A letter to my American cousins in (partial) defence of the UK’s farcical, shambolic, yet honourable (‘ish) democratic humiliation (and how preferable it is to the alternative). There. I fixed it. Let me state from the beginning that I feel no allegiance or partisanship towards humanity. From my earliest understanding of politics however I have wondered why there was never a Benthamite party – a utilitarianism/ humanist/ teleological party, a group dedicated to governing based on the…

I am not a great petitioner. But we have a real problem on Twitter and relatively few avenues with which to explain it. So, from the top. …

A smart man said to a smart friend.. "when people talk about straight white men it’s essentializing and dehumanising and I don’t think it’s fair." The friend replied.. "Well, exactly - that’s what happens to us all of the time; it’s just you guys aren’t used to it." What we…

What causes Social Injustice? — What causes Social Injustice? A. Social constructs. Structural Inequality. Systemic prejudice. What creates those constructs? A. Words. Language is community transmission for ideas. Ideas create Labels. Labels create Prejudice. Prejudice creates Violence. Labels are good for identity, but bad for people. It’s not empowering to label someone unless it is…

In a very elegant piece by Rachel Thompson for Mashable I was given the chance to think a little more deeply about an artwork I made recently regarding Trans issues and the way they are covered. The article is great : https://mashable.com/article/trans-media-coverage-fourth-estate/ …

Another of our kooky new ‘digital’ books about old ideas via Editions at Play. The old idea is that we all see truth in our stories in many different ways. To recast it we repurposed an old story: Ovid’s Pygmalion, which you may know better as My Fair Lady, or…

Recently I was lucky to be asked, via the brilliant Rachel Botsman, to say a few words at the conclusion of the school year. A traditional evening of speeches and awards, of dux and mensch, of beautiful music, welcoming parents and unexpectedly funny teachers. It was, how shall I say……

Sometimes a sub-editor’s decision on a strap-line (below) can skew a whole article’s perspective. — [This is a longer version of the essay that appeared in the guardian opinion section. This is the version without the line that suggests some kind of dialectic relation between our understanding of the universe and our understanding of gender. But it’s basically the same. A few more words. …

[This is a longer version of the essay that appeared in It’s Nice That] I am a woman. It’s nice to write that. I am a trans woman. The trans part is an adjective, it describes a quality of me, like most adjectives it does not define me. It is…