The question of whether Benjamin Netanyahu is merely taking cynical advantage of the global far right/MAGA populist tendency, or is himself an integral part of it, is ultimately both uninteresting and irrelevant. The practical upshot is identical: as long as he's in charge, Israel is a malign actor.

This has really tugged my heartstrings, because "carried on I think for a bit" is just SUCH a South Wales way of putting it. Like "I'll be there now in a minute". I've spent years of my life around people who talk like that.

If you value Israel's continued existence as a secular, liberal democracy, the Haredim (or "ultra-Orthodox") might be a greater long-term threat than even Hamas. Just like Islamic fundamentalists, they are utterly convinced they're doing God's will, and their political influence is far from trivial.

"As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect. Then he turned to look at his beautiful gigantic insect wife, still asleep next to him, and thought, 'wow, I'm one lucky gigantic insect.'" [Artwork by Hiyu Catoru.]

As per the ancient "like other people, only more so" rule, I'm not the least bit surprised that a Jewish man like Gad Saad willingly posts racist material all day. What DOES surprise me is how the Saads of the world apparently ALWAYS fail to anticipate that white supremacists are ALWAYS antisemites.

Did you know? If you're capable of holding two current events in your head at the same time, you can earn a mint as the Telegraph's much sought-after editorial cartoonist. You don't even need to be any good at drawing! NAILED IT again, boss.

🎶Hamas to the left of me Nazis to the right Here I am Stuck in the middle with Jews🎶

The unstoppable spread of AI "art" has been a real blackpill for me, perhaps more than any other horrible development of the last decade. What it's taught me is that a critical mass of humanity, or even a majority, simply DO NOT GIVE A FUCK. They will quickly, gleefully learn to love ANY. OLD. SHIT.

OK, this shit is starting to seriously freak me out. I'm not hugely interested in whether AI can, strictly speaking, accurately replicate human intelligence. But, starting from early outcomes like this, it's not at all hard to imagine something truly catastrophic unfolding. Are we prepared for that?

A gravedigger and his family, 1962. We think of the 1960s as basically the modern day, but millions of British people still lived like this. Gravediggers were probably paid quite well, too, compared to other manual workers. This is the reality behind the "corned beef of my childhood" nostalgia slop.

"Nothing then like a children's park." What the everliving fuck is this deranged simpleton talking about? Kids' playgrounds weren't invented by loony left social workers in 1988. If this *wasn't* written by a swivel-eyed twentysomething fascist in a blazer, I'll eat any three hats you care to name.

TL;DR: Nazi woman who says Nazi things is very upset by being called a Nazi.

A friend of mine was in a local arts centre with his little boy, who opened up a board game, and this fell out. I've never felt so bad about laughing my head off.

Most of you probably know that Michael McKean, Chuck in Better Call Saul, also starred as David St. Hubbins in This Is Spinal Tap. But did you know he played an evil clown in a 1996 episode of Star Trek: Voyager? It's much, much better than that makes it sound. In fact, he knocks it out of the park.

Neo-reactionaries must explain away the fact that the overwhelming majority of human beings in the West have embraced Enlightenment values, which means they need scapegoats. They often find them in Jews, and people of colour, but clearly their preferred solution is to blame women, aka their mothers.

Just watched The Sheep Detectives (free on Amazon Prime). What an absolute delight, can't recommend it strongly enough. It has much in common with the Paddington movies, taking place in a whimsical, wholesome and diverse parallel Britain, full of beguiling anachronisms. We need more films like this.

I'm tickled by the "perfectly mixed", here. As though there's some proprietary technique to making a whiskey and coke, beyond just... pouring them both into the same container.

There's something almost refreshing about "Free Palestine" advocates openly embracing *literally* Nazi antisemitism in this manner, given the murky web of semi-deniability these people generally operate in. "[W]ho were Zionists even though they said they were not" is a particularly Kafkaesque touch.

This video of former Australian prime minister Paul Keating, laying into Pauline Hanson, who was and is their equivalent to Nigel Farage, is thirty years old. When was the last time you heard any prominent left-of-centre politician, anywhere, offer such a muscular defence of multicultural democracy?

Just had a bit of a rant on Facebook, which, to save time, I've decided to screenshot instead of pasting it into a thread. I can't be the only one who feels this way, surely?

This "poem", which is yet again doing the rounds on Facebook, will one day, I'm certain, be studied as a key cultural artefact of our time. There's no more perfect encapsulation of how reactionary social views come clothed as innocent nostalgia, a defining phenomenon of early 21st century Discourse.

I honestly think that breeding dogs - the animal we claim to love more than any other in the world - into shapes so extreme, they can barely breathe unaided, will one day be seen as an inexplicable cruelty of our time, as we now look upon e.g. cockfighting or bear-baiting. The poor bloody creatures.

Just learned a top-grade bit of trivia: Rebecca Front's father designed the title-logo on the cover of the Beatles' Rubber Soul. Precisely the sort of factoid that makes my day; thanks, universe.

Westminster reacts to Burnham's purge of Starmer supporters.

This might be the sweetest thing I've ever seen. What a lovely kid, and a lovely dad.

If you've been to Dublin, you may have seen the statue of Molly Malone, heroine of the famous folk ditty. It depicts her with a large, overflowing bosom, an artistic choice that has attracted some criticism. Anyway, during a late night Wikipedia session, I came across this FANTASTIC rationalization.

These horrible, quasi-sacrilegious objects will soon acquire the same morbid kitsch appeal as memorabilia of Edward VIII's coronation, which never happened. The main difference being: as Trumpian as Edward was, in many ways, he at least kept his Nazi sympathies mainly confined to the private sphere.

There's always universal praise, when a big name dies. But I think you can tell when people are just going through the motions, and when it comes from the heart, and the reaction to Sam Neill's death belongs firmly in the latter category. He really does seem to have brightened an awful lot of lives.

This is why I have (marginally) more respect for David Icke than for other conspiracy theorists. If you're going to have an utterly insane belief system, why stop at sinister cabals? Why not go all the way, and say all of reality is a simulation projected from the Moon by aliens? That's commitment.

I also strongly recommend one of Neill's later films, 2016's Hunt for the Wilderpeople, in which his character couldn't be further from his role in The Dish. Between them, the two movies capture his exceptional range. Wilderpeople is also a fascinating, all too rare insight into New Zealand culture.