Society

Thursday

Melissa Kite

The end of an era: after 20 years we must move our horses off the farm

The letter arrived in a hand-addressed envelope, inside of which was a handwritten note. After everything we have been through, we were expecting something typed, from a solicitor. It began by politely thanking us for looking after the land so well. But in the next paragraph, the landowner attempted to serve us three weeks’ notice to move our horses, claiming that was all she needed to give. We texted her immediately to say our lease states three months. She replied later to say three weeks had been a mistake, she meant three months. She tried to make light of it. But we already know we are losing our smallholding because

Jeremy Clarke

How I love England — despite the hellhole that is Gatwick airport

At Gatwick airport, after an hour and 15 minutes in a snaking queue system apparently purposely designed to infect as many as possible with Covid-19, and our three bladders inflated like party balloons, we finally presented ourselves before an available passport control officer. Early fifties, hatless, bald and recruited from the working class, he was the first English person on English soil I’d spoken to for 18 months. I formed the impression of a man who liked a drink. ‘And these two are?’ he said. ‘My grandsons,’ I said, looking at them besottedly in spite of us having lived together in insupportable heat for a week. ‘And you’ve come from

Wednesday

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

Vaccine efficacy and the case for living with the virus

How fast does Covid vaccine protection wear off? New data from the Zoe Covid Study, published today, tries to quantify the extent to which the Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines wane over time. It’s a comprehensive study that accounts for PCR test data from over a million double-jabbed people. The results? After roughly six months, Pfizer protection against symptomatic illness fell from 88 per cent to 74 per cent. For AstraZeneca, it was a dip from 77 to 67 per cent after around five months. It’s important to note what, specifically, this study is measuring. It is a look at infections, not serious illness. In this sense, today’s study isn’t a

The Spectator

2518: Make a run for it? – solution

As suggested by 11A, other unclued lights were all anagrams of ducks: 12A drake; 16A teal; 28A redhead; 31A smew;  39A widgeon; 40A poker; 10D scoter; 20D shoveller. First prize Tom Shaw, Clevedon, Somerset Runners-up Sebastian Robinson, Glasgow, John Pugh, Ely, Cardiff

Tuesday

Ian Acheson Ian Acheson

Why are armed men still able to parade around Northern Ireland?

Is the Police Service of Northern Ireland equal to the task of dealing with the sour, indigestible remnants of Troubles paramilitarism? Events this weekend in an estate on the outskirts of Derry, showing yet more glorification of a terrorist by armed men firing weapons, suggests otherwise. Michael Devine, the man who was venerated by half a dozen goons dressed in black this weekend, starved himself to death in Northern Ireland’s notorious Maze prison in 1981 along with nine other republican prisoners in pursuit of political status. He was also a founder of the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA), one of the most viciously and overtly sectarian paramilitary death squads produced

Ferdie Rous

Cambridge, ‘whiteness’ and the politicisation of Classics

In Cambridge University’s latest push to right the wrongs of history, its Museum of Classical Archaeology will add some signage to explain the ‘whiteness’ of its collection of Greek and Roman statues. The Classics faculty, of which the museum is part, has taken this great and noble mission upon itself in response to an open letter signed by dozens of students, alumni and academics — including the chair of the Classics faculty itself. The letter calls for ‘an acknowledgement of the existence of systemic racism within Classics’ and argues that the white plaster casts of Classical statues give a ‘misleading impression’ of an ‘absence of diversity’ in the ancient world.

Monday

Ben Kelly

Can facial recognition be stopped?

In recent years, facial recognition technology has been introduced into our lives in various benign ways. The ease of using it to unlock our phones, make purchases, replace passwords, and manage our digital wallets is irresistible. Before long, perhaps, it will be integrated into our ‘smart’ homes, shops and airports, and available on all our devices. Unfortunately, our love of convenience may be distracting us from the fact that facial recognition technology is the most sinister and uniquely dangerous surveillance mechanism yet invented. As it increasingly plays a central role in our lives, we are being lulled into accepting its use by the police. And if it is not resisted now, it will

Tom Slater Tom Slater

The policing of ‘non-crimes’ and the dark side of rainbow cars

The great awokening of the British constabulary has got to be the most curious and infuriating part of our culture war. While knife crime continues to rise, an inordinate amount of police time now seems to be taken up by various virtue-signalling initiatives. Take the rise of ‘rainbow cars’. For some time now members of the public have been bemused to see cop cars patrolling their neighbourhoods emblazoned in the LGBT flag. Now the LGBT+ lead of the National Police Chiefs Council has felt the need to make an Instagram post explaining it all to us. In the video, deputy chief constable Julie Cooke — complete with rainbow lanyard and miniature

Sunday

Hannah Barratt

How the gender debate is dividing Germany

Pronoun politics can be something of a minefield. But if you think the gender debate is confusing, spare a thought for our German cousins. The quirks of the language make it hard to avoid causing offence, even for those determined to tread carefully. German, as with French and Spanish, has different noun endings for masculine and feminine words. For example, eine Ärztin specifically refers to a female doctor and ein Arzt to a male doctor. The masculine form is used most frequently and as a sort of gender catch-all. And it’s here that the issue arises. The language has, to be fair, adapted to cater for modern sensitivities. In modern

Saturday

Steerpike Steerpike

Prince Harry’s eco-warrior credentials take another hit

Life seems to be going well for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex after they officially split from the royal family and swanned off to sunny California. The couple have managed to bag an exclusive Netflix contract, reportedly worth millions, a new book deal, and have a snazzy charitable foundation which aims to ‘unleash the power of compassion to drive systemic cultural change.’ The pair have also been at the forefront of the charge to tackle climate change. In May Harry suggested that the climate was one of the two ‘most pressing issues’ facing the world (along with mental health, of course) and last year lamented that we couldn’t leave

Julie Bindel

Why is anyone still defending OnlyFans?

Starting in October, OnlyFans, which has 130 million users, two million contributors and billions in revenue will ban its creators from posting pornographic material on its site, which many sex workers use to sell explicit content. Nude photos and videos will still be permitted provided they are consistent with OnlyFans’ policy, the company has announced. As soon as the announcement was made, the narrative quickly focused on how unfair and discriminatory this move was, with many saying that the victims of the ban would be ‘sex workers’. The BBC suggested the porn ban would be a ‘“kick in the teeth” for creators’. And one commentator argued, ‘OnlyFans grew off the back

Thursday

Ross Clark Ross Clark

How are the vaccines affected by the Delta variant?

Has the emergence of the Delta, or Indian, variant reduced the effectiveness of Covid vaccines and if so by how much? The fear that the Delta variant might be partially escaping our vaccines has often been expressed in recent weeks, especially given that highly-vaccinated countries such as Israel and parts of the US have suffered new peaks of infection since the Delta variant came to dominate. But there has been a lack of real-world data to prove whether or not there is any grounding to these fears. Today, however, the Oxford University Covid 19 Infection Survey published a study which seeks to answer this question. It compared the results of

Nicholas Farrell

Churchill did admire Mussolini

In his ruthless demolition of Geoffrey Wheatcroft’s new Churchill biography in last week’s Spectator, the historian Andrew Roberts pours scorn on the ‘insinuation that Churchill had fascist leanings in the 1920s’ as it is not supported by ‘any actual evidence (for there is none)’. Well, however justified his hatchet job of Wheatcroft’s book is in general, Roberts is deeply mistaken about Churchill and fascism. Like so many in the 1920s and well into the 1930s, from all sides of the political divide, Churchill was a fervent admirer of the former revolutionary socialist Benito Mussolini and the fascist movement which he founded in 1919. Fascism was a nationalist rather than internationalist

The Spectator

It’s time to end furlough – and let the British economy recover

At the start of this year, Britain looked as if it would be the first major country to vaccinate its way out of lockdown. Kate Bingham and her team had secured Britain a supply of effective jabs delivered at the fastest rate in Europe. This opportunity was then squandered as the government was swayed by advice from Sage advisers, who kept underestimating the vaccines’ effectiveness. Sage produced no fewer than nine scenarios for Covid hospital cases by mid-August, all of which have proved vast overestimates. The government’s reliance on such advice has come at a heavy cost. In America, where most states lifted lockdown restrictions months before Britain, the economy

David Cohen

170,000 people go missing every year in Britain – my father was one of them

A couple of Southern Hemisphere summers ago, in January 2019, I was at the Michael Fowler Centre in Wellington, New Zealand. It was an unseasonably chilly evening as I sat listening to an emotional solo piano performance by Nick Cave. He sang a rendition of Leonard Cohen’s ‘Avalanche’, a wonderfully gloomy piece of psychology set to music about the death of a father. This rather well-known Cohen track has particular significance for me. It always prompts thoughts of a slightly lesser-known L. Cohen, my own father, who had disappeared without trace 50 years earlier. Whatever became of him? Where did he end up? What might he have been doing at

Rod Liddle Rod Liddle

Lily Cole, the burka and why we were right to leave Afghanistan

I have the feeling that Joe Biden will have to wait a while before he receives his Nobel Peace Prize, the traditional gift bestowed upon an American president if he’s a Democrat and before he’s actually done anything. The civilised world — by which I mean the mass of deluded lefties and liberals who understand nothing but firmly believe that they are the civilised world — is aghast at the man right now. There is no doubt in my mind that the pullout of US troops from Afghanistan was atrociously handled by a doddering halfwit and based upon magnificently flawed intelligence. But there is even less doubt in my mind

Charles Moore Charles Moore

It is shabby of Biden to blame the Afghans

Q. Is a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan now inevitable? The President: No, it is not. Q. Why? The President: Because you — the Afghan troops have 300,000 well-equipped — as well-equipped as any army in the world — and an air force against something like 75,000 Taliban. It is not inevitable… Q. Do you trust handing over the country to the Taliban? The President: No, I do not trust the Taliban. Q. So why are you handing the country over…? The President: It’s a — it’s a silly question. Do I trust the Taliban? No. But I trust the capacity of the Afghan military, who is better trained, better equipped,

Robin Oakley

A great contest without the skulduggery of the past

Taking a day off racing to enjoy Joe Root’s regal 180 not out against India on the third day of the England-India Test — tranquillity interrupted only by a call from home to say that Flat-coated Retriever Damson had eaten the TV controller — I was struck by the amount of ‘gardening’ indulged in by batters. After any ball that has beaten them they stroll down the pitch, glare malevolently at an innocent patch of turf and prod back into inoffensive conformity the infinitesimal protrusion on the surface which they have assured themselves was responsible for the ball whipping past their hung-out bat. Excuse accepted. Mental confidence restored. Confidence is

Melissa Kite

I’m not ill but I’m not as I was: how Covid takes its toll

If it’s true that the virus finds your weak spot, it has lodged itself like an evil monkey in my head. After departing from every other bit of my body, it was still in my brain. It told me I didn’t need friends any more. So, as I moped about the house ‘self-isolating’, I sent a series of very odd text messages, telling my friends what the monkey thought I thought of them. The monkey also told me his theory that there is no such thing as long Covid. All Covid is long. I would never get over it: ‘Well, have the authorities bothered to conduct any research to find

Jeremy Clarke

A tale of many swimming pools

My two grandsons are staying with us here in Provence for a week. Roman soldier Catriona flew from Marseille to Stansted and back in a day to get them out. Oscar, aged 11, is a regular summer visitor and knows the ropes. Klynton, ten, is here for the first time. Klynton is what used to be described as ‘a bit slow’. At school he stays two years in the same class to everyone else’s one. He is a cheerful, polite lad with a phenomenal memory for football statistics. He can hardly dress himself but can tell you that last season Sadio Mané scored 11 goals with seven assists and is