Lois Heslop

Lois Heslop is a Spectator intern. She is studying physics at Oxford

Identity crisis

28 min listen

On the podcast: In his cover piece for the mag this week, political scientist, Yascha Mounk has written about why identity politics has polarised our understanding of race. And why the left has come to divide groups into oversimplified categories of ‘the oppressors’ and ‘the oppressed’.  Also this week:  Can we trust photographs to paint

The rise of WitchTok

Halloween might be over, but Witching Hour has accelerated on TikTok. #WitchTok (or Witch TikTok) is the viral take on spirituality – think Paganism, psychics, and seances in 60 second videos. The hashtag #WitchTok currently has over 20.7 billion views on the video app. In comparison, #Kardashian only has 6.4 billion, and #LoveIsland clocks up

Should Britain brace itself for a major flu outbreak this winter?

Could flu be a bigger problem than Covid this winter? Professor Anthony Harnden, the deputy chair of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, has warned that it might be, suggesting that the low prevalence of flu over recent months could come back to ‘bite us’ as the weather worsens. There are also fears that reduced

No fun, no sex, and Zoom: the misery of the Covid campus

Usually I can’t wait for the start of a new term at university. But not this year. When students return, the rules are clear: no fun, no sex, lots of screen time – and the same high fees.  A number of universities – including Cambridge – have said all lectures will be online-only until next

The strange world of sororities

Until very recently, the opaque world of American sororities was a mystery to me. I’m a British student at a British University, and these highly selective, members-only groups for American female students were about as foreign to me as guns sold at the supermarket. All of that changed when a hoard of long-haired, glossy-lipped girls at the University of Alabama started appearing