- February Half Term 2025 -
No new post this week as it’s half term and I’m mostly sleeping, watching movies, reading, or catching up on Eastenders for the 40th anniversary. See you next week and, until then, you can always check out the archives…
204. START THINKING THE UNTHINKABLE - Time to Name Trump For What He Is
Read More“humanity routinely ignores the evidence of their eyes to make the common, everyday, standard oppressions and violences that are going on to people other than themselves ‘inconceivable’“
203. IN THE DARK - Medicine, Epistemology and Economics
Read More“I wonder if the economics of medicine are too-often overlooked, even in countries with a decent free public healthcare system. I wonder how many people have lived or died because of investigations presenting as questions of epistemology - how can we possibly know what is going on in this body? - which are actually questions of finance - can we justify the expenditure it would take to find out?“
202. PROGRESSING EVER BACKWARDS - Why This World and Not Another?
Read More“Trump is a symptom, not the sickness itself. There are other possible worlds where his overt peddling of misinformation and self-evident unfitness for office were immediate disqualifiers for an informed voting public. Where his allusions to Nazism and explicit fascistic authoritarianism were repulsive to us instead of something which won him votes. Where the intention disrupting of democratic institutions and surrounding himself with an oligarchy of tech billionaires rang alarm bells instead of raised cheers of support. That we do not live in one of those worlds should be the thing we ask the most questions about.“
201. THE FORBIDDEN BEAT - Should I Stop Listening to Marilyn Manson?
Read More“Manson always was a symptom and not a cause of the social sickness he personified. Watching the documentary this week simply reminded me that the world which created him continues to fail to confront the true causes of its sickness, and points the finger at individuals we can demonise instead of looking in the mirror and asking why such demons continue to exist.“
200. WHAT ARE WE DOING TO OURSELVES? - Ethical Digital Hygiene
Read More“why do I get news headlines sent to my phone?“
- CHRISTMAS BREAK 2024 -
It’s Christmas. No new posts until January 2025. See you in the new year!
199. DOES SANTA EXIST? - A Christmas Inquiry
Read More“I pointed out that while their ‘evidence’ certainly seemed to point to the idea that none of them were being given gifts from Santa - at least not on the Christmases in question - it did not completely remove the possibility that Santa Claus might still exist…“
- No Post Today -
Sorry guys - been absolutely swamped this week, and ill, and so took the sanity-saving decision not to bosh out a PU just to meet my own deadline. I hope to post something later in the week though…
198. NOT DEALING WITH TRAUMA - Why We Need to do Some Work Before Returning to Normal
Read More“And now normal is what happens when we live so long in denial about our generational wounds that they fester and metastasise into something ugly and, possibly, untreatable.”
197. ASSISTED DYING - A Reasonable Adjustment to Make
Read More“one could even call it a ‘reasonable adjustment’ to ensure one’s universal ability to end one’s own life is not unfairly denied to people just because of a physical disability (a protected characteristic under UK law). Not allowing assisted suicide is discriminatory to those of us without the physical capability for killing ourselves.“
196. ARGUMENTS DON'T WORK - And I Won't Be Able to Convince You
Read More“I have been thinking about arguments. And the more I do, the more I think they don’t actually convince anyone of anything.“
195. RECKONING WITH THE ELECTION - Reflections on a Soul-Crushing Week
Read More“Either I’d got Trump wrong, or I’d got the morality of my fellow citizens wrong? And neither explanation was particularly comforting.“
194. SHOULD THE STATE CARE ABOUT PRIVATE SCHOOLS? - On the Meaning of Independence
Read More“the conversation around VAT on independent schools being a conversation purely based around money, costs and affordability, instead of it being a serious public conversation around education and what a good education should look like is a conversation that fails to address what really ails the current state school system and what the advantages of going to, or working in, the independent sector actually are. “
- OCTOBER HALF TERM 2024 -
Now I’m back to regular weekly posting again that also means regular breaks when school is not in session. So October half term means there’s no new PU this week. Enjoy scaring yourself with some Halloween fun or, if that’s not your thing, you can always check out our archives.
See you next week…
193. THE WRONG CHOICE - Why Voting for Trump is More Than Just A Choice I Disagree With
Read More“Sometimes, when given a completely free choice, to choose any other way but one can be so self-sabotaging that there really is no choice at all. The 2024 US election is one such case. Whoever wins, we lose, but if Trump wins, what we lose is so significant we may never be able to win again.“
192. BAND PRAXIS - Punk and the Anarchist Squint
Band Praxis - Punk and the Anarchist Squint by DaN McKee (taken from The Anarchism and Punk Book Project’s Book 2 - DIY or Die: Do it Yourself, Do it Together & Punk Anarchism)
Read MoreBLACK HISTORY MONTH HISTORY ON PU
Read More"No new post this week. Instead, I thought it might be worth flagging several PU posts I’ve written from our archives inspired by, or relevant to, Black History Month which we celebrate here in the UK during October..."
191. WRESTLING WITH DONALD TRUMP - Why We Ignore The Wrestling Connection at Our Peril
Read More"Trump is undoubtedly a monster. Trump is a massive threat to the kind of democracy that all Americans should hold dear. But he is using the playbook of professional wrestling to win the White House once again and is therefore a monster we are responsible for keeping alive so long as we continue to not take the influence of professional wrestling on politics seriously."
190. TWO STUDENTS, BOTH ALIKE IN DIGNITY - On The Illusion of Individual Exam Success
Read More"Does a grade truly reflect the work and ability of a student, or is it merely a result of a context and circumstance over which the student is powerless?"