legislation increasingly undermining Britain's status as a safe haven
www.middleeasteye.net
January 10, 2026 at 10:11 AM
I asked an Iranian refugee living in the UK, who crossed the English channel some years ago, about the latest legislation by the Labour government targeting asylum seekers:
'Making asylum harder does not remove the reasons people flee - it only increases the risks they face'
'Making asylum harder does not remove the reasons people flee - it only increases the risks they face'
Reposted by Alex MacDonald
Sınır Tanımayan Gazeteciler (RSF), yetkilileri, 11 Ekim 2025’te İstanbul'da öldürülen çevre gazetecisi ve belgeselci Hakan Tosun'un cinayetinin nedenini ortaya çıkarmak için tüm çabaları göstermeye çağırdı. Soruşturma, iğrenç cinayete dair tüm gerçekleri bir an önce ortaya çıkarmalıdır! 👇(İNG)
Deadly attack in Türkiye: the murder of environmental journalist Hakan Tosun requires a full investigation
A preliminary autopsy report from the Institute of Legal Medicine confirms that Turkish independent journalist and documentary filmmaker, specialising in environmental issues, Hakan Tosun, died as a r...
https://rsf.org/en/deadly-attack-türkiye-murder-environmental-journalist-hakan-tosun-requires-full-investigation
January 10, 2026 at 10:02 AM
Sınır Tanımayan Gazeteciler (RSF), yetkilileri, 11 Ekim 2025’te İstanbul'da öldürülen çevre gazetecisi ve belgeselci Hakan Tosun'un cinayetinin nedenini ortaya çıkarmak için tüm çabaları göstermeye çağırdı. Soruşturma, iğrenç cinayete dair tüm gerçekleri bir an önce ortaya çıkarmalıdır! 👇(İNG)
Reposted by Alex MacDonald
In case you've seen the story about “grok now only generates images for paid users”, it's untrue. Apparently everyone just reported it because… it was what grok told them 🤦🏼
www.theverge.com/news/859309/...
www.theverge.com/news/859309/...
No, Grok hasn’t paywalled its deepfake image feature
X’s sexual deepfake machine is still running, despite Grok saying otherwise.
www.theverge.com
January 9, 2026 at 3:56 PM
In case you've seen the story about “grok now only generates images for paid users”, it's untrue. Apparently everyone just reported it because… it was what grok told them 🤦🏼
www.theverge.com/news/859309/...
www.theverge.com/news/859309/...
These are always weird questions - loads of stuff which didn't exist when I was younger that exists now, but I think younger people could understand concept of, say, not having the internet at home.
In terms of stuff that's beyond comprehension...I dunno, chocolate cigarettes?
In terms of stuff that's beyond comprehension...I dunno, chocolate cigarettes?
Without revealing your actual age,what's something you remember that if you told a younger person they wouldn't understand?
January 9, 2026 at 6:47 PM
These are always weird questions - loads of stuff which didn't exist when I was younger that exists now, but I think younger people could understand concept of, say, not having the internet at home.
In terms of stuff that's beyond comprehension...I dunno, chocolate cigarettes?
In terms of stuff that's beyond comprehension...I dunno, chocolate cigarettes?
Perhaps I've not been keeping up with my media law, but as I understand it, X is still regarded as a micro-blogging site in the sense that publishing something there has the same weight - at least above a certain level of engagement - as publishing on a news site.
Every day, thousands of women and children are victimized by people on X using the Grok chatbot to generate scantily clad and naked photos of them.
It’s time for governments to take action. Elon Musk’s X should have been banned long ago. They don’t have an excuse to delay any longer.
It’s time for governments to take action. Elon Musk’s X should have been banned long ago. They don’t have an excuse to delay any longer.
Elon Musk’s X must be banned
Regulators need to stop cowering before the richest man in the world
disconnect.blog
January 9, 2026 at 6:32 PM
Perhaps I've not been keeping up with my media law, but as I understand it, X is still regarded as a micro-blogging site in the sense that publishing something there has the same weight - at least above a certain level of engagement - as publishing on a news site.
Reposted by Alex MacDonald
So his response to the criticism of his app generating sexual deep fakes of children is... to try to monetise it as a feature
January 9, 2026 at 10:28 AM
So his response to the criticism of his app generating sexual deep fakes of children is... to try to monetise it as a feature
"I simply hinted that an ‘extraordinary’ man has the right… that is not an official right, but an inner right to decide in his own conscience to overstep… certain obstacles, and only in case it is essential"
This is literally what dictators say.
Trump Lays Out a Vision of Power Restrained Only by ‘My Own Morality’
www.nytimes.com
January 9, 2026 at 6:22 PM
"I simply hinted that an ‘extraordinary’ man has the right… that is not an official right, but an inner right to decide in his own conscience to overstep… certain obstacles, and only in case it is essential"
It would be good to sit down the board of directors and get them to go through from beginning to end their thought process here - get them to really spell out their decision:
The board of directors behind one of Australia's biggest literary events, Adelaide Writers Week, has announced their decision to remove prominent Palestinian author Randa Abdel-Fattah from their 2026 festival programme, citing ‘cultural sensitivity’ concerns in the wake of the Bondi Beach massacre:
January 9, 2026 at 7:07 AM
It would be good to sit down the board of directors and get them to go through from beginning to end their thought process here - get them to really spell out their decision: