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  1. Quote

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    In the real world, not all men want to be “breadwinners”, just like not all men want to be violent, or to have power over women. What men do want, however, is to feel needed, and wanted, and useful, and loved. They aren’t alone in this – it’s one of the most basic human instincts, and for too long we have been telling men and boys that the only way they can be useful is by bringing home money to a doting wife and kids, or possibly by dying in a war. It was an oppressive, constricting message 50 years ago, and it’s doubly oppressive now that society has moved on and even wars are being fought by robots who leave no widows behind. Laurie Penny, ‘We need to talk about masculinity’

    (Source: Guardian)

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    ‘With the headlines about a five-year-old using a gun marketed as “My First Rifle” barely faded, the NRA invited attendees to “[s]hare the excitement with spectacular displays and fun-filled events for the entire family”. The grade schoolers present shared the organization’s attitude towards the products that have caused the deaths of more American children in two years than the very tragic US military casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan. “I like guns because guns are fun,” said 9-year-old Kaykay Mace’ - Top 10 things you missed at the National Rifle Association Convention

    ‘With the headlines about a five-year-old using a gun marketed as “My First Rifle” barely faded, the NRA invited attendees to “[s]hare the excitement with spectacular displays and fun-filled events for the entire family”. The grade schoolers present shared the organization’s attitude towards the products that have caused the deaths of more American children in two years than the very tragic US military casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan. “I like guns because guns are fun,” said 9-year-old Kaykay Mace’ - Top 10 things you missed at the National Rifle Association Convention

    (Source: Guardian)

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    Within the feminist movement, the answer is less clear than one might hope. Trashing each other and exclusion have been hallmarks since the movement began, and each generation of feminist activists seems to suffer the same in-fighting. But contrary to simplistic ideas about catty, back-stabbing women, feminists don’t fight each other because women are uniquely competitive or cruel. Though we care about the movement, it happens because we’ve internalized a narrative of scarcity: we act as though we’re fighting for crumbs. Jill Filipovic, ‘The tragic irony of feminists trashing each other’

    (Source: Guardian)

  4. 10 lies we’re told about welfare

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    Comedian Rick Tomlinson writes:

    image

    Welfare reform, my arse. Has Jim Royle parked his chair, feet up, telly on, in the corridors between the Treasury and the Department for Work and Pensions? Employing him as adviser can be the only explanation for the utter rubbish that boils forth from this government on welfare.

    Who else could have dreamed up the bedroom tax, a policy so stupid it forces people to leave their homes and drag themselves around the country in search of nonexistent one-bedroom flats?

    That one has to be the result of too many hours in front of Jeremy Kyle (no offence) with the heating on full and a can of super-strength lager. It seems as if that is how this government views ordinary people: feckless and useless – poor, because they brought it on themselves, deliberately.

    Maybe the cabinet is confused. Twenty-three millionaires in the one room can get like that. But do you know what, enough. Let’s call this government’s welfare policy what it is – wrong, nasty and dishonest.

    Off the top of my head, I can list 10 porkies they are spinning to justify the latest stage of their attack on our 70-year-old welfare state.

    1. Benefits are too generous

    Really? Could you live on £53 a week as Iain Duncan Smith is claiming he could if he had to? Then imagine handing back 14% of this because the government deems you have a “spare room”. Could you find the money to pay towards council tax and still afford to eat at the end of the week?

    2. Benefits are going up

    They’re not. A 1% “uprating” cap is really a cut. Inflation is at least 2.7% . Essentials like food, fuel and transport are all up by at least that, in many cases far more. Benefits are quickly falling behind the cost of living.

    3. Jobs are out there, if people look

    Where? Unemployment rose last month and is at 2.5 million, with one million youngsters out of work. When Costa Coffee advertised eight jobs, 1,701 applied.

    4. The bedroom tax won’t hit army families or foster carers

    Yes it will. Perhaps most cruel of all, the tax will not apply to foster families who look after one kid. If you foster siblings, then tough. But these kids are often the hardest to place. Thanks to George Osborne and IDS, their chances just got worse. And even if your son or daughter is in barracks in Afghanistan, then don’t expect peace of mind as the government still has to come clean on plans for their bedroom.

    5. Social tenants can downsize

    Really, where? Councils sold their properties – and Osborne wants them to sell what’s left. Housing associations built for families. In Hull, there are 5,500 people told to chase 70 one-bedroom properties.

    6. Housing benefit is the problem

    In fact it’s rental costs. Private rents shot up by an average of £300 last year. No wonder 5 million people need housing benefits, but they don’t keep a penny. It all goes to landlords. 

    7. Claimants are pulling a fast one

    No. Less than 1% of the welfare budget is lost to fraud. But tax avoidance and evasion is estimated to run to £120bn.

    8. It’s those teenage single mums

    An easy target. Yet only 2% of single mums are teenagers. And most single mums, at least 59%, work.

    9. We’re doing this for the next generation

    No you’re not. The government’s admitted at least 200,000 more children will be pushed deeper into poverty because of the welfare changes.

    10. Welfare reforms are just about benefit cuts

    Wrong. The attack on our welfare state is hitting a whole range of services – privatising the NHS, winding up legal aid for people in debt and closing SureStart centres and libraries. All this will make life poorer for every community.

    Some call these myths. I call them lies. We are being told lies about who caused this crisis and lied to about the best way out of it. But I know one thing to be true: this government’s polices will make millions of people poorer and more afraid. To do that when you do not have to, when there are other options, is obscene. That’s why I’m backing union Unite’s OurWelfareWorks campaign in its efforts to help highlight the truth about our welfare state.

  5. Has feminism failed the working class?

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    We asked our readers for their thoughts. They replied - and here’s two picks:

    Isabel, Glasgow

    avatar blue

    As a single working mother with a 13-year-old daughter, I couldn’t really not be a feminist. Seeing the pressures my daughter will face as she progresses into adulthood makes me realise we all have a way to go. But it’s not feminism that runs the world, it’s money. The media, Guardian included, tend to fixate on the number of women in boardrooms, or whether some neoliberal rightwing politician is a feminist, rather than looking at the reality of working life. I’ve also been quite shocked at the hostility shown to parents, mothers especially. Some of the comments found on this very website have a real venom to them; there is at times a sense that if you are a mother, and especially a working-class mother, then by default you should not have embarked on parenthood at all.

    I don’t think the issue is about how feminism represents working-class women at all, it’s how the media and politicians choose to portray them. It’s not feminism that has the power to control what advertisers, the music industry and the media tell us; if anything, feminists tend to be the ones pointing out how damaging it can be.

    Seb, London

    avatar yellow

    I come from a white working-class single-parent family. I was a soldier and a teacher, and I worked with working-class white boys in the penal system. I would see myself in the third wave of feminism. I am sick of the second-wave dinosaurs who are currently in power, lecturing me on my undeserved privilege, berating me as an oppressor, excluding me for being male – when by and large I am sympathetic with the majority of their goals. I just don’t like the way they have turned what should be the greatest civil rights movement in history into a single issue lobbying movement which furthers their unearned privilege as wealthy white western women, ignoring everyone else who has suffered from patriarchy (including working-class men).

    With my work, I saw working-class boys being treated as disposable war assets by the government, or as disposable criminal problems by the penal system. If eight times more women than men were in prison, it would be a feminist issue. If three times more women killed themselves every year, it would be a feminist issue. The lack of support in men’s mental health is terrible; my (male) doctor does not even know who to refer a male patient to for support. This impacts me personally, but these issues impact all female family members too. There is so much more we can achieve as a team.

  6. Photo

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    Pope Benedict’s resignation: a stunning shock by Andrew Brown Pope Benedict’s resignation has been planned for some time – Rowan Williams, the former archbishop of Canterbury, knew about it before Christmas – but it is still a stunning shock to the outside world. No pope has willingly resigned since Pope Celestine V in 1294. Pope John Paul II hung on for years while dying of Parkinson’s disease, while the machinery of the Vatican rotted about him. During the decrepitude of John Paul II, Pope Benedict, as Cardinal Ratzinger, was his right-hand man. It may be that his experience then planted in him a wish to leave office while he was still able to discharge his duties. Modern medicine does not work well with autocratic regimes traditionally renewed by death or disease, and the papacy remains the last absolute monarchy in Europe. In Benedict’s resignation statement can be seen an implied rebuke to his predecessor, who argued that clinging to life and power for as long as possible was itself a form of witness to Christ’s suffering. Benedict, however, says: “I am well aware that this ministry, due to its essential spiritual nature, must be carried out not only with words and deeds, but no less with prayer and suffering. However, in today’s world … both strength of mind and body are necessary, strength which in the last few months, has deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognise my incapacity to adequately fulfil the ministry entrusted to me.” Nothing is known in detail of the 85-year-old pontiff’s health that would force his resignation. Benedict leaves a church battered in the west by child abuse scandals and a shortage of priests but still growing fast in the south. In the Middle East, its historic homeland, Christianity is now persecuted with almost unprecedented savagery. In the US, Germany and Australia, there is an endless and bitter struggle within both clergy and laity between liberals and conservatives. For Benedict, western Europe had been largely lost to Christianity, and was once more a mission field which would have to be reconverted. But it’s hard to see any signs of either planning or success in this task, despite the unexpected triumph of his visit to Britain in 2010. He stood on the side of reaction, and for many of his opponents epitomised it. But he did not manage to damp down the rebellions against compulsory celibacy in the priesthood, which have shaken the church in German-speaking countries. In fact, by his personal support of special arrangements for former Anglican clergy, he may have weakened the tradition of clerical celibacy. He maintained his predecessor’s hostility to capitalism, and to the sexual revolution. Neither of these things are likely to change under a new pope. The long planning means that the succession will go as smoothly as possible but it is always difficult to predict the outcome of the conclave in which cardinals elect a pope. As the last two have not been Italian, it may be that the succession will move towards Africa and away from Europe altogether. An African would mean a greater focus on the relationships with Islam, perhaps at the expense of the relations with the rest of Christianity.

    Pope Benedict’s resignation: a stunning shock

    by Andrew Brown

    Pope Benedict’s resignation has been planned for some time – Rowan Williams, the former archbishop of Canterbury, knew about it before Christmas – but it is still a stunning shock to the outside world. No pope has willingly resigned since Pope Celestine V in 1294. Pope John Paul II hung on for years while dying of Parkinson’s disease, while the machinery of the Vatican rotted about him.

    During the decrepitude of John Paul II, Pope Benedict, as Cardinal Ratzinger, was his right-hand man. It may be that his experience then planted in him a wish to leave office while he was still able to discharge his duties. Modern medicine does not work well with autocratic regimes traditionally renewed by death or disease, and the papacy remains the last absolute monarchy in Europe.

    In Benedict’s resignation statement can be seen an implied rebuke to his predecessor, who argued that clinging to life and power for as long as possible was itself a form of witness to Christ’s suffering. Benedict, however, says: “I am well aware that this ministry, due to its essential spiritual nature, must be carried out not only with words and deeds, but no less with prayer and suffering. However, in today’s world … both strength of mind and body are necessary, strength which in the last few months, has deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognise my incapacity to adequately fulfil the ministry entrusted to me.”

    Nothing is known in detail of the 85-year-old pontiff’s health that would force his resignation.

    Benedict leaves a church battered in the west by child abuse scandals and a shortage of priests but still growing fast in the south. In the Middle East, its historic homeland, Christianity is now persecuted with almost unprecedented savagery.

    In the US, Germany and Australia, there is an endless and bitter struggle within both clergy and laity between liberals and conservatives. For Benedict, western Europe had been largely lost to Christianity, and was once more a mission field which would have to be reconverted. But it’s hard to see any signs of either planning or success in this task, despite the unexpected triumph of his visit to Britain in 2010. He stood on the side of reaction, and for many of his opponents epitomised it. But he did not manage to damp down the rebellions against compulsory celibacy in the priesthood, which have shaken the church in German-speaking countries. In fact, by his personal support of special arrangements for former Anglican clergy, he may have weakened the tradition of clerical celibacy.

    He maintained his predecessor’s hostility to capitalism, and to the sexual revolution. Neither of these things are likely to change under a new pope.

    The long planning means that the succession will go as smoothly as possible but it is always difficult to predict the outcome of the conclave in which cardinals elect a pope. As the last two have not been Italian, it may be that the succession will move towards Africa and away from Europe altogether. An African would mean a greater focus on the relationships with Islam, perhaps at the expense of the relations with the rest of Christianity.

  7. Lochness monster as evidence against evolution … and five odder things kids are taught in some religious schools

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    Johnny Scaramanga writes:

    Accelerated Christian Education’s fundamentalist curriculum is used by more than 50 British schools. It is known for silent classrooms where students teach themselves, using workbooks in isolated booths. Professor Harry Brighouse describes ACE’s view as “a teleological account of American history as leading to the ultimate fulfilment of God’s will”. You may be unsurprised to learn that ACE was founded in Texas. ACE made headlines last year for a science textbook that cites the existence of the Loch Ness monster as evidence against evolution. Despite this, government agency UK NARIC defended its decision to deem ACE’s in-house qualification, the International Certificate of Christian Education, comparable to A-levels. Incredibly, Nessie isn’t ACE’s most bizarre claim. Here are five more:

    1) God is a right-winger. “Liberals” are the root of all political evil. God’s values are rightwing, and anything else is a rejection of His will. On a politics chart, “right” is associated with “absolute” and “God”, while “left” is connected to “no values” and “atheism.” The term “leftwing”, we learn, exists because “left” means “sinister”, “to twist something”, or “to corrupt.” Jesus, by contrast, taught that “we should use what we have to earn a profit.” If your political views lean left, you are neither a true Christian, nor a good citizen.

    2) No transitional fossils exist. Despite the avalanche of transitional fossils, ACE still shouts about mysterious “gaps”: “Though evolutionists have been searching for transitional fossils for more than 100 years, they have found none,” narrates one Presenting Accelerated Christian Education video. Nope, none. Not only that, but we can be certain “no transitional fossils have been or will ever be discovered because God created each type of fish, amphibian and reptile as separate, unique animals.” I’m sure the scientists who excavated tiktaalik will be crushed to learn that their discovery doesn’t, in fact, exist. But even without fossils, evolution is thoroughly supported by DNA and a wealth of other evidence.

    3) Solar fusion is a myth. It is nuclear fusion that has enabled our sun to shine for billions of years. ACE are determined to prove that the universe is less than 10,000 years old, in line with their literal interpretation of Genesis. As a result, they teach that solar fusion is “an invention of evolution scientists … All other theories require the sun to use up all its energy sooner than the evolutionists’ invented timetable would allow.” This preposterous suggestion is part of a wider campaign to discredit mainstream science.

    4) Evolution is an absurd, deliberate lie. Although ACE make no bones about being Creationists, they sometimes claim they also teach evolution. While evolution is mentioned frequently, it’s only to ridicule it. We are told, “Even from a strictly scientific standpoint, the theory of evolution is absurd.” Evolution is described as “impossible” and not “true science”. Scientists, it seems, know evolution is one big hoax: “Because evolutionists do not want to believe the only alternative – that the universe was created by God – they declare evolution is a fact and believe its impossible claims without any scientific proof!” While the scientists push their “indefensible theory”, ACE sees the obvious truth: “We have a risen Christ, unquestionable proofs and, as if we needed it, God has thrown in a host of inarguable evidences all around us!” This line of thinking writes off the majority of Christians, who reconcile their faith with evolution, as not true believers. It also denigrates scientists as conspiracy theorists. This worldview is antithetical to reasonable education.

    5) Science proves homosexuality is a learned behaviour. “Because extensive tests have shown that there is no biological difference between homosexuals and others, these tests seem to prove that homosexuality is a learned behaviour. The Bible teaches that homosexuality is sin. In Old Testament times, God commanded that homosexuals be put to death. Since God never commanded death for normal or acceptable actions, it is as unreasonable to say that homosexuality is normal as it is to say that murder or stealing is normal.” Quite apart from the flawed logic here, scientific consensus points to a genetic component in sexual orientation. But faith is not enough for ACE – even science must be shown to support their prejudice. The curriculum is designed to mould minds not to question the Absolute Truth and this, simply, is not education.

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    Abortion: thank God Justin Bieber fans won’t be listening to his mother

    Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett writes:

    What better way to welcome the 40th anniversary of Roe v Wade than the news that Justin Bieber’s mother is producing an anti-abortion film? I honestly cannot think of a superior way to celebrate how American women finally succeeded in winning reproductive rights.

    Bieber’s “mom”, less commonly known as Pattie Mallette, thinks the abortion epidemic needs addressing and is hoping to raise $10m through screenings of the film, called Crescendo. The money will go towards so-called “crisis centres” whose function is to deter women from having abortions, presumably through a combination of good old-fashioned indoctrination and endless YouTube repeats of her son’s 2010 hit Baby. From the looks of the trailer (and somewhat strangely for an anti-abortion propaganda film), Crescendo appears to be set in 18th-century France in what I assume is intended to be a kind of Christian fundamentalist version of Les Mis, but with the singalongs and revolutionary fervour replaced by botched abortion attempts with a coathanger and gin in the bath.

    [Read the rest here]

    Photographs: Victoria Will/AP/Invision | Bill Mccay/WireImage

  9. Quote

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    Unfortunately, while “pro-life” is a hideous misnomer, a simple term like “pro-choice” cannot encompass the gravity of bodily integrity and just how critical it is for women to have rights to our own bodies.

    So, perhaps it’s time to emphasize what Roe has wrought, 40 years on.

    For women, the ability to control the number and spacing of your children is fundamental. It’s nearly impossible to overstate just how crucial that right is: without it, we simply don’t have the same prospects and abilities to live full, free lives. It’s no coincidence that the dual rights to abortion and birth control ushered in some of the most profound cultural shifts in human history.

    While gender equality is far from perfectly realized, women today have more rights and opportunities than ever before. We go to college and most graduate schools at the same rates as men, and are increasingly present in high-paying jobs. We are better able to leave abusive marriages and relationships. We’re healthier, and so are our children – child mortality has greatly decreased, and a low child mortality rate is directly tied to reproductive healthcare and reproductive rights.

    Reliable birth control and access to abortion means that we can pursue an education and work to build a stable career before getting married and reproducing – and the marriages that come later in life between two highly-educated people are by far the most stable. Among couples who have children, those who plan the pregnancies are happier than those who don’t.

    Between 1970 and 2009, child mortality around the world fell by half, which is largely attributable to women being better-educated and better able to make their own reproductive decisions. In the US, along with Roe came safer and earlier abortions; emergency rooms are no longer lined with women injured by illegal terminations, and abortion is now one of the safest medical procedures a woman can have.

    What’s not to support?

    Roe v Wade at 40: what American women owe to abortion rights, by Jill Filipovic

  10. Photo

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    Animals: are they good for supper or good companions? Libby Brooks writes: […] But browsing for cute images online does not translate into offline kindness. Animal cruelty and abandonment are at record levels in Britain, in particular as a consequence of owners who can no longer afford to keep pets in a recession. Animal rescue charities are overwhelmed, and at a time when donations are also under pressure. It is a human convenience to make distinctions between lovable companions and supper, as the recent scandal over horse meat in burgers illuminated. Likewise, we draw comfortable lines between foreign outrages and domestic necessity. We abhor bullfighting in Spain, or whaling in Japan, while continuing to eat eggs from hens that have spent their short lives crammed into cages. Meanwhile, we are surprised when animals actually act like animals, whether that be scavenging our dustbins and bird tables or, in extremis, attacking a human being. This shock reveals a grandiose assumption that animals are simply less sophisticated versions of ourselves. Photograph: Franziska Krug/Getty Images

    Animals: are they good for supper or good companions?

    Libby Brooks writes:

    […] But browsing for cute images online does not translate into offline kindness. Animal cruelty and abandonment are at record levels in Britain, in particular as a consequence of owners who can no longer afford to keep pets in a recession. Animal rescue charities are overwhelmed, and at a time when donations are also under pressure.

    It is a human convenience to make distinctions between lovable companions and supper, as the recent scandal over horse meat in burgers illuminated. Likewise, we draw comfortable lines between foreign outrages and domestic necessity. We abhor bullfighting in Spain, or whaling in Japan, while continuing to eat eggs from hens that have spent their short lives crammed into cages.

    Meanwhile, we are surprised when animals actually act like animals, whether that be scavenging our dustbins and bird tables or, in extremis, attacking a human being. This shock reveals a grandiose assumption that animals are simply less sophisticated versions of ourselves.

    Photograph: Franziska Krug/Getty Images

  11. Why I’m trans … and a feminist

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    In the light of this week’s row between two prominent feminists and the trans community, we asked four trans writers to reflect on what feminism means to them

    Paris Lees: ‘At college, most people thought feminist meant man-hater’

    Paris Lees

    There were plenty of feminists on TV in the early 90s, and I always sided with these tough ladies, the ones that didn’t see men as their superiors. Raised by my mum, my gran and my aunty and bullied by a father I despised, child-me was certain that women couldn’t be the inferior gender. Teenage me wondered why there even have to be an inferior gender – or, in fact, gender at all. Couldn’t we all just do our own thing and be nice to each other? At college, most people thought feminist meant “man-hater”. This excluded men from feminism, including me, because, at the time, I looked like a boy.

    It was a figurative kick in the teeth being born male – but when I was younger, I also got actual kicks in the face for “acting girly”. Feminists have long fought to protect women from violence and I wish more of those with big platforms would discuss the very real abuse trans people suffer, often daily.

    Early into my transition, I read Germaine Greer’s The Whole Woman. It contained polemics about trans women in female toilets; suggesting we were men pretending to be women, trying to invade women’s spaces. It’s good to read authors one disagrees with. Greer caused me to question my identity, and form a more complex one. She was right: I am not a woman in the way my mother is; I haven’t experienced female childhood; I don’t menstruate. I won’t give birth. Yes, I have no idea what it feels like to be another woman – but nor do I know what it feels like to be another man. How can anyone know what it feels like to be anyone but themselves? Strangely, thanks to Greer, I now know that I am happiest as me.

    I do feel sorry for some of the feminist old guard, though. That fire they had in their bellies, that righteous indignation… it must be a shock to find they’ve joined the ranks of a chattering establishment, complicit in the oppression of others. I’m sure they never planned it.

    I’m trans and feminist. Most of my female friends in their 20s are feminist too, though few call it that. We see ourselves as equal to others, even if they don’t. We struggle to earn the same as our male peers, to be heard as much, to see as much of ourselves in public and political life. But we’ve progressed, through feminism and the idea that people should be treated equally despite what fate pops between your legs at birth. Who wouldn’t support that? As Dale Spender so eloquently puts it:

    “Feminism has fought no wars. It has killed no opponents. It has set up no concentration camps, starved no enemies, and practised no cruelties… Its battles have been for education, for the vote, for better working conditions, for safety on the streets, for childcare, for social welfare, for rape crisis clinics, women’s refuges, reforms in the laws. If someone says, “Oh, I’m not a feminist!” I ask, ‘Why? What’s your problem?’”

    Well, here’s the thing. The trans movement, fuelled by the radical notion that trans people are valid humans, hasn’t fought any wars either. No killing. No concentration camps. Our battles are for dignity, not to be ridiculed, abused, and murdered for who we are; to have our privacy respected by the media, to be free from harassment under the law; free to use the toilet – free to pee.

    [Read the rest of our panel here]

  12. Photo

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    Debate of the day: Is it wrong to eat horsemeat? Here in the UK, horse DNA has been found in burgers sold by four major supermarket chains, forcing stores to withdraw them from sale. In one sample, the Guardian reports, horsemeat accounted for 29% relative to the beef content. Despite the Food Safety Authority of Ireland, which made the discovery, saying that the findings posed no health risk and consumers should not be worried, it is urging people to return any implicated products to their retailers. The Guardian has rounded up “the best and worst jokes” on Twitter following the revelations but the reaction from the supermarket chains, the authorities and the media suggests we are incredibly squeamish about eating horsemeat. Why? Is it more immoral to dine on a horse than a cow? The Telegraph’s James Kirkup thinks not: “there’s nothing wrong with eating horse, or any other meat, just as long as we’re honest about it. And that means everyone, producer and consumer alike.” Food blogger Lagusta Yearwood, commenting on the student who recently discovered a “brain” in his Kentucky Fried Chicken meal, wrote on Comment is free: “We continually draw distinctions between what’s dinner and what’s trash, who our pets are and who our meals are. We live with cats and dogs we smother with love and affection, yet other animals live miserable lives and endure horrific deaths because we’ve decided their lives are only worth the price of a fast food meal… The fast food system – cheap food prepared quickly, eaten quickly, forgotten quickly – hinges on one slim peg: wilful ignorance. When incidences like this crop up, they slam right into what we don’t want to know. So we get outraged. But obviously the real scandal is that we’re allowing ourselves to fall for this great lie in the first place: that what we eat doesn’t matter, that it arrived in our hands magically, and that there are no consequences to our diets.” What do you think? Is it wrong to eat horsemeat? Photograph: Robb Kendrick/Getty Images/Aurora Creative

    Debate of the day: Is it wrong to eat horsemeat?

    Here in the UK, horse DNA has been found in burgers sold by four major supermarket chains, forcing stores to withdraw them from sale. In one sample, the Guardian reports, horsemeat accounted for 29% relative to the beef content. Despite the Food Safety Authority of Ireland, which made the discovery, saying that the findings posed no health risk and consumers should not be worried, it is urging people to return any implicated products to their retailers.

    The Guardian has rounded up “the best and worst jokes” on Twitter following the revelations but the reaction from the supermarket chains, the authorities and the media suggests we are incredibly squeamish about eating horsemeat. Why? Is it more immoral to dine on a horse than a cow? The Telegraph’s James Kirkup thinks not: “there’s nothing wrong with eating horse, or any other meat, just as long as we’re honest about it. And that means everyone, producer and consumer alike.”

    Food blogger Lagusta Yearwood, commenting on the student who recently discovered a “brain” in his Kentucky Fried Chicken meal, wrote on Comment is free:

    “We continually draw distinctions between what’s dinner and what’s trash, who our pets are and who our meals are. We live with cats and dogs we smother with love and affection, yet other animals live miserable lives and endure horrific deaths because we’ve decided their lives are only worth the price of a fast food meal… The fast food system – cheap food prepared quickly, eaten quickly, forgotten quickly – hinges on one slim peg: wilful ignorance. When incidences like this crop up, they slam right into what we don’t want to know. So we get outraged. But obviously the real scandal is that we’re allowing ourselves to fall for this great lie in the first place: that what we eat doesn’t matter, that it arrived in our hands magically, and that there are no consequences to our diets.”

    What do you think? Is it wrong to eat horsemeat?

    Photograph: Robb Kendrick/Getty Images/Aurora Creative

  13. Quote

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    If your daughter wants to be a vegetarian, urge her to wait until she is 16.

    When Lena Dunham announced that “a lot of times when you are a vegetarian it is a just not very effective eating disorder” she was duly pilloried. But speaking as someone who has been a vegetarian for 30 years and has a certain amount of knowledge about eating disorders, I’m going to defend Dunham here, even though she slightly missed the real point. Vegetarianism is not an ineffective eating disorder – it is a potential gateway to eating disorders.

    Obviously not all vegetarians become anorexic and not all anorexics are vegetarian (although in my experience, in regards to the latter part of that sentence, there is a heavy overlap). But vegetarianism encourages people to divide foods between the good and the bad, and it then becomes a legitimate means of limiting one’s diet. Your daughter has a whole lifetime ahead of her to think of food as something other than a pleasurable physical necessity. Why let her start early?

    A provocative quote by Hadley Freeman in her latest, How to parent girls: my guide to health and happiness

  14. Photo

    | 42 notes
    Malala was released from hospital today. Jonathan Jones writes: Malala Yousafzai just can’t help being a heroine. Any thoughts that the 15-year-old shot by the Taliban for her championing of girls’ education might now slip away from the limelight into a well-deserved ordinary youth seem dashed by this charismatic photograph. She displays in it a cool and collected personality that you can’t help warming to – unless, that is, you are a trigger-happy religious fundamentalist with a love of medieval gender relations. Malala’s courage and dignity come through strongly in a picture that is unexpectedly relaxed, almost flippant, given the circumstances. It shows her leaving the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham after advanced treatment for the bullet the Taliban shot into her head on a school bus last October. She is still an outpatient, and will return for cranial reconstructive surgery – but in spite of the severity of her injury this is not so much an image of defiance, as of victory. Link to this video While politicians and pundits in Pakistan and around the world debate the meaning and consequences of her stand for education, the girl at the centre of a story that has opened up a new debate on political Islam and social progress looks here almost casually self-assured. Her wave to the camera is relaxed, her keen eyes coolly assess the situation. She has the look of a leader in the making. There’s steel in her, it appears. Far from picking on a teenager who blundered into their sights, the Taliban were rattled by a brave and strong young woman who looks in this picture like she has plenty of fight in her yet. Bertolt Brecht was wrong about heroes. In his play The Life of Galileo he has the famous scientist – who stepped back from confrontation with religious bigots in baroque Italy – declare: “Pity the land that needs heroes”. Brecht’s view of history, in which individual efforts matter little in comparison to grand social forces, has been disproved many times in recent decades. Great men and women do exist, and do make a difference. Africa breathed easier when Nelson Mandela was released from hospital recently. Mandela is one of those people who have undoubtedly shaped history, as did Mikhail Gorbachev, and Pope John Paul II. At 15, Malala is very young to be counted in their company – yet this picture reveals her in a new light, not as a passive victim of ideological violence (if anyone ever thought she was that) but a genuine, boda fide young leader for the 21st century whose stand should inspire a better world. Photograph: University hospitals Birmingham/EPA

    Malala was released from hospital today. Jonathan Jones writes:

    Malala Yousafzai just can’t help being a heroine. Any thoughts that the 15-year-old shot by the Taliban for her championing of girls’ education might now slip away from the limelight into a well-deserved ordinary youth seem dashed by this charismatic photograph. She displays in it a cool and collected personality that you can’t help warming to – unless, that is, you are a trigger-happy religious fundamentalist with a love of medieval gender relations.

    Malala’s courage and dignity come through strongly in a picture that is unexpectedly relaxed, almost flippant, given the circumstances. It shows her leaving the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham after advanced treatment for the bullet the Taliban shot into her head on a school bus last October. She is still an outpatient, and will return for cranial reconstructive surgery – but in spite of the severity of her injury this is not so much an image of defiance, as of victory.

    Link to this video

    While politicians and pundits in Pakistan and around the world debate the meaning and consequences of her stand for education, the girl at the centre of a story that has opened up a new debate on political Islam and social progress looks here almost casually self-assured. Her wave to the camera is relaxed, her keen eyes coolly assess the situation. She has the look of a leader in the making. There’s steel in her, it appears. Far from picking on a teenager who blundered into their sights, the Taliban were rattled by a brave and strong young woman who looks in this picture like she has plenty of fight in her yet.

    Bertolt Brecht was wrong about heroes. In his play The Life of Galileo he has the famous scientist – who stepped back from confrontation with religious bigots in baroque Italy – declare: “Pity the land that needs heroes”. Brecht’s view of history, in which individual efforts matter little in comparison to grand social forces, has been disproved many times in recent decades. Great men and women do exist, and do make a difference. Africa breathed easier when Nelson Mandela was released from hospital recently. Mandela is one of those people who have undoubtedly shaped history, as did Mikhail Gorbachev, and Pope John Paul II.

    At 15, Malala is very young to be counted in their company – yet this picture reveals her in a new light, not as a passive victim of ideological violence (if anyone ever thought she was that) but a genuine, boda fide young leader for the 21st century whose stand should inspire a better world.

    Photograph: University hospitals Birmingham/EPA

  15. Quote

    | 7 notes

    There are probably many reasons that al-Jazeera in English is not very good. It doesn’t really seem to have a clear idea of who its audience is. It has often relied on old-time, marginal or unhappy mainstream broadcasters in an effort to gain some legitimacy and recognition. The heavy hand of state ownership is probably not only heavy, but given the particularly internecine politics of Qatar and its ever-expanding commercial and political interests, unfathomable. And, in general, al-Jazeera clearly does not place much of a premium on wit or style (…)

    If al-Jazeera were more passionate, more gutsy, more jaw-dropping to Muslim-fearing Americans, that would be something to defend, with joy in the cause. And even, perhaps, an audience to follow.

    But who is really going over the barricades for some super-rich Qataris and their roster of sanctimonious and boring news shows?

    Well, I guess Al Gore.

    Michael Wolff on Al-Jazeera, which just purchased Al Gore’s Current TV

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