The Critical Commentator

  Tracking our kids' every move with phones or AirTags is causing a "deeply concerning" increase in anxiety among young people, according to more than 70 psychologists, doctors, nurses and health professionals who have come together to urge parents to "reconsider whether the surveillance childhood we are sleepwalking into is really benefiting our children." They add: "We are implicitly telling them that the world is unsafe," and warn that constant monitoring prevents kids learning the skills and developing the autonomy necessary to navigate real life. "It's so normal to want to keep our children safe," says Clare Fernyhough, co-founder of the campaign group, Generation Focus. "But there is no evidence that tracking makes them any safer." A Huntsman with His Horse and a Group of Hounds Charles Bilger Spalding (1810-1871) Photo Credit : Walker Art Gallery [CC BY-NC] It's also a staggering invasion of privacy. I would never tra...

Five years ago, Thomas Yarrow was going through a difficult time: his marriage was breaking down. He was aware of the advice given to all men  at such moments: that it's essential for your mental health to open up to friends, to talk about your feelings, to express your emotions. His response? to spend lots of time with people who didn't talk much at all... and when they did, the discussion was about welding, axles and engine parts... Now Yarrow, [professor of anthropology at Durham University] 48, is publishing a groundbreaking study of the relationships within the group - and it will not make him popular with the burgeoning mental health industry that centres on  coaxing men into emotional disclosure. In fact a stiff upper lip, he found, serves many men pretty well. The study, published later this month in the journal American Ethnologist , is subtitled "Rethinking male friendship and the value of personal reticence".... It argues that research routinely linking emo...

  Courtesy is such a quiet force that its crumbling in formerly expected places can feel as shocking as a trusted handrail suddenly giving way... The flashiest slurs have emanated from the White House. In November President Trump aggrieved by a female reporter's question about Jeffrey Epstein, snapped back: "Quiet Piggy!" Earlier this month he dismissed Somali immigrants as "garbage". When the Hollywood director Rob Reiner and his wife were fatally stabbed... Trump suggested that Reiner's tragic death was caused by his negative stance on the president himself and because he suffered from a mind-crippling disease known as Trump Derangement Syndrome... The First Madness of Ophelia Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-1882) Photo Credit: Gallery Oldham [CC BY-NC-ND]  Trash talk aimed at political opponents and journalists or socially divisive language, did not commonly feature in presidential statements... By maintaining decorum in their public speech, previous preside...

  A study from 2024 found that 45% of Gen Z and 39% of millennials were actively trying to reduce their screentime, a number I can only imagine is increasing daily. My rationale had less to do with being anti-phone - I don't think every second spent on a screen is inherently harmful - but more to do with the free time I was losing. There was a richer life being sacrificed for what was mostly a mind-numbingly bad habit. The prevailing argument for how to resolve phone addiction is that all you need to do is just stop... We're told it's a matter of grit and discipline, something most of us simply lack. There is now a thriving industry of apps and technology dedicated to getting you off  your phone, which operate on this vague assumption... These interventions do work for some people. But for most, they serve as a Sisyphean torment: that even if you do briefly log off, you find the nothingness excruciating and are struck with how badly you are itching to return. You're als...

  Perhaps no scandal conveys the rot in our world more than the Jeffrey Epstein affair... For this isn't a story about left and right: it is a story about right and wrong.More specifically it is about power; about how the rich and powerful of all political persuasions live by a different set of rules from everyone else, not just in America but throughout the western world... The story we like to tell ourselves is equality under the law... But this fairy tale has now become an object of derision for millions of "ordinary" people  - me included and perhaps you too. Justice and Divine Vengeance Pursuing Crime Amy J. Curr  (active 1885-1894} Photo Credit: Aberdeen Archives, Galleriy & Museums [Public Domain]  How could it be otherwise when dozens of vulnerable children were trafficked, abused and threatened by Epstein and other rich men but not a single one of those men has been brought to justice beyond Epstein himself? The only person serving time is Ghislaine Maxw...

  As I apply for yet another job, I look at the company's website for context. I've now read their "what we do" section four or five times, and I have a problem - I can't figure out what they do. There are two possibilities here. One: they don't know what they do. Two: what they do is so pointless and embarrassing that they dare not spell it out in plain English. "We forge marketing systems at the forefront of the online wellness space" translates to something like "we use ChatGPT to sell dodgy supplements. But understanding what so many businesses actually do is the least of my worries. I'm currently among the 5% of Brits who are unemployed. In my six months of job hunting, my total lack of success has begun to make me question my own existence. About one in five of my job applications elicit a rejection email, usually bemoaning the sheer number of "quality applicants" for the position. For the most part, though - nothing. It'...