So frustrating that no one talks about the psychology when this is all entirely about psychology. The geopolitical ‘tactics’ are driven by pathological narcissism, which no one in media or podcast land seems to be able to identify as the primary driver for all this 💩
![[We see a close up of a young white male, tanned, white teeth, coiffed hair clearly an influencer on social media. It is an image such as you see when social media posts are shown on the news. In the corner of the screen is named a location: DUBAI. He is staring slightly off-camera for several silent panels of the comic strip. His eyes move slightly. He is having a thought.]
From off-screen a newsreader’s commentary comes:
NEWSREADER:
Extraordinary images here
of an expat in Dubai
[The influencer’s eybrows raise slightly]
…Having their first ever geopolitical thought.
[CUT TO a BBC news scene. The BBC newsreader CLIVE MYRIE is talking to an interviewee next to the screen showing the social media influencer’s face. The interviewee’s name is David Jones].
CLIVE MYRIE:
To explain the significance of this moment we’re joined by David Jones, our Expat Thoughts correspondent
DAVID JONES:
Clive, this is momentous
It was caught on film at the end of an Instagram post titled: ‘Dubai Is Brilliant’.
[Pointing at the screen, the influencer’s expression still the same]
You can clearly see in the eyebrows here, the dawning realisation that there *might* be something in the world beyond his dickhead self.
It marks a *huge* departure from all the Dubai Expat’s previous thoughts.
CLIVE MYRIE:
Which are…?
DAVID JONES:
You've Got To Get Yourself Out Here Mate, Everything Is So Clean, I Don't Have To Pay Taxes,
I Am Incurious As To Why I Do Not Have To Pay Taxes, and Spa.
CLIVE MYRIE:
And might we see an expansion of these new Thoughts in coming days?
DAVID JONES:
I think we can expect to see:
“I Deserve To Be Airlifted By A Country I Pay No Tax To”
CLIVE MYRIE:
Mmm.
[Ends]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:4m3we4apbjayclzcnhwe3pfp/bafkreibu6vuc7ofetq5hla3gfcknocotbfl3yk2ajczk6qfd2hnjxrav6q)
[We see a close up of a young white male, tanned, white teeth, coiffed hair clearly an influencer on social media. It is an image such as you see when social media posts are shown on the news. In the corner of the screen is named a location: DUBAI. He is staring slightly off-camera for several silent panels of the comic strip. His eyes move slightly. He is having a thought.] From off-screen a newsreader’s commentary comes: NEWSREADER: Extraordinary images here of an expat in Dubai [The influencer’s eybrows raise slightly] …Having their first ever geopolitical thought. [CUT TO a BBC news scene. The BBC newsreader CLIVE MYRIE is talking to an interviewee next to the screen showing the social media influencer’s face. The interviewee’s name is David Jones]. CLIVE MYRIE: To explain the significance of this moment we’re joined by David Jones, our Expat Thoughts correspondent DAVID JONES: Clive, this is momentous It was caught on film at the end of an Instagram post titled: ‘Dubai Is Brilliant’. [Pointing at the screen, the influencer’s expression still the same] You can clearly see in the eyebrows here, the dawning realisation that there *might* be something in the world beyond his dickhead self. It marks a *huge* departure from all the Dubai Expat’s previous thoughts. CLIVE MYRIE: Which are…? DAVID JONES: You've Got To Get Yourself Out Here Mate, Everything Is So Clean, I Don't Have To Pay Taxes, I Am Incurious As To Why I Do Not Have To Pay Taxes, and Spa. CLIVE MYRIE: And might we see an expansion of these new Thoughts in coming days? DAVID JONES: I think we can expect to see: “I Deserve To Be Airlifted By A Country I Pay No Tax To” CLIVE MYRIE: Mmm. [Ends]
As oil and gas companies see rocketing revenues, and more people face job insecurity, now is the time for the government to end tax breaks for fossil fuel companies, and support oil and gas workers into green jobs instead.
Sign my petition here👇
you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/en...
New study of media collision reporting from @patrickrerat.bsky.social
"Cyclists are placed at the center of the narrative, while motorists are either omitted or reduced to their vehicles... Making these biases visible is essential for challenging motonormativity"
findingspress.org/article/1575...
Kingfisher in the catkins. River Kelvin, Glasgow. #birds
Cue the Billy Nomates song with the line ‘who goes in on a Friday’ youtu.be/FsQSKt46iVI?...
We really should be asking ourselves why one rich twat’s racist opinion can become headline news in this country
While the perspectives of thousands of volunteers welcoming migrants in their communities & mixed migrant/British families are never heard?
"If Mandelson's links to Jeffrey Epstein disqualifies him from holding power, why does the company controlled by Epstein's business partner and co-owner retain access to the UK's most sensitive national security infrastructure?"
Peter Thiel. Jeffrey Epstein. Palantir. The UK Government.
The Argyle Street Ash Tree in Glasgow is in the running to be voted European Tree of the Year for 2026. If you're a fan of this tree, you can vote for it at www.treeoftheyear.org/vote/argyle-....
#glasgow #europeantreeoftheyear #tree #argylestreet #argylestreetashtree
A report out today from the Scottish Human Rights Commission calls for a programme of reparations for Scotland’s Gypsy Travellers subjected to decades of forced assimilation and on-going harm under policies known as the ‘Tinker Experiment’.
#humanrights
www.scottishhumanrights.com/news/call-fo...
NEW: Our investigation for @thenerve_news reveals not only that Peter Thiel’s Palantir is completely enmeshed in our critical national infrastructure.
It’s also the ‘cloud support’ for our nuclear weapons system 🤯
1/
www.thenerve.news/p/palantir-t...
An image of Woody Guthrie’s guitar with writing that says ‘this machine kills fascists’
A 77% increase in immigration raids, 83% increase in arrests, coupled with undermining modern slavery protections and a call to remove basic ECHR rights from migrants.
If you think what is happening with ICE in the US can't happen here I have a bridge to sell you. 1/
www.gov.uk/government/n...
In Days of Darkness Stuart A. Paterson “If these children need me in days of sunshine, how much more do they need me in days of darkness?” —Jane Haining You rose each day at 5 a.m. to go to market for their food, sliced your leather luggage into strips they’d use for soles on worn-out shoes, paid for everything on trips to beach or town, sewed clothes back into life for those in need of more than hand-me-downs, you, the second mother. Two days before your death, you wrote There is not much to report from here. There wouldn’t be, no excursions to arrange to forest or museum or picture house, no growing hands & fingernails to inspect, only memories of how you wept along with them when stitching yellow stars onto their uniforms, refused to leave for safety, stayed right to the very end for & alongside them, your girls. You lived & breathed your school motto, learning elevates, a missionary not just for church but life itself passed on from Lochenhead, Dumfries, Glasgow all the way to Budapest & into every small, attentive head you ever turned away from darker days toward the brightness of an opened book. Streets, stained glass windows, a commemorative cairn exist to honour you who saw mountains on the way not just to Heaven but to Auschwitz. And yet a little girl of ninety-seven is your true memorial, carries you as surely as you carried her into that sunshine, smiles still as she talks of times Miss Haining took the girls on woodland walks or to see the latest Judy Garland; tributes of smile, of breath, of memory that she paid for everything so they could live.
“If these children need me in days of sunshine,
how much more do they need me in days of darkness?”
—Jane Haining
“In Days of Darkness”, a poem by Stuart A. Paterson for #HolocaustMemorialDay #poem #poetry
www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/poem/days-da...
“On the dirt roads of Arkansas I first met Robert Burns…”
Currently on the BBC iPlayer: writer, poet, & activist Dr Maya Angelou goes on a pilgrimage to the home of Robert Burns (originally broadcast in 1996 to mark the bicentenary of Burns’s death)
#BurnsNight #C18
www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...
Solidarity with Minneapolis: stop ICE murders, no deportations. Monday 26 Jan 5.30pm Buchanan steps glasgow
🚨EMERGENCY PROTEST
Mon 26 Jan 5:30pm
📍Buchanan Steps, Glasgow
Yesterday ICE shot & killed Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse. People are rising up across the US in response. Stand in solidarity with them, against deportations everywhere & to fight Farage’s Trumpism in Britain
US Consulate in Edinburgh on Monday 26th Jan- Solidarity with Minneapolis.
Legally, it is not a strike because it isn’t from the strike region of France. It’s sparkling resistance
Sadly suppressing such a devastating report doesn’t make the risks go away - it just makes them even harder to deal with. Facing up to the truth is the first step to coping with it - it’s beyond scandalous that ministers tried to prevent this. They need to act - and fast
🚨 BREAKING 🚨
The UK Govt has quietly published - without announcement - the Joint Intelligence Committee/DEFRA report it suppressed last October. They tried to sneak it out in the midst of crisis. Read and share:
“Global Biodiversity Loss, Ecosystem Collapse & National Security.”
(link below)
Who is paying Nigel Farage while he’s meant to represent Clacton?
Where are the trees?
We have A LOT of this landscape and less than 4% native woodland. This should be a rich mosaic of habitats, moor, bog, woodland, montane scrub…We force it to remain in this artificial state. We don’t need to give every inch of our uplands over to sheep, grouse and deer stalking.
My NHS trust is using Palantir. I've just sent them the link to this article and asked how they are keeping me and my medical records safe from a company that does this. www.eff.org/deeplinks/20...
Hi Alex, have you found your way to a feed yet called ‘pro cycling chatter’ - just search for it in feeds if not
If you want to understand why the Ministry of Defence’s ‘strategic partnership’ with Palantir is so profoundly dangerous, please read my latest piece open.substack.com/pub/broligar...
go.bsky.app/J1WrWhr If you’re new here, I put together this starter pack around a year ago of arts and culture folk in Scotland. There are some really great accounts here. Give them a follow! #culture #arts #scotland
This is a good read. Cory Doctorow on how Trump Tariffs are actually an opportunity for the rest of the world to break the grip of US tech companies.
Say NO to Palantir in the UK.
Almost 8 years since I blew the whistle on an impenetrable UK political establishment, much of that time has been spent healing from the scale of the impact on both democracy and on me. Part of that healing, has been reclaiming my story. I hope to do some more here. substack.com/@shahmirsanni
