'A Simple Argument for the Existence of Viruses' by Sean Lloyd—guest blogger

For many readers, the title of this article might sound bizarre: why would the existence of viruses need proving? Yet there are many people who, bizarrely, do not believe viruses exist, and their voices are growing louder. This article is written for them.

When COVID first spread around the world, life changed almost overnight. Masking, social distancing, lockdowns—these all felt extreme at the time. But something unusual happened during those months: colds and the seasonal flu virtually disappeared. People stopped getting the usual sniffles, fevers and sore throats that come every winter. Then, as soon as restrictions eased and people began mixing normally again, these illnesses returned. It was almost as if the viruses had paused while the world stayed apart. This simple pattern raises an important question: if viruses don’t exist, how do you explain that?

This isn’t just anecdotal. Across many countries, hospitals reported record-low levels of flu, and everyday colds became far less common. When human interaction resumed, so did the illnesses, following a pattern that repeated globally. The logic is simple: less contact between people meant less illness; more contact meant more illness. That is exactly what you would expect if these illnesses are caused by something that spreads from person to person.

If viruses didn’t exist, you’d have to believe colds and flu are caused by internal processes, environmental factors, or some kind of general “toxicity”. But those factors didn’t suddenly disappear during lockdowns. And yet, illness rates did. When interactions returned to normal, illness rates rose again. The simplest explanation, the one that fits reality without adding extra assumptions, is that these illnesses involve something that passes from person to person—and that “something” is what we call viruses.

Some people argue that the pandemic was a hoax designed to control populations, to keep people fearful and to train them to accept other forthcoming restrictions in a “post-COVID world”. But if the goal was permanent control, why were restrictions lifted across the globe? Lockdowns ended, travel resumed, schools and workplaces reopened and social life returned to normal. To maintain the “total control” explanation, one would have to believe in a perfectly coordinated global plan to impose restrictions and then remove them, all while claiming it was for permanent population control. That seems far more complicated than a simple, observable reality: there was a real contagious illness, and measures were introduced (and later lifted) in response to it.

You don’t need a PhD in Virology to notice the pattern. For months, when people stopped mixing, colds and flu almost vanished. When people started mixing again, they returned. Restrictions were temporary, not permanent, illnesses followed human interaction and the world returned to normal. The explanation that fits these observations with the fewest assumptions is the one that makes the most sense: viruses are real, and respiratory illnesses like colds and flu are caused by them. Observing these patterns in your own life and community can be as persuasive as any scientific article.

Ed Davy is Correct

GB News CEO Angelos Frangopoulos is technically correct in his response to Ed Davey’s claim about the New World article: the article does not demonstrate that GB News has breached Ofcom rules. However, this is only because Ofcom appears to overlook its own impartiality standards in the case of GB News—which was precisely the point the article was making. Here is the article:

'Screen scandal: How Ofcom lets GB News get away with it' 

https://www.thenewworld.co.uk/alan-rusbridger-screen-scandal-how-gb-news-gets-away-with-it/

'Can Reform Survive the Demographic Shift?' by Ryan Soames—guest blogger

Reform’s prospects in the 2029 general election might face a significant challenge: demographics. A substantial portion of the party’s current support appears to come from older voters, particularly those in the 65-75 age range. While this group has been politically engaged and reliable at the ballot box, it is also, by definition, a shrinking constituency over time.

Elections are not only formed by ideas and campaigns, but by the composition of the electorate itself. As the years pass, natural demographic change alters that composition. Between now and 2029, many of Reform’s older voter base will inevitably be lost due to age. Unlike shifts caused by political persuasion, this is not something a party can easily counter through messaging or policy tweaks.

At the same time, younger voters—who tend to have different priorities, media habits and political identities—are gradually becoming a larger share of the electorate.

Therfore, these demographic headwinds alone could quietly erode Reform’s electoral chances before a single vote is cast.

‘How GB News Found More Profit in Provocation’ by Andrew Davies—guest blogger

When GB News launched in June 2021, it presented itself as a new entrant into Britain’s television news landscape. The channel promised to challenge what it saw as the perceived consensus of established broadcasters such as the BBC and Sky News, offering viewers what its founders described as a broader range of perspectives and a stronger emphasis on voices outside London. It was, in essence, pitched as a conservative-leaning but still recognisably journalistic alternative within the UK’s regulated broadcast environment.

In the early days the project had a veneer of seriousness thanks largely to veteran broadcaster Andrew Neil, who joined as chairman and lead presenter. Neil insisted the channel would respect the impartiality rules enforced by Ofcom, even while allowing presenters to express stronger views than were typical on British television.

Unfortunately for that plan, Neil departed only a few months after launch. Once he was gone, the channel seemed to discover its true calling: not sober journalism, but the far more lucrative art of “shouting at the television”.

The schedule gradually filled with presenter-led shows built around personalities rather than reporting. Populist right political figures and commentators such as Nigel Farage, Lee Anderson, Matthew Goodwin and Jacob Rees-Mogg appeared as hosts, delivering nightly monologues about "the state of the nation". News bulletins became secondary to opinion and commentary, while the need to produce clips that could spread online became increasingly central to the channel’s programming.

There were also practical reasons for this shift. Television news is expensive to produce. Investigative reporting, foreign bureaus and large editorial teams require substantial resources. For a new entrant such as GB News (already suffering significant financial losses in its early years) building a full-scale news operation capable of rivalling the reporting power of the BBC or Sky News proved impossible.

Talk-based programming built around strong personalities, by contrast, is far cheaper and far more adaptable to the digital media environment. Instead of trying to compete directly on reporting, the channel competed for attention. And attention, in the modern media landscape, tends to favour the loudest voices in the room.

In the age of social media, clips that provoke outrage, applause or controversy are far more likely to circulate widely online. A heated monologue or combative debate can travel far beyond the television audience, attracting millions of views on platforms such as YouTube or X. In this ecosystem, controversy can function as a marketing strategy.

Gradually, the channel’s identity shifted from a conservative news alternative toward something closer to the shock-jock tradition familiar from talk radio. Instead of competing primarily on reporting, it increasingly competed on provocation. Critics argue this has created a cycle in which outrage drives engagement, engagement drives visibility and visibility becomes essential for financial survival.

The case of GB News illustrates a broader tension in contemporary media: the conflict between journalism and the economics of attention. In a fragmented market dominated by social media algorithms and viral clips, the pressure to entertain can easily overwhelm the ambition to inform.

From The Avengers to Line of Duty: How UK TV Became Police Procedural

The Freeview TV channels in the UK are a goldmine of TV nostalgia. Each day they show repeats of the the crime-adventure shows made by ITC Entertainment, a company run by Lew Grade that aimed to make UK TV shows that appealed to both UK and US audiences.

As a child in the 1970s, I would watch repeats of these shows. They included Danger Man, The Saint, The Avengers, The Baron, The Prisoner, Department S, The Champions and Randall and Hopkirk. Shot on 35 mm film these shows were presented in a stylish and imaginative way, creating a world that seemed vast and exciting and full of visual flair, exotic locations and imaginative storytelling.

Edwin Astley who wrote most of the theme tunes and scores for these shows, apart from The Avengers, The Champions (he wrote the score only) and The prisoner, gave these shows added drama and energy. I was always surprised that after the 1960s he didn't write any more TV music.

Then in the early 1970s, UK TV began to dispense with these sorts of shows in favour of more realistic and gritty police procedural ones. Though earlier TV shows such as Z Cars and Dixon of Dock Green were already realistic to some extent, it was not until shows like The Sweeney (shot on grainy 16 mm film) that this approach began to dominate.

The dominance of the police procedural continued through the 1980s with Juliet Bravo, The Bill and Inspector Morse, into the 1990s with Prime Suspect, Cracker, Wycliffe, Dalziel and Pascoe, Silent Witness and A Touch of Frost, and carried on into the 2000s and beyond with Heartbeat, Midsomer Murders, Life on Mars, Ashes to Ashes, New Tricks, The Inspector Lynley Mysteries, Waking the Dead, Line of Duty, Lewis, Broadchurch, Happy Valley and countless others. And though Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes had a fantasy-based premise, their execution remained firmly realistic.

While police procedurals have their own merits, there is something inherently stifling about an unbroken stream of detectives, case files, paperwork, and routine investigation, week after week, year after year—without the flair, imagination, or sense of adventure that made the ITC show so brilliant.

Seeing these older shows again on Freeview is not just nostalgia but a reminder that television used to thrill and inspire.

Was Heathcliff Really a “Laskar”?

In Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights, the character Heathcliff is called a “laskar” as an insult by members of the upper-class Linton household, representatives of refinement and gentility. In early nineteenth-century Britain, “laskar” was an imprecise term referring broadly to non-European sailors (often South Asian, Middle Eastern, or Malay), but in everyday usage it had already drifted toward pejorative generalisation. It connoted poverty, roughness, moral inferiority, and foreignness rather than a precise ethnicity. Like many insults of the time, its force lay less in accuracy than in social positioning. In the novel’s context, “laskar” functions not as a literal racial description but as a classed and xenophobic slur, marking Heathcliff as socially inferior and an outcast.

This mode of description is not unique to that term. Heathcliff is also described as a “gypsy lad”, a phrase which, like “laskar”, has sometimes been read as ethnically literal. Yet in early nineteenth-century usage, “gypsy” frequently functioned as a loose marker of social marginality, vagrancy, lawlessness and dark appearance rather than as a precise ethnic designation. Its use participates in the novel’s wider pattern of metaphorical othering rather than clarifying Heathcliff’s genealogy. Heathcliff is repeatedly described in terms that blur the human and the inhuman (“dog”, “imp”, “devil”, “brute”), none of which are intended literally. Together, these labels form a vocabulary of exclusion rather than a set of biographical clues.

In recent years, Brontë’s use of “laskar” has been read literally by some commentators, who infer that Heathcliff was of Asian heritage. Yet if Heathcliff were unmistakably of Asian descent, the novel’s silence on this point would be remarkable. The narrative voices (Lockwood and Nelly Dean) are observant, judgemental and unafraid of detail. When Victorian novels foreground racial difference as a defining trait, they tend to mark it unmistakably. Brontë, however, never provides a clear physical description that would settle the matter. Instead, she layers metaphor upon metaphor: darkness of hair, darkness of temperament, darkness of origin. This suggests deliberate indeterminacy rather than evasion. Heathcliff’s “darkness” is moral, emotional and symbolic long before it is possibly racial.

A socially degraded, non-Asian Heathcliff fits the novel’s logic more comfortably than a clearly racialised one. The central transgression of Wuthering Heights is class violation. Heathcliff’s eventual rise in social and economic status provokes the terror and revulsion of the Lintons. He offends them not because he is racially “other”, but because he refuses to remain in the place assigned to him by the British class system. This reading also explains how Heathcliff can accumulate wealth, enter drawing rooms and command legal authority. Such upward mobility would have been socially and legally constrained for most colonial subjects in early nineteenth-century Britain, and the novel gives no indication that Heathcliff overcame those specific barriers.

Brontë was not writing social realism; she was writing Gothic tragedy. Heathcliff is not a sociological case study. His origins are unknown and his background and identity remain mysterious. Describing him too clearly would diminish his symbolic force. By allowing terms like “laskar” to operate between description and insult, Brontë ensures that Heathcliff remains a projection screen for fear, prejudice and cruelty. The novel is less interested in what he is than in what others do to him once he is seen as an outcast.

It is entirely plausible, and arguably textually stronger, to read Heathcliff as non-Asian, with “laskar” functioning as a generalised insult rooted in class contempt and xenophobic psychology rather than literal ethnicity. Brontë’s genius lies in refusing to resolve the ambiguity, allowing Heathcliff to remain a mirror for both societal prejudice and the imagination of the reader.

The Unrealistic Promise of the Second Amendment

In American politics, the Second Amendment is venerated as a foundation for personal freedom. For many US citizens (mainly on the right-wing of the political divide), the right to bear arms isn't just about self-defence, but about safeguarding personal freedom. The idea is that an armed population is essential to protect against an overreaching government. But in today's world, where advanced technology and military strength have shifted the balance of power, this argument no longer holds water.

In theory, a well-armed population could act as a check on government power or tyranny. But that theory was born in an era when the United States had to rely on militias, not fighter jets or drones. Nowadays it’s impossible to take that argument seriously. No matter how many guns people own, they stand little chance against the overwhelming force of the modern US military.

The US military is one of the most powerful in the world, and has technology that is superior to anything a civilian could match. Tactical nuclear weapons, stealth bombers, drones and fighter jets would render any resistance movement powerless. A group of civilians armed with hunting rifles wouldn’t stand a chance against the precision and reach of military aircraft, able to take out targets from miles away.

Also, today’s military can shut down communications and disable power grids, cutting off access to the tools needed for any coordinated resistance. Without communication and electricity, the fight would be over before it began.

So, when we look at the Second Amendment today, we can’t help but wonder if the argument for its role as a safeguard against tyranny is more a fantasy than a feasible reality. In the age of modern warfare, where the power of the state is nearly limitless, the the idea of armed civilians standing up to the government is, for all practical purposes, an impossibility.

‘How Beverley Turner Found a Home on Right-Wing TV’ by Ryan Soames—guest blogger

For the majority of her media career, Beverley Turner was remarkably uncontroversial. Her politics, insofar as they were visible at all, were mainstream and largely unremarkable. What changed was not a sudden, internal ideological "awakening" but the pushback she encountered from specific corners of the UK media and public when she began criticising COVID-19 lockdown measures, and the choices she made in response.

Turner first drew significant backlash in 2021, when she appeared as a guest on ITV’s This Morning. She clashed with presenter Dermot O’Leary after claiming that COVID-19 vaccines were not fully effective and suggesting that younger people might consider refusing them. Following the segment, she was reportedly banned from returning to the programme. A subsequent appearance on the Jeremy Vine Show sparked hundreds of Ofcom complaints. Turner later shared a video of herself crying, describing the experience as being “ambushed”.

These episodes highlight the reputational risks of dissent in mainstream media. Yet Turner’s response was not merely defensive: she eventually moved to platforms like GB News, which amplified opposition to COVID-19 measures and rewarded a more confrontational, oppositional style.

Media ecosystems are not neutral; they shape incentives, tone and identity. Once embedded within a partisan environment, a broadcaster is rewarded for alignment rather than nuance. Over time, heterodox positions can solidify into coherent ideological identities. Turner’s trajectory illustrates how structural incentives and personal choices intersect: while she faced pushback, she also embraced and cultivated the reactionary, grievance-driven style rewarded by sympathetic platforms.

Her early opposition to lockdowns evolved into a broader posture of institutional hostility, and in recent months, she has publicly expressed views that align with far-right talking points, such as supporting Donald Trump uncritically, and supporting his controversial use of ICE agents in Minneapolis. These choices show that she is no longer a marginal figure caught in a media vise; she is an active participant in a polarised, ideologically extreme discourse.

This process reflects a recognisable sequence:

1. Moral exclusion or public backlash in response to controversial positions.

2. Opportunities in partisan media that reward outrage and reinforce identity.

3. Adoption of broader ideological stances, often amplified by audience and platform incentives.

Turner is less an anomaly than a case study in how personal choices interact with structural pressures. Early ostracism does not excuse or justify her current views, but it helps explain the pathway by which dissenting voices can become entrenched in extreme positions. The lesson is not about her as a victim; it is about how polarised media environments create conditions where extremes thrive, and moderate voices are either pushed aside or radicalised.

Beverley Turner did not begin her career as a far-right figure. She has, however, chosen to embrace that role. The structural pressures of media ecosystems may have shaped the trajectory, but her current ideological stance is the result of conscious alignment, not mere circumstance.

‘From Analyst to Advocate: The Polarising Journey of Matthew Goodwin’ by Robert Miller—guest blogger

Matthew Goodwin, a former academic and political scientist, who held a professorship at Kent University, and is now a presenter on GB News, has had a career that has not been without controversy. 

Critics accuse him of being an advocate for populism's more extreme tendencies, with many questioning the objectivity of his work in that field. They argue that his interpretations of data and trends are often overly simplistic and tailored to fit a particular narrative, lacking the nuance required to fully understand complex political phenomena. These concerns are seen as casting a shadow over his contributions to the field, suggesting that his work might prioritise sensationalism over scholarly rigour.

A contentious aspect of his career is his shifting stance on immigration. In 2013, he argued that Britain had extensively debated immigration and that further stoking of public anger would destabilise the political system. This position was in line with calls for a balanced and measured approach to immigration policy. 

However, a decade later, he reversed his position, advocating for a more aggressive anti-migrant campaign and urging the government to mimic the hardline stance of US Republicans. This volte-face has been criticised as pandering to xenophobic sentiments and abandoning earlier calls for moderation. The shift has been viewed by some as a response to the increasing influence of nationalist and populist movements within British politics, as well as a strategic move to align with the more radical elements of his audience.

In his book Values, Voice and Virtue: The New British Politics, he argues that the UK’s elite is disconnected from the conservative instincts of the majority and that cultural institutions are dominated by cosmopolitan values that suppress dissent. His framing of these issues often aligns with reactionary identity politics, which critics argue distorts the true nature of Britain’s socio-political landscape. Of this, Oliver Eagleton said in The New Statesman on 25 March 2023:

“When setting out these positions, Goodwin often sounds like a duller Piers Morgan. Yet, unlike Morgan, he tends to obscure his most unpalatable opinions behind a dense thicket of polling data—distancing himself from their pernicious implications by informing us that this is simply what the average Red Wall voter thinks.”

Eagleton notes that while Goodwin acknowledges economic factors in the rise of populism, he primarily frames it as a cultural conflict between traditionalism and progressivism, often subordinating class issues to national identity. By emphasising cultural liberalism as the primary driver of populist sentiments, his analysis is said to overlook material grievances that have equally influenced political outcomes. This approach has sparked debate within the academic community, with some scholars arguing that it oversimplifies the relationship between economic hardship and political radicalisation. His critics argue that this perspective fails to account for the nuanced ways in which economic factors and cultural values intersect, thereby limiting the potential for comprehensive solutions to the challenges posed by populism.

Given these concerns, Goodwin’s influence in the field of political science is not without its challenges. His evolving stance on key issues, such as immigration, and his tendency to emphasise cultural rather than economic factors in his analysis have raised questions about the consistency and objectivity of his work.

His approach, which often aligns with reactionary viewpoints, suggests a potential prioritisation of sensationalism over nuanced understanding. As a result, these factors impact the perceived credibility and scholarly value of his research.

Sleep as a Rehearsal for Death

I’ve been thinking lately about dreamless sleep. Not the dreaming state, but the period where nothing at all is experienced. I think that state has something important to tell us about death.

Most people who don’t believe in an afterlife fear death because they fear “annihilation”: the idea of becoming nothing, of there being nothing after. Yet, when we look at it rationally, that fear relies on a strange assumption: that there will still be someone there to experience the nothingness. In other words, it asks us to imagine ourselves existing in a state where we cannot exist, which is paradoxical.

Dreamless sleep is the closest thing we know to genuine non-experience. When we wake from it, we don’t remember darkness, absence or being in “nothingness”. We are aware only of a discontinuity: one moment we are awake at night, the next we are awake in the morning. The interval itself is not experienced at all.

This shows that non-experience cannot be experienced. The fear of annihilation depends on imagining ourselves enduring nothingness, but dreamless sleep demonstrates that nothingness is not an experience in the first place. It cannot be feared, it cannot be remembered and it cannot exist as a conscious state. It is a kind of absolute neutrality, beyond the reach of thought or sensation.

Interestingly, we already practice “dying” every night when we sleep. We lie down, let go of control and allow consciousness to dissolve, without fearing annihilation. In sleep, we surrender ourselves to a state of non-experience that is nonetheless essential to life.It is a small rehearsal for what awaits us at the end of life, a reminder that the cessation of awareness is not inherently terrifying.

This does not, of course, remove all the fears surrounding death. We feel sadness at leaving loved ones behind, regret unfulfilled ambitions and have anxiety about the process of dying itself. These fears are understandable because they belong to the living mind: to consciousness that cares, hopes and remembers. But it does remove the specific terror of annihilation: the imagined torment of being trapped in nothingness. That fear only arises if we assume that non-experience could somehow be experienced, which is a logical impossibility.

Viewed this way, death is not an experience waiting for us at the end of life. It is the end of experience itself. What troubles us belongs to the living mind, on this side of consciousness. Beyond that, there is nothing: no fear, no awareness, only the absence of both. And perhaps that is not something to fear, but something profoundly simple: a return to dreamless sleep, which we pass through each night.

'The New York Post's False Claims About Renee Nicole Good' by Robert Miller—guest blogger

Recent coverage in certain outlets, including a New York Post article, has painted a distorted picture of Renee Nicole Good, the Minneapolis mother tragically killed by a federal ICE agent on 7 January, 2026. A careful review of reporting from multiple reputable sources shows that many claims in that story are unverified or false.

Renee Nicole Good, age 37, was shot during an ICE enforcement operation in south Minneapolis. She was a mother of three and a poet, with no known history of violent activism. Federal authorities assert the shooting was in self-defence, while some local witnesses have questioned the circumstances. The investigation is ongoing.

Debunking the False Claims

1. “Anti-ICE warrior” and “trained to resist federal agents”

The Post described Good as a militant activist trained to confront ICE agents. There is no evidence from credible reporting to support this. Family members and community sources describe her as a compassionate parent, not an organised protester or militant. No public records or independent reporting confirm that she received any formal training to resist law enforcement.

2. Involvement through a charter school pushing activism

The article claimed Good became involved with ICE Watch through her child’s school, which it described as politically radical. Reliable reporting confirms that the Southside Family Charter School emphasises social consciousness, but there is no evidence connecting Good’s school involvement with organised resistance to ICE operations. This appears to be speculative and anecdotal.

3. Organized confrontations and calls to violence

The Post alleged that ICE Watch and aligned groups encouraged barricading streets or ramming ICE vehicles. Independent sources confirm that some community groups monitor ICE activity, but there is no verified evidence that Good participated in violent actions, and claims of systematic coordination are unsubstantiated.

4. Claims of a 3,200% spike in attacks on ICE agents

The article cited a dramatic increase in vehicular attacks against federal agents. No government or reputable independent sources support this specific statistic. It appears to be an exaggerated figure not grounded in verified data. 

While the circumstances of Good’s death are still under investigation, the confirmed facts are: she was killed during an ICE operation, she was a mother of three and accounts of her actions immediately before the shooting are disputed. Assertions about her being a trained activist or participating in violent anti-ICE campaigns are unsupported by evidence.