Source: The Conversation – USA – By Kendall Deas, Assistant Professor of Education Policy, Law, and Politics, University of South Carolina
Originally developed as a tool to help Black children attend better schools, school voucher programs now serve a different purpose.Drazen via Getty Images
School voucher programs that allow families to use public funds to pay tuition to attend private schools have become increasingly popular.
The first vouchers were offered in the 1800s to help children in sparsely populated towns in rural Vermont and Maine attend classes in public and private schools in nearby districts.
After the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, in which justices ruled that separating children in public schools on the basis of race was unconstitutional, segregationists used vouchers to avoid school integration.
More recently, school voucher programs have been pitched as a tool to provide children from low-income families with quality education options.
As a scholar who specializes in education policy, law and politics, I can share how current policies have strayed from efforts to support low-income Black children.
History of school voucher programs
Over time, as school voucher policies grew in popularity, they evolved into education subsidies for middle-class families. Peter Dazeley/Getty Images
Research from education history scholars shows that more recent support for school choice was not anchored in an agenda to privatize public schools but rooted in a mission to support Black students.
Over time, as school voucher policies grew in popularity, they evolved into subsidies for middle-class families to send their children to private and parochial schools.
School choice policies have also expanded to include education savings account programs and vouchers funded by tax credit donations.
School voucher programs can negatively impact the quality of public schools serving Black students. Connect Images via Getty Images
States looking to add or expand school choice and voucher programs have adopted language from civil rights activists pushing for equal access to quality education for all children. For example, they contend that school choice is a civil right all families and students should have as U.S. citizens. But school voucher programs can exclude Black students and harm public schools serving Black students in a host of ways, research shows.
Since the Brown v. Board ruling, school voucher programs have been linked to racial segregation. These programs were at times used to circumvent integration efforts: They allowed white families to transfer their children out of diverse public schools into private schools.
For example, private schools that receive voucher funding are not always required to adopt the same antidiscrimination policies as public schools.
School voucher programs can also negatively impact the quality of public schools serving Black students.
As some of the best and brightest students leave to attend private or parochial ones, public schools in communities serving Black students often face declining enrollments and reduced resources.
In cities such as Macon, Georgia, families say that majority Black schools lack resources because so many families use the state’s voucher-style program to attend mostly white private schools.
Moreover, the cost of attending a private or parochial school can be so expensive that even with a school voucher, Black families still struggle to afford the cost of sending children to these schools.
Vouchers can siphon school funding
Voucher programs can disproportionately affect funding in majority Black school districts. kali9/Getty Images
Research from the Economic Policy Institute, a nonpartisan, nonprofit think tank based in Washington, D.C., shows that voucher programs in Ohio result in majority Black school systems such as the Cleveland Metropolitan School District losing millions in education funding.
Another example is the Marion County School District, a South Carolina system where about 77% of students are Black.
Marion County is in the heart of the region of the state known as the “Corridor of Shame,” known for its inadequate funding and its levels of poor student achievement. The 17 counties along the corridor are predominantly minority communities, with high poverty rates and poor public school funding because of the area’s low tax base due to a lack of industry.
On average, South Carolina school districts spent an estimated US$18,842 per student during the 2024-25 school year.
In Marion County, per-student funding was $16,463 during the 2024-2025 school year.
By comparison, in Charleston County, the most affluent in the state, per-student funding was more than $26,000.
Returning voucher policy to its roots
Rather than focus on school choice and voucher programs that take money away from public schools serving Black students, I argue that policymakers should address systemic inequities in education to ensure that all students have access to a quality education.
Establishing restrictions on the use of funds and requiring preferences for low-income Black students could help direct school voucher policies back toward their intent.
It would also be beneficial to expand and enforce civil rights laws to prevent discrimination against Black students.
These measures would help ensure all students, regardless of background, have access to quality education.
Kendall Deas does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Yet as fascination with America’s founding endures, controversy colors how the revolution is taught across the United States. From contested efforts by The New York Times “1619 Project” to put slavery at the center of America’s story, to attempts to limit teaching about race and racism, partisanship surrounds the teaching of American history. Anniversaries can inspire public passion, but they can also open old wounds.
As an American historian and a naturalized citizen of the United States, I regard the American Revolution with both personal and professional interest. The fact that I grew up in the United Kingdom amuses my students to no end whenever we discuss the Revolutionary War. Sometimes, in my British-accented English, I remind them I did not personally grow up with King George. Teaching history is encouraging students to think critically about the past without dictating what emotions they should feel – patriotic or otherwise.
Sadly, in the U.S., the sort of objective historical knowledge once taken for granted now appears to be waning. According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress, just 13% of eighth graders in 2023 ranked “proficient” in American history. A 2010 survey found that 26% of adults could not identify from whom America declared its independence, with China, Mexico and France among the responses.
America divorcing France would have been news to Gilbert du Motier, better known as the Marquis de Lafayette. His commitment to the new country not only helped secure its independence, but it also helped solidify American identity decades later.
Key alliance
A privileged aristocrat who served in both the American and French revolutions, Lafayette went to war at age 19. Commissioning and equipping his own expedition across the Atlantic in 1777, he fought in many battles against the British, including decisive action at Yorktown. Earning George Washington’s confidence, Lafayette attained the rank of major general in the Continental Army.
‘The reception of Lafayette at Mount Vernon, home of Washington,’ painted by Herman Bencke around 1875. Bencke & Scott/Library of Congress
Lafayette’s enrollment in the U.S. military predated the 1778 alliance between his home country and the United States. Eventually, France’s alliance turned the tide against Great Britain on land and at sea. By the war’s end, the French had supplied some 12,000 soldiers, 22,000 sailors and dozens of warships to the American cause, plus huge financial resources. When Lafayette volunteered, however, he was one of just a few foreign volunteers – and the most acclaimed.
“Nowadays,” as historian Sarah Vowell conceded, Americans think of Lafayette as “a place, not a person.” But an abundance of cities, counties and thoroughfares named after the revolutionary hero attest to his former celebrity. During World War I, U.S. troops sailed to France under the slogan “Lafayette here we come,” promising to repay America’s debt of gratitude to France.
A growing country
Older Americans may recall the U.S. bicentennial of 1976, marked with much pageantry and even a state visit by Queen Elizabeth II. America’s semicentennial, however – the 50th anniversary of independence – played a far greater role shaping the idea of America in the minds of its citizens.
Lafayette starred in the buildup to this 1826 commemoration, the first of its kind at the national level. President James Monroe, a fellow veteran of the War of Independence, invited Lafayette to be “the guest of America,” honored as the last living major general of the Continental Army. Beginning in July 1824, at the age of 66, Lafayette embarked on a triumphal tour of all 24 states then comprising the union – nearly double the original 13.
As Lafayette headed west, borne by horse-drawn carriage, steamboat and canal barge, he journeyed across a changing America. Nowhere was America’s economic and demographic growth more evident than Cincinnati, where a crowd of 50,000 welcomed Lafayette in May 1825. Once a small frontier town, Cincinnati was growing faster than any comparably sized city in the nation: Its population increased from around 15,000 to roughly 115,000 in the quarter century following Lafayette’s visit.
He addressed his audience with emotion: “The highest reward that can be bestowed on a revolutionary veteran is to welcome him with a sight of the blessings which have issued from our struggle for independence, freedom and equal rights.”
Lafayette gave human face to America’s national commemoration. He granted citizens of frontier states like Ohio – hitherto excluded from the revolutionary narrative – license to celebrate themselves. High turnouts in western stops such as Cincinnati reflected enthusiasm for grand spectacles. They also reflected the growth of America’s print media, which had advertised his visit, and improved transportation in formerly remote regions of the country.
Lafayette’s tour culminated with a September 1825 state banquet in Washington, D.C., hosted by the new president, John Quincy Adams. Adams – the son of America’s second president, John Adams – praised “that tie of love, stronger than death,” connecting Lafayette “for the endless ages of time, with the name of Washington.”
Rose-colored glasses
The enthusiasm that welcomed Lafayette 200 years ago was authentic. But like all good history lessons, Lafayette’s legacy is open to interpretation.
His grand tour cemented the myth of “the Era of Good Feelings”: a golden age of American political harmony. In reality, the seeds of America’s civil war were already evident. Missouri’s 1820 admission to the union threatened the country’s precarious balance between states that opposed slavery and states that allowed it – a crisis Thomas Jefferson warned was “a fire bell in the night.”
Likewise, Lafayette’s lionization in the western United States coincided with the ongoing forced removal of Indigenous people. Ohio, for example, forcibly removed its last Native American tribe in 1843.
Despite the uses and abuses of historical memory and the aversion of modern historians toward hero-worship, Lafayette remains a charismatic figure – a “citizen of two worlds” who championed both abolitionism and women’s rights. I believe his fading public memory indicates a troubling amnesia. America’s anniversary offers the opportunity to reconsider his legacy, alongside revolutionary stories of Americans from all walks of life.
As Lafayette wrote home following the British army’s surrender in 1781: “Humanity has won its battle. Liberty now has a country.”
Matthew Smith does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
When people use the term “Orwellian,” it’s not a good sign.
It usually characterizes an action, an individual or a society that is suppressing freedom, particularly the freedom of expression. It can also describe something perverted by tyrannical power.
It’s a term used primarily to describe the present, but whose implications inevitably connect to both the future and the past.
But while Orwell believed in the existence of an objective truth about history, he did not necessarily believe that truth would prevail.
President Donald Trump signed an executive order to determine whether ‘public monuments, memorials, statues, markers, or similar properties … have been removed or changed to perpetuate a false reconstruction of American history.’ Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
Winners write the history
During World War II, the Nazis broadcast reports on German radio describing nonexistent air raids over Britain.
Orwell knew about those reports and wrote: “Now, we are aware that those raids did not happen. But what use would our knowledge be if the Germans conquered Britain? For the purposes of a future historian, did those raids happen, or didn’t they?”
The answer, Orwell wrote, was, “If Hitler survives, they happened, and if he falls, they didn’t happen. So with innumerable other events of the past ten or twenty years. … In no case do you get one answer which is universally accepted because it is true: in each case you get a number of totally incompatible answers, one of which is finally adopted as the result of a physical struggle. History is written by the winners.”
As Orwell wrote in “1984,” his final, dystopian novel, “Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.”
Power, Orwell appreciated, allowed those who possessed it to create their own historical narrative. It also allowed those in power to silence or censor opposing narratives, quashing the possibility of productive dialogue about history that could ultimately allow truth to come out.
The Ministry of Truth
The desire to eradicate counternarratives drives Winston Smith’s job at the ironically named Ministry of Truth in “1984.”
The novel is set in Oceania, a geographical entity covering North America and the British Isles and which governs much of the Global South.
Oceania is an absolute tyranny governed by Big Brother, the leader of a political party whose only goal is the perpetuation of its own power. In this society, truth is what Big Brother and the party say it is.
The regime imposes near total censorship so that not only dissident speech but subversive private reflection, or “thought crime,” is viciously prosecuted. In this way, it controls the present.
But it also controls the past. As the party’s protean policy evolves, Smith and his colleagues are tasked with systematically destroying any historical records that conflict with the current version of history. Smith literally disposes of artifacts of inexpedient history by throwing them down “memory holes,” where they are “wiped … out of existence and out of memory.”
At a key point in the novel, Smith recalls briefly holding on to a newspaper clipping that proved that an enemy of the regime had not actually committed the crime he had been accused of. Smith recognizes the power over the regime that this clipping gives him, but he simultaneously fears that power will make him a target. In the end, fear of retaliation leads him to drop the slip of newsprint down a memory hole.
The contemporary U.S. is a far cry from Orwell’s Oceania. Yet the Trump administration is doing its best to exert control over the present and the past.
As part of efforts to purge references to gay people, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered the removal of gay rights advocate Harvey Milk’s name from a Navy ship. Screenshot, Military.com
Other erasures have included the deletion of content on government sites related to the life of Harriet Tubman, the Maryland woman who escaped slavery and then played a pioneering role as a conductor of the Underground Railroad, helping enslaved people escape to freedom.
The administration also directed the removal of content concerning the Tuskegee Airmen, the group of African American pilots who flew missions in World War II.
Over the past several months, many of Trump’s opponents have bemoaned the fecklessness of the Democratic Party in mounting an effective opposition to the president’s agenda.
Current proponents of the “anti-woke” agenda at both the federaland state level are focused on reshaping educational curricula in a way that will make it inconceivable for future generations to question their historical claims.
Orwell’s “1984” ends with an appendix on the history of “Newspeak,” Oceania’s official language, which, while it had not yet superseded “Oldspeak” or standard English, was rapidly gaining ground as both a written and spoken dialect.
According to the appendix, “The purpose of Newspeak was not only to provide a medium of expression for the worldview and mental habits proper to the devotees of [the Party], but to make all other modes of thought impossible.”
Orwell, as so often in his writing, makes the abstract theory concrete: “The word free still existed in Newspeak, but it could only be used in such statements as ‘This dog is free from lice’ or ‘This field is free from weeds.’ … political and intellectual freedom no longer existed even as concepts.”
The goal of this language streamlining was total control over past, present and future.
If it is illegal to even speak of systemic racism, for example, let alone discuss its causes and possible remedies, it constrains the potential for, even prohibits, social change.
It has become a cliché that those who do not understand history are bound to repeat it. As George Orwell appreciated, the correlate is that social and historical progress require an awareness of, and receptivity to, both historical fact and competing historical narratives.
Laura Beers does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
While many Americans do not trust national news, they still say they have faith in local news. iStock/Getty Images Plus
Many Americans say they have lost trust in national news – but most still believe they can rely on the accuracy of local news.
In 2023, trust in national newspapers, TV and radio reached historic lows. Just 32% of Americans said they have a “great deal” or “fair amount” of trust in these news sources. In 1976, by comparison, 72% of Americans said they had a “great deal” or “fair amount” of trust in mass media, including newspapers, TV and radio.
And in 2021, the United States ranked last among 46 countries in the trust citizens placed in news outlets.
Yet even as the local news industry is declining in the U.S. – more than 3,200 local and regional newspapers have closed since 2005 – Americans still place much more trust in local news than they do in national news.
In 2024, 74% of Americans said they had “a lot of” or “some” trust in their local news organizations, and 85% believed their local news outlets are at least somewhat important to their community.
Despite their trust in local news, many Americans are not willing to pay for it. Only 23% of Americans who say they pay for online news report paying for a local or regional newspaper.
News organizations in the U.S. have long relied on commercial business practices – such as advertising from companies and subscriptions from readers – that have not been financially sustainable since the mid-2000s.
Newspapers’ advertising revenue peaked around 2005 and has since rapidly declined from more than $49 billion a year in 2005 to less than $10 billion in 2020, according to the Pew Research Center. This drop was driven by the rise of the internet.
As a result, the U.S. has lost more than a third of its local and regional newspapers since 2004.
Now, “news deserts” have become more common. This term describes places where there are not enough reliable news sources to help people get information about their local communities.
Of the local newspapers that remain, 80% are weeklies, as opposed to the daily local newspapers that were more common in the past.
Americans also read local newspapers less than they once did. Since 2015, print and digital circulation numbers have dropped 40% for weekday news editions and 45% for Sunday editions among locally focused daily newspapers and their websites.
Despite local news’ problems with declining revenue and readership, Americans still trust local news – and this trust crosses partisan lines.
A 2024 Pew Research Center survey found that both Republicans and Democrats think local journalists are in touch with their local communities. The majority of Democrats and Republicans in this survey agreed that local news media “report news accurately,” “are transparent about their reporting,” “cover the most important stories/issues” and “keep an eye on local political leaders.”
This might be because local newspapers can focus on issues people encounter in their day-to-day lives rather than on national politics. In many cases, readers are also able to more easily connect with local journalists in their communities and share story ideas or feedback.
Local news gives constituents information they need to monitor whether their local leaders are implementing campaign promises. People who regularly follow local news are more likely to participate in politics, including voting in local elections, contacting a local public official and attending a town hall meeting.
A man reads the New York Post, a local New York City paper, on Nov. 5, 2008, in Grand Central Station. Don Emmert/AFP via Getty Images
Some Americans started relying more heavily on national news when local newspapers shut down, which research shows led to increases in political polarization. My research found that when people trust a partisan-leaning national news source, for example, they’re very likely to agree with the partisan-slanted news stories published by that source.
As nonpartisan local newspapers have vanished or downsized, partisan-leaning online local news content has cropped up over the past several years. These sites publish news stories that are focused on local issues but approach it with a partisan bent. As a result, people looking for local news information may take in unreliable information that is presented as local news and interpret it as trustworthy.
Verifying the origins and intentions of information continues to be paramount for news consumers to make sure they are receiving accurate information – including when it comes to local news.
While the local news industry continues to face financial problems, research shows that local journalists could consider new content ideas to increase readers’ interest, such as engaging with community members by answering their specific questions.
Meanwhile, I believe that news consumers should consider whether they are willing to pay for and continuously support the local news they say that they trust. Without that support, their trusted local news source may disappear.
Jennifer Hoewe does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation – USA – By Michael A. Little, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Anthropology, Binghamton University, State University of New York
If people stopped having babies, how long would it be before humans were all gone? – Jeffrey
Very few people live beyond a century. So, if no one had babies anymore, there would probably be no humans left on Earth within 100 years. But first, the population would shrink as older folks died and no one was being born.
Even if all births were to suddenly cease, this decline would start slowly.
Eventually there would not be enough young people coming of age to do essential work, causing societies throughout the world to quickly fall apart. Some of these breakdowns would be in humanity’s ability to produce food, provide health care and do everything else we all rely on.
Food would become scarce even though there would be fewer people to feed.
As an anthropology professor who has spent his career studying human behavior, biology and cultures, I readily admit that this would not be a pretty picture. Eventually, civilization would crumble. It’s likely that there would not be many people left within 70 or 80 years, rather than 100, due to shortages of food, clean water, prescription drugs and everything else that you can easily buy today and need to survive.
Sudden change could follow a catastrophe
To be sure, an abrupt halt in births is highly unlikely unless there’s a global catastrophe. Here’s one potential scenario, which writer Kurt Vonnegut explored in his novel “Galapagos”: A highly contagious disease could render all people of reproductive age infertile – meaning that no one would be capable of having babies anymore.
A lot of these works are science fiction involving a lot of space travel. Others seek to predict a less fanciful Earth-bound future where people can no longer reproduce easily, causing collective despair and the loss of personal freedom for those who are capable of having babies.
Two of my favorite books along these lines are “The Handmaid’s Tale,” by Canadian writer Margaret Atwood, and “The Children of Men,” by British writer P.D. James. They are dystopian stories, meaning that they take place in an unpleasant future with a great deal of human suffering and disorder. And both have become the basis of television series and movies.
In the 1960s and 1970s, many people also worried that there would be too many people on Earth, which would cause different kinds of catastrophes. Those scenarios also became the focus of dystopian books and movies.
‘The Last Man on Earth’ is an American postapocalyptic comedy television series about what might happen after a deadly virus wipes out most of the people in the world.
Heading toward 10 billion people
To be sure, the number of people in the world is still growing, even though the pace of that growth has slowed down. Experts who study population changes predict that the total will peak at 10 billion in the 2080s, up from 8 billion today and 4 billion in 1974.
The U.S. population currently stands at 342 million. That’s about 200 million more people than were here when I was born in the 1930s. This is a lot of people, but both worldwide and in the U.S. these numbers could gradually fall if more people die than are born.
One thing that will be important as these patterns change is whether there’s a manageable balance between young people and older people. That’s because the young often are the engine of society. They tend to be the ones to implement new ideas and produce everything we use.
Also, many older people need help from younger people with basic activities, like cooking and getting dressed. And a wide range of jobs are more appropriate for people under 65 rather than those who have reached the typical age for retirement.
Declining birth rates
In many countries, women are having fewer children throughout their reproductive lives than used to be the case. That reduction is the most stark in several countries, including India and South Korea.
The declines in birth rates occurring today are largely caused by people choosing not to have any children or as many as their parents did. That kind of population decline can be kept manageable through immigration from other countries, but cultural and political concerns often stop that from happening.
At the same time, many men are becoming less able to father children due to fertility problems. If that situation gets much worse, it could contribute to a steep decline in population.
Neanderthals went extinct
Our species, Homo sapiens, has been around for at least 200,000 years. That’s a long time, but like all animals on Earth we are at risk of becoming extinct.
Consider what happened to the Neanderthals, a close relative of Homo sapiens. They first appeared at least 400,000 years ago. Our modern human ancestors overlapped for a while with the Neanderthals, who gradually declined to become extinct about 40,000 years ago.
Some scientists have found evidence that modern humans were more successful at reproducing our numbers than the Neanderthal people. This occurred when Homo sapiens became more successful at providing food for their families and also having more babies than the Neanderthals.
If humans were to go extinct, it could open up opportunities for other animals to flourish on Earth. On the other hand, it would be sad for humans to go away because we would lose all of the great achievements people have made, including in the arts and science.
In my view, we need to take certain steps to ensure that we have a long future on our own planet. These include controlling climate change and avoiding wars. Also, we need to appreciate the fact that having a wide array of animals and plants makes the planet healthy for all creatures, including our own species.
Hello, curious kids! Do you have a question you’d like an expert to answer? Ask an adult to send your question to CuriousKidsUS@theconversation.com. Please tell us your name, age and the city where you live.
And since curiosity has no age limit – adults, let us know what you’re wondering, too. We won’t be able to answer every question, but we will do our best.
Michael A. Little does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Imagine finding out your friends hosted a dinner party and didn’t invite you, or that you were passed over for a job you were excited about. These moments hurt, and people often describe rejection in the language of physical pain.
While rejection can be emotionally painful, it can also teach us something.
I am a social psychology researcher, and research my colleagues and I have conducted shows that rejection can serve as a learning signal – shaping how people navigate relationships and decide whom to attempt to connect with in the future.
But why does being excluded hurt so much? From an evolutionary standpoint, our brains likely evolved to treat social rejection as a threat. For our ancestors, losing social bonds meant losing access to protection, resources, and cooperation – making social connection and belonging a fundamental human need. In other words, rejection hurts to alert you that your welfare is in danger.
Early neuroscience studies seemed to support this idea. When people were left out of a simple virtual ball-tossing game, their brain activity mirrored the response to physical pain, showing activation of a brain region called the anterior cingulate cortex.
Later studies suggested a different explanation: Perhaps it wasn’t just the pain of rejection that triggered this brain activity, but also the surprise of it. In this view, the brain responded differently to negative feedback and unexpected feedback. What might your brain do with this unexpected feedback?
Social lives aren’t defined by isolated moments of rejection. You learn through interactions: You get to know people, read their intentions, revise your assumptions and try to make sense of mixed signals. People might turn you down for all sorts of reasons – some understandable, others harder to accept. You then reflect on what these experiences mean, adjustyour behavior, and if you cross paths with them again, you get another chance to decide how you want to engage.
This is where our research takes a next step: We examine how people learn from social rejection and acceptance over time and how they use these past experiences to build future connections, deciding on whom to invest in building relationships with and whom to let go.
Rejection as an experience to learn from
My colleagues and I designed a dynamic experiment that mimics the structure of real social decisions. Using behavioral tests, brain imaging and computational modeling, we studied how people learn from repeated social feedback.
Our college-aged participants played a multi-round economic game while undergoing brain scans. First, they created personal profiles for themselves answering questions about times they were honest and trustworthy, and were told that other players would read these profiles to get to know them better. These other players, who assumed the role of “Deciders,” would then rank participants – “Responders” – in the order they wanted to play with them.
In each round, Responders were either accepted or rejected by Deciders. This depended on two things: how highly they had been ranked and how many slots the computer had allowed for that round. In reality, Responders weren’t paired with real people; the Deciders’ rankings and number of slots were generated by the computer.
Participants could receive a high rank but still get rejected if there were not enough slots. That scenario is like not receiving an invitation to a wedding due to a very tight budget – the outcome is disappointing but understandable because you know you were excluded due to circumstances and that your friend still values you. Or participants could receive a poor rank but still get accepted if there were a lot of slots. This would be similar to being picked last for a team – still getting a chance to play despite knowing you were not as desired.
This unique design allowed us to tease apart how people learn from two types of feedback. When you’re accepted, your brain notes that feeling included results in a rewarding experience. Your brain also calculates relational value, which indicates how much you think others value you. In the case of our study, relational value was indicated by how highly Responders were ranked by the Decider.
If accepted by a Decider, Responders would receive a pot of money that would triple. Responders would then get to decide whether to give half of the tripled amount back to the Decider or keep all to themselves, putting trust and reciprocity to test.
We found that Responders were more likely to choose Deciders who had accepted them and rated them highly, learning from both kinds of feedback. With neuroimaging, we identified that these learning mechanisms were distinctly tracked by different regions in the brain.
Brain areas that researchers previously foundto be active in social rejection studies, like the anterior cingulate cortex, were also activated when participants received feedback about how much they were valued. Interestingly, this activity didn’t just reflect pain or surprise; it reflected a recalibration of their perceived social worth, as this brain activity occurred when participants changed their beliefs about how others rank them.
Together, these findings suggest that the brain is doing more than reacting to rejection or reward – it’s in fact learning from it. Each social interaction helps people update internal models of who values them and who doesn’t, shaping future decisions about whom to trust, approach or avoid.
When it comes to social relationships, the two learning systems we studied here – how people respond to rewards and how they track relational value – serve an important role in interpreting social interactions and adjusting behavior. To maintain healthy relationships, you need to disentangle social rewards from how much you think others value you.
You sometimes need to recognize that your friend still values you even if they might disappoint you, like missing a birthday party for a valid reason. Without this kind of understanding, relationships can become unstable.
In fact, some mental health conditions reflect problems in these very processes. For example, borderline personality disorder is often marked by volatile relationships and intense reactions to both kindness and perceived slights.
By unpacking how people learn from acceptance and rejection, our study offers a foundation to better understand both healthy social behavior and the struggle to connect.
Begüm Babür does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Public health officials in Plymouth are warning people about blue tablets being sold illegally as Valium. These tablets may come in blister packs with Arabic writing.
This follows the news that three people died after taking what is believed to be these tablets.
Professor Steve Maddern, Director of Public Health for Plymouth City Council, said:
“Any loss of a life is a tragedy, and we want to prevent it happening to anyone else. We’re very concerned about these tablets. We cannot currently speculate about the content of these drugs whilst they are being tested, but we do want people to be aware. They might look like Valium, but they could be contaminated with another substance and therefore more toxic. If you or someone you know has these tablets, do not take them.”
What to do if someone becomes unwell
If someone has taken drugs and becomes unwell, call 999 straight away or take them to Derriford Hospital’s Emergency Department. Don’t wait—doctors and nurses are there to help, not to judge.
If the person is unconscious but breathing, put them in the recovery position. This helps keep their airway clear. You can find more advice on the FRANK website.
Reducing the risk
The safest option is not to take these pills at all. But if you do choose to use drugs:
Don’t use alone. Being with someone else could save your life.
Take a small amount first and wait to see how it affects you.
Don’t all take drugs at the same time—stagger your use so someone is always alert.
If you’re using alone, tell someone your plans or use the BuddyUp app by Cranstoun so someone can check on you.
Carry naloxone if you can. It’s a medicine that can reverse opioid overdoses, and it won’t harm someone even if they haven’t taken opioids. Having naloxone nearby could save a life. In some cases, more than one dose is needed, so carrying extra is a good idea. You can get naloxone for free in Plymouth from:
Harbour, Hyde Park House, Mutley
Hamoaze House, Mount Wise
North Road West Medical Centre
Adelaide Street GP Surgery
St Levan GP Surgery
Detective Inspector Michelle Dunn from Devon and Cornwall Police said: “We are currently investigating the unexplained deaths of three men in Plymouth which occurred over the weekend.
“At this time, the deaths are believed to be drug related and we are working closely with our partner agencies to establish the full circumstances.
“Anyone with information which may assist police is asked to call 101 or report via our website quoting reference 50250144278.”
If you’re looking for help with your own drug use, contact Harbour on 01752 434343 or visit harbour.org.uk.
Hamoaze House offers support for anyone affected by someone else’s drug or alcohol use. Their Affected Others group meets every Friday from 1–3pm. Call 01752 566100 to get in touch.
Anyone with information about these pills are asked to contact police through theirwebsite, or call 101.
Source: Rosneft – Rosneft – An important disclaimer is at the bottom of this article.
The Rosneft team won the second tournament of the corporate league in chess blitz. The competition was attended by 108 chess players in 15 teams.
As a result of a tense struggle, the Rosneft team scored 29 points and overtook all competitors. At the same time, in the personal standings, the first place was also taken by an employee of the Company’s audit service – Dmitry Obolenskikh. He led the entire tournament and finished with a score of 9.5 points out of 11 possible.
Rosneft’s corporate chess team is one of the strongest in the country. In May 2025, the Company held a team corporate online rapid chess tournament dedicated to the 80th anniversary of the Victory in the Great Patriotic War. About 100 teams from 54 Rosneft subsidiaries took part in the competition.
Support for mass and professional sports, as well as a healthy lifestyle, is one of the key areas of Rosneft’s social work. In the regions where it operates, the Company builds multifunctional sports complexes and venues, ice arenas, and holds mass sports events in various disciplines for children and adults.
As part of the corporate sports and health movement “Energy of Life”, employees regularly engage in sports and compete in various sports disciplines. In 2024, almost 128 thousand employees of the Company engaged in sports as part of the “Energy of Life” movement. At the same time, more than 92 thousand employees took part in competitions in various sports.
Department of Information and Advertising of PJSC NK Rosneft June 9, 2025
Please note: This information is raw content directly from the source of the information. It is exactly what the source states and does not reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.
June 9, 2025 – Ottawa, ON – National Defence / Canadian Armed Forces
Exercise CUTLASS FURY 2025 (Ex CF25) will take place from June 9 to 18, 2025 off the coast of Halifax, Nova Scotia. This strategic initiative will bring together a diverse array of military forces from across Canada and around the world to enhance collective defence capabilities, strengthen maritime security, and foster international cooperation.
Ex CF25, led by Canada, will feature the Canadian Atlantic Fleet alongside joint elements of the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF), and Allied Forces from the United States, the United Kingdom, and Denmark. The focus will be on anti-submarine warfare and air-maritime integration, aiming to refine warfighting skills and improving interoperability among participating forces.
This exercise underscores Canada’s commitment to global security and its role as a reliable defence partner on the international stage. By participating in Ex CF25, Canada and its allies will demonstrate their readiness to address complex security challenges collaboratively, promoting stability and peace worldwide.
In 2024, the United States produced a record amount of energy, according to data in our Monthly Energy Review. U.S. total energy production was more than 103 quadrillion British thermal units in 2024, a 1% increase from the previous record set in 2023. Several energy sources—natural gas, crude oil, natural gas plant liquids, biofuels, solar, and wind—each set domestic production records last year.
Natural gas accounted for about 38% of U.S. total energy production in 2024 and has been the largest source of U.S. domestic energy production every year since 2011, when it surpassed coal. U.S. dry natural gas production was nearly 38 trillion cubic feet, about the same as in 2023.
Domestic crude oil accounted for about 27% of U.S. total energy production in 2024, as the United States continues to be the world’s top crude oil-producing country. U.S. crude oil production was a record 13.2 million barrels per day in 2024, 2% more than the previous record set in 2023. Almost all of the production growth came from the Permian region that spans parts of New Mexico and Texas.
Coal accounted for about 10% of U.S. total energy production in 2024. At 512 million short tons, last year’s coal production was the lowest annual output since 1964. Coal was the largest source of U.S. energy production from 1984 through 2010.
Natural gas plant liquids (NGPL), which includes fuels such as ethane and propane that are associated with natural gas processing, accounted for about 9% of U.S. total energy production in 2024. NGPL production was a record 4 trillion cubic feet in 2024, up 7% from 2023. Domestic NGPL production have increased every year since 2005 as U.S. natural gas production and processing capacity have increased.
Biofuels, wind, and solar production each set records in 2024, contributing to record total renewable energy production in the United States. In 2024, U.S. total biofuels production, which includes ethanol, renewable diesel, biodiesel, and other biofuels such as sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), was a record 1.4 million barrels per day, up 6% from previous records set in 2023.
In 2024, U.S. solar and wind production increased by 25% and 8%, respectively, as new generators came online. Output from other energy sources that are primarily used for electric power generation either peaked decades ago (hydropower and nuclear) or fell slightly from their 2023 values (geothermal).
We convert sources of energy to common units of heat, called British thermal units, to compare different types of energy that are usually measured in units that are not directly comparable, such as barrels of crude oil and cubic feet of natural gas. Appendix A of our Monthly Energy Review has the conversion factors that we use for each energy source.
overnor Kathy Hochul today released new data showing the massive impact the GOP’s ‘Big Ugly’ Reconciliation Bill would have on New York families. The latest bill threatens to severely disrupt health coverage for millions of New Yorkers. In addition to increasing the number of uninsured by 1.5 million and stripping $13.5 billion in annual funding from New York’s healthcare system, the bill would trigger steep increases in private health insurance premiums for vulnerable New Yorkers and impose excessive burdens on consumers enrolling through NY State of Health, the State’s official health plan marketplace.
“The GOP’s Big Ugly bill would slash health care coverage for millions of New Yorkers and raise monthly costs by hundreds of dollars,” Governor Hochul said. “If New York’s Republican delegation won’t stand up for their own constituents, I will.”
Health care providers, insurers and state leaders across the country are sounding the alarm over the proposed legislation, which would slash billions in federal health care support. In addition to jeopardizing and in some cases entirely eliminating coverage for New York’s 1.6 million Essential Plan enrollees, the bill would trigger steep increases in costs for many New Yorkers who purchase private health insurance. The elimination of American Rescue Plan enhanced premium tax credits, alone, will increase net cost of coverage across the State by an average of 38 percent for 140,000 low-income individuals and families purchasing plans through the state’s marketplace. This equates to an increase in cost of $114 per month for an individual and $228 per month for a couple.
See below for a summary of expected premium increases due to the elimination of American Rescue Plan enhanced premium tax credits across the State:
Region
Average Monthly Cost Increase For a Couple ($)
Average Monthly Cost Increase For a Couple (%)
New York City
$211
38%
Mid-Hudson
$206
31%
Long Island
$219
32%
Capital Region
$231
33%
Western New York
$267
38%
Central New York
$256
43%
Finger Lakes
$248
42%
Mohawk Valley
$270
49%
Southern Tier
$265
48%
North Country
$253
44%
Statewide
$228
38%
The combined impact of the elimination of enhanced premium tax credits and additional provisions of the proposed U.S. House Republican reconciliation bill will push more healthy consumers out of the insurance market, leaving behind a less healthy population and driving further rate increases. This cycle will result in spiraling insurance costs and lack of access to coverage for individuals and families.
New York State Health Commissioner Dr. James McDonald said, “The proposed cuts to federal health care support hurt everyone. These cuts take health insurance away from working New Yorkers. They undermine the progress we’ve made in providing affordable and accessible health insurance to New Yorkers. When people lose health insurance, they risk going without needed health care or suffering financial hardship.”
In addition to increasing premiums for low-income individuals and families who qualify for tax credits, it is estimated that the elimination of those tax credits will increase insurance rates for the more than 100,000 New Yorkers who purchase coverage in the individual commercial market but do not qualify for tax credits. Insurers have estimated that those consumers and families will face a 4.3 percent increase in their insurance rates next year solely due to the elimination of these credits.
Early estimates also indicate the proposed bill could result in 65,000 to 80,000 people — approximately one-third of enrollees in the individual market — losing their coverage. Many more consumers will experience significant new red tape that will make it harder to enroll in and renew coverage.
The proposed bill would also strip New York of its flexibility and autonomy in running its own marketplace and serving the needs of its residents, imposing onerous and costly new administrative burdens on the State. The State anticipates more than $10 million in new administrative costs to implement the changes required by the bill.
NY State of Health Executive Director Danielle Holahan said, “We have tremendous concerns about the compounding effects of this bill especially when combined with the expiration of the premium tax credits. Reducing eligibility for the financial assistance that helps New Yorkers afford care means people end up paying more for doctor visits, medications, and mental health care. Already struggling providers, especially in rural parts of the state, might not be able to sustain operations under this proposal, further restricting New Yorkers’ access to care.”
New York has had tremendous success over the past 12 years in operating its marketplace — with 6.7 million individuals currently enrolled in coverage — and has achieved a statewide uninsured rate of less than 5 percent, the lowest rate amongst large states across the country. This bill would reverse decades of progress in expanding coverage and making health care more affordable and accessible in New York and jeopardize the health of consumers across the State.
Foster Portsmouth braved the thunderstorms alongside Fostering South East cluster partners Fostering Southampton and Hampshire County Council at UK Pride on Saturday 7 June.
Of the 260+ community-run Pride organisations across the UK, Portsmouth Pride won the bid to host UK Pride in 2025.
Taking ‘Pride’ of place at the event is part of a campaign being run throughout June by Foster Portsmouth, Portsmouth City Council‘s fostering service. Their team were also part of UK Pride and The Family Network’s LGBTQ+ Routes to Parenting event on 3 June, and they will be celebrating their foster carers from the LGBTQ+ community and taking action to bust myths around who can foster throughout Pride Month.
Foster Portsmouth, Fostering Southampton and Hampshire County Council’s fostering service joined forces at UK Pride with the aim to raise awareness of the national crisis in foster care and the need for more foster carers in the area.
They also engaged with event goers to tackle any perceptions that may prevent some from the LGBTQ+ community from exploring fostering to build a family life.
Anyone aged over 21 with a spare bedroom could foster – regardless of their age, gender, sexuality, faith, ethnicity, marital or work status, or whether they rent or own their own home.
Councillor Nick Dorrington, Cabinet Member for Children, Families and Education at Portsmouth City Council, said:
“Foster Portsmouth celebrates the diversity of our committed team of foster carers, and we are all proud to work with many individuals and couples from the LGBTQ+ community.”
Foster Portsmouth’s presentation at the Parenting Network and UK Pride’s ‘LGBTQ+ Routes to Parenthood’ event helped identify pathways to parenthood within the LGBTQ+ community. Attendees were also offered expert insights, lived experiences and an opportunity to connect with community members and support networks.
This Pride Month, Foster Portsmouth also aims to shine a light on the incredible efforts of our existing LGBTQ+ foster carers and thank them for their contribution to the care of vulnerable children and young people in the city and the immediate surrounding areas. Foster carers like sole carer Michael.
Michael, a full-time IT project manager, fosters teens with Foster Portsmouth. He shared:
“Because I was fostered myself, I chose to become a foster carer rather than adopt. I had the same wonderful long-term carers who gave me amazing opportunities. I want to give something back to children who need care and stability in their lives.”
Michael has fostered a number of teenagers, including providing respite care for a sibling pair and an emergency placement, and three longer-term arrangements for teenage boys, one of whom was a child seeking safety and asylum.
“There have been many touching moments which makes it all worthwhile and lets me know that I’ve been a positive chapter in their story.”
Foster Portsmouth are in need of additional foster carers with the skills and experience to help children develop a positive sense of their own identity, so they are asking individuals and couples in the LGBTQ+ community to consider the impact they could have on a child or young person’s life through fostering.
There are many types of fostering and everyone will be able to find one that will work for them and their family or commitments. This could be a short or long-term arrangement for a child or siblings until they’re ready to live independently or be reunited with family, support for children with a disability or children seeking safety and asylum, supported lodgings to develop their independent living skills, a parent and baby placement, or respite care.
Our Foster carers receive local round the clock support and ongoing quality training such as therapeutic care, including through our mentoring scheme and our innovative award-winning Mockingbird programme which provides a support network of other foster carers similar to that of an extended family. They also receive competitive fees, discounts, benefits and allowances, social activities, and free membership to The Fostering Network.
Our foster carers come from Portsmouth or the immediate surrounding areas, from Emsworth and Rowlands Castle to Gosport and Fareham, and the Isle of Wight and Hayling Island to Petersfield and Havant.
They would welcome the opportunity to explore if their close-knit fostering community at Foster Portsmouth would be the right fit for them.
Source: People’s Republic of China in Russian – People’s Republic of China in Russian –
Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News
BEIJING, June 9 (Xinhua) — The number of China-Europe/Central Asia freight trains originating and returning from Zhejiang Province totaled 904 in the first five months of this year, up about 8 percent from the same period last year, according to the official website of the State Post Administration of China.
In particular, in January-May, 201 freight trains departed from the city of Jinhua in this province, with 113 trains arriving there on the return journey, and 348 trains departed from the city of Yiwu, with 242 trains arriving back.
China-Europe/Central Asia rail freight plays an important role in developing trade links between Zhejiang Province and Belt and Road countries. At present, the province has opened a total of 25 China-Europe regular rail freight routes, covering 160 cities in 50 countries and regions.
Zhejiang Province is one of China’s economically developed regions. The province’s Yiwu City is known as the “world’s supermarket” and a key supplier for China’s cross-border e-commerce platforms. -0-
Source: People’s Republic of China in Russian – People’s Republic of China in Russian –
Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News
BEIJING, June 9 (Xinhua) — Chinese and Russian scientists have agreed to step up cooperation in the field of organosilicon polymers, according to the official website of Shandong University, which is located in Jinan, the capital of Shandong Province (East China).
From June 4 to 6, the university hosted a Chinese-Russian symposium on green organosilicon polymers. The ceremony was held by Feng Shengyu, a professor at the university’s Institute of Chemistry and Chemical Industry, and Aziz Muzafarov, an academician at the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS).
The event was attended by more than one hundred people, including academicians and corresponding members of the Russian Academy of Sciences, professors from Zhejiang University, Nankai University, the Institute of Chemistry of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, as well as representatives of business circles.
“A favorable foundation for cooperation has been laid between Shandong University and the Russian Academy of Sciences. The two sides should jointly promote innovative development in the field of research on polyorganosiloxanes and high-molecular polyorganosiloxanes,” said Shandong University Rector Li Shucai, speaking at the opening ceremony of the symposium.
A. Muzafarov called on the parties to deepen exchanges and jointly solve technological problems in order to further expand the application areas of polyorganosiloxanes.
Research between China and Russia in the field of polyorganosiloxanes is complementary, Feng Shengyu noted, expressing hope that experts from both sides will make important contributions to global innovation in materials science.
Silicones are widely used in the automotive industry, aerospace, construction, electronics and medicine. The unique and universal set of properties, biological inertness and recyclability of silicones into raw materials allow them to be considered one of the most promising materials of the future. According to data, since the beginning of the 21st century, silicone production has been growing at a rate of 5-7 percent per year. -0-
Source: People’s Republic of China in Russian – People’s Republic of China in Russian –
Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News
BEIJING, June 9 (Xinhua) — A contingent of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) will leave for Mongolia in mid-June to participate in the Han Quest 2025 multinational peacekeeping exercise, Defense Ministry spokesman Jiang Bin said Monday.
Chinese military personnel will take part in the exercises at the invitation of the Mongolian Defense Ministry, Jiang Bin said at a press conference.
He also announced that the 20th meeting of the ASEAN Defence Ministers’ Meeting Plus (ADMM-Plus) Working Group on Peacekeeping Operations will be held in Nanjing, east China’s Jiangsu Province, from June 11 to 14.
According to him, member countries and states with observer status in ADMM-Plus, as well as the UN and the ASEAN Secretariat, will send their representatives to the upcoming meeting, the aim of which is to deepen military mutual trust and security cooperation among countries in the region and strengthen their peacekeeping capabilities. -0-
Source: People’s Republic of China in Russian – People’s Republic of China in Russian –
Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News
BEIJING, June 9 (Xinhua) — China’s State Council announced new personnel changes on Monday.
Zhou Haibing has been appointed vice chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission of China, replacing Zhao Chenxin.
Tong Lixin was appointed deputy head of the General Administration of Physical Culture and Sports of the People’s Republic of China. Wang Hong became deputy head of the State Food and Material Administration of the People’s Republic of China. -0-
Source: People’s Republic of China in Russian – People’s Republic of China in Russian –
Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News
BANGKOK/PHNOM PENH, June 9 (Xinhua) — As Cambodia has reduced the permitted stay of Thai citizens to seven days, Thailand has also adjusted its policy to limit the stay of Cambodian citizens in Thailand to seven days, Foreign Ministry spokesman Nikorndej Balankura said on Monday.
Cambodian Interior Ministry deputy spokesman Touch Sohak said on the same day that in response to Thailand’s reduction in the visa stay period for Cambodian citizens, Cambodia had reduced the permitted stay for Thai citizens from 60 days to seven days. –0–
Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News
COLOMBO, June 9 (Xinhua) — More than 25,000 cases of dengue fever have been reported in Sri Lanka since the beginning of the year, the National Dengue Control Authority said on Monday.
A total of 25,055 cases and 13 deaths related to dengue fever have been recorded during this period, department specialist Priscilla Samaraweera said at a press conference.
More than 50 percent of cases were detected in the Western Province, the country’s most populous region, she said.
P. Samaraweera urged the public to eliminate mosquito breeding sites and take precautions during the morning and evening hours when dengue-transmitting mosquitoes are most active. –0–
Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News
BEIJING, June 9 (Xinhua) — Chinese authorities on Monday issued guidelines to further ensure and improve people’s livelihood and actively address issues that worry them most.
The document was jointly released by the General Office of the CPC Central Committee and the General Office of the State Council. It aims to promote fairer, more balanced, inclusive and accessible development of public services. -0-
Source: People’s Republic of China in Russian – People’s Republic of China in Russian –
Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News
BEIJING, June 9 (Xinhua) — China saw double-digit growth in passenger car retail sales last month as the country continued to implement policies to stimulate consumption, the China Association of Passenger Automobile Manufacturers said Monday.
According to the association’s statistics, in May this year, retail sales of passenger cars in the country increased by 13.3 percent year-on-year and exceeded 1.93 million units.
To stimulate domestic demand and support economic recovery, China launched a large-scale trade-in program in 2024. Under the program, individual consumers can receive subsidies to buy new cars, home appliances and many other items. The program was expanded earlier this year.
According to China’s Ministry of Commerce, 4.12 million new vehicles were sold under the program in the first five months of this year.
In addition, about 1.17 million new energy vehicles were produced in the country in May, and retail sales of such vehicles exceeded 1.02 million units, up 30.2 percent and 28.2 percent year-on-year, respectively.
According to the association, in the first five months of this year, retail sales of passenger cars in the country exceeded 8.81 million units, up 9.1 percent. -0-
Source: Rosneft – Rosneft – An important disclaimer is at the bottom of this article.
With the support of Rosneft, the Sambo World Cup was held in Yerevan (Armenia). More than 250 of the strongest athletes from 18 countries took part in the international competition.
The tournament in the capital of Armenia featured medals in two disciplines: sport and combat sambo among men and women. In total, sambo wrestlers competed in 28 weight categories. Russian athletes won 15 gold, 11 silver and 10 bronze medals.
The World Cup in Yerevan became one of the main events in the international sambo calendar this year. The live broadcast of the competition was available on the website of the International Sambo Federation.
Rosneft pays great attention to the development and support of mass and professional sports. The company builds multifunctional sports complexes and sites, ice arenas, holds mass sports events in various disciplines for children and adults. Since 2013, the Company has been the general sponsor of the International Sambo Federation. During the cooperation, dozens of outstanding championships of the Russian and international level have been held.
Department of Information and Advertising of PJSC NK Rosneft June 9, 2025
Please note: This information is raw content directly from the source of the information. It is exactly what the source states and does not reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.
Paddy Hill spent more than 16 years in prison for murders he did not commit. One of the so-called Birmingham Six who were wrongfully convicted for the Birmingham pub bombings in 1974, he was proof that exoneration and financial compensation do not fix a miscarriage of justice.
When I met him in July 2023, more than 30 years after his release from prison, his ordeal continued to haunt him. He was in his late 70s, looking frail and far from the “12 and a half stone” man he was in Parkhurst Prison. He had very little appetite and was in poor health. The little sleep he was able snatch was marred by screaming nightmares.
Neither of us knew it at the time, but this was to be his final interview. He died aged 80, on December 30 2024. I sat down to talk with Hill in his living room. Struggling to control his emotions, he told me: “Sometimes I sit in the bedroom … and I’m crying my eyes out like a child and I don’t know what the fuck happened … I’ve been so fucking screwed up.”
The ITV docudrama Mr Bates vs the Post Office thrust wrongful convictions into mainstream consciousness in January 2024 – a quarter of a century after the Post Office began prosecuting sub-postmasters and mistresses for fraud, theft, and false accounting and 15 years after Rebecca Thomson’s Computer Weekly article exposing the Horizon IT system as the potential culprit.
Now the public could finally see the human impact of miscarriages of justice on these upstanding – and, more importantly, innocent – members of their communities. Public outrage followed.
But despite the mass quashing of hundreds of convictions, and amid promises of speedy financial compensation, progress has been pitiful. While collecting a National Television Award in September 2024, former sub-postmistress Jo Hamilton confirmed that out of the “555 group”, those involved in the litigation which exposed the Horizon scandal, “more than 300 haven’t been paid yet, including Sir Alan Bates”.
Sadly, this timescale is far from unusual. In July 2023, Andrew Malkinson finally had his 2003 rape conviction overturned after several unsuccessful appeals, including unsuccessful applications in 2012 and 2020 to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), the independent body which investigates potential miscarriages of justice.
Crucially, the CCRC did not commission the DNA testing that finally exonerated him and did not review police files which would have shown that Greater Manchester Police had withheld crucial evidence at his trial.
Malkinson spent 17 years in prison maintaining his innocence. Perversely, he could have been released sooner had he falsely confessed. He was eventually exonerated thanks to the help of the charity Appeal, which commissioned those crucial DNA tests and unearthed the disclosure failures.
The CCRC has since acknowledged in an independent review that it “failed Mr Malkinson” with chairperson Helen Pitcher OBE (whose recent resignation was welcomed by the Ministry of Justice) eventually expressing “sincere regret and an unreserved apology on behalf of the commission”. All of this happened 12 months after Malkinson called on the CCRC to apologise to him. Malkinson said it was “shameful” that the CCRC has kept private the names of those responsible for his ordeal and delayed the publishing of the report highlighting its mishandling of his case.
The true number of miscarriages of justice is unknown. In the UK, the CCRC referral rate averages 2% including appeals of sentence. In the US, estimates of wrongful conviction and imprisonment range from 6% to 15.4%.
The Insights section is committed to high-quality longform journalism. Our editors work with academics from many different backgrounds who are tackling a wide range of societal and scientific challenges.
Inevitably, some innocent people will have their appeals denied and will remain convicted for the rest of their lives. The trauma of remaining legally guilty of a crime you did not commit cannot be overstated.
But persistent psychological ill-effects can be seen even in those who have been formally exonerated, including long-term effects on their employment and relationships.
I’ve been examining cases like this as part of a research project into the experiences of people who suffer grave miscarriages of justice. Working with Dr Mandy Winterton at Edinburgh Napier University, I interviewed several men who have been imprisoned for crimes they did not commit.
As academics with psychology and sociology backgrounds, we were predominantly interested in how victims were affected by such injustices. Previous research has documented the litany of mental health and social effects on those who have been wrongfully convicted and exonerated, and the flaws in the criminal justice system that are to blame. But little attention has been paid to individual experiences. While there were clear commonalities in the men’s stories, they all had unique perspectives.
Of the people we spoke to, Hill and a man called Jimmy Boyle spoke to us on the record and specifically requested that they be named. I have given the other men featured here pseudonyms to protect their anonymity.
Paddy Hill
Hill’s story is particularly harrowing. On November 21 1974, shortly after 8pm, bombs exploded in two pubs in Birmingham, England, killing 21 people and injuring around 200 others. They were attributed to the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA), which had detonated many bombs in the West Midlands in the previous year.
Hill and his friends were arrested at Heysham Docks as they were boarding the ferry to Belfast to attend the funeral of an old friend who had been a member of the IRA. Hill said that they were initially interviewed at Morecambe police station in Lancashire, and the West Midlands Police took over their questioning the next day.
Hill and his co-accused were, says Hill, tortured by the West Midlands serious crime squad. They were subjected to anti-Irish verbal abuse, hours-long beatings over several days, mock executions, were burned with cigarettes, and deprived of sleep, food and drink. Unable to withstand this, four of the six men eventually signed false confessions, condemning them all to life imprisonment in 1975 for the murders. The six men brought a civil action against the West Midlands Police which was thrown out in 1980 by Lord Denning.
These shocking revelations eventually reached the public consciousness thanks to investigative journalist and former Labour MP Chris Mullin, who uncovered evidence of police wrongdoing and corruption. His work informed the group’s court of appeal hearing in 1987. However, the convictions were upheld by Lord Chief Justice Lane. It was only at their second appeal in 1991, after Mullin had uncovered more evidence of their innocence, that they were finally exonerated.
Despite other lines of enquiry which could have led to the real bombers – including a confession and several named suspects – the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) decided in 2023 that there was insufficient evidence to prosecute, denying justice to the families of those killed and injured.
The impact on Hill’s family was enormous. With such public vitriol for the Birmingham Six, his wife and children had to move house regularly and change their names to avoid being recognised. He told me:
Everywhere they went, sooner or later somebody found out who they were and then they’d pick on them. And sometimes my kids were going to school and they couldn’t even remember what fucking name they were supposed to be using, they were that confused.
Hill’s marriage ended while he was in prison. “I told her to divorce me. I said: ‘Meet someone, you want to get married, don’t worry about me.’ And that was it.”
He later remarried, but his relationship with his children was irretrievably destroyed. “Along the way I lost my own kids, because I came out of jail and I didn’t feel nothing for my kids. I still don’t … I’ve spent more time here with you than I have done in the last 20 fucking years with my kids.”
Though he was referred to psychologists for support, he told me none were able to help him. Over and above the pains of imprisonment, the wrongfully convicted are betrayed by the very people that we are led to believe are there to protect us. The justice system has wrought on them the worst injustice, and many will suffer from enduring anger and mistrust of authorities.
When we met, Hill was still consumed by his anger and felt badly let down: “Over the years I realised I was never going to get any professional help from the government, even though we have it in writing that they have a duty of care towards us – but they’ve never done nothing to help us … If they did, they would acknowledge what they’ve done wrong.”
Up until his death, Hill had spent much of the past 30 years helping other survivors of miscarriages of justice. Initially intending to spend his first 12 months of freedom campaigning, he “got involved with the families, and it was then I realised how bad the families had it … That’s what kept me going, coming out and campaigning.”
He established the Miscarriages of Justice Organisation (Mojo), a Glasgow-based charity dedicated to supporting the wrongfully convicted. It provides advocacy for clients in prison, aftercare and reintegration services, and dedicated psychological support offered pro-bono by a clinical psychologist.
But the demand far exceeds Mojo’s ability to help, and it may take several months for a case to be assessed. Euan McIlvride, the organisation’s legal officer, told me it typically receives “250 applications a year, and we will probably support only ten of those because the rest of them don’t meet the requirements for our support … We have finite resources.”
For Hill, keeping busy provided some relief from thinking about his ordeal.
…When you aren’t doing something, all you’re going to do is sit there and think … about things you don’t fucking want to think about. I don’t know what happens to me when I go to sleep … [My wife] hears me screaming … kicking and punching everything … I’ll be watching television and all of a sudden … BANG! It’s like a non-stop video going through your head all the time.
Chained to a radiator
The Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (Pace), which came to effect in 1986, aimed to reduce miscarriages of justice by balancing the powers of the police and the public. Pace provides safeguards for suspects during questioning, puts a limit on how long suspects can be questioned for, and insists that interviews be recorded.
This makes it easier to detect when protocols have not been followed or there may have been mistreatment or intimidation.
It doesn’t prevent such wrongdoing, however.
I spoke with one man, who I am calling Mark, who was wrongfully convicted of murder in 1988. He told me there were over one hundred breaches of Pace in his case, including being handcuffed to a hot radiator, being denied food and water, and being denied a solicitor.
One of his co-accused, a vulnerable adult, had also falsely confessed to the crime. Mark lost his first appeal in 1990 but his case went to the CCRC when it was established in 1997. The CCRC brought in another police force to investigate. He said:
When I saw [their] report … I nearly fell off my chair and nearly choked on my coffee … Everything I had said all those years ago … the handcuffing to the radiators, they proved it. All the breaches of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act … that we were interviewed off the record … Making up notes and stuff like that. I couldn’t believe it. I knew we were going home.
He subsequently pursued a civil action against the police which was settled out of court, with the force insisting the settlement did not mean it was admitting liability.
Mark also suffered a marital breakdown, after he and his wife lost their baby daughter while he was on remand:
It ripped the guts out of my marriage, you know. My wife was only 17-18, same age as me … She had a husband inside and she lost a child. And you’ve got to look at the economical impact and the mental impact it had on her … She was just as much a victim as what I was.
He started taking drugs in prison: “I didn’t care if I lived or died because I had lost everything, as far as I was concerned.”
But Mark turned himself around, got off drugs and availed himself of all the education he had access to, including law and human rights, to build the strongest possible case for his appeal. With the aid of a human rights lawyer the CCRC referred his conviction in 1998, which was then quashed by the Court of Appeal in 1999. He had spent 11 years in prison as a convicted murderer.
‘The innocence test’
After his exoneration, Mark was successful in securing over £600,000 compensation for his ordeal, though he had over £37,000 deducted for “saved living expenses”. A House of Lords ruling in 2007 deemed that those receiving compensation for a miscarriage of justice can have the amount reduced to account for “savings” made while in prison – for costs such as food, housing and other bills that they would have had to pay had they not been wrongfully incarcerated.
Considering the difficulties people face accessing any financial compensation for their wrongful imprisonment, this adds further insult to injury. The rule has since been scrapped following the high-profile Malkinson case – but deductions made prior to this are not being reimbursed.
Mark was given no financial counselling or support, and he rapidly spent the money – more than he had ever had in his life – while trying to block out his pain:
By the time six months had gone, I’d spent the hundred grand [interim payment] on wine, women, drugs … ’cause I couldn’t cope with what was going on … That was my way of blotting out all the things I saw in prison.
The money also caused a rift in his family – something echoed by others I have spoken to. After the death of his mother, his family “went their own ways”.
Nowadays, only a small proportion of those exonerated will ever receive financial compensation due to the requirements of the so-called “innocence test”.
The Criminal Justice Act 1988 made it difficult for applicants to receive compensation because there had to be a newly discovered fact – not available at the time of their original trial – that they could use to make the case that they had suffered a miscarriage of justice.
The definition of what constitutes a miscarriage of justice has become more restrictive over time, meaning an applicant now must provide evidence, beyond reasonable doubt, of their innocence. In the absence of a key witness admitting to falsifying their statement or DNA evidence proving innocence, this is unlikely.
Like Hill, Mark struggled to adjust after his exoneration and release, and found support to be woefully lacking:
I had nobody to talk to, no money, no job, no house. I didn’t have any prospects. I phoned up my solicitor … I remember saying: ‘Why did you get me out?’ It was difficult to adjust … I slept with a hammer … under my pillow – I was very paranoid … All they did was give me tablets and told me to get on with my life. No counselling. Nothing. They didn’t know what to do with people like me.
Mark still suffers with post-traumatic stress disorder and depression, and has never been able to work a normal job. He continues to campaign for the wrongfully convicted and to increase awareness of miscarriages of justice. He credits this work with giving him a sense of purpose.
Jimmy Boyle – not innocent enough?
I also spoke to James Boyle, who was acquitted at retrial of historical sexual offences after he had spent five years in prison. Boyle, from Rutherglen, who likes to be known as Jimmy, has always maintained these offences never happened.
From the outset, Boyle found processes quite at odds from how we are told they are supposed to be. He said: “Things that you should have: for example, presumption of innocence – nonsense, it doesn’t exist. None of these rights exist in reality.” He claims that lines of evidence undermining the allegations against him were not investigated. Further, he encountered professionals in the criminal justice system who he says were incompetent and even “malicious” and “criminal”.
To add further insult, he was later told that he was not considered exonerated because he did not provide evidence proving his innocence (he failed the “innocence test”). As a result, the General Teaching Council for Scotland did not reinstate him and he was unable to return to his teaching career which he had found enormously fulfilling.
Like others I have spoken to, Boyle, now in his 60s, hasn’t been able to work since his release:
There was so much involved, and fighting with the Teaching Council – you know, it was full time. It really was full time when you’re dealing with these agencies … I do plenty [at Mojo] – I’ve spoken at a number of events … But I had to continue fighting my own fight.
Martin: total lack of victim support
Miscarriages of justice have a huge effect on a person’s mental health. But my research found the impact begins long before a conviction – with effects such as anxiety, trauma and depression resulting from the wrongful allegation.
Martin (not his real name) detailed the difficulties he experienced from his initial wrongful allegation of rape – including isolation, lack of advice, and a lack of appropriate mental health support. He said:
I kept [the rape allegations] to myself and it was horrific, because I didn’t know what was going to happen … Once I was charged … I went to my GP because I was severely depressed. I could barely function. [Counselling] was actually making things worse rather than better … I had looked online … There’s victim support and there’s witness support, but if you’ve been accused there is absolutely nothing.
It took over three years from the initial allegation to court proceedings, during which time two other allegations of rape and indecent assault were made and charges were brought. Martin kept the allegations from his employers and friends:
You don’t mention it because if you mention it, you’re opening the box and then that becomes a big thing – and God help how you’re going to feel at the end of that conversation.
Convicted of rape and indecent assault (the second and third charges), he was sentenced to four years in prison, but successfully appealed on the basis that the Moorov doctrine was misapplied.
Moorov is a principle of Scottish law which allows evidence of one crime to corroborate evidence of another. As the charges against him were considered to corroborate one another, having been acquitted of the key (first) charge he should have been acquitted of all. Instead, he spent about a year in prison – yet he considers himself fortunate.
The guy [Andrew Malkinson] that won his appeal the other day spent 17 years in prison. I only spent one. And although I shouldn’t have spent any, it could have been a hell of a lot worse. There are a lot of people that haven’t been able to clear their names, there are a lot of people that have spent a long time in prison. I spent one year and managed to clear my name, so I should be thankful for what little happiness I’ve managed to get out of it.
Martin was fortunate in that he’d had a good education and had taken detailed notes during his trial, which assisted his appeal. He also helped other prisoners who were struggling to complete required forms for themselves, and managed to get a job in the prison kitchen.
Since his release, he has pursued a law degree, eager to use his experience for positive change in the justice system. “I think it’s given me a new perspective really … You know what, life’s too short – let’s just get on with it.”
What needs to be done?
People wrongly accused of crimes are in dire need of support from the moment the initial allegation is made, to help them navigate the complex legal processes and challenging psychological effects of being wrongly accused.
Currently there is woefully inadequate mental health support at all stages, from initial allegation to post-release.
Of course, there are many guilty people in prison who protest their innocence – but support should not be denied to those who maintain their innocence.
Reforms are needed to make it easier for an innocent person to appeal their conviction. The CCRC has suffered a decline in funding, from £9.24 million in 2004 to £6 million in 2022. Over this period, the workload has more than doubled while the Ministry of Justice has reduced CCRC commissioners’ terms of employment from full-time salaried positions to one-day-a-week contracts, making the workload unsustainable.
People may also face significant barriers in accessing evidence that would exonerate them such as police files, without which they have little hope of a successful appeal. This was evident in the Malkinson case, where the charity Appeal accessed the police files the CCRC had refused to look at.
The lack of accountability and consequences for those who purposely harm innocent people causes further anger and distress to the wrongfully accused and convicted. Yet those affected rarely even receive an apology. This needs to change.
Finally, there needs to be greater public awareness of wrongful convictions and allegations, their causes and consequences, and an understanding of their devastating and long-term effects. As Hill told me the year before he died:
People think you come out and they give you a few quid … [then you] walk off into the sunset and live happily ever after. If only. I would love to go to bed at night like an ordinary fucking person … without waking up so angry and tense.
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This work was supported by the BA/Leverhulme Trust grant SRG1819190884. Many thanks to Dr Mandy Winterton, co-Investigator on this research, and to the Miscarriages of Justice Organisation (MOJO) for supporting us by facilitating access to clients.
Faye Skelton is affiliated with the Miscarriages of Justice Organisation having joined the Board of Directors in April 2025.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Victoria Mapplebeck, Professor in Digital Arts, Royal Holloway University of London
Ten years ago I was at a preview screening at the British Film Institute (BFI) of short films shot and set in London. My smartphone-filmed short, 160 Characters, was part of the programme and told the story of me raising my son Jim alone.
I was excited to have my film included, but by the end of the night I was a little less euphoric. I was one of only a handful of women directors screening work that night and almost every film in the programme was set on a council estate, featuring one-dimensional characters who were either mad, bad or sad.
At the post-screening drinks, I met some of the male directors who’d written and directed those films. Several of them had put between £20,000 and £40,000 of their own money into their productions, hoping their short would be the calling card to their first feature. Having a “day job” was not a concept they seemed to have come across.
Flash forward a decade and I’m at a Reclaim The Frame preview screening of Daisy May Hudson’s feature drama Lollipop, watching her receive a standing ovation from an audience who – like me – were bowled over by the authenticity and power of her storytelling .
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Lollipop is a BBC Films-funded feature drama which tells the story of Molly (Posy Sterling), recently out of a prison after serving a four-month sentence. She comes out to find she has lost her council housing and custody of her kids. Molly finds herself in the mother of all catch-22s: she can’t get housing because she doesn’t have her kids living with her, but she can’t get them back without a roof over her head.
On the surface, this film could read like another council estate melodrama. But Lollipop is the polar opposite of middle class fantasies of working class life. When Hudson was writing it she drew on her own experience of homelessness, explored in her debut feature documentary, Half Way (2015).
In Half Way, Hudson, her mum and her kid sister find themselves stuck in “half way” hostels in an endless battle with council bureaucrats who meet their escalating housing crisis with a continual chorus of “computer says no”.
There’s a great scene in which Hudson’s sister complains that the film is too heavy and that she’s sick of talking about their “trauma”. She jokes: “I was thinking we need to liven this documentary up, it’s really dull and miserable and boring, we just talk about doom and gloom stuff.” She goes on to mimic Hudson’s line of questions about how they’re all “feeling”.
Hudson’s decision to keep that scene in gave us a much needed reminder of how many documentary directors fall into the trap of “poverty porn” in which the money shot is the tear rolling down your protagonist’s cheek.
The trailer for Lollipop.
Watching Lollipop with an audience of mainly women, there were a lot of tears but also lots of laughter. Hudson continues to see the importance of humour in her stories as a way of enriching and empowering her characters. She explains in the film’s production notes: “Although Lollipop is grounded in real-life, I never want to see women as victims on screen, because we’re so full of life, there’s so much about us.”
In Hudson’s entirely female cast, Molly and her best mate Amina (Idil Ahmed) are fierce single mums who transform the challenges they face into laugh-out-loud moments of comedy. The film is about the power of their friendship, their love for their kids and their sense of humour.
When it came to casting, Hudson wanted to work with women actors – professionals and first timers – who could relate to what the characters were going through. In the film’s production notes, Hudson explains:
I come from a lived experience background, and it was really important to me that I worked with women with lived experience … women who felt full and rounded, not perfect. Every woman you see in the film is someone trying to do their best. We’re humans. We’re messy, and our beauty is in our messiness.
Hudson’s work is part of a new wave of film and TV drama and comedy written and directed by women who are empowered rather than disempowered by their messiness.
Cash Carraway’s Rain Dogs (2023), Sophie Willan’s Alma’s Not Normal (2020), Michelle de Swarte’s Spent (2024) and Charlotte Regan’s debut feature drama, Scrapper (2023) are all part of an emerging genre of stories in which we finally see working class characters who are well written and relatable. Every one of these directors has mined the highs and lows of their own lives to create these funny, flawed, complex and ultimately believable characters.
The trailer for Rain Dogs.
Rain Dogs*, for instance,* follows the roller-coaster journey of Costello (Daisy May Cooper), a single mum battling to find a permanent home for her and her nine-year-old daughter. Carraway has said of her series:
We don’t see interesting single mothers in TV. We don’t really see that many interesting people living in poverty. If we do, it’s always politicised. I wanted to make it entertaining.
Hudson echoes these sentiments. Speaking to me over the phone, she explains:
Lollipop isn’t issue-led. I don’t want to shout from the rooftops and talk about everything that’s wrong with the world. Yes, the context is these things that I care strongly about. But ultimately, I want audiences to come away, feeling: Wow, isn’t love a magical thing?“
Hudson’s mantra in both life and film is to: “Turn your pain into power and into medicine.” Her women characters have an alchemy and agency we rarely see in the black and white council estate films that became such a staple of UK independent films in the 80s and 90s. Hudson’s women aren’t victims or martyrs, the magic of Lollipop is that she has created fascinating real characters – and captured them in glorious technicolour.
Victoria Mapplebeck does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
When I started horse riding lessons at the age of eight, I was told that if a horse had its ears forward that was a good sign, and if horse had its ears back it wasn’t happy. Those riding lessons sparked a fascination with equine behaviour that is still with me and inspires my research.
Yet when I carried out my new study into horse facial expressions I was still surprised at how complex equine communication can be.
Horses are a social species with wild and feral populations living in complex societies. They form relatively stable herds or “bands”, typically made up of a stallion protecting his group of mares. The ranges of these bands overlap, and the need to share space and resources means that effective communication is essential for horses.
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We also know that facial expressions are an important method of communication for horses. In a 2016 study, equine cognition researcher Jen Wathan and her colleagues demonstrated this when they showed a group of horses images of another horse.
The horse in the images was displaying one of three different facial expressions: aggression, positive attention and relaxation. Horses were more likely to approach the images of the horse showing positive attention and relaxation. They tended to avoid the horse showing aggression. This shows that horses can use the expression of another horse to infer that animal’s intent.
Equine facial communication is therefore, understandably, of significant interest to those working with and around horses. Go to any stables, as I did when I was young, and you will hear talk of which signals to look out for. You will quickly learn that the ears are important. However, in recent years, scientists have become interested in the more subtle cues that are often overlooked.
Research into horse facial expressions began in 2014 with identifying indicators of pain to try and improve horse welfare. More recently, there have been a number of studies that have looked at facial expressions outside of pain contexts. These have, however, been restricted to a small number of usually human-created, contexts.
For example, in 2024 animal behaviour researchers Romane Phelipon and colleagues examined the facial expressions of horses when they were being led towards a bucket of feed and allowed to eat. They were also shown the bucket of feed and then prevented from eating it.
In the positive situation, horses had a lower neck position, their ears forward, and their upper lip extended forwards. In the more frustrating situation, horses held their neck higher, with their ears backward or to the side.
My team wanted to extend what we know about equine facial behaviour into contexts that don’t involve humans, and to identify the expressions that horses use when communicating with each other.
To do this we used something called the equine facial action coding system (EquiFACS). This involves two types of code: action units, which correspond to the contraction of particular facial muscles; and action descriptors, which correspond to more general facial movements.
There are already similar codes for a variety of primate and domestic species, including cats and dogs. This makes them useful for making comparisons between species and for studying the evolution of facial behaviour.
We observed groups of domestic horses out at pasture. Whenever they interacted with one another we would hit record on our video camera and film the facial expressions they made. This gave us a bank of 805 expressions, which were coded using EquiFACS.
We categorised the expressions based on the behaviour they were associated with, such as a kick threat or friendly contact. Then we used network analysis techniques to assess how the individual action units and action descriptors work together to create the overall facial expression. Network analysis is a statistical method usually used to study social networks, but which also works well for understanding how the different areas of the face work together.
This created a catalogue that identified 22 discrete facial expressions. These included expressions from a range of aggressive, friendly, playful and alert interactions. Some movements are used across several contexts, for instance rotated and flattened ears which can indicate aggression or playfulness.
When making a threat, horses have their ears rotated backwards and flattened downwards. They often lower their head, raise the inner corner of their brow, and/or flare their nostrils.
Most interesting are facial expressions during play, which are highly dynamic. They involve a range of different facial movements, often in quick succession. Movements include depressed lower lips, raised chins, parted lips, wide-open mouths, rotated and flattened ears, increased visibility of eye whites, and noses pushed forward.
We also identified similarities between the facial expressions horses make during play and the play faces used by primates and carnivores. Primates and carnivores often use an open-mouthed expression to indicate that an interaction is playful. This can help prevent misunderstandings about the intent of an interaction, and is particularly useful during rough-and-tumble play. The fact that this expression is also used by horses suggests that it evolved much further back than scientists believed.
Anyone who needs a way to assess a horse’s subjective experience can benefit from our catalogue, from researchers through to those working with horses. I certainly wish I had had it over the many years I spent riding, and later working, at my local riding school.
Our results also highlight the importance of looking beyond our primate cousins if we are to gain a comprehensive understanding of facial expressions and their evolutionary origins.
Kate Lewis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Stephen Clear, Lecturer in Constitutional and Administrative Law, and Public Procurement, Bangor University
Since returning to office, Donald Trump has often called the US legal system into question. He has criticised judges as activists, challenged the role of the courts and insisted some firms do free legal work in support of his administration’s causes to make up for working for some of his political opponents.
Meanwhile, Vice-President J.D. Vance has advised US Supreme Court chief justice John Roberts that he ought to be “checking the excesses” of the lower courts.
And Stephen Miller, deputy White House chief of staff, said: “We are living under a judicial tyranny,” after the US Court of International Trade ruled the president didn’t have the power to impose international trade tariffs. Meanwhile, judges are asking for more security to protect them from threats.
Trump’s federal investigations and volley of executive orders (presidential directives that don’t require legislative approval by Congress) have also put enormous pressure on law firms. And a recent report shows that both trust in law firms’ independence, and even the rule of law itself, is perceived as under threat in the US. But what does this mean, and why is it important?
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The president has taken action against law firms in two prominent ways:
First, by federal investigation. Specifically, letters to a group of 20 law firms from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. These demanded information about their diversity, equality and inclusion (DEI) policies, based on the proposition that any sort of treatment of underrepresented groups that appeared preferential to them in policy, or practice, was unequal treatment for other groups, and, consequently, discriminatory.
Second, the president has passed numerous executive orders introducing punitive measures on specific law firms that previously represented clients opposing his administration, or employed attorneys involved in past investigations against him. His administration has also revoked government contracts and suspended security clearance from buildings. In practice, the orders would prevent attorneys from accessing from where they work, such as courthouses and federal agencies.
In response, some prominent law firms have sought to mitigate the fallout with the Trump administration by entering into agreements with it. These have included pledging US$1 billion (£730,000,000) in pro bono (free) legal services supporting causes aligned with Trump’s agenda.
For example, support for veterans, representing police officers, and antisemitism prevention. Noteworthy is that law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison have now agreed to discontinue certain DEI policies, in addition to committing US$40 million (£29.4 million) in pro bono work for the president’s causes. In response the Trump administration has now lifted restrictions against them.
Judges say they are under threat.
More broadly, it has been reported that 70% of the US Justice Department civil rights division’s attorneys are leaving their posts. The mass exodus is believed to be part of attempts to reshape the division into one focused on enforcing executive orders.
The consequences of these developments are that the president’s actions have led to a significant realignment in the legal professions. Some US attorneys have reported that law firms are now more hesitant to engage in pro bono work that could be viewed as opposing the administration’s policies.
By contrast, some lawyers are now trying to establish independent firms aimed at defending civil servants and challenging federal overreach, ensuring at least some, albeit less resourced, support for underrepresented groups.
Trump criticizes judges and legal activists.
Other lawyers have sought legal action against the orders as unconstitutional interference. Some of these have led to success. For example, Perkins Coie challenged theirs and got it struck down. The concern here centred around their representation of Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. In arriving at the decision, the district judge ruled the president’s actions to be an “overt attempt to suppress and punish certain viewpoints”.
Why this matters
These developments call into question the balance between governmental influence and the independence of lawyers in upholding the rule of law. Lawyers must be impartial in representing their clients in order to effectively represent their interests, and allow the judiciary to fulfil their duty of checks and balances on the government’s decisions.
When unfettered power is wielded by the government, and the law is undermined, scope for monitoring the constitutionality of decision making is compromised.
The rule of law is a foundational principle of western democracies. It means that everyone is subject to the law, including governments. Laws must be applied equally, fairly and consistently, and no one is above them.
In essence, laws govern the nation, not arbitrary decisions by individuals in power. In that sense, following the rule of law helps prevent tyranny, protect people’s rights and liberties, and ensures a stable and predictable society.
In order to deliver these objectives, an independent legal sector is needed. Trump’s actions are a threat to achieving this cornerstone US constitutional principle. Some have gone as far as to suggest that by entering into agreements with Trump, law firms have become subsidiaries of his administration.
A recent study on trust in the rule of law found that Americans’ trust in lawyers was already undermined, even before the second Trump administration.
The results, based on public attitudes in 2024, compared public perceptions in Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Norway, the UK and the US. Norway and the UK ranked highest in respect of trust in the rule of law (81% and 74% respectively), and Spain and Italy were least trusted (49% and 43%).
The results for the US are interesting. Around 71% of American respondents stated that they had a high level of trust in the rule of law. Yet the country came third from the bottom under the metric “you feel like you are in good hands in US courts”.
The reasons for this are implied in the responses to the other questions in the survey. The US performed second worst (just behind Spain) in respect of belief that judges could be biased. The US also performed worst of all in the category where the public were asked if lawyers were impartial (just 41% agreed).
In interpreting these results it is important to note that the survey was conducted in 2024, prior to Trump’s second term. But anti-elite and anti-judge rhetoric pointing to arguments for more presidential power and less judicial oversight had already been prominent in the first Trump term, and the 2024 campaign.
The results expose the already fragile nature of trust in the legal sector in the US, and underline how this could be ramped up further after the announcements in recent weeks.
Stephen Clear does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Fitness enthusiasts have debated the question for decades: is it better to do cardio before or after lifting weights? Until recently, the answer has largely been down to preference – with some enjoying a jog to warm up before hitting the weights, while others believe lifting first is better for burning fat.
But a new study may have finally answered this long disputed question.
According to the study, the order of your workout does significantly affect how much fat you lose. Participants who performed weight training before cardio lost significantly more fat and became more physically active throughout the day compared to those who did cardio first.
The researchers recruited 45 young men aged 18-30 years who were classified as obese. The researchers split participants into three groups for 12 weeks. One group was a control group. This meant they stuck to their usual lifestyle habits and didn’t make any changes to their exercise regime.
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The other two groups exercised for 60 minutes three times weekly. Participants were also given sports watches to objectively track daily movement. This helped the researchers avoid reliance on self-reporting, which can often be inaccurate.
Both exercise groups followed identical training programmes, differing only in exercise sequence. Strength training involved actual weights, with participants performing exercises such as the bench press, deadlift, bicep curl and squat. The cardio sessions involved 30 minutes of stationary cycling.
Participants in both groups experienced improvements in their cardiovascular fitness, muscle strength and body composition – specifically, they lost fat mass while gaining lean muscle mass. Interestingly, cardiovascular fitness improvements were similar regardless of sequence – echoing recent findings that exercise order has limited impact on cardiovascular adaptations.
But the real differences emerged when it came to fat loss and muscle performance. Participants who lifted weights first experienced significantly greater reductions in overall body fat and visceral fat – the type of fat most strongly linked to cardiovascular disease risk.
They also increased their daily step count by approximately 3,500 steps compared to just 1,600 steps for the cardio-first group. Additionally, the weights-first approach enhanced muscular endurance and explosive strength.
Why exercise sequence matters
The reason behind these findings is tied to how your body uses energy.
Resistance training depletes muscle glycogen stores – the sugar that’s stored in the muscles which acts as your body’s quick-access fuel. Imagine glycogen as petrol in your car’s fuel tank. When you lift weights first, you effectively drain this fuel tank, forcing your body to switch energy sources.
With glycogen stores already low, when you transition to cardio, your body must rely more heavily on fat reserves for energy. It’s akin to a hybrid car switching to battery power once the petrol runs low. This metabolic shift helps explain the greater fat loss seen in the weights-first group.
This recent study’s findings align with broader research. A comprehensive systematic review published in 2022 found resistance training alone can significantly reduce body fat and visceral fat, the type linked to chronic diseases. Muscles are metabolically active tissues, continuously burning calories even at rest, which amplifies these effects.
Conversely, performing cardio first might compromise your strength training effectiveness. Cardio uses up glycogen stores, leaving muscles partially depleted before you even lift a weight. It also induces fatigue and may reduce your muscles’ ability to produce explosive power and strength.
A recent systematic review on concurrent training (the practice of combining both resistance and aerobic exercise within the same program) supports this – highlighting that explosive strength gains might diminish if aerobic and strength training occur in the same session, especially if cardio is performed first.
These findings align with other research on concurrent training. A systematic review and meta-analysis examining exercise sequence effects found that resistance-first protocols produced significantly superior strength improvements compared to endurance-first training.
The American Heart Association’s 2023 statement on resistance training confirmed resistance exercise significantly improves lean body mass and reduces fat, especially when combined with other exercise types. However, resistance training alone was found less effective in improving cardiovascular health. This underscores the importance of including cardio in your exercise routine.
However, it is worth noting the study’s limitations. As it only involved obese young men, this means we don’t know how the results will apply to women, older adults or those with different body compositions. A 2024 review suggests adaptations may differ by sex, indicating the need for further research involving diverse populations.
The 12-week duration also may not capture long-term changes. Results also specifically only apply to concurrent training – performing both exercises in the same session.
Moreover, the study did not account for nutritional intake, sleep patterns or stress levels, all of which can significantly influence body composition outcomes. Future research should incorporate these factors to offer even more comprehensive guidance.
Workout sequence
Whether you prefer to do cardio before or after lifting weights, the message is clear: both will improve overall health. The only difference is that weight training before cardio provides advantages for fat loss, abdominal fat reduction and increased daily physical activity.
Interestingly, resistance training boosts confidence and energy levels, naturally encouraging more movement throughout the day, further aiding fat loss.
If cardiovascular fitness is your primary goal, the sequence matters less, as both ways equally boost aerobic fitness. However, if fat loss and optimising daily activity are your main objectives, evidence strongly supports placing resistance training first.
Jack McNamara does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Northeast India’s security landscape has undergone a sweeping transformation over the last 11 years, emerging from decades of insurgency and ethnic unrest to a new era of peace and stability.
Between 2014 and 2025, consistent efforts by the central government, including historic peace accords and confidence-building measures, have brought thousands of armed cadres back into the mainstream.
More than 8,000 insurgents from various outfits—ranging from the Bodo and Karbi groups to factions of the NSCN and ULFA—have laid down their arms as a result of peace agreements facilitated between 2019 and 2023. These efforts were instrumental in dismantling underground networks and paving the way for inclusive governance.
Insurgency-related incidents have declined by 89%, civilian casualties have reduced by 86%, and security forces’ deaths have dropped by 76% since 2014. The scale of improvement has allowed the government to withdraw the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) completely from Tripura and Meghalaya, and partially from Assam, Manipur, Nagaland, and Arunachal Pradesh—an unprecedented step in restoring normalcy.
Adding to the atmosphere of cooperation, Assam signed boundary agreements with both Meghalaya and Arunachal Pradesh during this 11-year period, resolving long-pending disputes and de-escalating local tensions.
The government also launched targeted rehabilitation schemes to help surrendered militants reintegrate into civil society through education, vocational training, and livelihood support. Together, these measures mark a fundamental shift in the region’s approach to peace—from confrontation to collaboration.
Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News
BEIJING, June 9 — In the first quarter of 2025, the medical expenses of nearly 70.8 million patients incurred outside their home provinces were directly settled on site, according to the National Healthcare Security Administration (NHSA).
During the first quarter, over 3.6 million online registrations for the direct cross-province settlement scheme were processed through China’s unified online-filing channel, representing an increase of 18.06 percent year-on-year.
In addition, a rising number of medical institutions have been incorporated into the streamlined settlement scheme. By the end of the first quarter, China had built 651,600 institutions of such kind nationwide.
These projects are a part of the Council’s and Scottish Government’s ongoing play area upgrade programme.
Four play parks, Langlands Park in Luncarty, The Well Green in Scotlandwell, Westfield Common in Rattray, and Greenloaning, have all undergone full upgrades as part of the council’s commitment to enhancing outdoor spaces for communities. On Friday 6 June, Langlands Park, The Well Green and Westfield Common were officially opened, with community celebrations at each location.
The upgrades include a wide range of new play equipment and surfacing, designed to make each park more fun, inclusive, and environmentally sustainable.
These improvements were shaped in partnership with community councils, local schools, and residents, ensuring the new spaces reflect the needs and aspirations of the people who use them most.
A unique feature of the project is the installation of commemorative boards at each site, combining printed acknowledgements with handwritten signatures from those involved creating a lasting tribute to the community spirit behind the transformation.
Local children also played a key role, contributing creative ideas, designing logos for park signage, and sharing their hopes for the future of their play spaces through a detailed consultation process.
Councillor Richard Watters, Convenor of Climate Change and Sustainability Committee said: “We are delighted to see these play parks transformed into vibrant, welcoming spaces for children and families.
“This investment reflects our ongoing commitment to improving local amenities and supporting healthy, active lifestyles. We hope these parks will be enjoyed by the community for many years to come.”
Park Highlights
Westfield Common, Rattray
Combining a free draining circular pathway, the play areas contain soft fall areas of wood chip. A large climbing net and basket swing provides fun for the older children whilst a multi-unit, roundabout and springies keep the younger children engaged. A zip line also provides family fun on the other side of the greenspace. Coupled with the community run BMX track and MANTALK Blairgowrie garden this greenspace provides facilities for all.
The Well Green, Scotlandwell
Includes a thrilling new zip line, monkey bars, swings, and other modern play equipment. Located on the site of a freshwater well, the history of the site is noted in the entrance sign and was once used as an area to dry clothing lines manufactured from locally grown flax.
Langlands Park, Luncarty
Features a hybrid grass surfacing that combines artificial and natural grass for a durable, safe play area. Aimed at the younger children, the play area was developed and relocated following consultation with the Community Council and local school. Combining the adjacent route to school with a line-marked cycleway helps provide the opportunity for young children to learn road safety skills at roundabouts and junctions. There is also a ‘hopscotch’ marked on the footway, which we are sure must be used by all age groups, sometimes ‘secretly!’
Greenloaning
Located within the greenspace area of a housing estate this facility provides for all the family with picnic benches for family feasts and a range of play equipment for all ages. A rubber surfacing keeps the site useable in all weathers with the play equipment combining a range of vibrant natural colours. The equipment is manufactured from many recycled materials including ‘used fishing nets’ melted down and used in the production for the recycled plastic posts, guaranteed for life.
