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lfranca.uk
Immigrant, physicist ⚛️, neuroscientist 🧠, and computer scientist 👨🏾‍💻. Assistant Professor at Northumbria University. 🏳️‍⚧️ ally. (he/him)
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Or to put it another way, overseas students now subsidise the cost of teaching each UK undergraduate by an average of £2,500 each. Take them away and you've got an absolutely existential crisis for universities. www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/politics/pol...

submitted 14 hours ago • 25 comments

Transphobia, like islamophobia, has shown how easily liberal scripts can be subverted to suit fascist politics Women, LGB or children's rights or free speech can all be turned into reactionary demands if they ignore wider power relationships and intersectionality to protect the status quo

submitted 14 hours ago • 7 comments

It's impossible to say this often enough. Many people feel worse off (and not just financially) now than a year ago. Work out what you can do to make life feel less of a battle for people relying on public services.

submitted 16 hours ago • 3 comments

Because who needs rule of law, huh? 😏

submitted 2 days ago • 0 comments

Some Labour MPs right now…

submitted 2 days ago • 0 comments

This post from Lewis Goodall a few months ago was prescient: Labour's reluctance to genuinely go on the offensive against Reform *and its policies* has got us to where we are today. And their belief that simply adopting Reform policies will protect them is naive at best, incredibly stupid at worst.

submitted 2 days ago • 16 comments

To the extent Labour has a plan, it involves adopting socially conservative positions to hold off Reform. This will work no better for Labour than it did for the Tories, perhaps worse, writes @samfr.bsky.social. www.prospectmagazine...

submitted 3 days ago • 4 comments

Reform did not win, Labour lost. Voter apathy is the biggest story here the British commentariat will simply ignore.

submitted 3 days ago • 1 comment

Transphobia is homophobia - it’s partly why trans women are the focus and not trans men.

submitted 4 days ago • 1 comment

Heartened to see that close to 900 fellow academics and educators have already signed our letter in support of trans rights, trans wellbeing & trans inclusion, and against essentialist, anti-scientific, racialised & regressive views of womanhood. Please do read, share & sign! tinyurl.com/mud7va29

submitted 5 days ago • 19 comments

100% this. Saw there was a blue Labour MP saying he "didn't care" if universities went bankrupt so long as immigration went down. He might want to look at some of the basic demographics of Labour support (and also look at who the largest employers are in large Labour seats).

submitted 5 days ago • 24 comments

The Supreme court ruling is "scientifically illiterate". Great to see it confirmed that this is exactly what the BMA said. In my experience doctors aren't usually minded to speak in these terms in such a public way. They are furious. Thanks Natacha for breaking the story and acting with caution.

submitted 6 days ago • 1 comment

Dehumanisation of people who are either queer or disabled. Sounds like something we have seen before, not that long ago… P.S.: I used ‘queer’ in this context because this is obviously going to impact not only trans people. Any ‘non-confirming’ person (cis,trans,non-binary) is a potential target. 😞

submitted 7 days ago • 0 comments

I won't use disabled toilets because I'm not disabled and disabled people need them Also trans people are so dangerous that they can't be around cis people... unless those cis people are disabled then it's fine? It's pretty clear they just see both trans and disabled people as a class of non human

submitted 7 days ago • 66 comments

🧪 “Science serves society best when its integrity is protected from political influence.” It’s a welcome development for the American Psychological Association (APA) starting to speak up, now after 1,000+ terminated NSF grants 👏 updates.apaservices.org/statement-on...

submitted 8 days ago • 2 comments

PhD Timeline xkcd.com/3081

submitted 10 days ago • 610 comments

The Internet of Things ended up being the internet of unsupported products. Google is ending support for 1st & 2nd generation Nests and completely pulling out of Europe. Imagine having to replace the thermostats in your home because of a reorg at some big tech meant it was no longer a priority.

submitted 10 days ago • 149 comments

Thank you to my (many) professional colleagues who, appalled by the Supreme Court decision, have reached out to offer their help pro or low bono in service of the trans community. For our amoral political class it's all a game but my colleagues know it's deadly serious.

submitted 10 days ago • 20 comments

If you are in the UK and call yourself a #trans ally, get on this 👇 #ProveIt 🏳️‍⚧️🙏 #ShareThisLink ⤵️

submitted 14 days ago • 1 comment

In the year ending June 2024, UK police recorded 69,184 rapes. (It’s likely this represents c. 1 in 6 of the rapes actually committed.) In 2023/24 there were 2,283 prosecutions for rape, and 1,220 convictions. And c. 11,900 rape cases are currently waiting to go to court, many for more than 2 years.

submitted 19 days ago • 9 comments

To achieve legal and/or medical transition in the UK, people are REQUIRED to live IN PUBLIC in their preferred gender, FOR A PERIOD OF YEARS. Or they will be refused support. CAN YOU UNDERSTAND that doing that is being made ILLEGAL? CAN YOU UNDERSTAND that it's making BEING TRANS illegal?

submitted 13 days ago • 1 comment

Numbers Labour could publish on foreign born people instead of criminal history: 😀Windrush without compensation 😀People who have experienced hate crime 😀Stats on NRPF that they refuse to publish 😀Stats on race/ethnicity that they refuse to publish 😀Visas denied due to racist decision making

submitted 13 days ago • 7 comments