The Badger 7th Edition

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BADGER

Welcome Home

Sussex University’s Official Student Newspaper

Front cover image taken by Rob Barrie The Team Editor-In-Chief Georgia Keetch News Print Editor Ritika Srivatsan News Sub-Editor Jasmine Crowhurst News Online Editor Maisie Levitt Features Editor Olly DeHerrera Features Sub-Editor Rhys Mathers Features Sub-Editor Sellah Penteliuk Features Online Editor Grace Dawes Travel & Culture Print Editor Aishwarya Johnson Jogul Travel & Culture Online Editor Mia Stuckey Travel & Culture Food Editor Justine Codery Arts Print Editor Molly Openshaw Arts Online Editor Alice Stevens Music Editor Dylan Bryant Film and TV Editor Emma Norris Issy Anthony Theatre Editor Ali Arief Books Editor Saskia May Artist Focus Editor Éloïse Armary Comment Print Editor Sophie McMahon Comment Online Editor Simon Edwards Science & Technology Editor Rob Barrie Sport Print Editor Charlie Batten Sport Online Editor Ava Steed Sports Sub-Editor Will Vo

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Society Spotlight

itchcraft is becoming a popular form of alternative spirituality for many. With a focus on choosing your own spiritual path, and learning Occult subjects that have otherwise been hidden, many are rejecting religious dogma for a religious practice that revolved around nature and nature alone.

The University of Sussex has a diverse range of societies, if you’re interested in learning how to practice Witchcraft, or if you’re looking to gain more knowledge in Astrology. Herbalism and Tarot, this is the society that should help you get on that broomstick.

You don’t have to be a Witch to join however, the society is extremely welcoming to everyone of all backgrounds, whether you’re a practicing Witch, or even if you’re just curious to see what it’s all about.

The community that arises when a group of people with fringe interests come together is often extremely beautiful. Outside of online spaces, finding a community within Occultism is difficult. There’s a lot of fear that surrounds the Occult, which puts a lot of practitioners off from telling family and friends about their spiritual practices.

Having a community such as WitchSoc helps break the stigma that surrounds the Occult, and offers a welcoming, wholesome space where

members can talk about their Craft freely, without fear of judgement.

Many believe that the real-world practice of Witchcraft is all about Harry Potter-esque spells at best, and Devil worship at worst. This is the farthest from that truth, and everyone at the society is keen to destigmatise the myths that surround Witchcraft, and what it looks like in reality.

The society itself has run a variety of sessions since it started in September.

From Tarot talks, to Samhain bonfire celebrations and Astrology lectures, the society is extremely keen to talk about and discuss all forms of Witchcraft from all around the world.

As a Witch myself, having community spaces like this is vital. Whilst online spaces are incredibly important, a lot of misinformation about Witchcraft exists on social media sites and having in person spaces in which to combat this misinformation whilst also talking about the appropriate resources, is essential.

Since I’ve started coming to WitchSoc every week, I have felt a sense of homeliness and comfort. It is wonderful being around like-minded people who accept you for who you are, and don’t ask invasive questions, but instead want to help, grow, and support each other and our own knowledge.

Many are probably thinking that we gather on a Full Moon every

month (I wish!) or go to the woods and practice intricate rituals (again, sounds idyllic), but no. Instead, it’s just a community of people, meeting every Wednesday to talk about different areas of their spirituality.

If you’re feel called to the Witchy side of life, or if you’ve been practicing for a while, I highly recommend joining. You will find yourself in such a beautiful community, and you will learn so much from everybody there.

Words By Ali Arief, Theatre Editor

You can find the Witches on Instagram @WitchesofSussex

The Badger 24th of January 2022

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Refreshers Events: What’s On! Buddy Making Schemes: 24th January and 26th January The events this week continue with Buddy making schemes such as the Postgraduate Speed Friending Event held on the 24th January between 3:30-4:30pm in the Meeting House. This is a completely free event, brought to you by the Buddy Scheme and Residential Life. Immerse yourself within a fun and friendly environment which will get you meeting new people and making new friends ahead of term time! Not a Postgrad?

The Buddy Scheme are hosting a walking tour of Brighton on the 26th January where you can discover the city whilst chatting and conversing with fellow students. The meeting point will be 2pm outside Falmer House Reception.

Refreshers Event: 25th January Introducing the Refreshers Event 2022, found in Falmer House and Attenborough Centre Tuesday 25th January!

Are you a fresher of 2021 and wanting to find out what the University has to offer?

Or maybe you are hoping to

introduce yourself to something new. Here at Sussex’s Refreshers Event you will have the opportunity to scope out any societies, clubs and more that the university has to offer! (You may even be able to grab a few freebies whilst you’re there.)

It is important to note that for any accessibility requirements there will be a quieter hour taking place between 11am-12pm. Everyone attending the event will be required to wear a facemask whilst each area will be widely spread across three buildings.

If you are unable to attend this event, there will be a digital alternative taking place live on Monday 24th January!

Falmer Market: 25th January Are you a foodie? Or maybe love a bit of alternative shopping?

Falmer Markets brings to Sussex University a variety of market traders that are rotated. Grab yourself a bite to eat in between classes with stalls offering a variety of cuisines such as Vietnamese and South American. Or maybe you fancier something smaller and sweet which can be found from stalls serving delicious baked

goods! This market occupies a space for arts and crafts hidden gems offering something for everyone. Societies are welcomed to get involved!

Roller Disco: 27th January Come to Mandela Hall at either 7pm, 8pm or 9pm on the 27th of January for a bit of skating with your mates! No need to own any roller skates, you will be provided with some (though you are welcome to bring your own pair too). Each slot lasts an hour so it’s a great way to have fun with friends after the holidays or a great opportunity to make new ones. Each ticket is £9 and you can book via the Sussex Student Union website.

There will be accessible toilets, including a gender neutral one.

Vintage Clothing Fair: 28th January From 10am in Mandela Hall on the 28th of January you are welcome to browse the large selection of vintage clothing!

With completely free entry, the hall will be full of clothes from Nike, Ralph Lauren, Levis, Champion, Hugo Boss and more.

You’ll be able to find fleeces, coats, jackets, t-shirts and other items on racks. There will be

@Wikimedia Commons ground level access, a changing facility, accessible toilets and a gender neutral toilet.

For

more details, sussexstudent.com

see

British Airways Ends Brighton i360 Sponsorship Amy Holden Staff Writer

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he British Airways i360 is the number one paid-for visitor attraction in Brighton, and it has been sponsored

by British Airways since it opened in 2016. Standing at over 160m on the seafront, the tower is an important part of Brighton’s tourism, offering 360 views of the city.

Providing around 160 jobs in the local community, there is also the opportunity to climb the tower, as well as make use of the restaurant and bars inside.However, British Airways has recently announced its decision to end sponsorship of the attraction, which will stop on 3rd November 2022.

It is the finances of the tower which are of concern, as it has missed over £6 million in loan repayments over 3 years, since visitor numbers have been smaller than projected targets.

In the financial year ending June 2020, British Airways i360 lost over £5 million, with just over 195,000 visitors instead of the target 390,000. Lack

of visitors makes repayments more difficult and the Head of Brighton i360 Ltd, Julia Barfield, has said that lockdowns had a role in this.

Brighton and Hove City Council originally lent Brighton i360 Ltd £36.2 million in 2014 to build the tower and in 2019 councillors drew

up a loan restructure which reduced future payments, increasing the likelihood of repayments being paid. A 2021 Council report on the debt meant that the outstanding amount owed, including interest, was £41 million.

However, some sources

@The Argus

suggest the figure is £45 million, as they also received an additional £4 million from the Coast to Capital Local Enterprise Partnership.

British Airways’ sponsorship has previously led to some protests against the airline occurring outside the i360. These include the airline’s role in helping the Home Office with deporting flights in 2020, and the airline’s proposed job cuts during the start of the pandemic. This reinforces the role British Airways i360 has in the city and the importance of picking the correct sponsor when the time comes later this year. One of Woodingdean’s Councillors, Steve Bell, has also highlighted this issue, wanting the new sponsor to be in line with resident views and suggesting airlines be out of contention. In contrast, a Councillor for Hangleton and Knoll, Dawn Barnett, has suggested that this is the “beginning of the end” for the tower, citing the cost to use the tower was a large

reason: tickets for 25+ are £16.50, and tickets 16-24 costs £11.10, although central Brighton and Hove residents can receive discounts.

According to the i360 though, guests are spending longer there than previously, highlighting that the attraction is still very popular and that the impact of travel restrictions has been mitigated by locals attending, alongside those visiting Brighton on day-trips.

However, the decision to stop sponsoring the tower appears to be amicable, with the Chief Operating Officer of Brighton i360 Ltd, Ian Hart, saying “The globally-recognised BA brand helped to catapult Brighton i360 on to the international stage from the very beginning.”

Hamish McVey from British Airways said, “We are proud to have been the first sponsor of the i360.” The partnership was originally for 5 years, although it was extended by 15 months in August 2021. Potential sponsors are being encouraged to apply, with the deadline for entries being the end of July.

Information correct at the time of writing

The Badger 24th of January 2022

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Eastbourne Bin Strike Continues: Workers Walk Out Over Pay and Safety Refuse truck drivers in Eastbourne began further strike action on Friday 14 January, amid rows with the Town council.

Jasmine Crowhurst News Sub-Editor

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MB Union members in Eastbourne had taken industrial action on 3 individual days: December 31, January 7 and January 10. The Strike continued on Friday 14 January, with industrial action set to last a full week this time.

The first of three days of strike action began in Eastbourne on New Year's Eve. HGV drivers and other workers joined a picket line outside the depot on Courtlands Road on the morning of Friday, December 31.

The Council said the strike, which left residents with uncollected rubbish on New Year's Eve, was "wholly unnecessary".

The Union estimated that rubbish collections have been disrupted for around 50,000 residents in East Sussex.

The GMB Union says the row with South East Environmental Services, which is owned

by Eastbourne Council, is over pay and safety issues.

On Wednesday 5 January, Eastbourne Borough Council offered a 7 per cent pay increase to pay to drivers and a 3 per cent increase to all other South

East Environmental Services Limited staff (SEESL). However, the union continued to hold out for an offer closer to 20 per cent.

GMB met with council bosses on January 6 where they offered drivers approximately £12.30 per hour - a far cry from the drivers’ claim for £13.50 per hour – still considerably lower than the industry standard.

The Council then made a public statement outlining the deal, which the GMB union

said was a misleading public statement as drivers were yet to vote on the new offer and the Strikes continued.

On Friday, 14th January, a vehicle was blocked from leaving the depot. A spokesperson for Eastbourne Borough Council called their actions “unlawful”.

They added “In addition to this, it is wholly wrong that a trade union is prepared to prevent people who want to work from collecting the refuse and

recycling from local homes”.

The Council reported that only 19 out of 88 staff are involved in the Strike Action, and that Sussex Police are closely monitoring the situation.

The Trade union GMB and the Council had a meeting at 10.30am on Monday, January 17.

A council spokesperson said, “The GMB union is considering our latest offer.”

“We hope that they will reconsider our seven per cent

@Flickr

pay rise offer for drivers and three per cent for all other staff.”

“We believe this is a very generous offer in the current climate and follows other pay rises staff have received since the council took over the waste, recycling and street cleansing service.”

According to the Council, a seven per cent pay rise would achieve pay equality with drivers in Lewes.

The council confirmed that contractors will install a new shower facility at the Courtlands Road depot along with a new welfare unit.

GMB Organiser Declan Macintyre made a statement voicing the intentions of the Drivers in Eastbourne. “The last thing these drivers want to do is strike – and they are so sorry about the impact this will have on the people of Eastbourne – but the barbaric working conditions they suffer leave them with no choice.”

The dispute continues between Eastbourne Borough Council and the Union amid bin collection strikes in the town.

Editor Note: Details are correct as of time of writing 17/01/22.

Homosexuality Convictions to be Potentially Wiped From UK Records as an Amendment to the Controversial Changes in the Police and Crime Bill Mansi Tailor Staff Writer

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he Home Office is set to “right the wrongs of the past” as a pardons scheme is being expanded that would remove all past convictions for homosexual activity.

The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts bill included controversial policies such as anti protest measures, and increased police stop and search powers. It also presented the potential to criminalise traveller communities. The bill, however, is being reassessed as the House of Lords rejected the amendments put forth.

If reassessed successfully, it would include a pardons scheme that would remove past convictions for consensual homosexual activity.

Currently only nine former offences are included on a list that the Home Office said “largely focused on the repealed offences of buggery and gross indecency be-

tween men”. More offences to be revoked will be added as part of the new amendment.

This amendment will make it possible for civilians and military personnel to have their offences stricken off the record, should these offences be due to consensual homosexual activity. Those already covered under this scheme will get automatic pardons.

In Priti Patel’s attempt to expand the government’s Disregards and Pardons scheme from a narrow set of laws, anyone convicted of a crime under the now repealed laws can appeal to have it removed from their criminal record.

Those who have convictions to their names and have passed away or the people who may pass away for up to 12 months after the scheme is introduced will get a posthumous pardon.

The Home Secretary said that “It is only right that where offences have been abolished, convictions for consensual activity between same-sex part-

ners should be disregarded too”, and that “I hope that expanding the pardons and disregards scheme will go some way to righting the wrongs of the past and to reassuring members of the LGBT community that Britain is one of the safest places in the world to call home”.

Patel thanked her peers, the non-affiliated Lord Cashman and the Conservative Lord Lexden for raising the issue. The two of them, along with Professor Paul Johnson, have been working on this inclusion for five years.

The Home Office said that there would be certain conditions in place when removing a conviction. If these conditions are not met, a person would still have the charges on their record. These conditions are that all the parties involved must be 16 years old or above and that the offences convicted for should not be an offence today.

Lord Lexden had pointed out that it was an “affront to gay people” that the scheme had

not been extended. Whereas Cashman said in November that “the disregard and pardon schemes in England and Wales are significantly flawed because they encompass only a small fraction of the laws that, over the decades and centuries, have immiserated the lives of gay and bisexual people”.

Lord Cashman, Lord Lexden and Prof Paul Johnson welcomed the news and said “For

five years, the three of us have been working together on behalf of gay people in the armed forces and in civilian life, who suffered grave injustice because of cruel laws which discriminated against them in the past.”

“We are delighted that our long campaign will at last bring many gay people, both living and deceased, the restitution they deserve.”

@Pixabay

The Badger 24th of January 2022

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Leading Members of Government Found to Have Breached Lockdown Restrictions Multiple Times

Evie Felton Staff Writer

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ver the course of January 2022, a series of allegations have come to light implicating various members of the Government and Civil Service, including the Prime Minister himself, in continuous breaches of lockdown restrictions since the introduction of Coronavirus legislation.

On the 20th of May 2020, the then Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, Oliver Dowden, announced that for the first time since the instigation of the UK’s initial national lockdown, on the 23rd of March 2020, people were finally permitted to meet one person from outside their household.

However, on the same day as the first tentative adjustment to Coronavirus legislation, the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, attended a party in the gardens of Downing Street.

The risk COVID posed to the UK at this time remained extremely high, with COVIDrelated deaths on the 20th of May 2020 amounting to 363, according to Government data.

@Flickr Following the publication of a leaked email sent by the Prime Minister’s very own Principal Private Secretary, Boris Johnson has since said that he did attend the party on the 20th of May under the impression that it was nothing more than a work event.

However, copies of the leaked email show how it referred to the gathering as “socially distanced drinks”, with the reasoning for this event being to “make the most of the good weather” and to reward No.10 staff for their work. However, a leaked email provides written

evidence revealing that It is said that out of the 100 people that were originally invited, 40 people attended the party in the private garden of No.10.

Prior to Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs) on the 12th of January, there had been consistent pressure from the media to address the mounting evidence initially exposing that this party had taken place and that the Prime Minister had been in attendance. In the chamber, Boris Johnson finally admitted that he was at the party, whilst also stating that according to the date in

which the event took place the party “could be said technically to fall within the guidance”.

Johnson’s defense was immediately shamed by Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, using this most recent allegation as an example of the Government empting themselves from Coronavirus laws. In his role as Leader of the Opposition, Starmer has been previously branded as holding back in his critiques of the Government’s handling of the pandemic. However, during this set of PMQs he called for Boris Johnson’s resignation

symptoms.

This minimally invasive and inexpensive test could reduce wait times by several weeks, increasing the chances of treatment and survival significantly.

The scientific team tested 300 samples from patients who were recruited via the Oxfordshire Suspected Cancer (SCAN) pathway. All experienced nonspecific cancer symptoms, like fatigue and unexplained weight loss. Out of the 20 patients who had cancerous tumours, the blood work test identified 19, a 95% accuracy rate.

The test could also recognise if the patient was suffering from a localised cancer or a spreading one with a 94% accuracy. This is the first to be able to do so without identifying the type of tumour beforehand.

The study was published in the Clinical Cancer Research journal and was lead by Dr James Larkin, who said that “We have already demonstrated that this technology can successfully identify if patients with multiple sclerosis are progressing to

the later stages of disease, even before trained clinicians could tell. It is very exciting that the same technology is now showing promise in other diseases, like cancer”.

While other tests that search for biomarkers associated with cancer usually focus on DNA mutations, elevated protein

levels, white blood cell damage and others, this test uses a technology named nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), which profiles blood molecules called metabolites. NMR uses magnetic fields and radio waves.

It would enable professionals to observe a cancer, as well as to see if the cancer has spread,

and has since stated that he believes the Prime Minister has broken the law.

The Metropolitan Police have expressed their reluctance to investigate the No.10 party under the defense that they rarely take on retrospective cases when breaches of Coronavirus legislation are concerned.

Therefore, for the time being, all eyes are on the inquiry by the Cabinet Office’s Senior Civil Servant, Sue Gray, commissioned to look further into the evidence and allegations surrounding the series of Downing Street lockdown parties that have taken place. It has not yet been confirmed when the findings of the inquiry will be published, however they will have the power to determine the future outcome of Boris Johnson’s career as Prime Minister.

With allegations of more lockdown parties and breaches of Coronavirus legislation being investigated, the Government risks losing further public and party support.

Editor note: Information was correct at time of writing 16/01/2022.

New Blood Test Could Identify Cancer Earlier With 95% Success Rate

Maisie Levitt News Online Editor

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niversity of Oxford scientists have developed a new blood test that may detect cancer and its spread early on. With a success rate of 95%, the test could detect cancer in people with non-specific symptoms such as weight-loss and fatigue.

By detecting the early onset of cancer, the response to treatment would be increased due to early access. The test would also reduce the time between noticing early symptoms and an official diagnosis, leading to a higher chance of survival.

This would increase survival rates amongst patients with nonspecific symptoms the most, as they are those who are often diagnosed the latest.

While there is currently a “two-week wait path” for patients with organspecific symptoms, there is no clear option for those with non-specific

@Pixabay

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as the metabolites in people with localised or spreading cancer each look different to each other while still differing to those of healthy people.

Dr James Larkin told The Guardian “The problem we’ve had in the past is that if they do have cancer, that cancer is growing all the time, and when they come back the cancers are often quite advanced…

We’re hoping to capture these patients when they come to the GP, to give them an immediate referral option”.

The next step is further confirmation of the test’s accuracy. It must be confirmed in up to 3,000 cancer patients who have non-specific symptoms. Dr Larkin hopes for this to have happened by 2024, saying that being able to diagnose a patient with a tumour “provides a strong incentive” to search for the cancer and treat it as fast as possible, all resulting from a test that is efficient, accurate and cost effective to the patient and to the health system.

The Badger 24th of January 2021

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Kazakhstan’s Protests: How They Began and Why They Matter Ritika Srivatsan News Print Editor

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n 2nd January 2022, protests erupted in the southwestern city of Zhanaozen, Kazakhstan, and quickly spread to the rest of the country. Originally protesting over the rising price of liquified petroleum gas (L.P.G), a lowcost fuel commonly used to power cars in Kazakhstan, protests intensified as residents fought against their autocratic government for wider social and political reform.

In Kazakhstan's largest city of Almaty, demonstrators seized the airport whilst setting vehicles, the mayor’s office and City Hall ablaze.

Close to a dozen policemen and National Guard officers were killed. In response, they fired tear gas, water cannons and used stun grenades on the public before President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev issued a shoot-to-kill order.

Tokayev’s harsh order mirrors his time in office and is symbolic of the severity of struggles Kazakh residents face. After accepting his cabinet’s resignation for their failure to quell protests, Tokayev announced a state of emergency in several districts and temporarily shut down the internet.

Russian President Vladimir Putin sent in Russian peacekeeping forces at the behest of Tokayev but the protests further weakened an

already turbulent region. The death toll has risen above 220 with hundreds more injured (at the time of writing), causing widespread uncertainty and international concern.

Background A mineral-rich nation, Kazakhstan was the last Soviet republic to declare independence in 1991 after which President Nursultan Nazarbayev came into power.

The autocratic leader controlled natural resources and within months of his presidency, sought to increase his wealth via deals with private corporations.

After years of making millions with the help of foreign investment companies, his wealth handed him the power to rig elections and maintain political representation for nearly three decades.

Wealth was concentrated within a minority elite whilst commoners were deprived of similar privileges.

Nazarbayev stepped aside in 2019 and hand-picked Tokayev to be his successor. Despite the change in presidency, many considered Tokayev to act on Nazarbayev’s accord and retain his methods of leadership during his tenure in office.

Stifling dissent, undemocratic elections, corruption and imprisoning the opposition were all common occurrences.

What led to the protests?

Price hikes seen with L.P.G aggravated residents.

However, their demonstrations highlighted deeply ingrained problems with the nation’s

@WikiMedia Commons

social, economic and political fabric. Government statistics state the average salary to be $580 a month but this is inconsistent.

Unemployment and inflation rates have steadily risen to 5% and 7% respectively.

Largescale inequality amongst residents whilst the elite lived lavishly incensed people who in turn took to the streets.

Authorities deny allegations made by those protesting and claim foreign militants intended to destabilise the country in an attempted coup d’état.

What are protesters demanding?

Along with a reduction in L.P.G prices, reform within public institutions and an improvement in living conditions are paramount to protesters. However, there is no main opposition leader to deliver the same. All previous instances of discord and defiance have been met with strict crackdowns. In 2011 for example, 16 people were killed and 64 were injured by state police in Zhanaozen over industrial action undertaken by oil workers who had been on strike for eight months.

The ever-increasing wealth gap makes accessing essentials tougher and the lack of fair political representation silences a majority of the population.

Similar uprisings with protesters seeking a move to democratic values were previously seen in Ukraine’s 2014 and Belarus’ 2020 protests.

How does the turmoil affect the world?

Kazakhstan is the world’s largest landlocked country and is bigger than western Europe.

It has long been considered the edifice of economic and political stability in Central Asia, despite it being at the cost of repression.

The United States and Russia have long been vying for dominance in the region.

An intervention led by Russian forces, part of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), an intergovernmental military alliance of 6 former Soviet states, has the power to greatly impact geopolitics in the region. Fearing a ‘colour revolution’, Putin once again had the opportunity to showcase Russian prominence within a former Soviet nation, akin to Ukraine and Belarus in recent times.

Bordered by China to the southeast, many expected

@Financial Times the superpower to condemn Tokayev for turning to Russia instead of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, a central Asian bloc. Instead, Chinese President Xi Jinping fully endorsed Tokayev and guaranteed support, worrying the United States.

The US has historically maintained good ties with Kazakhstan and was the first country to recognise its independence.

Trade relations and substantial investment into the nation’s energy sector may be strained.

Neighbouring countries and authoritarian regimes around the world have been eyeing developments closely as the uprisings could influence similar actions.

The way ahead Tokayev assured he would listen to grievances and bring about reform.

He initially showcased the same by accepting his cabinet’s resignation and announced a probable dissolution of Parliament, a move that would result in new elections. He also dismissed the “leader of the nation” Nazarbayev from his post of chairman of the country’s security council after demonstrators repeatedly shouted “Shal ket” or “old man out”, referring to the 81-year-old Nazarbayev who controlled Kazakhstan from behind the scenes.

Residents are sceptical regardless. Tokayev’s image transformed from a replacement carrying out his predecessor’s wishes to that of an uncompromising authoritarian

leader aiming to retain and expand his sphere of influence.

Many believe that the balance of power has been permanently altered. Nazarbayev lost his power with loyalist Tokayev breaking free and exercising his own power.

Russia’s intervention cannot be taken lightly either. An associate fellow at think tank Chatham House, Kate Mallinson, stated “Nothing comes for free with Putin, and there will be a quid pro quo”.

There has also been speculation on Putin’s future.

When his term ends in 2024, stepping aside and controlling Russia through a kleptocracy akin to Kazakhstan’s model seems ideal.

This may now seem risky and Putin may choose to remain in power as long as possible.

Britain and its links to Kazakhstan’s kleptocracy Many kleptocrats choose Britain to store their illretrieved wealth, courtesy of poor transparency laws.

In December 2020, Chatham House published a report titled ‘The UK’s Kleptocracy Problem’ which mentioned 34 properties bought and owned

by Kazakhstan’s ruling elite at a cost of approximately £530m. John Heathershaw, an author of the report said, “Most of the property is linked to Nazarbayev’s family or members of the ruling elite that are close to them”. Scholars believe this is the tip of the iceberg since a lot of data is unavailable.

It is tough to cease kleptocracy if there is an easily available option for them to guard and access their assets.

News Rebecca Chitolie News Editor

The Badger 24th of January 2022

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Expert Says Protein from Gorse Bush Could Feed Millions of People

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he invasive gorse bush could produce enough protein to “easily” feed millions of people, according to a leading expert.While gorse is native to Britain, it has been widely cleared across Scotland due to it encroaching on valuable arable land that is used for other crops.

The prickly plant contains 17% protein content and has previously been used as an animal feed.

The suggestion comes from Professor Wendy Russell of the University of Aberdeen and leader of a Scottish Government research programme, looking into the protein content of invasive plants that must be doused with herbicides to keep them under control.

She revealed the gorse bush requires much less carbon dioxide emissions to produce a single kilogram of protein separate from gorse – 4.5 to 6kg – opposed to an average of 102kg used to produce an equivalent for meat.

“The whole point about

@Pixabay gorse is it is actively being removed from marginal lands – it’s something we can gain protein from at no extra cost,” Russell said.

While calculations suggest that protein could feed Scotland's population, it is a suggestion for the future rather than for immediate implementation.

Professor Russell said, “If protein isolates are produced in the correct way, so to be safe, they could be considered as human food in the future”.

Russell spoke at a Science Media Centre event on

alternative proteins that looked at the positives and negatives of alternatives to meat and dairy food products. The Food Standards Agency (FSA) launched a polling report at the event that showed 60% of people in the UK were willing to try plant-based alternatives to meat and dairy; a third were willing to try lab-grown meat and a quarter were willing to try edible insects.

Livestock and fodder production occupies 83% of the world’s farmland but produces only 18% of protein.

Studies show that sharp cuts in

meat eating in rich nations are needed to halt global heating.

From 1950 to 2000 the global population doubled, but meat intake increased fivefold, said Russell. This trend will become unsustainable for the environment, she said: “We really do have to change our diet.”

Fifteen Scottish farmers also planted hemp this year for the first time, Russell said. “These alternative plant proteins are very healthy, high protein, high in fibre, and high in micronutrients.”

Professor Robin May, the chief scientific adviser at the

FSA said “There is a huge potential for novel proteins to have massive benefits in terms of environmental (..) and nutritional benefit. Our priority is to do everything possible to help businesses get those novel, innovative products safely onto the shelves as swiftly as possible.”

May said that while many people were reluctant to try new products, such as labgrown meat, a quarter said they would change their minds if they were confident it was safe and well regulated. “That’s where we play a key role,” said May. Lab-grown meat went on sale for the first time in December 2020 in Singapore. Supporters say they are produced in clean facilities and do not carry the risk of bacterial contamination like meat from livestock.

Neil Shah, at the Edison Group investment research firm, said “cultivated meat (…) has already begun attracting significant investor interest, as it offers the chance to enter an industry which could disrupt the global meat market over the coming decades”.

South Korean President Moon Jae-In Pushes for Peace with North Korea Before His Presidency Ends Ritika Srivatsan News Print Editor

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outh and North Korea, the United States and China have agreed in principle to declare a formal end to the Korean War, stated the South Korean President Moon Jaein during his four-day visit to Australia in December.

Ending in only an armistice and not a peace treaty, the Korean war ended in July 1953 but technically, the two countries are still at war.

Speaking at the United Nations General Assembly in September 2021, Moon said that a formal declaration would “mark a pivotal point of departure in creating a new order of reconciliation and co-operation on the Korean peninsula”, a move frequently spoken of but steeped in endless diplomacy between Seoul, Washington, Pyongyang and Beijing. Moon admitted that action regarding the peace declaration was being held back due to North Korea wanting the US to end hostility as a precondition.

Moon’s proposition was entrenched in the idea that the peace declaration is a symbolic gesture rather than a legally binding act. “Koreans have long aspired for peace, prosperity and unification. I will continue to make efforts to institutionalize sustainable peace, and I won’t stop that until the end of my term”, said Moon in one of his new year addresses of 2022.

With Moon’s presidency coming to an end in May, his quest for peace seems unlikely since international entities involved are unable to agree over the timing and the necessary preconditions they each insist upon. Go Myong-Hyun, a senior fellow at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Seoul believes that Kim Jong Un, North Korea’s Supreme Leader, is questioning the point of signing an end-of-war declaration when a new president will be elected in a few months.

North Korea’s shaky relationship with the US does not make it easier as the former has continued developing nuclear and ballistic missiles, thereby breaching

UN sanctions. Despite Moon strongly advocating that the declaration will bring an end to the nuclearization of the Korean peninsula, experts remain divided.

Moon Chung-in, a former special adviser for unification, diplomacy and national security affairs for the President said, “The proposal represents an effort to end the impasse, increase confidence between the parties and build towards a breakthrough on the issue of the denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula”. Kim Jongun’s influential sister, Kim Yojong, also previously expressed that she thought of the treaty as “interesting and admirable”.

However, the US has not yet confirmed its level of support.

Washington is concerned that the declaration will mean viewing North Korea as a “friendly” nation whilst also normalizing the regime’s severe autocracy.

An end-of-war treaty could also undermine the US’ military presence in the region. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said last October that Seoul and

Washington “have somewhat different perspectives on the precise sequence or timing or conditions” of the proposed declaration.

China plays an important role in the peacekeeping process given its extensive history with Korea both when divided and unified. Despite China’s strong alliance with North

Korea, President Xi-Jinping has repeatedly said he endorsed the idea of a declaration and is impelling his North Korean counterpart to do the same.

While South Korea and the US reportedly happen to be in the last stages of framing a draft declaration, the pathway is dotted with uncertainty due to differing interests.

@Thousand Wonders

The Badger 24th of January 2022

News

8

News Where You’re Not

Georgia Keetch, Editor-in-Chief, reviews some of the most interesting stories from across the country Daring Dog-Inverness A Yorkshire Terrier’s bizarre kerbside walking habit has left Facebook users baffled. dogs tend to develop habits that can confuse their humans, and this little Yorkie is no exception. Fluffy eight-month-old Odin, who lives in Inverness, Scotland has developed a confusing quirk of his own over the past few months.T he tiny pup has decided that he isn’t much of a fan when it comes to walking on the pavements while he’s out on walkies. Odin prefers to walk only on the kerb edge, with his tiny paws fitting perfectly. Choosing not to stray from what he clearly considers his very own personal yellow brick road, the Yorkie cuts an amusing figure walking through the night.

Odin’s owner was left perplexed by the unusual habit, something that the dog started doing at around four months old, sharing the footage on Facebook.

Chip Meister-Manchester

Inverness

What a Cock Up-North yorkshire 3 giants stone penises are stolen from shop. Three giant penis-shaped garden ornaments have been snatched from a shop which hit the headlines after the owner refused to remove one of the ‘obscene’ statues from his window display.

Jason Hadlow, 58, owner of Simply Dutch in Leeming Bar, North Yorkshire, was forced to look on as his beloved 4ft masonry manhood was seized in 2010 following complaints from the public. But the defiant businessman declined to pay the £80 fine to have the stone sculpture returned to him – and instead ordered 150 more from Indonesia. The incident led to him launching the ‘Free Willy’ campaign – with pictures of concrete penises appearing online in various locations. North Yorkshire Police eventually bowed to pressure and released the statue to the shop. But now, 11 years later, the final three ornaments were stolen around 10pm on Monday night. The thieves also took five cast iron stags and five concrete dogs, said Jason, who lives in the town of Yarm.

A man claims to be on a mission to collect one chip from every single one of the 925 Wetherspoons across the UK. Boris Bennett, 45, says he carries a folder of chips around with him – each in a clear pouch and perfectly labelled with the restaurant they were purchased from.His hilarious hobby came to light when he posted a picture of his ‘trading cards collection book’ on Facebook.It appeared on Wetherspoons paltry chip count – a group on the site where Wetherspoon fanatics discuss how many chips they got with their meal.

Boris, from Bury, says he’s thrilled with the response and would ‘love to shake the hand’ of Wetherspoon founder Tim Martin one day.He said: ‘I decided to do it because I thought it would be funny to other members of the group, and also because it gives me an excuse to travel the UK to all the pubs’

Yorkshire Manchester

Are you Flocking Joking?-New Forest

A 70-year-old man has been taken to court by his neighbour due to the ‘unrelenting noise’ of his flock of 15 pigeons. Alan Pidgley, who had a sign up by the coop saying ‘Mr Pidgley’s Pigeon Loft’, now faces having to get New Forest rid of the birds to comply with a council noise order. The pigeon problem has split opinion in his countryside cul de sac, with other neighbours backing him and even offering to pay his fine. Mr Pidgely converted a garden shed near his detached bungalow into an enclosure after seeing an advert for the birds two years ago.But neighbour Rebecca Wells, who he had lived alongside for over a decade, was not so enamoured with the animals. She claimed the noise of the pigeons was so ‘distressing’ she and husband Paul have been forced to try to move from the New Forest village where they live.After she complained, the council went to investigate and observed that the sound of the pigeons ‘could be heard over ambient noise such as refuse collection and planes overhead’. It was found to be a ‘statutory nuisance’ and he was told to reduce the noise, for example by getting rid of some of the pigeons.After this didn’t happen, Mr Pidgely was taken to court and told to pay a fine of £500 and £450 in costs – a significant reduction from the £4,389.89 New Forest District Council sought – after he admitted failing to comply with their order.

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The Badger 24th of January 2022

9

Features

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Are New Year’s Resolutions Really Worth Making?

Grace Dawes Features Online Editor

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ith the Christmas holidays over and the spring semester in motion, I want to discuss the habit to ‘start fresh’ in January. Whether you have celebrated the new year, and whether or not you have subsequently made some new year’s resolutions, it seems to be a pre-established inclination for some people to better themselves in the event of the new year.

Maybe it is because of the guilt of indulgence during the Christmas period, or the year has rushed past some, or we may be in need of regulating ourselves, but it is a common trend to set yourself goals to achieve throughout the course of the following year. Some of the most popular new year’s resolutions, according to Brad Zomick from Go Skills, involve: exercising more, losing weight, living life to the fullest, reading more, quitting smoking, spending more time with family/friends, etc.

According to the same website, roughly half of those who set themselves resolutions are actually successful. That means that 1 in 2 resolutionists will give up or quit their goals for the year. There is a variance of reasons why one may give up their resolutions, but it calls into discussion why we bother to declare them in the first place. So my question is, are new year’s resolutions really worth making?

Despite the typical trait for resolutions to become

short-term efforts, there are many reasons why they are useful. The Christmas holidays tend to be the most widely-applicable break period to most people from work, school, care, etc. I appreciate that this does not apply to all professions and circumstances, as many employments and responsibilities of every kind do not incur a break even over Christmas. For those who are fortunate enough to have a break at Christmas, it makes the most sense to then reflect on the year that is coming to an end. What has been achieved, and what has been lost. So, a new year's resolution is sensible for those who want to make reasonable goals to achieve for the next year, where there is no break until the next Christmas. For them, resolutions provide hope for the future, an aspiration to achieve, and a goal to strive towards. Sometimes that is what people need; something to work towards. Something to motivate you to get out of bed every day, to work harder, love more, learn more, try more, and to eventually feel fulfilled. To feel like you have done all you can to better yourself, so that by the end of the year you won’t feel the guilt of not becoming the version of yourself that you could, or should, be. Sometimes the distraction of a long-term goal can keep spirits high, and dull the monotony of everyday life that you experienced last year. It allows life to be play and work. Especially the feeling of achievement, at the end of the year after working so

@Real Simple

10

@ISmart Sitting Blog hard to accomplish your goals, is what keeps some going.

But new year’s resolutions aren't functional in every way. Why should we choose to start fresh only in January? Should we delay the choice to better ourselves until the start of the year?

“

don’t distance yourself too much from the person you want to be with unrealistic goals, because chances are you are much closer to being that person than you think I understand that I have previously stated that the end of the year is when time for reflection has the most opportunity to take place. But if we really are unhappy with the way that we are living, in relation to conditions that you are able to take some control of, then the free will of starting fresh should be embraced all year round. If the consensus is to change the climate of your well-being at a specific time of year, then aren't we really just delaying the chance to do better? I can appreciate the reality that change is scary, and is not always easy to pursue, let alone pushing yourself to initiate change. Thus, I can appreciate the tendency for a large proportion of people to choose to make new year’s resolutions with the comfort of knowing that others are also pushing themselves

too.

Nevertheless, doesn't this just promote an implicit competitiveness between resolutionists? Perhaps, the talk of ‘new year’s resolutions’, and the expectation to make them, is more damaging than beneficial? Let’s say, considering the popularity of these resolutions, that every person made the new year's resolution to eat healthier and exercise more. Although it would have apparent benefits, this is not an ideal goal for every human being. Even if we all ate the same healthy diet, and followed the same workout plan, everyone would still look and feel completely different. Because, health looks different on everyone. Or let’s say that everyone made the same new year’s resolution to practice well-being exercises that benefit mental health; there would still be a variance in the general mental health of everyone who chooses to make that resolution. There is never going to be a universal result, and new year’s resolutions are not going to function well for everyone in the same way. If half of those who make new year’s resolutions are going to give them up anyway, and the other half are only going to cause those who didn’t make any to feel guilty, their worth seems to be lacking.

So I would say that my main doubts with new year’s resolutions are: they don't function well for everyone, their promotion to only set long-goals/changes in wellbeing in the month of January, and their tendency to make others feel like they aren’t doing

enough to better themselves.

If setting goals for the future is what you need to help you through the year, and they will help you feel better, then you should absolutely set yourself some new year’s resolutions.

But the key is to be realistic.

Let yourself set goals that are possible to achieve, don’t make resolutions for the sake of it because it feels like everyone else is. Growth in well-being is never linear, so don't expect yourself to be better this year compared to the previous year. When you do achieve those goals, appreciate your growth and acknowledge your accomplishments.

However, if you haven't set new year’s resolutions yet, or have already given them up, then maybe they're not for you, and that's okay. As long as you are able to acknowledge the things that you have control to improve in your life, and you are willing to work at it throughout the year, not just in January, then maybe you don't need new year’s resolutions. They are only worth making if you need that encouragement for the next year ahead, and you like knowing that others are setting out their goals too. Don’t stress too much about constantly making yourself better, make the resolutions a long-term goal and something to work towards, make them fit around the main responsibilities of your daily life. Either way, don’t distance yourself too much from the person you want to be with unrealistic goals, because chances are you are much closer to being that person than you think.

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Features

11

The Night Freedom Burned Lucy Dover Staff Writer

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n the night of 9th November 1938, cries of angry mobs, broken glass and grief-stricken Jewish families could be heard across the cities of Germany and parts of Austria. Fires rampaged through hundreds of Synagogues, Jewish religious artifacts were burned, and desecrated, and violent gangs of Nazi stormtroopers destroyed Jewish businesses and schools.

On what became known as Kristallnacht, or the night of broken glass, 91 German Jews lost their lives, and some 30,000 Jewish men were sent to Concentration Camps.

Nazi Officials depicted these riots as justified reactions to an event that has occurred just two days prior. On November 7th, Ernst vom Rath, the Third Secretary of the German Embassy, was shot by 17-year-old student, Hershel Grynszpan.

Grynszpan’s parents had been deported to Poland, from Hanover, Germany, despite the fact that they had lived there since 1914. When arrested by French police, he pleaded and tried to raise awareness of the mistreatment that Jews were facing in Europe: "Being a Jew is not a crime. I am not a dog. I have a right to live and the Jewish people have a right to exist on this earth.

Wherever I have been I have been chased like an animal."

His pleas went overlooked.

Over the next couple of days, violent mobs, spurred on by Nazi encouragement, destroyed Synagogues, businesses, orphanages, homes and schools. Firefighters were told not to interfere, unless adjacent “Aryan” property was in jeopardy, police were told only to arrest Jews and witnesses recall seeing families fleeing from the scenes.

Ruth Winkelmann was only ten years old when Kristallnacht occurred, but in an interview with the BBC, she recounts it vividly. She saw “broken shop windows and shards of glass lying in the streets” and “a shop where someone had painted the word 'Jew', and smeared on a star of David”. After arriving at school, she learnt the horrifying truth that several of her classmates’ fathers had been either deported or sent to concentration camps.

It is difficult to pinpoint

exactly when the Holocaust began, but this horrific event is usually viewed as the turning point in the Third Reich’s history.

It marked the poignant shift from antisemitic legislation, to violence and destruction.

The letter J was stamped on Jews’ Nazi-Era ID cards, marking them a target. Ruth Winkelmann still has hers. "In retrospect, I became a grownup on that day," Kristallnacht is burned into her memory.

"The pogrom night took away my childhood,” Following the riots, the Nazi government fined the Jewish community one billion reichsmarks (about $400 million at 1938 rates), for the damage caused and Jews were banned from schools on 15th November. By December 1938, just a month after the riots occurred, Jews were banned from most public places in Germany. Nazi politician Joseph Goebbels commented on the violence saying, "We shed not a tear for them [the Jews.]” and that the Synagogues “stood in the way long enough.”

“

We might look back on this, in retrospect, and wonder “why didn’t we listen?” as we do looking back on the events leading up to Kristallnacht.

Ruth still remembers her father’s words on the 10th November. He took her and her little sister into his arms and said: 'this is the beginning of a very difficult time, and we'll try to live through it'." In 1943, Ruth’s father was sent to Auschwitz. He was killed in January 1944. Just before the end of the war, Ruth’s younger sister, Eddi, died of diphtheria.

But the road to Auschwitz did not begin and end with train tracks and gas chambers, or with mass murder graves, nor did it take a single night of riots. There were warnings, beginning with Hitler’s rise to power. In April 1933, the Nazis organised a boycott of Jewishowned businesses. Jews were excluded from civil service jobs, and in October of that year, ‘non-Aryans” were banned from working in Journalism. In September 1935, the Nuremburg Race Laws were passed. This forbid marriage between Jews and Germans. Looking back, there were clear signs of rising antisemitism, but no one

helped, no one came to their aid.

Today, there is a disturbing parallel between events that occurred during the holocaust and events today. Amid the tensions between Israel and Palestine, antisemitism is on the rise. In May 2021, three men were arrested in Bonn, Germany, for burning an Israeli flag, and throwing rocks at a synagogue’s window. On the same night, a fire was lit on top of a stone memorial, which is on the grounds of a synagogue, destroyed during Kristallnacht.

In September of the same year, German police arrested four others over an Islamist terrorist plot to attack a Hagen synagogue on the Jewish festival of Yom Kippur. Jews in Germany have seen a 13% spike in antiSemitic crimes in 2020, and more than 2000 incidents were registered. But it is not just Germany who are seeing a rise. In the first six months of 2021, there was a record spike in antiSemitism, in the UK. CST (Community Security Trust) recorded 628 antisemitic hate incidents from 8 May to 7 June 2021 in Britian, the highest number CST has ever recorded in any month-long period, and roughly four times

the number of antisemitic incidents that would normally be expected during this period.

Kristallnacht is an incredibly important moment in history that has often been overlooked.

It can teach us so much about the consequences of not taking the warning signs of antisemitism seriously.

“

Looking back, there were clear signs of rising antisemitism, but no one helped, no one came to their aid.

Although the situation facing Jews today is nowhere near comparable to the horrific crimes they faced in Germany, according to the BBC, many Jewish people are questioning their safety in today’s society.

Holocaust denial persists, neo-Nazism is on the rise, and there are increasing incidents of violence against Jewish people. These warning signs should not be ignored.

According to data from Campaign Against Antisemitism, 1 out of 5 British Jews feel the authorities aren’t doing enough to project them.

According to a 2016 survey by the charity Campaign Against Antisemitism, half of British Jews avoid showing “visible signs of Judaism (such as Star of David jewelry or Kippah) in public”.

The night of 9th November 1938 changed the course of history, but it did not take just one day for this incident to occur. It did not take just one day for the concentration camps to be built, or the mass graves to be dug. It took many days of people not paying attention, or people too afraid to stand up for their neighbour.

It took many days of people ignoring the pleas of others, before it was too late. Poet Martin Niemöller wrote in his incredibly infamous prose: First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out, Because I was not a socialist… Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out, Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak for me.” In today’s climate, this poem is more relevant than ever before, because one day, we might look back on this, in retrospect, and wonder “why didn’t we listen?” as we do looking back on the events leading up to Kristallnacht.

@Wikipedia

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Features

12

“One Day”

Writer Jake Smajie shares their reflections on this years Holocaust Memorial Day Jake Smajie Staff Writer

T

his Holocaust and Genocide Memorial Day’s theme is ‘one day’. It struck me than ‘one day’ is the length of the news cycles through which most if not all people get their updates on the state of the world, and it made me think to the day in November when 24 asylum seekers drowned in the channel.

This brought, temporarily, some focus onto the British governments Nationality and Borders Bill which is currently passing through Parliament and represents a threat to the integrity of the international laws designed to protect refugees across the world. It struck me as important not just to look back to the time of the holocaust, but to take a moment to check on the health of the international laws and institutions put in place to ensure ‘never again’ could something happen as the international community looked on as horrific as the Holocaust and steps which lead to it. The Spanish essayist

,Jose Gasset ,once wrote: ‘law is born from despair of human nature’, few laws seem as worthy of this quote as international refugee law.

The Nationality and Borders Bill has been criticised as undermining two institutions that protect people, firstly citizenship, and secondly, the right to claim asylum. This is a cause of concern and represents an attempt to undermine institutions that should protect people the world over.

Clause 9 of the bill “Notice of decision to deprive a person of citizenship” – of the bill, which was updated earlier this month,

exempts the government from having to give notice if it is not “reasonably practicable” to do so, or in the interests of national security, diplomatic relations or otherwise in the public interest.

The UK’s Law Society raised concerns that “allowing differential treatment of refugees depending on how they arrive in the UK would penalise those arriving via irregular means; this is incompatible with the UK’s obligations under the Refugee Convention 1951” The ability to remove citizenship from people without notifying them is a development on the existing

@UCU

ability of the government to remove citizenship from people with ‘dual nationality’ who are deemed to be a threat to the country.

Guardian columnist Zoe Williams explained “Dual citizenship is not a precondition; they can be made stateless so long as the British government believes they are eligible for citizenship of another country”, she went on to reveal there are “5.5 million in England and Wales who fall into this category, including about 408,000 people born in the UK”.

This aspect of our existing constitution's famous and controversial use was the removal of Shamima Begum’s citizenship. This case raised important questions over the lack of legal oversight of removing citizenship and what constitutes a dual nationality.

Her position as a Bangladeshi national, a country she had never been to, is doubtful at best.

The government argued her entitlement to get citizenship justified her removal of British citizenship. The vagueness of the government’s approach to the ‘dual’ of nationality should

be of concern to many people, as many on twitter were quick to point out that, following the Nuremberg Laws, all British Jews could be considered eligible for citizenship in Israel.

The bill also seeks to categorise refugees in a way that many institutions including UNHCR, the UN’s body for refugees, and the Welsh Government argue breaches the 1951 convention on refugees which was part of the international laws that came about afterthe Holocaust.

In august 2021, the Board of Deputies of British Jews released a statement criticising the proposed Bill, explaining: “Many people in the Jewish community originally came to the UK as frightened and vulnerable refugees – some on the Kindertransport – and were welcomed into this country”.

Holocaust survivor Elie Weisel wrote ‘Never again' becomes more than a slogan: It's a prayer, a promise, a vow’. Essential to maintaining ‘Never Again’ is to maintain the institutions born from despair at human nature, so they can protect people if they are ever needed, ‘one day’.

Why Everyone Should Watch ‘Don’t Look Up’ Sellah Penteliuk Features Sub-Editor

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Netflix- produced movie took the reality that earth is inevitably dying and made a parody of it. The goal was to take a new approach to educate about the global warming crisis.

‘Don’t Look Up’ had a starfilled cast including; Leonardo DiCaprio, Jonah Hill, Jennifer Lawrence, Timothee Chalamet, Meryl Streep. With cameos including Ariana Grande and Kid Cudi, this movie was set to receive a lot of attention.

The movie's plot surrounded the idea that scientists discovered a meteorite that was on track to hit earth within six months and wipe out all of humankind. When the scientists took this information to the government, the government took it as a joke. When finally realizing the danger they were in, the government decided to have a new-upcoming tech company take charge of the destruction of the meteorite.

The tech company promised that the resources found on the meteorite would provide new

jobs and a booming economy.

With the scientists doing their best to warn the public and fight against the government's decisions, time was ticking.

While I don't want to reveal the ending, I genuinely believe that this was one of the most impactful movies I have watched in a few years.

“

Through humour and frustration, they were able to showcase what it means if society doesn’t listen to the facts.

With climate change and the global warming crisis constantly watching over us, society and governments have failed to act accordingly. Scientists and experts can only say so much, and if we don't believe them or trust them, then that's on us. It's the type of movie that you want to scream at the characters through your screen to do the right thing, but there's something in your gut telling you that's not going to happen.

The solution felt so obvious

for the audience but wasn't for the characters in the movie.

I believe the movie is trying to portray a sense of embarrassment from the audience as we still have time to change our ways but constantly neglect the issue.

The movie asks the question, when did we stop believing in science? When were the individuals who dedicated their lives to studying these complicated topics not smart enough, and we thought we knew more? The movie portrays the government as acting in a way that is in their best favour for their political party to win the next election… it seems concerningly realistic to what we see in reality.

I wholeheartedly believe that everyone should watch this movie and take a few moments to self-reflect afterwards. Ask yourself, why did the producers choose the go the comedic route? Is this an accurate reflection of how our society is living? Why did they get so many influential actors to participate? If this movie was telling of one thing, is that we

better act, and act fast. The movie ‘Don’t Look Up’ took a new approach in delivering a very important message. Through

humour and frustration, they were able to showcase what it means if society doesn’t listen to the facts.

@IMDB

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Features

13

Alopecia and Me: Losing my hair as a student Features Editor, Olly DeHerrera, opens up about the experience of hairloss at 22.

Olly DeHerrera Features Editor

H

air has quite a distinct place in popular conscious- and no time does that feel more apparent than when you begin to lose yours.

Hair, and indeed where it is, appears to dictate so much about how we categories, gender and construct ourselves.

I have been a hairy person since birth, on account of hormones and my mixedrace status. The dark hair that covers my neck, arms, back and anywhere hair will grow has acted as somewhat of an emblem for navigating my identity and culture. The anxiety, teasing and bodydysmorphia caused by my body hair was a saga that involved support from doctors and members of my extended family. Eventually, learning to love and leave my body hair intact was a long but empowering experience- now losing my agency on how to treat my hair feels violating.

I first noticed patches of hairlessness on my usually thickly haired arms; initially chalking this up to cheapshirt induced chafing, I was bothered, but presumed quick grow-back would follow. A few weeks later, I noticed the hair on the back of my hands was completely gone- seemingly overnight, then another few weeks later- my boyfriend found a bald patch in my hair. I sat in sickly silence on the edge of my bed as he gently combed through my hair, my heart sunk a bit each time his phone was raised to take another picture.

I made an appointment with my GP and spent the next few days lacing my fingers through my hair in the back of lectures, feeling patches of the strange tackiness of my scalp.

Alopecia, is a word that comes from the Greek 'alwpeki`a, meaning ‘fox’, “because loss of the hair is common among foxes”, according to the Webster online dictionary.

Alopecia describes a range of hair loss: from patches, to baldness, to total body hair loss; caused by a range of conditions from Iron deficiency to the hair-loss commonly associated with aging.

Alopecia Arceta, my strain of the condition, is characterised by patchy hairloss on the scalp and other areas of the

body. Alopeica Arceta is an autoimmune disorder caused by anti-bodies mistakenly attacking hair follicles, often caused by illness, stress, weight loss, hormonal imbalance or deficiencies- according to the NHS website. For a condition that effects approximately 1 in 500 people, surprising little seems to be known about Alopecia Arceta. All questions I seemed to have could only be answered with “perhaps” by the nurse and various medical websites. Many people I interacted with online reported irrevocable hair-loss in some places and regrowth in others, most explained that this new condition was often a lifelong affliction, coming on after periods of high stress.

Campaigning for treatment has been a fraught process; after my blood test results did not show signs of deficiency, I was prescribed a steroid cream, Betamethasone, that has been “reported to help hair regrowth” but is not a clinically proven treatment.

“

I will continue to learn about my body and adapt to changes as and when the come; for those who are going through this condition now, my word of advice is: be tender to yourself.

Whilst alopecia has no adverse physical effects on one’s health (unless it is a symptom of another condition), the condition impacted my life in complicated, distressing and unexpected ways. Around Christmas Eve I developed a small rash on my chest which induced a rather severe anxious reaction- suspecting I now had a serious skin condition I cried on and off from 2am to 4am because I felt like I was losing control of my health and body.

Before, I was the sort of person who was perhaps not worried enough about my healthignoring pains and lumps: now I was crying at night over a rash because the idea of becoming suddenly seriously ill no longer felt like something that “wouldn’t happen to me”.

I also began to feel a strange guilt that I had wished my hair away in all my younger years of hating it. One night, my

boyfriend complimented my eye colour, and an immediate urge to end the conversation took over as I began to worry that talking about liking my eyes may cause something bad to happen to them.

It took some time for me to admit to myself that alopecia was affecting me. Having had a friend suffer a diagnosis of Non – Hogkins Lymphoma in sixth form, I felt that alopecia was really a lucky hit on the dartboard of potential medical inflictions. This sort of guilt pervaded my thinking constantly. Was I hypocrite for caring about my hairloss after spending years promoting a ‘beauty is a subjective’ narrative to my friends? Did my vulnerability reveal a flaw in my feminist conviction that prides myself on my academic achievements and rejects being confined to my appearance?

The truth is, there hasn’t been a day since November that I forget I have alopecia.

Showering lost its refreshing power as washing and brushing hair became a distressing and often mood-ruining event, and I admit I sometimes put those tasks off for embarrassingly long because I don’t want to confront the sight of hair sliding off my head onto the shower basin floor. I took some comfort in taking time to treat my hair, buying scalp oils and expensive conditioner, even if only for mental placebo. These were also important acts of self-care, giving myself time to relax which is perhaps what my alopecia was signalling a need for.

I am unsure what caused my alopecia, and that uncertainly contributes to anxieties about a lack of oversight of the condition itself. I had been battling ongoing fatigue and illness from contracting the Delta variant of COVID 19 in May 2020, as well as associated stress of lockdowns and a year of so-called ‘university of zoom’. I need not explain the effects that lockdown living has had on all of our collective physical and mental state, and whilst the vulnerability of alopecia is upsetting, it reminds me to be sympathetic to myself for the trauma that 2 years of a global pandemic has caused.

I decided on day one that I wanted to make my diagnosis public. The idea of keeping my condition a secret would only serve to deepen the

stigma I imposed on myself, it also helped prepare me for the possibility of the condition worsening. Making my alopecia public knowledge was a brilliant decision and I received much kindness and support from my friends.

“

Eventually, learning to love and leave my body hair intact was a long but empowering experience- now losing my agency on how to treat my hair feels violating.

Perhaps, however, the most comforting reactions of all were that of no reaction. I would not go as far to say, “hair

does not define me”, because as mixed-race person I rejoice in the textures and placing of my hair- but seeing how people have continued to respect my academic work and value my place in their lives far beyond my potential appearance, has been comforting.

Many will push the narrative of “learning to love” your alopecia, and whilst I am overjoyed for those who achieve that love, I have accepted that I cannot force myself to experience this new condition positively.

Instead, adjusting to life with hairloss is much the same as adjusting to a new normal after any loss. I will continue to learn about my body and adapt to changes as and when the come; for those who are going through this condition now, my word of advice is: be tender to yourself.

@Olly DeHerrera

Horoscopes Ali Arief Theatre Editor

T

he communicative technological planet of Mercury has gone retrograde and will remain retrograde until February 3rd.

A lot of fear and anxiety exists when Mercury goes retrograde, however the purpose of the planet making this movement is so we can revisit, rediscover, and revalue aspects of our lives. As stated, Mercury is fundamentally the planet of communication.

This means when Mercury goe s retrograde, you can expect communication issues within your relationships, be it personal or professional.

Furthermore, Mercury rules technology and transport due to mythologically being the messenger God, so expect transport frustrations and technology playing up. It is also good to remember that Venus, the planet of love and pleasure, has been in retrograde since December 19th, and is due to end on January 29th.

The Badger 24th of January 2022

January Horoscopes be questioning a lot of opinions you’ve previously held about yourself, and revaluating lessons you’ve previously learned.

Don’t think about these things too deeply, simply understand that you’ve grown and start living life without any constraints.

Gemini: Venus retrograde will bringing up some deep seated, hidden, and taboo aspects that you’ve been burying down to the surface. Perhaps there’s unrecognised grief you haven’t faced, or maybe you’re confronting

nerships and relationships. You would like to indulge yourself into the romantic, passionate, and sensual, however a limiting belief is holding you back from pursuing it with your whole heart. Open communication with your partner is the key to healing these problems.

Leo: Relationship problems have been a growing concern of yours, and now these concerns are about to hit a boiling point as Mercury goes retrograde. If an old flame returns from the

imperative that you let your hair down, but bear in mind that too much indulgence can lead to a lack of focus on your goals.

Listen to what your inner child wants and spend time on activities that makes your soul shine.

Libra: Your home life is being called into question, and whether you are comfortable in your domestic surroundings.

You are being asked to investigate issues in your home, perhaps your thinking of moving house, or you’re considering

Taurus: The urge for adventure maybe calling you with both the Venus and Mercury transits. You are being called to step outside your comfort zone and break out of any deep-seated thoughts and habits that are holding you back. It’s time to live freely, openly, and honestly about where you want your year to go and what adventures you want to embark one. You may

ing a problem that you can assist them with. In any case, its time to communicate clearly, openly and with honesty and integrity.

Sagittarius: Money is on your mind as Venus and Mercury transit retrograde. You’re being asked to take your values and attachments to material objects very seriously and ask yourself about whether you need to save money or spend it. Its okay to indulge once and while, and you are more than entitled to luxury every now and then, however perhaps looking after your finances during these retrogrades will pay off for you in the long term.

Capricorn: Your identity and personality will be going through the motions during these retrogrades. Perhaps you’re calling into question who you are and where you want to be, reflecting on your childhood and wondering where to go next. You may be making changes to appearance, wanting to get a new haircut, body modification or change up your wardrobe to cement the new you. In any case, these retrogrades are letting you know just how much you’ve changed and grown, and that its time find a new look that suits the brand-new version of yourself.

This astrological report aims to inform you of how these planetary movements will be affecting your sign, using placidus and tropical astrology methodology.

You can apply these to your Star (sun) sign, or even use your rising and moon signs if you know them.

Aries: Your community is of utmost importance to you throughout this retrograde period and how you relate to a larger group and the role that you play will come to your attention. You may experience friendship problems or help a friend work through a serious problem they are having. Alternatively, you may want to join a new club or social group and spend time finding your identity within that whole. In any case, leaning on your friends can only be a good thing. This Venus retrograde will also be illuminating problem areas in your reputation and career, perhaps you’ve had your reputation questioned and now are picking the pieces back together.

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some aspects of your personality that you’re not fond of. You’ll be experiencing an intensity of emotion that you’re not particularly used to, and that could cause some uncomfortably. Dig deep into these feelings and find the root cause of the problem.

Venus could also be highlighting here your money habits, particularly money that could be belonging to other people.

You may receive an investment, or some monetary gift from another person or institution.

Cancer: You may be feeling a push towards the luxurious and the sensual, however you are hesitant to see these feelings follow through due to previously held beliefs about yourself and how you operate in part-

past, you have an opportunity to revaluate if letting person back into your life is a good idea or not.

Expect new thoughts about the personal connections you have, a lot of people may be showing you problematic behaviours that you need to communicate how it is affecting you. This Venus retrograde will also be showing you your attitudes to work, you may feel a need to switch up your career or find another job.

Virgo: You may be feeling like you need to take a load off and to go have fun, celebrate, and enjoy yourself. You may have a lot of these joyous feelings being called into question, as you may be feeling like you can’t properly relax and focus as there’s work that needs to be done. Its

making changes to the home you’re already living in. Ask yourself if there’s anything holding you back from making these changes and adjust this accordingly. You deserve feel safe and secure in your own home, and Mercury and Venus will be trying to show you how you can overcome these problems.

Scorpio: Communication and how you use your voice will be at the heart of these retrogrades, perhaps theses a problem that you really need to get off your chest and address directly, or maybe you’re feeling like you can’t speak up in your own environment. Sibling relationships could also be a hot spot to work through as well, perhaps a sibling of yours is fac-

Aquarius: You may be feeling an itch for rebellion as Venus and Mercury go retrograde. Perhaps you’re feeling constrained, highly strung, or boxed into your surrounds. Now would be the time to break free if anything’s been holding you back or making you feel caged.

You may be feeling the urge to quit a job, end a relationship or move away out of nowhere, and this break for freedom will be extremely good for you.

Pisces: The depths of your subconscious are calling you during the time of these retrogrades.

You will be experiencing intense emotion, and Mercury highlights emotional wounds and past pains, trying to surface any emotion you have previously buried for survival. Its time to pay attention to these emotions, maybe they are showing themselves to you in dreams, or occurring to you when you leas expect it. You may also start to feel inclined to spiritual or mindful practises to cope with the intensity of these emotions, and you are encouraged to take up such practises. Remember to resurface from the depths once and while for some fresh air.

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Travel & Culture

Seven Stars – Review

Justine Cordery Travel & Culture Food Editor

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think it is vital in any city, town or village, to establish where a good roast lunch is. Obviously it’s a bit harder in a city but I like to think that I have found somewhere that does an exceptional roast here in Brighton.

Seven Stars is on Ship Street and their Sunday menu has a great selection of roasts.

They have beef, pork, chicken, a nut roast and a ‘Herb and Harissa Seitan’ dish for vegans. I personally have only had the chicken, but it was amazing. They filled the plate with the chicken, roast potatoes, carrots, parsnips, beetroot and, to top it off, a Yorkshire pudding.

Of course they also had a delicious gravy covering the plate. Not only did it look amazing, but it also tasted amazing with all the elements perfectly cooked. I must say it was a little bit too overwhelming and I did end up leaving a little bit because I couldn’t manage it all!

My friend, who had the beef, however, was able to eat it

all and he said it was amazing. Although the wait was a little long, you can completely understand once you get your food, and all is forgiven.

As well as the delicious roasts, Seven Stars has the great qualities of a classic British pub, with some slightly more modern elements. Firstly, the décor is very trendy, with a sky light at the back of the pub with plants scattered around, even some hanging. I must

say, the only slightly annoying element was that I was seated on a high table with high stools which, if you are eating a massive roast, you don’t feel particularly comfortable on. The size of their tables also might need revalidating as with a party of six, we felt quite squished together.

Just like any pub, they have their own great selection of pub classic meals as well including, fish and chips, burg-

ers and of course, bangers and mash. They also cater for all with a vegan menu and a great selection of small plates which are amazing for sharing. They equally also have a variety of drinks in which you will most likely find something that you love. Although a little bit more on the pricey side, for Brighton, and for such great quality food and drinks, you don’t question it.

Therefore, if you’re looking

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for a great place to take family when they visit or somewhere to have a friend date, or real date, Seven Stars is definitely a great place to go, even if you solely base it on the quality of their roasts!

I would recommend maybe asking for a more comfortable table than I had though.

Nevertheless, the staff were amazing, as was the food, so I still highly recommend you trying this place out.

@Seven Stars

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Travel and Culture

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Sustainable Tourism Aishwarya Johnson Jogul Travel & Culture Print Editor

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ravel & Tourism has been one of the worst hit industries by Covid – 19 Pandemic. International arrivals in United Kingdom received just 277,000 visits in-between April and June 2021 which is 97% below 2019. This condition prevails across the globe.

But now that you are vaccinated and are finally travelling and exploring again, you don’t really want to pile on problems such as climate change carbon footprint, overcrowding or cause discomfort to people working in travel and tourism industry. So, how do you travel in an eco-friendly/thoughtful manner and contribute towards sustainable tourism?

But first, what does Sustainable tourism actually mean?

Sustainable tourism is defined by the UN Environment Program and UN World Tourism Organization as “tourism that takes full account of its current and future economic, social and environmental impacts, addressing the needs of visitors, the industry, the environment and host communities.”

In simple terms, it refers to sustainable practices in and by tourism industry and it aims to minimize the adverse effect of tourism on environment and people and maximize the positive ones.

Now why is it so important?

Apart from remembering to exercise our typical sustainable behaviours when on vacation, why is sustainable travel / tourism a particular case? International travel, according to the United Nations, is rising like never before. Between 2000 and 2015, the number of individuals travelling throughout the world nearly doubled (see the UNWTO’s 2016 report here).

Every year, over 1.2 billion individuals board an international aircraft. By 2030, this figure is expected to rise to 1.8 billion. Not surprisingly, the travel and tourism business accounts for up to 10.2 percent of world GDP ($7 trillion!). Of course, all of this travel comes with a huge environmental and social cost. This is the primary reason why the United Nations chose 2017 as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development.

So how can we travel sustainably? There’s a lot you can

do to limit your effect and do good while on tour, including our regular sustainable behaviours like turning off the lights, not wasting food, and avoiding making garbage. Here is a guide to sustainable tourism to help support local economy and travel in an eco-friendly manner.

Choose your destination Wisely Experts advise that if you do decide to visit crowded and prominent places, you should do it outside of peak summer months. Stay longer, seek sustainably approved lodging, and choose local activities that give back to communities rather than the most popular activities, which are typically tourist traps.

Look for Sustainability Certifications Look for licenced lodging providers if you wish to stay in an environmentally and socially responsible institution.

Inquire about their green certification and whether the certifier is authorised by the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC). The GSTC establishes a set of minimal conditions that a tourist business must meet in order to be approved.

As an example, conserving and preserving natural and cultural resources, maximising social and economic benefits to the local community, and promoting cultural heritage.

Local Transport Transportation is a major source of greenhouse gases and other hazardous pollutants. Considering how you get to and from your location might help you leave a smaller carbon footprint. Use local Sustainable transportation, consider bike or walking tours. Avoid engine powered

@Ethical Zest boats while on the water. Take public transport instead of renting a car or try carsharing.

Reduce Plastic / Avoid Waste One of our favourite aspects of travelling is sampling fragrant, delicious coffee from throughout the world. We normally try to drink it in a good café (in a glass), but sometimes we’re on the go, trekking, or just in a hurry. As a result, we may succumb to temptation and get a takeout coffee. Similarly, it is common to require on-the-go access to water.

Carry your steel/copper water bottle to avoid water bottle plastic waste. If possible, carry your own reusable cutlery.

Ban using straws as they harm wildlife and cause pollution in the oceans. Most importantly, carry a tote bag everywhere.

Eat Right What we eat accounts for around one-quarter of all plan-

et-warming greenhouse gases generated each year, so considering what you eat when travelling is critical if you want to leave a smaller footprint.

While language and cultural difficulties might make it difficult to understand precisely what is in your food and where it comes from, a change in diet can also provide an excellent chance to sample new foods and make new choices.

Shopping Another strategy to reduce your own emissions and leave a smaller footprint is to be mindful of your consumption when travelling. Here are some things to think about: search for eco-friendly shops, explore local options, support local businesses, look for a fair trade or similar logo (this indicates your clothes were made sustainably), for gifting – ditch the wrapping papers,

@LuggageHero

invest in products that are ecofriendly and long lasting and avoid shopping in gift shops.

Support Local Economy Despite the fact that so much money is spent on tourism, the majority of the cash spent (often as much as 90%) seep out of the actual trip location.

Instead, they return to large global corporate tourist providers. Given the tremendous (mainly good) influence tourism can have on a local place, this is a disheartening figure. To benefit the local communities to which you travel; consume and purchase locally, stay in a local hotel, especially one that is environmentally friendly (we use Airbnb to make this as easy as possible) and travel using local transportation companies.

In this day and age, we are really fortunate to be able to explore the world so readily and widely. It is, without a doubt, one of life’s greatest joys and experiences. We also believe it is essential for our own education and the development of an open, loving mentality. All that remains is to make it sustainable.

It has the ability to provide significant benefits to the destination of choice, but so much depends on our actions. We hope this list has given you some ideas for some sustainable travel practises and ideas.

But we can’t end this post without mentioning another one we published that covers a slew of zero waste travel ideas to help you become an even more environmentally conscious traveller!

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Travel and Culture

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Easy oven meal ready in 30 minutes!

This is probably the most simple and easy thing to cook when you feel like making nothing for dinner, and it’s even easier to make it for as many people as you want...

Justine Cordery Travel & Culture Food Editor

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ll you need are some chicken breasts, large potatoes and a cauliflower (or broccoli if cauliflower is not your thing).

Firstly, cut the potatoes into wedges, making them as big as you want, then put them in a bowl and cover them in olive oil, salt and pepper (plus any other seasoning you like on your potatoes). Then put them on a baking tray which also has a thin layer of oil on so that they don’t stick and put them in the oven at 200º for 30 minutes. Very simple, just remember to check on them a couple of times to move them around and maybe turn them over occasionally.

For veggies, cut the cauliflower (or broccoli) into small(ish) pieces and then spread them out on an oiled baking tray, coating them slightly in said oil. If you are making this meal for yourself then there should be enough space on the potato tray to save extra washing up. Put the cauliflower in the oven for 30 minutes, although make sure to check

on it, similar to the potatoes.

Finally, put however many chicken breasts you want on a tray which is covered in foil.

Then drizzle a bit of oil on both sides of the chicken, (don’t worry if you pour too much, I actually quite like it so that I can pour the seasoned goodness over the chicken later…). Then salt and pepper the chicken.

The key to this chicken that makes it so gorgeous and juicy is chicken seasoning. This seasoning is an essential to have in your kitchen and you can get it at any supermarket. Put a generous amount of seasoning on both sides of the chicken and slightly tap or rub it in.

Cover the chicken loosely with some foil then put it in the

oven at 200º for 20 minutes.

At the end of the 20 minutes you should have some juices in the tray with the chicken.

You should baste the chicken and then put it back in the oven for another 5 minutes. Always make sure your chicken is cooked all the way through before eating it though!

So at the end of the 30 min-

utes you will have a full meal which you have done barely anything to accomplish and that’s the best thing about this meal.

It is a god send when you have work to get done or you’re running behind getting ready to go out and yet, it is still healthy…to an extent!

@Save the Student

How to Find an Alcohol-Free Drink That Still Hits The Spot

Non-alcoholic cocktails are a minefield, and no-lo wines are still a no-go, but alcohol-free Spirits continue to impress...

Georgia Keetch Editor-In-Chief

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ry January—the practice of taking the first month of the year to abstain from alcohol—has exploded in popularity since its inception in 2013. For some, Dry January is the chance to break from booze after the holidays, while others use the time to rethink their drinking habits altogether.

Whatever your reason, skipping out on alcohol doesn’t mean you can’t still sip on a fun and flavorful cocktail, or rather, mocktail. Read on for six, non-alcoholic cocktails and spirits that promise to pack a flavorful punch. You may even find yourself stocking your bar cart with these beverages for the rest of the year.

(Note that if you’re pregnant, many of the companies listed below recommend checking with your healthcare

provider before imbibing, as products may contain trace amounts of alcohol)..

Curious Elixirs offers solely alcohol-free, ready-to-drink cocktails. If you find yourself feeling a little calmer while relaxed, you’re not imagining things. These drinks get their added edge from the addition of herbs and adaptogens. For example, Curious Elixir No. 1, inspired by the Negroni, contains rhodiola, an herb found to have energizing and stress-relieving properties.

Along with Curious Elixir No. 1, there are two other Curious Elixir mainstays: A damiana-infused Dark and Stormy, for a supposed relaxing and aphrodisiac effect, and an ashwagandhainfused Cucumber Collins, designed to be stress-relieving (the brand notes that this particular cocktail should not be consumed if you pregnant).

The company also has a rotation of limited-release cocktails, such as the Blood Orange Spritz and a booze-free champagne cocktail featuring elderflower and lavender.

Curious Elixirs boasts cocktails that are gluten-free, caffeine-free and made with organic ingredients, as well as no refined sugar, preservatives, sulfates and fillers. For those looking to play the role of mixologist, Seedlip offers three distilled non-alcoholic spirits that are designed to be mixed with tonic, soda, ginger ale or used as a cocktail base.

The Seedlip Garden 108 offers an herbal taste with top notes of peas and hay and hints of spearmint, rosemary and thyme, according to the company. Meanwhile, the Spice 94 provides a citrus and spice profile with cardamom, lemon and grapefruit peels and oak and cascarilla barks. The Grove

42 leans into citrus notes of lemon, bitter orange, mandarin and blood orange mixed with ginger and lemongrass.

With plenty of possible combinations, Seedlip provides

several mocktail recipes on its website to spark inspiration.

Seedlip drinks are sugar-free, sweetener-free and made with natural ingredients, according to the company.

@Libby Gissing @ Dry Jan

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Arts • Music

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Pip Millett Live at the Islington Assembly Hall Music Editor, Dylan Bryant, reviews an incredible show from the rising R&B star Pip Millett.

DylaniBryant Music Editor *Trigger Warning - Offensive language* espite the freezing cold weather mixed with the post-Christmas come down, the atmosphere for this gig was incredible and Pip Millet, the Manchester R&B sensation confirmed this by saying “It sure doesn’t look like January blues in here, you all look so happy!” And all credit to her performance; the audience had a good reason to be in such high spirits.

This was my first gig back after the Christmas break and I was ready to hear some music that swapped out sleigh bells for polished guitar chords and soothing, effortless vocals.

Pip Millet provided exactly this and delivered an elegant performance that blended her immense talent with her charming and relaxed rapport with her fans. With one of the most captivating voices in the UK R&B scene right now, Pip is an artist who is establishing herself amongst the very best in the genre.

Pip’s set at the Islington assembly hall offered a diverse range of songs that blended her confessional lyricism with her rhythmic instrumentals and addictive beats. ‘Running (feat. Ghetts)’ confronted Pip’s thoughts on society and her personal perceptions through

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the prism of soul. This great track offers a stimulatingly blunt take on the reality of being black in the UK and the identity that comes with it. “I’m feeling pretty foggy about my feelings, about myself. Black and free, I don’t think that’s a thing no no”. Pip is an artist who is growing recognition and her ability to write critical and honest reflections on the political and social issues within the UK is meaningful and offers a very personal perspective.

Pip opened the night with ‘Heavenly Mother’; a smooth and addictive groove demonstrating her effortless and rhythmic approach to her music. Pip writes with a style that is so unflinching and this track is a perfect representation of her cool and powerful approach.

As Pip two-stepped around the stage, swaying her arms, the crowd embraced the music and danced along to the beat.

A personal highlight of the night was when Pip played ‘Ava’ – a glorious track that blends her soothing vocals with an alluring and calming instrumental. The song silenced the crowd with its emotional and smooth lyricism as Pip sang the touching vocals “You’ll grow through this, painful as it is, you’ve always got this shoulder, feeling lonely you come over” and “no I don’t mind you crying, and I think of all the times when, you were there for me, and you cared for me”.

Pip’s ability to write compelling

@Instagram

@Dylan Bryant songs that capture the audience was championed by this song and this created a special and memorable moment.

The crowd looked on in awe, some holding their friends’ hands, others holding their partners in their arms as they swayed from side to side embracing the music.

Speaking on the topic of her latest EP release, ‘Motion Sick’ Pip says - “I have often felt lost when things around me have started to change. In recent times I’ve realised I’m simply ‘Motion Sick’. My core self is still there but without change, there cannot be any growth. ‘Motion Sick’ is about the various changes in my life and with this change, I have tried to find comfort in the simple things.”

‘Hard Life’ provided an immensely soulful moment with its catchy beat and moving backing vocals. Pip touches on the themes of unresolved trauma and finding peace in growth and change and she is brutally honest in this soul-soaked track.

Pip is an artist to get on your radar as she continues to gain critical acclaim and significant praise. She has a talent that is flexible and able to appeal to both the mainstream boundaries of BBC Radio 1 and the critical appreciation from some of the most respected DJs and artists on the scene, notably, Jorja Smith has referred to her as an artistic muse.

Pip has worked with an impressive portfolio of names.

For example, Joice (Jorja Smith, Loyle Carner, Stormzy) and Josh Crocker (Celeste, Kali Uchis, Gotts Street Park).

It’s no surprise that with a voice that is so elegantly composed she is attracting attention from some of the biggest names in the industry.

Whilst Pip has a musical style that combines various different genres and styles; she is effortlessly comfortable whether it be soul, boombam or hip-hop. She writes in a way that is self-assured and confident. In ‘Fancy’ she sings the lyrics “I’m so fancy, I, I’m so sexy. Higher than before, love me a little more”.

Her performance of this track combined with the lyrics as she danced around the stage and sang in her convincing and unfaltering style.

Pip closed the night with fan favourite ‘Make Me Cry’. Her performance of the track made it no surprise that her performance of it on COLORS has racked up over 4.5 million views. Pip’s delivery of the song is so deep and combines the elements of her self-confessional style with an abundance of soul. The stunning guitar riff was met with claps and the powerful vocals, “F**k you and your lies, and your last goodbyes.

You’re a victim in your own

game, stick it to mister no name”. The crowd clearly adored the smooth melody and sang along with the personal and relatable lyrics that clearly resonated with many.

Although her number of releases only includes a handful of EP’s and singles; Pip Millet’s live performance was able to demonstrate her talent and musical versatility.

Pip is an artist who has all of the attributes of an artist who is destined to achieve big things. Equipped with a voice that is pitch-perfect whether it’s hitting the imposing high notes, or the evocative lows, there is a growing hype around this undeniable talent.

In just three years, Pip Millet, the 23-year-old R&B artist from Manchester has grown into one of the most promising and exciting talents in the UK. Scan the barcode below to listen to some of her best tracks over on The Badger Spotify.

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Arts • Film and Television

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Euphoria, Skins and Teenage Angst

An exploration of the strange comfort found in the trails and tribulations of adolescence Emma Norris Film & TV Online Editor Trigger warning: mention of drugs, rape/abuse and mental illness

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he release of series two of Euphoria, timed alongside the finishing of my assessment period, led to a nostalgic bingeing of its 2019 premier; an American teen drama that follows the electric, colourful, explosive life of its protagonists, as they all suffer through the trials and tribulations of contemporary adolescence.

The show is dazzling, painful and cripplingly unrealistic, the perfect encapsulation of teenage angst and the highs and lows of growing up, of navigating life, love, drugs and the ‘adult’ world. The shows portrayal of adolescence is an extreme; angst turns to drug addiction, first experiences of love turn to scenes of abuse and rape, the drama of childhood morphing into debilitating mental illness.

@NME What makes it so special, giving it binge-worthy status and offering an odd feeling of comfort to its viewers, is to see a portrayal of teenage angst that is not pretty, glorified or glamorous.

Protagonist Rue, played by Zendaya, breaks through to the core of childhood pain, battling a devastating addiction

whilst simultaneously falling in love with her best friend.

Every aspect of youthful angst is mirrored, the shows relatability in its characters' interactions feeling, at times, hauntingly accurate. This angst, placed against the setting of darkened school corridors, the flashing lights of carnivals and house parties, the softened

glow of first love, feels almost dizzying, fully submerging the viewer into the heart and soul of its characters.

This series, of course, holds an uncanny similarity to British naughties classic Skins, a drama following the lives of teens growing up in Bristol in the early 2000s. Despite the Skins realm being very different to that of Euphoria, the two shows mirror each other in their portrayal of sex, drugs, mental illness and the, at times horrifying reality of being a teenager in the 21st century.

The show opens up a new feeling of relatability, mirroring the lives of its viewers through its setting, costuming and language, whilst also showing adolescence at its most extreme and raw.

Watching it as a thirteen year old offered a sickening sense of admiration for its protagonists, a strange desire to approach secondary school with a similar sense of angst, to drink and smoke and love and rebel in the way that they all were.

What The New Gossip Girl Is Missing Despite the glitz and glamour, the new reboot fails to draw you in Issy Anthony Film & TV Print Editor

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oney, mayhem and a sex drive that just won’t quit can only mean one thing: Gossip Girl is back on our screens.

As part two of the reboot was released on New Years Day, I of course binged it during my procrastination sessions.

Warning: spoilers ahead.

The original Gossip Girl is an artifact of nostalgia for me, and probably many teens who grew up during the 2000s.

Blair’s hairbands and Serena’s blowouts meant an escape from reality, to a world that the vast majority of us would never know. The characters were far from likable, but that wasn’t the point.

We were given Dan Humphrey as the audience’s voice of reason; we felt his annoyance when his classmates didn’t remember his name and his utter confusion at just how much power their parents held. While Dan is arguably a sociopath (for those of you who haven’t watched the original Gossip Girl, this isn’t really a spoiler, he is pretty creepy from the first episode

onwards), his outsider status mirrored that of the audience and gave us at least one character who was aware of the real world—although let’s not forget that Dan and Jenny pretended like they weren’t living in a Brooklyn loft that is likely worth a hefty sum.

But I digress. We were never meant to like the characters.

And this is where the new Gossip Girl fails. It has attempted to make us like the characters, but without giving them any redeeming qualities that would actually make them likable.

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With the characters being neither good enough to be likable or evil enough to love to hate, we are left in limbo, wishing we were watching something else.

The show clearly wants us to view them as developed from But they are still spoiled teenagers, desperately trying to get us to pity them, and failing.

Julien has a God complex, almost as if she knows she is the main character of the series, and therefore everyone’s lives must revolve around hers.

At first, we feel sorry for Zoya, her mum having died while giving birth to her and having been bullied at her old school, but dating your sister’s ex-boyfriend barely 24 hours after they have broken up is a serious no-go, and after that my respect for Zoya rapidly depleted, no matter how much Julien deserved it.

Obie, the son of billionaires, who dated his ex-girlfriend’s sister, and then cheated on that sister with the ex-girlfriend, somehow still views himself as above it all because he has a ‘Right to the City Alliance’ pin.

And then let’s not forget Aki. Poor, beautiful Aki, who I think might be the only character in the show with any redeeming qualities, his shyness and love for his girlfriend Audrey giving him some of the humility the others lack. Aki realises that he is bisexual, which causes Audrey to think that he needs to also date a boy to satiate both desires.

Who is going to tell Audrey

This desire was undoubtedly unhealthy, the series covering incredibly graphic and triggering topics, debatably in a glamorised manner, but simultaneously, the show provided a sense of comfort for me as I settled into teenage life; serving as a striking display of life at its most cruel and most terrifying whilst importantly opening a narrative in which young people were treated like adults and not children.

To binge the series now, being in my 20s, serves as a lasting reminder, an encapsulation, of the feeling of teenage angst, of first rebellions, first kisses, of trying to feel like an adult in a society that often felt painfully patronising. Of course, the series was far from a typical narration of teenage life but still, shows such as Skins and Euphoria offer viewers a sense of comfort and nostalgia that few have been able to achieve.

Euphoria Series 2 is currently streaming on Sky Atlantic and HBO.

Film & TV's Must-Watch List

that this is not how bisexuality works and that this is actually a part of bi-erasure? No one it seems, as this is quickly skipped over as the couple settle into a ‘triad’ with their friend Max. And I really don’t want to start on how painful the teachers are.

Maid Beautiful, haunting, and made even the toughest of us cry. And who doesn’t love a mother-daughter duo acting together?

Julien has a God complex, almost as if she knows she is the main character of the series

Dopesick Like Maid, it has been out for a couple months, but we both binged this over Christmas, and it did not disappoint. An incredibly important story that will leave your heart hurting and your blood boiling.

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While the reboot has succeeded in diversifying its cast, which was very much needed after the overwhelmingly white, heteronormative world of the old Gossip Girl, it fails to draw you in. With the characters being neither good enough to be likable or evil enough to love to hate, we are left in limbo, wishing we were watching something else.

The Gossip Girl reboot and the original are available to stream on BBC iPlayer

Stream now on Netflix

Stream now on Disney+ and Hulu Licorice Pizza Paul Thomas Anderson's latest picture takes us to San Fernando valley in the 1970s, and features not only all three of the Haim sisters, but their parents as well. For those who aren't fans of the band, it is worth it alone for the Dazed and Confused-esque escape from reality.

Now showing in cinemas

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Arts • Theatre

Revolutionary Theatre: Les Misérables

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Looking at the journey of Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables, we can see how revolutionary it has been in the process of developing a novel into a musical and a film adaptation. Arts Print Editor, Molly Openshaw, looks at the history of the musical and its roots.

Molly Openshaw Arts Print Editor

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es Misérables is the most significant example of the power of the theatre. Giving a stage to the narrative, Victor Hugo’s 1862 novel has been revolutionary, not only in its plot but in its development from novel to the theatre.

Growing up in a family of theatre lovers, musical enthusiasts and amateur performers, I have always engaged with theatre and musicals. From seeing the 2012 adaptation in the local Odeon at the age of eleven to reading Victor Hugo’s novel to watching the theatre show at the Sondheim Theatre, Les Misérables has always been my greatest love in art.

No matter your level of expertise in the antics of the stage, it is universally acknowledged that Les Misérables is a masterpiece. It is evident that the revolutionary aspect of Jean Valjean’s story is not limited to the pages it is bound to. Starting this exploration with Hugo’s mammoth novel, we can see the emergence of Les Miserables’ extraordinary genesis. In his preface, Hugo explains that ‘so long as, in certain regions, social asphyxia shall be possible; in other words, and from a yet more extended point of view, so long as ignorance and misery remain on earth, books like this cannot be useless’. This motif

mirrors that of Les Misérables’ timeline, we can see its universal nature, social reform is inseparable to this story’s success and thus is essential to its creation.

In his letter to his publisher, Albert Lacroix, Hugo expressed that he wanted his work to go ‘wherever men go in ignorance or despair, wherever women sell themselves for bread, wherever children lack a book to learn from or a warm hearth, Les Misérables knocks at the door and says: “open up, I am here for you’.

Hugo wrote this novel during his political exile in Guernsey after being outcasted by Napoleon, Les Misérables was born out of political strife and has excelled due to the ubiquitous nature of struggling. The creation of this epic story reflects the tale being told. The publication of Les Misérables was unlike any other book at the time. In his book, ‘The Novel of the Century: The Extraordinary Adventure of Les Misérables’, David Ballos explains the financial risk Lacroix ensues to ensure the publication of this novel. With vocational risk, financial gambling and social embarrassment, the story of this novel’s publication is similar to the narrative of Jean Valjean.

Lacroix was determined for this novel to succeed with a press release like no other, advanced copies were released under embargo six months before the publication as well as adverts all over Paris. Taking out a large

loan to provide this campaign, Lacroix succeeded in using this risky move in the nineteenth century without any insurance or fallback. Despite Lacroix knowing that Hugo was an exiled political outcast, he put his career in jeopardy for the novel.

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It is evident that the revolutionary aspect of Jean Valjean’s story is not limited to the pages it is bound to.

However, Les Misérables was not an overnight success, Alexandre Dumas, a French writer and critic at the time, disliked the novel, comparing the experience of reading the novel to ‘wading through mud’. As well as Gustave Flaubert, a literary critic mocked Hugo’s work as a ‘book written for catholico-socialist shitheads and for the philosophico-evangelical ratpack’. Despite this negative reception, the novel sold out immediately in Paris and as a result all over Europe. After the popularity of Hugo’s magnum opus, it was adapted into a stage show by Claude-Michel Schönberg, Alain Boubil and Jean-Marc Natel in 1980. Despite this adaptation occurring 118 years after the publication of the novel, the story of Les Misérables has remained popu-

@Les Mis lar and relevant. After a short run of Schönberg’s production in Paris, it was picked up by Cameron Mackintosh. Creating version in English with the Royal Shakespeare Company, Mackintosh’s Les Miséreables opened in 1985 at the Barbican Centre. With a complete sellout in its first run, the show was moved to the West End, starting at the Palace Theatre where it stayed from 1985 to 2004, then moving to the Sondheim Theatre, formally the Queen’s Theatre where it remains today.

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No matter your level of expertise in the antics of the stage, it is universally acknowledged that Les Misérables is a masterpiece.

@Les Mis

Les Misérables is the longest-running musical in history, showing how a story of social reform, protest, love, feminism, rights, criminality remains popular and meaningful, even to an audience three centuries later than initially intended.

With three runs on Broadway, eight Tony Awards and three Academy Awards, Victor Hugo’s nested, multi-narrative novel has gone on to be one of the most popular musicals,

films, novels and television shows- a cultural phenomenon.

Theatre was essential to this success, seeing music applied to this epic novel of love and loss creates atmosphere and emotion, bringing the audience into these emotions.

Having seen Les Misérbles in theatre a handful of times, it is evident that Hugo’s work is brought alive through theatre. Les Misérables’ revolutionary nature is not limited to the plot but is exemplified through the timeline of popularity and adaption. Theatre has been the bridge between Hugo’s novel all the way to a film in 2012 with the likes of Hugh Jackman and Anne Hathaway demonstrating the legacy of Hugo’s novel.

We can see the role of theatre as the influential medium of popular art in other franchises, such as ‘The King and I’, ‘Oliver!’ and ‘Into the Woods’ all demonstrating how theatre is essential to the development of a story from a novel to a film. Using Les Misérables as the most significant example, we can see how revolutionary it was. Looking at Les Misérables from a literary perspective, it is evident that this story of ‘The Wretched’ has been loved, passed on and adapted, showing how in the face of misery, death, revolution, the story will live on.

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Arts • Books

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Romanticising the Real- Dolly Alderton’s ‘Everything I Know About Love’ (2018)

Staff writer, Megan Whitehead, reviews Dolly Alderton’s 2018 novel, ‘Everything I Know about Love’, touching on heartbreak, sex, adolescence and depression Megan Whitehead Staff Writer

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f I was ever forced onto a desert island and only had one item to bring with me, I would pick Dolly Alderton’s ‘Everything I Know About Love’, in a heartbeat. Alderton’s debut novel is an autobiography packed with endearing anecdotes that make you feel like she’s a random girl in a club toilet, who is quickly becoming your new best friend in telling you her life story.

From tales about getting a taxi from Exeter to Durham for an after-party, random hangover recipes, and emails full of the things you wish you could say but can’t, this book has it all.

Alderton is an award-winning journalist, recognised for her work in The Telegraph, GQ, Marie Claire, and she is also well known for hosting a podcast series called ‘The High Low’. This is her first novel, and she has since published a fiction piece called ‘Ghosts’ about the reality of modern dating, which I also highly encourage you to read.

Few books have been able

to make me feel the way this book does, and Alderton’s honest, funny, and heartfelt memoir really was the friend I needed at the time. It’s a coming-ofage essay-based memoir that captures the journey of what it means to be a girl growing into a woman. The book covers her life from her early teens right up until her early thirties, and much to the reader’s delight, she doesn’t hold back on any detail. Messy relationships, nights out, dating encounters, awkward interactions, the inner monologue of a twentysomething-year-old girl: this is the book every woman should read in her early twenties.

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“The love we have for each other stays the same, but the format, the tone, the regularity and the intimacy of our friendship will change forever.”

In the book, Alderton explores her coming-of-age in suburban London and spends her teenage years wishing she was older. Much of the book is centred around her relationship with her life-long best friend Farley. Alderton explores their time at university, where Farley was the one keeping Alderton’s shenanigans in check and spans to navigating their friendship in later years and assessing the difficulty of how to act when your best friend has a significant other. She regularly steps back in the book to reflect on the way she sees her twentysomething-year-old self, writing that “they were all good stories, and that’s what matters”.

Alderton has a huge amount of love for the women in her life and the friendships she has, and it is really fascinating to think about the ways that these relationships change over the different stages of life and growing up. It’s not something I’ve seen many other writers address, but it is true. The stories she tells make you want to reach out to your friends and tell them how much you love them. The story is only partly about self-love and being alone, but more about loving all the good people in your life unconditionally, because the main love in your life isn’t always romantic. It romanticises all the little moments that don’t seem big at the time, but it makes you realise those are the moments that shape you and that you’ll think about forever

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“Nearly everything I know about love, I’ve learnt from my long-term friendships with women.”

@Instagram

She shares her experience of an eating disorder and the thoughts she had at the time, writing that “I carried on because I just wanted to be happy and everyone knows when you’re thinner, you’re happier”.

I think this part of the book is really important for any young woman to read because it makes you realise, you’re not actually crazy. There is a special comfort to be found in realising that many things really are a universal experience.

I first read this book at a low point in my life. I was sitting in my bed in Park Village (again, it was low), setting up an appointment to finalise my dropping out of university and picked

@WikipediaCommons

this book up in an attempt to distract myself from how messy my life seemed. As soon as I read the first chapter which reminisced over nostalgic MSN conversations, I knew I wasn’t going to sleep until I finished it.

I read it from cover to cover, and I only wish I could read it for the first time again. It made me both cackle and cry my eyes out in the space of a chapter, whilst all the same making me feel like I wasn’t so alone. It made me less scared for whatever direction my life was headed in, reminding me that a change of plan didn’t have to mean everything was going wrong, it was just another story to tell. All the things that felt so big and embarrassing were made smaller because of this book.

Every time one of my friends is feeling a little down or heartbroken, I thrust this book into their arms and without fail, I get a text message two days later telling me how much they love it.

If you’re feeling lonely, overwhelmed, or just lost in the puzzle that is growing up and navigating your way through this turbulent age, then I urge you to read ‘Everything I Know About Love’.

It is such a beautifully written and reassuring novel that I will hold close to my heart forever.

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@Instagram

“When you’re looking for love and it seems like you might not ever find it, remember you probably have access to an abundance of it already, just not the romantic kind. This kind of love might not kiss you in the rain or propose marriage. But it will listen to you, inspire, and restore you.

It will hold you when you cry, celebrate when you’re happy, and sing All Saints with you when you’re drunk.

You have so much to gain and learn from this kind of love. You can carry it with you forever. Keep it as close to you as you can.”

Artist Focus: AFLO. the poet AFLO. the poet is a spoken word artist. She started performing in 2019 and now is a strong knot in the black poetry scene in Brighton. I had the occasion to see her live several times – she is a storm of energy who takes the whole room’s breath with her flow. Let’s introduce you to her creative input that I hope, will inspire you this year to make your own art to express matters close to your heart.

Tell me how you got into poetry, After uni, I worked in a therapeutic community, working with people with psychosis and addictions. The need to help people was incongruent with the need to help myself. In the job, everything crumbled apart. I couldn’t work, I was in bed, catatonic for a year. It was a burnout and years of not wanting to look inside. I always wanted to look outwards, how I can help to make things better for other people, that must make me feel better, rather than looking inwards first before I could turn myself outwards. I spent a lot of time in therapy, I started working in a college with young people with autism and worked my way up there.

It was there that I started to do poetry. I went to The Fringe one year, in 2018, to see Travis Alabanza. There were local poets performing, Subira was one of them. That was one of the first times that I heard of spoken word and thought that was something that I could do, as a way of expressing myself. Although poetry can feel dull, I saw people that I could relate to; a lot of the poems were about race and gender identity. It really clicked for me.

© AFLO. the poet How important did poetry become to you?

I started performing in March 2019 for International Women’s Day, it was at Dead Wax, there were female performers and artists from around the city. I wrote about being a woman of colour with mental health difficulties, it’s quite a big thing to try and break down! It was my first poem. My poetry has always been about an expression because I haven’t felt able to be heard by adults. I started doing poetry at twenty-seven, which is as many years as possible of not feeling heard.

It initially felt like a really cool thing to do, going to open mics and share what I had to say. But there wouldn’t be any other black artist there. I remember going to another poetry night, where Priss Nash was performing, that was the first time I heard her poetry. We were doing similar things, but we weren’t coming together. One day I went to a gig with other black poets, and I said: we need to change the scene! It was the last gig before Covid hit. Then George Floyd was murdered, we came together in the community, different people wrote different things for protests. Priss and

After I shared this poem, people tell me about how it resonated with them, how they saw a part of themselves in a part of it. It circles back with my want to help people, but not being able to help them because I need to help myself. I feel poetry has been the missing link in that, it has been a good reflecting tool for me.

I wrote Wake Up together. This year, I am working with QM records to put together nights of AFLO. and the poets with a line-up of black and marginalised gender poets. After the pandemic, I’m trying to hold more spaces, share more poetry, encourage more people to have a go, holding more workshops.

The Badger 24 January 2022

Tell me more about Wake Up. Wake Up came about because Sam Parish-Rookes approached Brighton Black Lives Matter and offer up his skills as a white ally for the movement and make a video of some kind. He approached me separately because I had written a different poem about George Floyd not long before. He wanted me to do a voice-over for the film about the protest. Priss and I were talking about writing a poem together, we had been grieving together and protesting together already. We thought this would be a good thing to do healing wise. Sam suggested the idea of wake up: what’s it like to wake up on the day of a protest, what’s it like to see people waking up at a protest to the things you have been talking about your whole life, what’s it like to wake up after the protest. At first, we weren’t sure about it, but it actually felt like a really good framework. We started about what it is like to wake up in the body you’re existing it, that is experiencing racism. What it feels like waking up during the protest and after the protest, we already predicted what it feels like waking up to people falling off that bandwagon. It was clearly a trend. Priss and I wrote it in two evenings together, it flows out, it felt quite cathartic. It went from there, it’s really amazing where it’s taken us. It’s been shared around the world, by some Black famous people. There is a local brewery that has a craft beer BN1, they wanted to put some local Brightonians on it, they put us on that beer can. It’s really strange how I write a poem, I perform it at a protest, and now I’m on a beer can. That’s not something that I expected or predicted out of it, but that’s a really lovely thing to embrace.

After Wake Up and the protest, Latest TV approached me and wanted to do a little TV series on anything that I wanted. I wanted to platform other black artists, I brought on other spoken word artists or musicians, featuring other arts in the background. From that, Brighton Dome put on events to raise money for live venues. They asked AFLO. and the poets to perform at the Dome, which was very different from the interviews for the TV Show. Priss, Khanyisa and I performed at the Dome, and we wrote a song together about Black joy. We did that again for a whole night at the Green Door Store, and again at the Unitarian Church.

After that, I performed again at Brighton Dome; the New Civilisation Orchestra is doing a tour around the country to commemorate Martin Gaye. In each city, they perform with a spoken word artist to talk about ‘what’s going on’ politically in their eyes and in their city. It’s really sad, fifty years on, that all the lyrics in his songs feel relevant, in terms of seeking racial equity and justice; and police brutality.

© Andreas Lange Tell me about an artist who inspires you.

Bob Marley. He’s my grandma’s first cousin. There are pictures of him around everyone’s family house. I remember not being older than six, and crying, because I wanted to be like Bob Marley, or as Martin Luther King, and trying to get black liberation. That felt so important because that was everything that was drummed into me from before school. I thought that racism was over because I’m mixed race, my mum is white, my dad is black. I cried because I thought I couldn’t be like them. It’s sad that the fight is still ongoing. But I’m really proud of myself and I think little me would be really proud of myself, because I’m doing what I wanted to do, and even if I thought I couldn’t do it for whatever reason, that’s how life turned out.

Do you think that performing live creates a community?

Yes, even more so after a year and a half of not being able to be together.

When we did AFLO. and the poets at Green Door Store, there were so many black people in the crowd, I hadn’t seen a night like that in Brighton in my life. And that’s what we wanted! We were able to bring that back after not only events were in danger, but people’s lives were in danger.

Here we are we’ve come back bigger than ever and better. It’s a good distraction from the world being on fire! It feels that what we have been able to do locally has been really beautiful.

AFLO. the poet has gigs and workshops coming up this year, be sure to follow her on her Instagram to see her live! You can also find the series AFLO. and the poets on Youtube as well the film Wake Up. Youtube: AFLO. the poet Instagram: @aflo.thepoet Words by Éloïse Armary

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Arts • In Review

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New year, same beautiful you

Blending Romance and Realism

Diet culture is toxic… please, sashay, away.

Alice Stevens Arts Online Editor *Trigger Warning- dieting and eating disorders* ody image is a funny one in January. The first month of the year should be a space for reflection and appreciation, especially for our bodies that have amazingly kept us safe and alive amidst a worldwide pandemic. But instead, many of us are left ashamed, anxious and feeling generally bad about ourselves. It just so happens that this time of year is a difficult one for many, like myself, who have past experiences with disordered eating and therefore would like to ignore the diet culture madness that wants us to believe that we are not good enough as we. This is especially apparent when we think about how different December and January are when it comes to talk about food eat all the food you want, drink, enjoy yourself, be merry - but as soon as January comes around, it’s a constant cycle of diet adverts that pretend not to be diet adverts, gym membership discounts, countless exercise plans, juice cleanses, diet shakes, the list goes on. The diet industry thrives this time of year, making us feel bad for eating one too many stuffing balls or enjoying the Christmas selection box your grandma bought you.

Here are just a few truths the diet industry doesn’t want you to know: 1. 95% of diets end in failure 2. The stigma you may face because of your weight is much more dangerous than what you eat 3. Dieting is a 60.5 billion dollar industry 4. Diet culture is build on patriarchy, sexism, white supremacy, racism and colonialism that pushes white eurocentric standards of beauty 5. BMI is not an accurate predictor of health 6. Body shape does not reflect health 7. There is a large correlation between diet culture and eating disorders 8. Beauty standards are unattainable 9. Your worth is not tied to your appearance Diet culture is a phenomenon

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feminists have researched for many years in an attempt to uncover the gendered meanings and power reactions dieting has been built upon. This is especially poignant when regarding the intersections of patriarchy, sexism, white supremacy and racism that hides under the guise of the diet industry. Now this is not to say that you shouldn’t want to loose weight, exercise or eat healthier - its to say that we must have a nuanced understanding of how our perceptions of our bodies are shaped in relation to power, such as the diet industry, so we can begin to love and appreciate our bodies for what they are - diverse. This acknowledgement can also allow us to deconstruct how we can do better when it comes to going on a diet in ways that are healthy and long-lasting.

This is why body-positivity to me is so important. Body-positivity is about reclaiming ourselves from the prying eyes of the diet industry, an industry that wants to capitalise on our insecurities, insecurities that have been created by the ‘ideal eurocentric beauty standard’ that society has pushed on us since birth. Reclaiming ownership can mean different things to different people, it can range from loving ourselves for what we are, trying to ignore the harmful body ideals, or exercising when you actually want to and enjoying it! For me personally, moving my body and eating what it needs is a pleasure and a huge privilege that I will never take for granted.

Just because it’s a new year, it doesn’t mean you should punish yourself for what you did or didn’t eat over Christmas, your body deserves to be nourished and happy!

If you would like to read further into diet culture and its relation to fat-phobia, intersectional oppression and social justice, I highly recommend these 3 books: Anti-Diet: Reclaim Your Time, Money, Well-Being and Happiness Through Intuitive Eating by Christy Harrison The Politics of Weight: Feminist Dichotomies of Power in Dieting by Amelia Morris Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia by Sabrina Strings

As Valentine’s Day approaches, how is love depicted?

Molly Openshaw Arts Print Editor

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ver Christmas, I was the lucky recipient of a positive Covid test, leaving me susceptible to bingewatching Netflix and obsessively rereading novels. One of these shows that I enjoyed was season two of Emily in Paris, following the quirky American Emily travelling to Paris to work in a very suave marketing firm.

With the beautiful set of Paris and the attractive casting, this show has been considered as stereotypical, romanticiced or hypersexualised.

With season one setting up the series with Emily making friends, having difficulty fitting in and establishing a love interest; season two starts with more love drama, even more, ridiculous outfits (if that is possible) and more problems in translation.

This show positively encourages the motif that Paris is the city of love, with a multitude of love interests as well as an overarching laissez-faire attitude to sex and relationships.

When discussing the marketisation of Paris and the large amount of capital being made off of the romanticisation of the City, Emily expresses ‘so what if marketing capitalises on romance, being a romantic and a realist are not mutually exclusive’. I think that this statement perfectly exemplifies the beauty of Emily in Paris, there is a sense of attainability to the dream of living abroad and finding love in another city. The act of romanticising Paris as well as depicting the hardships of language barriers, missing home comforts and being a foreigner blend together to create an entertaining, yet (sometimes) realistic. It is portrayed that finding the balance between the real and the romantic is the key, particularly in making capital off of Paris. The context of Valentine’s Day is used in this show, demonstrating how using love for the marketing of Paris is often deemed unethical, yet this romanticisation is not separate from the real experience of Paris.

With Valentine’s Day approaching, it is not uncommon to experience the bombardment of love, hearts and roses, which often feels less like an expression of content relationship, and more of a technique to profit off of love.

This representation sparks the debate of whether profiting off of love on Valentine’s day is unethical, and who is

also guilty of doing this? It often seems that half of February is washed over with red tint with everyone carrying cuddly toys, roses and chocolates, but is art and media responsible for this?

Emily in Paris almost breaks the fourth wall here, deciding that it is aware of the show’s romanticisation of Paris.

The whole show seems to mediate between the perils of living abroad with the absolute beauty of Paris, with Emily herself demonstrating how ‘finding a balance’ is essential between the real and the romantic.

In terms of the show’s reception, it is quite evident that people are unhappy with the depiction of Paris, with Deana Korsunsky arguing that the show is ‘a plethora of generic tropes’, yet bingeable. Through representing Paris as clean, beautiful and effortless, the show ignores the pickpockets and the hig expense of living in the city. It seems that there is a cultural ambivalence in which the show is not quite parisian due to the american influence. But this brings into question how far artistic licence can go.

@Instagram

Etymology of the edition: Badger

@Akshay Gupta

A noun. Referring to the nocturnal animla in which this newspaper is named after. Coming from the sixteenth century, badger is seen to evolve from the Anglo-French badge meaning a mask or token, due to the white markings on the animals head. lookin g at the french word blaireau, bler meaning ‘marked with white’, this is evident. We can also

see influence from the Old French bauzan mening ‘black and white spotted’. Looking at Old English names for the animal, brock was borrowed from celtic in Ireland and Wales with connotations of a white streak but also meaning ‘dirty’ or ‘lowly’.

However, take what you will from our namesake, we think they are pretty cute!

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Comment • The Big Debate

THE BIG DEBATE

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This edition features a Big Debate that was published during the Christmas break, where two writers discuss whether commercialisation has ruined the holiday.

Yes Stevie Palmer Staff Writer

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efore the take-over by capitalism, Christmas was, in its traditional quintessence, about the birth of Christ.

A day to celebrate God’s son coming into the world. Since then, ‘Christmas’ as a holiday has been through a series of evolutions. Christmas became about family and coming together with loved ones to celebrate that love, as was resembled by God’s son coming to save us all. It became about eating and drinking in excess and joy and happiness.

However, the evolutions of Christmas did not stop there, they transcended us into a new realm of Christmas, which can be referred to as ‘commercialised Christmas’. A Christmas that is less so about spending quality time with family, and celebrating the birth of God’s son, and more so an anxiety-riddled time of year, filled with qualms about getting the ‘right’ or the ‘best’ present in order to show how much we love our friends and family. It’s become less a time of giving and more so a time of receiving, where those with the biggest and brightest trees reign supreme as the Christmas winners.

Commercialised Christmas is yet another example of how capitalism cannot resist the urge to control and maximise profit in all areas of life. The consumer-driven notion of Christmas not only puts money into the back pockets of the largest conglomerates and other big retailers, who drive down mass competition with massive Christmas sales, adulterating the market in their favour, and not that of the small business, who I see as the only potential winner of commercialised capitalism. But moreover, works to reinforce the control that capitalism has over modern society, warping peoples internalised perception of Christmas in order to maximise the control they have over their consumer base. This is because, once you’ve used clandestinely manipulated people once, it sets the precedent for you to do it again.

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It resembles a period of extra hours, endless saving, and increased uneasiness As the calendar flicks to December 1st, instead of an eagerness for the festive season, for many parents Christmas induces fears surrounding not being able to give their child as many presents as other parents at school, or provide the Christmas of dreams, as is manufactured by social media.

This has become the new reality of

Christmas.

This daunting reality means for many, the festive period does not resemble the light and beauty that it once did.

Instead, it resembles a period of extra hours, endless saving, and increased uneasiness, all in order to satisfy the illusion of Christmas set by the system that continually emanates inequality through standards that are attainable only to the elite few, manifested in Christmas.

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Christmas isn’t even really Christmas anymore.

Tis' also the season for enviornmental damage. The waste generated by the 6 million Christmas trees, two million Brussel sprouts and the 227,000 miles of wrapping paper in the UK exclusively, provides a clear portrayal of how Commercialised Christmas is the killing the planet, and promoting a wasteful and overindulgent lifestyle, with little to no consequences on the effects this has on others. Especially those living in

No Sophie McMahon Comment Print Editor

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he reality is that Christmas is an exuberant display of capitalist productivity, I won’t deny that.

Everybody knows that as soon as all the Halloween decorations are taken down stores are lit up with tacky light displays, filled with Christmas trees, and underpaid workers don their finest elf costumes. The British public recognises how increasingly ostentatious Christmas is each year, but in truth, we love it.

The commercialisation of Christmas is nothing new, with such complaints existing in the 1800s when, for example, images of Santa Claus were being used by merchants as a way to encourage spending.

Stephen Nissenbaum notes that ‘Christmas became a crucial means of legitimising the penetration of consumerist behaviour into American society’ in the 1800s.

Has Commercialisation Ruined Christmas? increasingly uninhabitable places, due to the climate crisis, or the millions of workers in fast fashion and warehouses, who are worked into the ground, in poor conditions for minimal pay. With the UK spending on average 700 million pounds on unwanted Christmas presents annually, think of what that money could do for so many charitable causes, which at their core, are generated by capitalism.

The cherry on the environment crisis cake comes when looking at the energy expenditure used for Christmas lights. As of 2015, electrical expenditure in the USA alone, came in at 6.63 billion Kilowatt hours, which is more than the total energy expenditure of many developing nations at the time.

In addition to highlighting inherent inequality, it also accentuates how far commercialised Christmas has gone, to the point people are polluting the environment in order to have the biggest, flashiest lights, nicest wrapping paper and most exotic tree, all to fulfil the capitalist driven idea of Christmas.

So yes, commercialisation has ruined Christmas. Christmas isn’t even really Christmas anymore. The magic and sparkle have been sucked out by the leech that is capitalism. Which has sought to commercialise a happy time for its own gain, with no concern for its effect on the planet and the people who inhabit it. This isn’t what Christmas is about.

Ronald Hutton dates commercialisation back even further in his book The Stations of the Sun: A History of the Ritual Year in Britain. He discusses documents from the 1600s which showed traditions of gift-giving and spending at Christmas, as well as complaining about the expense of the season. Granted, Jacobean children weren’t exactly yearning for the latest Apple product like today’s kids are.

The tide of consumerism continued post-Second World War which can be seen in Miracle on 34th Street. Kris Kringle, a man who had been assigned to play Santa in a parade, tells his friend ‘I’ve been fighting against [it] for years, the way they commercialise Christmas’.

Buying and spending has always played a part in Christmas throughout history, and so pining for a noncommercial holiday is like mourning a loss that never really existed.

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As Christmas TV adverts start appearing on our screens it makes me reminisce... it may be commercialisation, but it’s also nostalgia.

This feeling of loss is most likely down to our change in perspective. As

children, commercialisation was only the background noise to Wham’s Last Christmas or the sound of Santa’s sleigh.

Growing up made us recognise the power of these huge companies in influencing our consumerist behaviours, and the tactics used by massive corporations to make us spend more. But this hasn’t meant that Christmas lost its sparkle.

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Commercialisation helps to curate a festive spirit which goes hand in hand with goodwill.

It's cliché, but there’s much more to Christmas than the gifts. To argue that commercialisation has ruined the festive seasons is to overlook everything else Christmas brings. Walking through Christmas markets whilst fighting off the cold weather with a mulled wine in hand, is one of my favourite times of the year. Seeing lights go up on houses and trees go up in windows fills me with a festive spirit which brightens the darkening winter nights. I even love the festive menus that brands bring out, with flavours of mint and Bailey’s that feel solely made for this time of year. As Christmas TV adverts start appearing on our screens it makes me reminisce about the times I spent as a little girl flicking through the pages of an Argos catalogue, marvelling at all the toys. It may be commercialisation, but it’s also nostalgia.

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Christmas is what you make it, and for me, that stops it being ruined by commercialisation.

The spending nature of Christmas is always viewed as a bad thing, castigated as being materialistic and straying away from the traditional religious roots, and the ‘true’ meaning of the holiday. I would argue that commercialisation helps to curate a festive spirit which goes hand in hand with goodwill. With 61% of us celebrating Christmas as an entirely secular holiday, it has become for the majority of the nation a time for coming together, for helping others locally and across the globe, and for rejoicing. This is why it is unsurprising that December is the peak time for donations, according to the Charities Aid Foundation (CAF).

It seems that now more than ever, Christmas is a very personal holiday.

For some, it is a day to celebrate the birth of Christ, for others it is a time to reunite and spend quality time with loved ones. As students, it is our safe haven, a respite from recent deadlines and a chance to recharge. Christmas is what you make it, and for me, that stops it being ruined by commercialisation.

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Comment

26

The Ignorance of Influencers Molly-Mae demonstrates how over-glamourising and admiration for influencers has led to ignorance over real life struggles. the general public online due to racism on the show. In the 2021 series of Love Island, the first four women dumped from the villa were women of colour.

Roxanna Wright Staff Writer

O

ver the last decade, not only has social media ‘influencing’ become a career, but it has also become a massive part of our cultural climate.

There are, of course, a variety of opinions towards influencers, but amongst youth especially, there are elements of admiration and superiority. The glamorization and social pedestal influencers have gained over the past few years has been thought to be revolutionary in terms of marketing and branding, but it can be argued that it can lead to ignorance and negligence of the struggles of hierarchies present in the real world.

One example of influencers ignorance was a recent feature in the podcast ‘The Diary of a CEO’ hosted by Steven Bartlett. Social media influencer, ex Love Island finalist and now creative director at Pretty Little Thing, Molly-Mae Hague, sparked a lot of controversy online from the public. On the podcast, she stated that everyone has the “same 24 hours in a day” and “if you want something enough, you can achieve it.”

This isn’t arguing that 22-year-old Molly-Mae didn’t work for her current position. But for those who want to go down a similar path, they may have to work a whole lot harder and for a whole lot longer to even stand a chance.

“

“She’s got very carried away and has such an air of self-importance and entitlement.”

An influential factor to take into consideration is financial positions. According to ThinkTank reports, since Covid, the wealth gap in the UK has increased alongside housing prices increasing by 8%.

Molly-Mae dwelled upon this in the podcast, talking about how it is becoming harder and harder to get onto the property ladder for those who are young or have lower incomes than herself. The increase in the wealth gap, statistically proven by ThinkTank and other economic analysts in the UK, demonstrate how during the pandemic, those in the higher earning brackets earned

@Pixabay more, whereas they statistically state that those who are in the lower third financially, earned even less due to redundancies, working less hours or working for themselves.

“

Love Island reflects the discrimination woven into British society Molly-Mae was born and raised by a middle-class family in the county of Hertfordshire, which is considered in the top 10 wealthiest counties in the UK. By being born into a family without financial difficulties, with both parents being police officers, responsibilities and restrictions are lesser than if she was born into poverty. For example, many children or young adults that were born into lower earning families may have responsibilities such as being relied on by family members to bring in income or having to look after siblings if parents had to work two jobs or work overtime to gain more money.

Furthermore, by living in a nice area, there is no lack of opportunities as she attended a well-funded, good school and by living in a nice area, there are plenty of valuable contacts in business just through the social hierarchy of the UK. She did briefly touch upon this during the podcast saying that she has never lived in poverty, but a brief mention does not cover the extent of the differences between growing up in wealth and in poverty.

Many comments on the podcast with Molly-Mae mention the irony of her thoughts when she is the Creative Director of a brand which promotes fast fashion and exploitation of workers. It has been rated ‘Very Poor’ by website Goodo-

nYou on its labour conditions.

Pretty Little Thing provides no evidence it ensures payment of living wage. Also, it discloses zero to minimal information about its supplier policies or audits, and there is no information on forced labour, freedom of association and gender equality.

One Tweet about the podcast says, “Molly Mae is right, it IS possible to get rich through hard work. If you work hard to sh*t on everyone around you, exploit them, underpay them, steal the value of their labour, and rip them off, you’ll make millions just like her.”

Furthermore, another extremely influential aspect to Molly-Mae’s success is due to the politics of attractiveness. When she was a teenager, Hague was crowned Miss Teen Hertfordshire in 2015 and World Teen Supermodel UK in 2016. Then from there, MollyMae was scouted by ITV2’s Love Island casting team, which she appeared on the show renowned for its lack of physical diversity in 2019. All three of these achievements are mainly down to appearance, and although you can shape your body in the gym, genetics have the most influence on how “attractive” you are perceived to be by Western audiences.

“

“It’s very tone deaf to dismiss those who are living incredibly deprived lives and/ or face significant obstacles with the ‘everyone has the same 24 hours’ attitude.”

Furthermore, year after year audiences see black women not getting picked by men on the first day and struggling to find men whose type isn’t white.

This just shows the horrific reality of white privilege and the racism present in the UK. Other examples of how Love Island reflects the discrimination woven into British society is its lack of diversity of religion, disability, and different body sizes. No wonder MollyMae’s podcast comments created such a reaction when she fits perfectly into what Love Island and what Brit-

ain’s dominant society idealise.

The reactions as mentioned include comments on the video of the podcast, Tweets, TikToks, memes on Instagram and newspaper articles. One comment on the podcast’s YouTube video states, “She’s got very carried away and has such an air of self-importance and entitlement.” Another says, “It’s very tone deaf to dismiss those who are living incredibly deprived lives and/or face significant obstacles with the ‘everyone has the same 24 hours’ attitude.”

“

Molly-Mae was born and raised by a middle-class family in the county of Hertfordshire Yes, her intentions may not have been to be harmful or insensitive; perhaps she was simply trying to inspire and encourage people to try and make the best of their time, work hard and dream big. However, her white, pretty, wealthy privilege demonstrates the naivety of influencers to real life struggles and over-glamorizing the work they had to put into to get where they are.

“

Her white, pretty, wealthy privilege demonstrates the naivety of influencers to real life struggles On the podcast, Molly-Mae stated that when contestants leave Love Island, they are on a “level playing field”. This isn’t an accurate statement either.

There have been many complaints through Ofcom and

@Flickr

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Comment

27

Filming The Unfilmable How Should The Holocaust Be Shown?

Simon Edwards Comment Online Editor CW: of

themes the

and events Holocaust

J

anuary 27th marks National Holocaust Memorial Day. This annual day of remembrance falls on the liberation date of Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1945, commemorated to ensure that the genocide committed in Nazi-occupied Europe, as well as victims of genocide in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur, are not forgotten. Remembrance of the atrocities of the Holocaust is a highly complex topic, and one of particular contention is the role filmic depiction should, or should not, play in ensuring the events of the Holocaust are remembered.

The relationship between Holocaust remembrance and film traces back to the initial liberation of the camps – Allied Commander-in-Chief Dwight D. Eisenhower directed press and film journalists to capture the scenes of Buchenwald concentration camp, telling them that “I want you to see for yourself and be spokesmen for the United States” and ensuring widespread dissemination of now infamous images of the camp and its victims. These pictures are harrowing, stark visualisations of unbelievable acts, evidence of suffering that, to all rational minds, is undeniable upon seeing them. Yet their ubiquity has troubled many for decades – their use in documentaries, feature films, on constant loop in museums and, more troublingly, by organisations applying them to unrelated causes and events, continues to spark debate.

indelible mark on us all: I would imagine most people have some memory, even if fleeting, of when and where they first saw them. Their constant usage by historians, filmmakers and museum curators confirms a simple truth: they work. However, arguments against their widespread distribution are varied: many argue that the images, especially of bodies and mass graves, are exploitative, reducing victims of genocide to grim tableaux for us to weep over, affirming our own humanity before moving on with our lives.

“

January 27th marks National Holocaust Memorial Day. There is a reasonable case to be made that it is not the job of the dead to tell us why their suffering was unimaginably cruel and painful – the message can be conveyed without the images.

A further concern, more typcally voiced by scholars, is the risk of diluting the effectiveness of the images through constant use. Exposure to something, no matter how horrific, naturally strengthens our capacity to endure it, and in an age where the internet steals our innocence early, and graphic images are a few keyboard taps away, there is every risk that these pictures will begin to lose their

power over us: does enshrining them in context fight back against that, or contribute to it?

Finally, on a gentler note, we might question why those who do not know this history, typically children, must learn it in such a horrific way? This is not to suggest that the events of the Holocaust be smoothed over and made child-appropriate: it is more a question of whether it is essential that, in order to understand a historical event, children be exposed to graphic, traumatising imagery. The Holocaust must be known and understood, but depicting it is a topic fraught with contention.

The other major means of mediating the events of the Holocaust is through depictions in fictional cinema. Films on the Holocaust cover a broad spectrum of productions: from Hollywood-produced prestige pictures to independent foreign films, British pictures for children and even tragicomedies – the events of the Holocaust have been presented in a myriad of cinematic forms.

In spite of these various efforts, there are many scholars and other figures who pour scorn on attempts to portray mechanised extermination of human beings on film. From David Mamet’s dismissal of Schindler’s List as an exploitation film to Slavoj Zizek’s essay on the 90s’ wave of ‘Holocaust com-

edies’, recriminations against depictions of the Holocaust on film are widespread, and varied.

Even Son Of Saul, a truly bleak and soul-crushing two hours that captures the horrors of life in Auschwitz as perfectly as any fictional film may be capable, has been called “soft porn for refined people”, sufficiently all-playing to win an Oscar while courting the arthouse chin-stroking crowd, without actually adding anything new to Holocaust remembrance.

The fundamental issue with films that depict the Holocaust is nonetheless self-evident: it is near-impossible to do justice to the events in a way which is tasteful, non-exploitative, educational and artistic.

By drawing the Holocaust into the realm of cinema, questions of profit and market value, audience satisfaction and awards contendership, instantly marr the film as a tool of remembrance.

“

It is near-impossible to do justice to the events in a way which is tasteful, non-exploitative and educational How can a commercial artistic product capture the deaths of millions of Jews,

“

Reducing victims of genocide to grim tableaux for us to weep over The undeniable power of the images is often cited as one of the most powerful tools of educating the uninformed about the Holocaust. Documentaries, going back to the seminal BBC series The World At War, have used footage captured by Allied and Nazi photographers and documentarians to supplement their descriptions of Auschwitz, Treblinka, Dachau and Buchenwald. Seeing these images for the first time leaves an

@WikimediaCommons

Roma, LBGTQ+, Poles, disabled groups, and more besides?

Whether tasteful or tasteless, explicit or implicit, it seems that films can, at best, evoke the horrors of those events; but do they do so more effectively than hearing them described? Does fiction create a barrier which dilutes reality?

“

Evidence of suffering that, to all rational minds, is undeniable upon seeing them.

There are documentaries and films which, in my estimation, do a far better and more valuable job of remembering the events of the Holocaust – two in particular I wish to highlight are Sidney Lumet’s The Pawnbroker and Claude Lanzmann’s Shoah. The former, a fictional story of a Jewish pawnbroker in 1960s New York, depicts a man haunted by atrocities he witnessed during the Holocaust, spiritually ‘dead’ ‘and yet continuing to live. Shoah is a ninehour documentary entirely made up of interviews with Jewish, Polish, and Nazi witnesses to the death camps, capturing so complete a picture of the events that transpired there.

What sets these films apart is that they fulfil the job that the images captured in 1945 are relied upon so heavily to do: they provide indelible accounts, from the eyes and mouths of survivors (all real in Shoah, fictional but inspiredby in The Pawnbroker) of what the Holocaust truly was, in harsh, unrelenting terms.

Their cinematic testimonies, as Lanzmann reflected after the film’s release, “speak for the dead… [and] acknowledged the generality of the people”. Those who are lucky enough to have heard survivors tell their stories know that their recollections are among the evocative and powerful means of transmitting these events to future generations.

As time claims those who survived, it becomes ever more important to focus cinematic remembrance on recording and remediating their words: by championing footage of those who survived and were able to give their accounts, teaching others about the atrocities of the Holocaust through their stories, we allow the dead to rest.

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The Badger 24th of January 2022

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The Badger 24th of January 2022

Science and Technology

29

Man Receives Heart From Pig in Ground-Breaking Procedure Cross-species organ transplantation is a marvel of science, but is it ethical?

Maria Margot Kafka Staff Writer

O

n January the 7th, David Bennet was given a second chance in life at age 57 by receiving the first successful genetically modified pig heart transplant and is now free of cardiac support.

This scientific breakthrough was conducted by the University of Maryland School of Medicine (UMSOM) and involved three experimental steps: the growing of a gene-edited heart, an experimental immunosuppressant drug, and a novel solution to store bodiless organs.

Dr. Muhammad Mohiuddin had to seek a special “compassionate use” authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to complete this surgery which skipped some clinical trials. Benet was ineligible for a human heart transplant and suffered from terminal heart failure, making him unlikely to leave the hospital alive.

Bennet consented to this risky surgery as his only hope and wished that even in the event of his death science would learn something new. UMSOM and Revivicor -the biotech company that produced the hearthave shared their belief that xenotransplantation (the transplantation of cells, tissues, or organs from one species to another) is a viable solution to the

organ shortage crisis which kills 17 people daily from the 100,000 individuals on waiting lists.

The human immune system’s response to anything it recognises as foreign is xenotransplantation’s biggest challenge.

Pig cells have sugar chains on their surface that act like tags.

When the immune system detects them in a graft, it will attack the organ in a similar way that it would attack an organ from a person with a different blood type. The characterisation of an organ as a ‘match’ between donor and recipient is complicated even in human transplants, hence the shortage. Additionally, the patient must be I’ll enough to qualify for a transplant as a matter of medical urgency, but also healthy enough to receive an organ that would significantly prolong their life. Consequently, finding a match is a rare event; patients wait years (that they may not have) for the lifesaving call. So, it comes as no surprise that scientists had to look elsewhere for a solution.

For the creation of the hybrid (biologically called a ‘chimera’) heart, a pig’s embryo underwent 10 precise genetic modifications using CRISPR-Cas9, a tool that can be described as molecular scissors. Revivicor knocked out 3 pig genes that would trigger the human

immune system, added 6 human genes to improve functional compatibility, and modified a pig gene that controls organ growth for it to fit in a human chest. However, these 10 gene edits are not enough to prevent organ rejection.

After the surgery, an experimental drug, KPL-404 was used to dampen Bennet’s immune system. KPL-404 targets antibody production and was designed to treat rheumatoid arthritis. KPL-404 successfully passed phase I safety trials on healthy volunteers in May 2021.

The post-operative administration of this drug marks an impressive jump in progress.

Lastly, this procedure required special permits by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration because one of the ingredients in the novel transport solution (shipped from Sweden) was cocaine - how it works remains unclear but it is evident that it keeps the donor heart healthy. Nevertheless, the regulatory demands of this procedure are not focused on the use of this organ solution.

Xenotransplantation is surrounded by a plethora of ethical and philosophical questions that policymakers must tackle before it can materialize as the solution to the organ shortage.

Some religions hold strict laws on using pigs for consumption, and patients who

follow Islam or Judaism, for example, might question religious teachings when qualifying for xenotransplants. Religious experts such as Dr. Moshe Freedman, senior London rabbi and member of the UK’s Moral and Ethical Advisory Group, and Dar al-Ifta, Egypt’s central authority for issuing religious rulings, both provided the BBC with statements indicating dispensations that follow the same reasoning. When faced with saving human life, the use of animal material is permitted.

Other communities, who hold the rejection of anthropocentric ideology central to their cosmovision may reach different conclusions. If an individual refused xenotransplants for religious beliefs, their choice should not interfere with their eligibility for another treatment.

Transplant priority must be solely determined by medical and logistical factors, regardless of personal or social characteristics even when the distinction is not straightforward.

While Bennet’s 1988 knife crime conviction should not affect his right to health, it was his lack of compliance with medical instructions that made him ineligible for a human transplant. “Organs are a precious resource” Dr. Mohiuddin stated, “the main concern was whether to give the heart to a person who may not be able to take

@Tareq Salahuddin - Flickr

care of it”. Bioethicists will need to discuss what would make a patient eligible for a xenotransplant instead of a human one.

On the topic of human rights, the question of treatment accessibility is paramount to the xenotransplantation debate.

The main argument for porcine xenotransplants as the solution for the organ shortage crisis is the availability of donor animals. However, the seemingly unlimited supply of pigs for consumption purposes would not be the one used for xenotransplants, and neither would their crowded facilities.

Part of the FDA’s reluctance to approve clinical trials was the lack of clinical-grade facilities that tightly control for infections. While Revivicor refused to disclose the cost of producing the heart, they acknowledged that it is expensive. The equipment needed for modification and the raising of chimera animals is unavailable in many countries.

Focusing funding on progressing the already morally grey field of medicine can further exacerbate healthcare access inequalities across the globe.

Lastly, news of this surgery has re-sparked animal rights groups that oppose gene modification of animals under any circumstance, under the preface gene-editing may cause unpredictable effects to the animal’s health. The ethics of growing genetically modified animals to study them and harvest their organs from are arguably different from growing animals to eat, however, it is difficult to debate this when the meat industry tramples animal welfare.

In short, this January marks a huge milestone and is a true testament to the discoveries that cross-disciplinary collaboration makes possible. If xenotransplantation becomes the way forward, this future iteration of medicine may require an on-demand organ delivery system with a plethora of jobs being created to support it. A cross between a geneticist and a farmer, to breed chimera animals. Specialized surgeons that bridge veterinary with human medicine. Most importantly, a strong network of regulators that focus on equity and policymaking. Will xenotransplantation turn organ transplants from emergency medicine to planned routine operations; or will geneticists face ethical implications that resemble the plot of Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake novel? Time will tell. David Bennet’s life is an unfolding omen for the future of organ transplants.

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Science and Technology

30

Why Are So Many Athletes ‘Anti-Vax’?

Rosie Marilyn Burgess Staff Writer

A

t the time of writing this, Novak Djokovic is still awaiting a court hearing ahead of the start of the Australian open on Monday after being detained for being unvaccinated. Djokovic is a 34-year-old Serbian Tennis player and is currently ranked as World number one. But, ahead of his hopes to win the tournament to claim 21 major titles, Djokovic has already had an extensive history of spouting anti-science opinions.

During lockdown, the tennis player spent time publishing a web series called the “The Self Mastery Project.”. He interviewed a series of wellness and self-help figures with many of these having spread known conspiracy theories.

The athlete had also previously stated that he was against vaccination and wouldn’t want to be forced by someone to take a vaccine in order to travel.

But, with so many other athletes such as NFL stars Aaron Rodgers, NBA stars such as Kyrie Irving and plenty of Premier League players against vaccination, why is it that so many professional athletes tout the anti-vax cause?

One argument is that athletes value their bodily autonomy more than the aver-

age person. In an interview, West Bromwich Albion player Callum Robinson affirmed that he was against vaccination because it was “My Body, My Choice”. Young athletes are often very aware of what goes into their bodies. In order to be successful, they need to understand their bodies and its abilities in order to push it to perform better. Strict lifestyle regimens and extensive drug testing may also contribute to athletes taking a higher interest in what goes into their bodies.

“

As citizens of society, protecting our most vulnerable communities and reducing the harm to Public Health is an essential task.

Many athletes are concerned about the possible long-term effects of vaccination and whether or not it could affect their performance or career.

NFL quarter-back Aaron Rodgers explained that “ I am somebody who is a critical thinker.

I believe strongly in bodily autonomy and the ability to make choices for your body, not to have to acquiesce to some sort of woke culture or crazed indi-

@Mika Baumeister viduals who say you have to do something”. Novak Djokovic also said, “ Freedom of choice is essential”, “What do you want to put in your body.” It is clear that for many athletes, success requires a belief in one’s own body.

So, as a consequence athletes are obsessive over their health in their quest to improve and this might lead many down a pseudo-medicine and disinformation rabbit hole.

For many, this line of think-

@BBC

ing is viewed as unacceptable especially when collective choices have to be made in order to protect our most vulnerable. A recent public survey conducted by the Australian research organisation stated that at least 50% of the public did not approve of Novak Djokovic being allowed to stay in Australia if he continues to remain unvaccinated.

“

So, as a consequence athletes are obsessive over their health in their quest to improve and this might lead many down a pseudo-medicine and disinformation rabbit hole.

Another argument states that athletes are isolated from the ‘Real World’. Many athletes lead lives in the limelight as celebrities as well as sporting professionals. Most athletes surround themselves in environments that reflect their same views. This echo chamber perpetuates because of confirmation bias. They might not have anyone challenging their views. Other athletes, coaches and fans might feel the same way especially if they are sharing their views on social media.

Novak Djokovic is also no stranger to sharing his opinions online. One conspiracy group called “Unvaxxed Sperm” has expressed their joy at having someone become an icon for their movement.

And, for the average person the prospect of not being able to go to a nightclub or be restricted from travelling because of being unvaccinated is a real issue that could affect their livelihoods. It is an obvious deterrent. However, how do athletes feel about these potential consequences when they could just buy a whole nightclub or rent a private jet to travel?

Reasons for vaccine hesitancy among athletes remains a relatively understudied field.

But, some people feel that regardless of opinions, athletes need to be vaccinated in order to show consistency.

They feel it should not be one rule for one and one rule for another. As citizens of society, protecting our most vulnerable communities and reducing the harm to Public Health is an essential task.

Athletes often train in close quarters, travel all around the world and come into contact with many different people.

The rates of positive COVID-19 cases in the Premier league this week alone show that COVID-19 is spreading fast. With 103 cases after Christmas, some people believe that more needs to be done to prevent athletes from falling victim to anti-vax perspectives.

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Sport

31

The Ashes 2021/22 Review – First As Tragedy, Then As Farce How Do You Solve A Problem Like English Cricket?

Simon Edwards Comment Online Editor

I

t’s the hope that kills you.

The run-up to the First Test of the Ashes on December 8th brought a few bright spots to lighten a seemingly predictable Ashes series between England and Australia: Aussie captain Tim Paine’s shock withdrawal from the team, replaced by Pat Cummins (bowlers can’t be captain!), the promise of an unseasonably damp summer, green pitches and cloudy skies more akin to Wolverhampton than Wollongong, and the return of Ben Stokes all offered hope that England might pull something off. Swinging balls and weakened opponents?

We might actually win a game! And then Mitchell Starc knocked Rory Burns’ off-stump over with the first ball at the Gabba and English shoulders slumped: same old, same old.

There’s a few ways to try and capture the sheer ignominy and horror of this Ashes tour. The numbers speak for themselves: England’s tour batting average of 20.21 was the lowest of any Ashes series ever; the decimation in the Third Test was the shortest Boxing Day Test Melbourne has hosted since 1932; Australian Test debutant Scott Boland claimed eighteen wickets in three Tests, at an average of 9.56; on the final day of the Fifth Test, England’s openers finally established a reasonable partnership of 68 for no loss, before the entire team

collapsed, losing ten wickets in 21 overs for 56 runs, throwing away an eminently winnable game and demonstrated that there were shambolic depths yet unplumbed.

While the numbers are shocking, and yet strangely entertaining –analysts have had a field day providing as many numeric humiliations as possible – the human story is the real meat of it. Moreso than any other sport, Test cricket is a cruel game, and this series was truly a sadist’s paradise. Jos Buttler’s stand in the Second Test is a typical example: with a win impossible but a draw feasible, England’s typically explosive wicketkeeper dug in, batting for over four hours, facing over two-hundred deliveries, batting for the team, the series, and potentially his own career. And his reward? He stepped on his stumps, got himself out, and walked off in utter humiliation as England collapsed behind him. The innings could’ve rejuvenated his Test career – now it’s barely a footnote.

The series is littered with these moments: a succession of nervous looking young English batsmen looking like fresh lambs to the slaughter as a seemingly endless stream of Australian fast bowlers pelted 90mph balls at them until they threw away their wickets out of sheer desperation. Jack Leach, England’s spin bowler, thrust onto an unsuitable pitch in the First Test after a year of going

unselected, getting spanked for eight runs an over by grateful Aussie batters, and never making an impact in the series again. Even Joe Root, who came within less than two hundred runs of the all-time record for any batsmen in a single year, was cowed and ineffectual, balancing captaincy, batting, painful press interviews, replacing COVIDstricken coaches at net practices for the others, cutting crusts off sandwiches and getting hit in the nuts twice at close to 100mph. The pressure England was under was insurmountable, and no-one emerged uncrushed.

By contrast, the Australians made the most of an enjoyable series. Even with star batsman Steve Smith a little below par, every member of the Aussie squad had his time in the sun: returning batsmen and Sussex CCC captain Travis Head was man of the series after hitting two centuries, while Usman Khawaja hit a rare two centuries in a single test on his return to the side. New captain Pat Cummins was lead wickettaker for the series with 23, a feat he has achieved in every Ashes series he has played.

The unorthodox Marnus Labuschagne became the top Test batsmen in the world while comfortably handling England for most of the series.

Then there were the new bowlers: after the big three fast bowlers of Cummins, Starc and Josh Hazelwood rolled over England at the Gabba, Jhye

Richardson replaced the injured Hazelwood and Michael Neser the COVID-afflicted Cummins at the Second Test, comfortably defeating England as if they were seasoned veterans. Then, at the Third Test, 32-year old Scott Boland made the sort of debut children dream about, claiming six wickets for seven runs in four overs, skittling England for 68 and claiming the Mullagh Medal for best performance at a Boxing Day Test – a feat made more significant as Boland was the first Aboriginal player to win the medal named for Australia’s greatest unsung indigenous cricketing hero. The depth of Australia’s bowling roster was a stark contrast to England’s squad: whereas England struggled to put bodies in front of the Aussie attack, the Australians happily drew debutants into the side who cut through England like a hot knife through soft butter.

By the end of the Second Test, it was tragic: Australians weren’t even enjoying it (much), commiserating with English fans as the fight left the team and its supporters. By the end of the Fifth Test, it was farcical: England collapsed again, Stuart Broad took a break from bowling to chew out an overlyenthusiastic camera robot, and the scent of village cricket wafted through the air. Was this what English cricket had come to? Pundits rushed to blame everything and anyone: the captain, the coaches, the

counties, the Hundred, the schedule, the pitches back home, the impact of race and class on English cricket culture, the increasingly elitist reputation of English cricket as it languishes on pay-to-watch premium television, and anything else that might reasonably be blamed.

There was a brief point of hope that saved the series from total omnishambles status: the Fourth Test at Sydney was drawn, just, in a thrilling down-to-the-wire climax that encapsulated the very best of Test cricket. England’s bowlers were on fire, as they had been all series in spite of the team’s woes, and the Australians wobbled. Johnny Bairstow made a redoubtable century, Zack Crawley made 77, Ben Stokes finally came alive with two 60s, and it was enough, just, to prevent a whitewash 5-0 series defeat. Pundits flocked to remind everyone (with a hint of desperation) that this was what made Test cricket so great – the drama, the tension, five glorious days of sport.

Ultimately though, nothing sums up the series up quite like an anecdote drawn from the nets of the Adelaide Oval during the Second Test.

A ten-year old Australian fan watching England warmup asked opener Rory Burns, who had already had a shocking start to the series that was only going to get worse, if he liked cricket.

“Sometimes, mate”, Burns reportedly replied.

@Flickr

The Badger 24th of January 2022

Sport

32

New year, new you: get into uni sport with this term with Active US Bella Currie Active US Rep As always, these social sport sessions will be run by students for students – so come along if you fancy getting active in a commitment free, laidback environment with US! Active US is for all students, regardless of background or sporting experience.

From Freshers to postgraduates, we would love to see you there. So come along to get your sweat on, have a laugh, and get to know your fellow students!

We want to get as many students active and involved in sport as possible - which is why each session is only £2. All the equipment will be provided by our friendly activators who will also be able to show you the ropes of each sport – you just need to bring yourself!

The health benefits of doing

sport are endless, especially social sport! From improving your cardiovascular health to increasing your selfconfidence and memory - there is always an excuse to pop into one of our social sessions.

So, feel free to drop in and get to know new people, catch up with old friends or just to play some sport between lectures! This semester we will be running social sessions for...

Badminton Netball Basketball Squash Football Running Volleyball Any of these sessions can be booked in advance through the online booking portal. Our updated timetable for these sessions will be added to our website and socials within the coming weeks so keep an eye

on our social media accounts!

We had a blast last term running loads of fun events like Rainbow Laces Day, UV Badminton, and UV Spin! This term we will also be running exciting events like Wheelchair Basketball, This Girl Can Week,

Re-Freshers Taster Sessions, One World Week, Holi Run and more UV Events. To keep up to date with where and when these events are on, follow us at @activeussussex to find out the latest news.

M

y usual experience of watching football begins with 45 minutes of largely uninterrupted, gripping football. At half-time there is a 15-minute break, giving my heart-rate a chance to stabilise. This is followed by another 45-minute stretch of nerves, excitement and passion.

Emotions are at the heart of the game, continually building one’s loyalty and support of their club. It’s what makes you come back for more, a roller-coaster experience with thousands of like-minded supporters.

This experience was my general conception of what watching sports is about and why it has become a staple of global culture.

Little did I know of the differences in major sports across the pond.

After a few months of watching the NBA and playing Madden NFL, I could not get my head around the stop-start nature of American sports.

A basketball match is separated into four quarters of 12 minutes each, with breaks in-between them adding up to just under 30 minutes.

In 2021, breaks for fouls and free-throws totalled another 40 minutes of non-play time.

This means that, in a game with 48 minutes of allotted

playing time, another 1 hour and 10 minutes of non-playing time is thread throughout.

If this wasn’t enough to stun you, in a game of American Football, which lasts roughly 3 hours, the ball is in play for an average of just 11 minutes (Ganninger, 2020).

As I started to watch these sports, a recurring theme began.

The moment I became invested in a game, a foul or timeout was called, instantaneously sucking all momentum from the game.

How any atmosphere or emotional build-up could occur in such settings bemused me.

Some of my most vivid memories of watching football consist of my team defending for their lives during a relentless

17th-30th January Australian Open

26-30 January Women’s Ashes

5th February Tottenham v Brighton

America’s Worst Nightmare: Fluid Football Esteban Ramirez Staff Writer

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20-minute stretch, or conversely the agony of them bombarding the opposition goal and being denied time-after-time, with the occasional last-minute winner.

This is what makes football, the heroic highs and the crushing lows. The release of pent-up energy and frustration flowing out in screams of delight as you see the back of the net ripple.

This is just something that cannot be replicated when play is continually interrupted every few minutes – it simply does not allow for any extended period of engrossment and subsequent emotional build-up.

It can be considered rather ironic then, that American fans find European sports such as football and rugby

boring. What they love in highscoring basketball and detailed categorization of every play in American football they trade away in emotional investment and atmospheric build-up.

Different theories have been thrown around for why this is. Some say its because of the capitalist ideal of saturating television with ad-breaks.

A more interesting theory is that it is down to an obsession with analytics. Being able to count every time a player catches, passes or tackles allows for objective player rankings, the popularisation of which is seen in the film ‘Moneyball’.

Perhaps they just had enough of missing the action whilst going to the toilet.

5th February Man City v Fulham

5th February Cambridge United v Luton Town

5th February Ireland v Wales (Rugby Union)

5th February Scotland v England (Rugby Union)

6th February African Cup of Nations final

@Evening Standard