Owen Michael
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owenwmichael.bsky.social
Owen Michael
@owenwmichael.bsky.social
2.3K followers 2.4K following 7.4K posts
Welsh and European. Biromantic Asexual. @UKLabour, @unisontheunion, and @thefabians. Data person and all round geek. He/him/o
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owenwmichael.bsky.social
The editor would also be the guy who had a book with this paragraph published in April 2022
In January 2022 as Russia stationed troops at the Ukrainian border in a bid to halt NATO’s eastward expansion, Starmer used a Telegraph op-ed to applaud the Tories’ tough line on the “Russian threat”, and encouraged the government to cut off Russian access to the global financial system.
November 12, 2025 at 9:17 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Also reminded me of this , which I'm not sure I'd summarise in its totality as "libertarian", even if the faction in question seems to have
In May 1986 the Scottish Federation of Conservative Students, under its chairman Simon Morgan, launched its Conservative Manifesto for Scotland which included such libertarian ideas as the legalisation of incest between consenting adults, the legalisation of euthanasia, mandatory castration of those found guilty of rape and other sexual offences, commercial surrogate motherhood as well as urging that the "pagan and disrespectful practice" of registry office weddings be banned, "leaving the Church as the only body capable of celebrating marriage". The manifesto added that the incidence of sex crimes would be reduced by the decriminalisation of prostitution, creating an open market. Peter Fraser, Solicitor-General for Scotland condemned the document as "loopy libertarianism" and even the national FCS repudiated the manifesto a "a sick joke", with Harry Phibbs, in his capacity as member of the FCS national committee, denying any knowledge of the document. https://etheses.bham.ac.uk/id/eprint/518/1/Lamb03PhD_A1a.pdfKEwivvf6WmaaQAxXAXUEAHX_ZArgQFnoFCIMBEAE&usg=AOvVaw3v26pGjxPgaQP5V3VSnBq-
October 15, 2025 at 12:31 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
As Yom Kippur ends, sending my support to all those grieving and/or frightened after today's horrific attack in Manchester
To everyone in Britain's Jewish Community: You are not alone. We will not let hate or those who spread it win. We stand with you.
October 2, 2025 at 6:31 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Standing room only at the Trans Solidarity Rally earlier
#Lab25
@nadiawhittome.bsky.social speaking in front of two @labour4transrights.bsky.social flags
September 30, 2025 at 2:41 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
As a contemporary indeed noted
All contemporary writers share to some extent the contemporary outlook—even those, like myself, who seem most opposed to it. Nothing strikes me more when I read the controversies of past ages than the fact that both sides were usually assuming without question a good deal which we should now absolutely deny. They thought that they were as completely opposed as two sides could be, but in fact they were all the time secretly united—united with each other and against earlier and later ages—by a great mass of common assumptions. We may be sure that the characteristic blindness of the twentieth century—the blindness about which posterity will ask, “But how could they have thought that?”—lies where we have never suspected it, and concerns something about which there is untroubled agreement between Hitler and President Roosevelt or between Mr. H. G. Wells and Karl Barth. None of us can fully escape this blindness, but we shall certainly increase it, and weaken our guard against it, if we read only modern books.
September 8, 2025 at 11:37 AM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
We had a beautiful picture of [MacDonald] in our passage. Dad’s idol. My dad’s idol. I came home from school, sitting there waiting for him to come in, and there was such a commotion. We’d heard him come in with his key and there was such a commotion ... There’s dad in the passage, he’s got the frame round his neck ... and he’s standing like this: ‘You bloody traitor, you bloody –’ tearing the picture up into little pieces ... And afterwards he came in and mum said: ‘What’s all that about, about him being a traitor and all that?’ So he said to me: ‘You saw what I did?’ ‘Yeah.’ So he said, ‘Well, I think he’s killed the Labour Party.’
August 6, 2025 at 11:12 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
I tried this with the pirate game (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirate_...)
It (more or less) gets it right up to three pirates and then breaks down
Me: Suppose five rational pirates are trying to divide a loot of 100 pieces of eight according to a strict set of rules. They have a hierarchy where each has a unique rank. The highest ranking proposes a distribution, and they all vote yes and no, with the highest ranking having the casting vote. If there are more Noes than Yeses, the highest ranking is thrown overboard, and they start again with the next in line, otherwise the distribution is accepted. All the pirates want to maximise their number of pieces of eight and to not be thrown overboard. Other things being equal, they would rather see another pirate thrown overboard than not. How are the pieces of eight distributed? ChatGPT said: This is a classic game theory puzzle involving rational actors. Let’s label the five pirates by rank: Pirate A (rank 5, highest) Pirate B (rank 4) Pirate C (rank 3) Pirate D (rank 2) Pirate E (rank 1, lowest) The pirates are extremely rational and have the following priorities, in order: Survive (not be thrown overboard). Maximize the number of coins. If indifferent, prefer throwing someone else overboard for the fun of it. Let’s solve it backwards, considering what happens in smaller groups and using induction. 1 Pirate (E): Pirate E keeps all 100 coins. No one to oppose. 2 Pirates (D, E): D proposes a split. If E doesn't like it, D is thrown overboard and E gets all 100. E knows this. So D offers nothing to E (since E prefers D to die) and keeps 100 for himself. E votes No, D votes Yes, it's a tie, and D survives with casting vote. So: D: 100 E: 0 3 Pirates (C, D, E): C needs 1 vote in addition to his own to survive. He knows: If C is thrown overboard, then D will get 100, E will get 0. C wants to buy someone off. C offers 1 coin to E (who would otherwise get 0). D gets nothing (would prefer C to die, because in the next round, he gets everything). So: C: 99 D: 0 E: 1 C + E vote Yes, D votes No ⇒ proposal accepted. 4 Pirates (B, C, D, E): B needs 2 votes in addition to his own to survive. If B dies, from above: C: 99 D: 0 E: 1 So B must offer bribes better than what pirates would get if B dies. E is already getting 1 ⇒ B can offer E 1 to keep him. D is getting 0 ⇒ B can offer 1 to D. C is getting 99 ⇒ B won’t bribe C. So: B: 98 C: 0 D: 1 E: 1 B, D, and E vote Yes ⇒ proposal accepted. 5 Pirates (A, B, C, D, E): A needs 3 votes in total to survive. If A dies: From above: B: 98 C: 0 D: 1 E: 1 So A must bribe those who would get 0 otherwise: C and E. D gets 1 ⇒ needs 2 to switch. A offers: C: 1 E: 2 (better than 1) A keeps 97. Votes: A, C, E vote Yes ⇒ accepted. ✅ Final Distribution: A (highest): 97 B: 0 C: 1 D: 0 E: 2 Each pirate acts in pure self-interest, assuming all others do as well.
August 4, 2025 at 11:08 AM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Now thinking of this exchange (from a Torchwood fanfic of all things)
“I’m going to find a bi pride flag and drape myself in it. And then go paint my face pink, purple and blue until someone gets the bloody point.” “And if some little girl comes up to you and says ‘that’s a nice mermaid Cosplay miss?” “Then I’m throwing myself into the bloody bay.” “Wouldn’t dissuade the mermaid comment—well until you drown.”
July 26, 2025 at 12:51 AM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Remembering this a friend said on the LP merging into the DPP in 2019
When I asked ██████████████, a scholar of Japanese politics, about Ozawa, ███████ explained to me that Ozawa was possibly the single most hated man in Japan, that he has basically managed to betray everyone at some point, was as shameless an opportunist as one could get when it comes to policy, corrupt in the way only an old disciple of Tanaka Kakuei could be corrupt, and that he was now isolated, deeply distrusted, and his party basically consisted of the remains of his old koenkai up in Iwate.
July 20, 2025 at 10:47 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
I was rather amused when I came across this from Lord Auckland in the Hansard complaining about the new thing of political bubbles in, er, 1960
There is an old French saying, "Chacun à son goût", and far be it from me to criticise people who take an interest in the affairs of their favourite football team. But it seems to me to be rather unreasonable to cast on the Press the whole of the blame for the fact that people are not more conversant with foreign affairs. Of course various newspapers have various political biases. If you read the Daily Herald, you get the Labour Party's point of view. I read Reynold's News. I often disagree with it, but I find it, in its way, a stimulating paper. I greatly miss one of their most famous correspondents by the name of Yaffle. I used to read him quite regularly. I believe that a lot of the trouble to-day is that people are politically intolerant. Because they are Conservative, they must read the Daily Mail or they must read the Daily Telegraph, and they must not read the Daily Herald. People who are Socialists say, "Oh, the Daily Mail is a wicked Tory paper", just as Tories say that the Daily Herald is a wicked Socialist paper. There is far too much of that attitude about. I do not think one can blame the Press for that—certainly not entirely.
July 3, 2025 at 4:07 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Great for @unisontheunion.bsky.social to hear from @nicklowles.bsky.social of @hopenothate.org.uk on Reform UK at #ulgc25
Lowles on screen for UNISON Local Government Conference talking about needing as an antiracism organisation to sometimes come in talking about other issues
June 15, 2025 at 3:59 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Anyway my top 10
Poland 12 Estonia 10 Latvia 8 Armenia 7 Switzerland 6 Germany 5 Luxembourg 4 Sweden 3 Israel 2 Iceland 1
May 17, 2025 at 10:26 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
www.markpack.org.uk/107255/polit...
_DON'T LET YOURSELF BE TRICKED_ A disgraceful plot is being perpetrated in an attempt to mislead Conservatives in Bexley. A man called James Robert Lambert has changed his name by deed poll to EDWARD HEATH and has had himself nominated as a candidate against the *REAL* Edward Heath, leader of the Conservative Party. Further, he has the effrontery to describe himself as "Conservative" although he had no official connection what-soever with the Conservative Party */Take care when you vote*/ There will be two HEATH names on the ballot paper, but the *REAL* Edward Heath will be shown as *HEATH EDWARD RICHARD GEORGE Leader of the Conservative Part* (Shown ballot paper style) and will be the *_bottom_* name on the list Heed this warning (white on blue background, reversing previous)
March 23, 2025 at 11:15 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
I think this is one of the best articulations I've seen of this point, which for whatever reason people seem particularly desperate to ignore lately
As Midge Decter famously said, at a certain point you have to join the side that you are on. It’s a good maxim for political analysis, either of yourself or of others. Man cannot live on caveats alone: you are what you do and say and you support who you profess support for.
February 16, 2025 at 12:03 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Hmm, interesting. I guess somewhere I know something about the political system and what changes seem feasible and where they seem to have space to bed in would interest most but I don't have major links to any non-UK countries so seems kinda arrogant to say "I should run South Africa" or wherever?
NGL: You get to be head of government of any country that isn't the UK. Which one do you choose?
January 18, 2025 at 9:32 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Alright, nothing's gone too badly wrong, had some good times and sorted a few things out
NGL: How's your year going so far?
January 18, 2025 at 9:32 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
A lot but @alunephraim.bsky.social, @goldwagnathan.bsky.social, @fakegreekgrill.bsky.social, @lines.snail.skin @ralucahippie.bsky.social, @cjterry.bsky.social @nathanwylabour.bsky.social and @mconcagh.bsky.social sprung to mind first
NGL:Which Bsky accounts do you follow that you think are underrated?
January 18, 2025 at 9:14 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Anyway I helped run what I thought was a fairly basic aspec awareness workshop two weeks ago and now I'm thinking of this meme
XKCD 2501: How could anyone consider themselves a well-rounded adult without a basic understanding of silicate geochemistry? Silicates are everywhere! It's hard to throw a rock without throwing one!
December 14, 2024 at 6:46 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
I still love this description of the CERES-Rocard faction fight by Hanley
At times it was reminiscent of the later stages of the fight between two heavyweights, with the punches becoming cruder and more wayward, under the eyes of a referee (Mitterand) who favoured first one contestant, then the other, before walking off with the prize money
December 4, 2024 at 9:28 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Great for @youngunison.bsky.social to hear from Becky Gittins MP about her experiences as a young trade unionist at #uymc24
November 30, 2024 at 11:26 AM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
An example nearer to hand is the Soviet film Chapaiev, which has been shown a number of times in London. Technically, by the standards of the time when it was made, Chapaiev is a first-rate film, but mentally, in spite of the unfamiliar Russian background, it is not so very remote from Hollywood. The one thing that lifts it out of the ordinary is the remarkable performance by the actor who takes the part of the White officer (the fat one) — a performance which looks very like an inspired piece of gagging. Otherwise the atmosphere is familiar. All the usual paraphernalia is there — heroic fight against odds, escape at the last moment, shots of galloping horses, love interest, comic relief. The film is in fact a fairly ordinary one, except that its tendency is ‘left’. In a Hollywood film of the Russian Civil War the Whites would probably be angels and the Reds demons. In the Russian version the Reds are angels and the Whites demons. That is also a lie, but, taking the long view, it is a less pernicious lie than the other. Here several difficult problems present themselves. Their general nature is obvious enough, and I do not want to discuss them. I am merely pointing to the fact that, in England, popular imaginative literature is a field that left-wing thought has never begun to enter. All fiction from the novels in the mushroom libraries downwards is censored in the interests of the ruling class. And boys' fiction above all, the blood-and-thunder stuff which nearly every boy devours at some time or other, is sodden in the worst illusions of 1910. The fact is only unimportant if one believes that what is read in childhood leaves no impression behind. Lord Camrose and his colleagues evidently believe nothing of the kind, and, after all, Lord Camrose ought to know.
November 28, 2024 at 8:55 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Highbrow literature apart, the whole of the existing left-wing Press, in so far as it is at all vigorously ‘left’, is one long tract. The one Socialist paper in England which could live a week on its merits as a paper is the Daily Herald: and how much Socialism is there in the Daily Herald? At this moment, therefore, a paper with a ‘left’ slant and at the same time likely to have an appeal to ordinary boys in their teens is something almost beyond hoping for. But it does not follow that it is impossible. There is no clear reason why every adventure story should necessarily be mixed up with snobbishness and gutter patriotism. For, after all, the stories in the Hotspur and the Modern Boy are not Conservative tracts; they are merely adventure stories with a Conservative bias. It is fairly easy to imagine the process being reversed. It is possible, for instance, to imagine a paper as thrilling and lively as the Hotspur, but with subject-matter and ‘ideology’ a little more up to date. It is even possible (though this raises other difficulties) to imagine a women's paper at the same literary level as the Oracle, dealing in approximately the same kind of story, but taking rather more account of the realities of working-class life. Such things have been done before, though not in England. In the last years of the Spanish monarchy there was a large output in Spain of left-wing novelettes, some of them evidently of anarchist origin. Unfortunately at the time when they were appearing I did not see their social significance, and I lost the collection of them that I had, but no doubt copies would still be procurable. In get-up and style of story they were very similar to the English fourpcnny novelette, except that their inspiration was ‘left’. If, for instance, a story described police pursuing anarchists through the mountains, it would be from the point of view of the anarchist and not of the police.
November 28, 2024 at 8:55 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Considering who owns these papers, it is difficult to believe that this is un-intentional. Of the twelve papers I have been discussing (i.e. twelve including the Thriller and Detective Weekly) seven are the property of the Amalgamated Press, which is one of the biggest press-combines in the world and controls more than a hundred different papers. The Gem and Magnet, therefore, are closely linked up with the Daily Telegraph and the Financial Times. This in itself would be enough to rouse certain suspicions, even if it were not obvious that the stories in the boys' weeklies are politically vetted. So it appears that if you feel the need of a fantasy-life in which you travel to Mars and fight lions bare-handed (and what boy doesn't?), you can only have it by delivering yourself over, mentally, to people like Lord Camrose. For there is no competition. Throughout the whole of this run of papers the differences are negligible, and on this level no others exist. This raises the question, why is there no such thing as a left-wing boys' paper? At first glance such an idea merely makes one slightly sick. It is so horribly easy to imagine what a left-wing boys' paper would be like, if it existed. I remember in 1920 or 1921 some optimistic person handing round Communist tracts among a crowd of public-school boys. The tract I received was of the question-and-answer kind: Q,. ‘Can a Boy Communist be a Boy Scout, Comrade?’ A. ‘No, Comrade.’ Q,. ‘Why, Comrade?’ A. ‘Because, Comrade, a Boy Scout must salute the Union Jack, which is the symbol of tyranny and oppression.’ Etc., etc. Now suppose that at this moment somebody started a left-wing paper deliberately aimed at boys of twelve or fourteen. I do not suggest that the whole of its contents would be exactly like the tract I have quoted above, but does anyone doubt that they would be something like it?
November 28, 2024 at 8:55 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Reminded of this by some of the recent discourse on a "left-wing Rogan"
(George Orwell's essay "Boys' Weeklies)
Of course no one in his senses would want to turn the so-called penny dreadful into a realistic novel or a Socialist tract. An adventure story must of its nature be more or less remote from real life. But, as I have tried to make clear, the unreality of the Wizard and the Gem is not so artless as it looks. These papers exist because of a specialized demand, because boys at certain ages find it necessary to read about Martians, death-rays, grizzly bears and gangsters. They get what they are looking for, but they get it wrapped up in the illusions which their future employers think suitable for them. To what extent people draw their ideas from fiction is disputable. Personally I believe that most people are influenced far more than they would care to admit by novels, serial stories, films and so forth, and that from this point of view the worst books are often the most important, because they are usually the ones that are read earliest in life. It is probable that many people who would consider themselves extremely sophisticated and ‘advanced’ are actually carrying through life an imaginative background which they acquired in childhood from (for instance) Sapper and lan Hay. If that is so, the boys' twopenny weeklies are of the deepest importance. Here is the stuff that is read somewhere between the ages of twelve and eighteen by a very large proportion, perhaps an actual majority, of English boys, including many who will never read anything else except newspapers; and along with it they are absorbing a set of beliefs which would be regarded as hopelessly out of date in the Central Office of the Conservative Party. All the better because it is done indirectly, there is being pumped into them the conviction that the major problems of our time do not exist, that there is nothing wrong with laissez-faire capitalism, that foreigners are un-important comics and that the British Empire is a sort of charity-concern which will last for ever.
November 28, 2024 at 8:55 PM
owenwmichael.bsky.social
Lisa Nandy!
Culture Secretary delivering second keynote
November 23, 2024 at 11:53 AM