Jacky
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jacky3344.bsky.social
Jacky
@jacky3344.bsky.social
580 followers 320 following 3.4K posts
Concerns: climate change, food quality, equality & ecosystems of all kinds - physical, ideological, philosophical and (most of all) my compost heap - although is it mine or does it own me?
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jacky3344.bsky.social
Also see Nesrine Malik in this morning's Long Wave newsletter from the Guardian:
Behind every leader there is, perhaps, an army that will not cede power to civilians easily, or a business class that has much to lose from the dismantling of their corrupt lucrative political arrangements. Every government at odds with its people is not about a single president or party, but a complex web of arrangements that benefit just enough people to make change undesirable: such as the member of parliament with a nice sideline in import and export, or the industrialist who has negotiated a favourable tax deal.
November 12, 2025 at 1:09 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
In what way is this not equally true of many "democracies"?
Telling words about Africa made me realise what a big problem the UK has, never mind the US:
@nesrinemalik.bsky.social in this weeks Long Wave newsletter from @theguardian.com
Behind every leader there is, perhaps, an army that will not cede power to civilians easily, or a business class that has much to lose from the dismantling of their corrupt lucrative political arrangements. Every government at odds with its people is not about a single president or party, but a complex web of arrangements that benefit just enough people to make change undesirable: such as the member of parliament with a nice sideline in import and export, or the industrialist who has negotiated a favourable tax deal.
November 12, 2025 at 12:29 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
Both their total votes & ave per candidate dropped, and the % of all votes cast they got dropped too.
Comparing 2025 AGM results to 2024: - Ave votes per Restore Trust candidate decreased by 28% - Total votes cast for Restore Trust candidates dropped by 16% (despite them putting up an extra candidate this year) - They received less than 24% of all votes cast, compared to nearly 27% in 2024.
November 9, 2025 at 12:41 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
@davidallengreen.bsky.social makes some really useful points here - in particular for politicians, but also for journalists.
Forwarded this email? Subscribe here for more Trapped in a latter-day Plato's cave Social media platforms do not necessarily correspond to the outside world Nov 5 READ IN APP Once upon a time the writer of this blog had far too many followers on social media, and when one has far too many followers, things start becoming distorted. And unless one does something about it, one can go quite mad. By ‘quite mad’ it is meant that one’s sense of reality becomes disconnected from, well, reality. One begins to replace thoughts with ‘takes’ - and to replace developing those thoughts with promoting memes. The value of your takes and memes is then measured by likes and reposts from the similarly afflicted. Pretty soon you are trapped within a self-contained and self-perpetuating system of understanding the world, and one becomes unable to see the world in any other way. You are trapped within a latter-day Plato’s cave.
November 5, 2025 at 9:46 AM
jacky3344.bsky.social
If you're anywhere near the Forest of Dean next weekend (Nov 7th - 8th) drop into the INKED festival in Cinderford:
www.nicholagoff.com/inked-print-...
November 3, 2025 at 10:10 AM
jacky3344.bsky.social
I particularly like the bit where he points out that this leaflet doesn't contain career politicians - because none of these people exist. They were created by AI.
So guess what? You COULD make it up...
November 1, 2025 at 5:12 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
“Frivolity and absurdity are kryptonite to authoritarians who project the stern-father archetype to their followers. Once the pants are lowered and the undies of the despot are glimpsed, there is no point of return.” - Gary Shteyngart in the NYT

We need more of this!
People in inflatable dinosaur, chicken & unicorn costumes at a "NoKings" demo, 18/10/25
October 21, 2025 at 6:33 AM
jacky3344.bsky.social
Those inflatable frogs are really dangerous, y'know.
This weekend we showed what power looks like when the people remember who really runs this kingdom. So imagine what happens when those same millions take one day off work. One day off Amazon. One day off going to the mall. The billionaire oligarchs won’t just tremble, they’ll piss themselves in fear like they just saw an inflatable frog.
October 20, 2025 at 3:09 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
We need more protests like this, everywhere.
But preferably with less plastic.
Can we find ways of knitting / crocheting costumes, preferably in natural fibres?
That would show real intent.
And be harder to "pop", too.
October 20, 2025 at 9:10 AM
jacky3344.bsky.social
It is excellent but that photo is just horrid.

I prefer the one of Ffarij in a tutu:
Withnall Jones post of "Swan Lake": Nigel Ffarij in a candy pink tutu by a pond
October 8, 2025 at 2:33 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
He did used to be racist when he was at his posh private school.
We have a long letter (below) written in June 1981 by a young English teacher, Chloe Deakin, begging the master of the college (head teacher), David Emms, to reconsider his decision to appoint Farage as a prefect. Deakin did not know Farage personally but her letter includes an account of what was said by staff at their annual meeting, held a few days earlier, to discuss new prefects. The letter says that when one teacher said Farage was "a fascist, but that was no reason why he would not make a good prefect," there was "considerable reaction" from colleagues. The letter continues: "Another colleague, who teaches the boy, described his publicly professed racist and neo-fascist views; and he cited a particular incident in which Farage was so offensive to a boy in his set, that he had to be removed from the lesson. This master stated his view that this behaviour was precisely why the boy should not be made a prefect. Yet another colleague described how, at a Combined Cadet Force (CCF) camp organised by the college, Farage and others had marched through a quiet Sussex village very late at night shouting Hitler-youth songs."
October 8, 2025 at 10:04 AM
jacky3344.bsky.social
The neoliberal economist takes a richly-deserved bashing from Cory Doctorow again.
@pluralistic.net.web.brid.gy
pluralistic.net/2025/10/07/t...
Ultimately, I just don't think neoliberal economists believe in what they're selling. They don't want a market of "demand-signals" that can be used to guide allocations. They just want to help the greediest, worst people on earth screw you as hard as they can, all day long. And then blame you for it.
October 7, 2025 at 3:42 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
@thenerve.news has a "Reform UK" correspondent.
If I were (god forbid) part of that "organisation", I'd be worried.
@johnsweeneyroar.bsky.social has a great track record of ridiculing the ridiculous.
Picture of John Sweeney wearing a "union jack" blazer, looking nothing like Ffarij.
October 3, 2025 at 6:57 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
A useful resource - a checklist of facts to repost to those unpleasant characters who tell lies about what's going on.
Plain text version in alt-txt.
Text version: 0.7% of the UK population are refugees. Claims that we're being "overrun" are scaremongering. Public services are stretched because of decades of underfunding, not migration. £3.3 billion is how much migration brings to UK public finances each year. Migrants contribute in so many ways, from paying taxes to bringing diverse skills & creating setting up new businesses. 1 in 6 people arriving in the UK by small boat is a child. They're the most vulnerable to conflict and trafficking, yet some politicians want to turn them away. This doesn't make any of us safer. Less than 5% of all migration to the UK is by small boats. Some politicians and media deliberately distort the proportion of these journeys to stir up fear and hostility. 92% of those applying for refugee family reunions are women and children. They're the ones hit hardest by the lack of safe routes. 1 in 5 NHS workers are migrants. They're not the ones causing the NHS crisis - they're helping to keep our hospitals, care homes & GP surgeries running. Sources: 1. ICRC Refugee stats & statistics, 2024 2. CEBR "Immigration is estimated to yield £3.3bn annually for public finances..." 2023 3. Immigration system statistics, year ending June 2025 4. Immigration system statistics, year ending June 2025 5. Immigration system statistics, year ending June 2025 6. NHS data in the Guardian "Record one in five NHS staff in England are non-UK nationals, figures show" - 2024
October 3, 2025 at 11:46 AM
jacky3344.bsky.social
Trump really has lost the plot, completely & utterly. Please, retire him on health grounds.
open.substack.com/pub/heatherc...
Late last night, President Donald J. Trump shared on social media a deep fake video that appeared to be a clip from his daughter-in-law Lara Trump’s Fox News talk show My View. In the video’s split screen, Lara Trump, on the left, says: “President Donald J. Trump has announced a historic new healthcare system, the launch of America’s first MedBed hospitals and a national MedBed card for every citizen.” As she speaks, the video shows a building with the caption: “MEDBED HOSPITALS: THE NEW ERA IN HEALTHCARE.”
September 29, 2025 at 10:18 AM
jacky3344.bsky.social
I know I shouldn't repost from that hellsite, but this one's too good to ignore!
Picture of Ffarij in a pink tutu, labelled "Today on the BBC: Swan Lake" Posted by Withnail Jones on Twitter.
September 27, 2025 at 8:46 AM
jacky3344.bsky.social
Nice:
September 24, 2025 at 12:30 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
Trump's Whitehouse is so incompetent, it's sabotaging Trump's appearances on the world stage.
Or is it deliberate?
@hcrichardson.bsky.social on Trump at the UN:
Trump loyalists turned tonight to the idea that someone had sabotaged the president by stopping the escalator and the teleprompter. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News Channel personality Jesse Watters that it looked like sabotage and she would personally see to it that there would be accountability, and Trump loyalist senator Mike Lee (R-UT) called for defunding the U.N. for “orchestrating escalator and teleprompter malfunctions.” The United Nations correspondent for the Associated Press, Farnoush Amiri, reported that “[a] UN official said the UN understands that someone from the president’s party who ran ahead of him inadvertently triggered the stop mechanism on the escalator. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the White House was operating the teleprompter for Trump.”
September 24, 2025 at 8:47 AM
jacky3344.bsky.social
Keep putting in formal complaints to the BBC.
Three of the 4 "issues of wide audience concern" on the BBC complaints intro page are already on this topic - see attached screenshot taken today,22/9/25
You'd think they'd take the hint, sooner or later?
www.bbc.co.uk/contact/comp...
September 22, 2025 at 5:59 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
Yet another formal complaint submitted.
3 of the 4 "issues of wide audience concern" on the BBC complaints page are on the topic of the amount of coverage RefUK Ltd gets on the Beeb.
Surely Ofcom has to notice, at some point?
(screenshot taken today, 22/9/25)
www.bbc.co.uk/contact/comp...
Screenshot of https://www.bbc.co.uk/contact/complaints showing 3 of 4 "issues of wide audience concern" are to do with Reform UK Ltd. The other one is about the coverage of the "Unite the Kingdom" march held on Sept 13th.
September 22, 2025 at 3:10 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
Lovely writeup by the Graun:
Reform UK has suspended one of its councillors while the party investigates him over alleged online comments about wanting to kill Keir Starmer. The suspension came after the party was presented with details indicating that John Allen, a Reform UK Northumberland county councillor, had posted comments online about wanting to shoot the prime minister. Nigel Farage, the party’s leader, last week challenged police to arrest social media users who he said had been using TikTok to call for him to be shot.
September 20, 2025 at 11:47 AM
jacky3344.bsky.social
And the next thing on my twitter feed was this. Note that I only go to X to leave things like that petition & don't bother to read the responses, that mostly seem to come from bots or idiots. Or idiotic bots.
September 19, 2025 at 12:16 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
Sorry this is behind a paywall, but Byline Times has hit on the real problem with populist politicians (of all colours) in the UK.
They're living in a fantasy world because they only talk to rich people, and imagine that the people who marched in London on Saturday are typical of the working class.
Yet, in reality, it is the populists who are out-of-touch with ‘ordinary people’ – speaking in almost cartoonish terms of a form of working-class life which has largely disappeared. Among other reasons, that happened because of the very success of previous Labour Governments in enabling working-class people to leave behind manual work or to benefit from education previously only available to a tiny elite. That should be a source of pride, not guilt.
September 16, 2025 at 5:08 PM
jacky3344.bsky.social
There ARE people in the Labour party, even in Parliament, who understand what needs to change.
It's just that Starmer's not listening to them.
They don't have the money to pay lobbyists or make massive donations.
@MattBishopMP
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
George Osborne’s issuing of a high number of inflation-linked gilts (more expensive to pay back than conventional gilts with a fixed interest rate when inflation is high) and policy of quantitative easing and subsequent unwinding of that policy now cost the country billions each year. Separately, we continue to subsidise commercial banks to the tune of £40bn annually through interest on reserves – a policy other institutions such as the European Central Bank and Swiss National Bank do not pursue – even as vital services remain underfunded.
September 9, 2025 at 8:39 AM
jacky3344.bsky.social
How many more cases like this are going to come to light?
This man was jailed in 2017 for multiple sexual offences & put on the sex offender register for life.
Yet people bring their kids to anti-migrant demos.
They'd be safer inside the hostel.
If you think it's "fake news" do your own search.
Photo of a Times article from 7/9/25 saying that Anthony Styles, a UTuber who "wanted to protect kids" was sentenced to 4.5 years in jail after indecently assaulting a schoolgirl
September 7, 2025 at 5:42 PM