Tag: accountability

Stop Using Grok and X Now!

Let’s be honest about what’s happening here. X hasn’t simply “changed”, it’s been deliberately reshaped into something harsher, noisier, and less trustworthy, and people are right to walk away. A public square that once aspired, however imperfectly, to host plural voices has become a platform where outrage is rewarded, nuance is buried, and misinformation travels faster than truth. That’s not accidental, it’s structural, and users are being asked to accept it as the new normal.

Trust has been hollowed out. Moderation has been weakened in the name of “free speech”, but what that has often meant in practice is freedom for the loudest, the most aggressive, and the most cynical. Good-faith conversation gets drowned. Marginalised voices retreat. Reasonable people self-censor or leave altogether. A space that silences people through hostility is not a free space, it’s a hostile one.

Then there’s the concentration of power. One individual now exerts extraordinary influence over rules, reach, and direction, with minimal transparency and no meaningful accountability. You don’t need a law to be broken to decide you want no part in that. Consumers are allowed to make moral choices. Withdrawing attention, data, and participation isn’t censorship, it’s conscience.

Grok sits uncomfortably inside all of this. It isn’t being received as a neutral, trustworthy tool, but as an extension of the platform’s brand and ideology. When the environment around a technology feels politicised, unstable, and ego-driven, trust in the technology collapses with it. That’s not irrational scepticism, it’s common sense.

People aren’t leaving because they’re fragile or offended. They’re leaving because they can see clearly what the platform has become, and they refuse to pretend otherwise. That’s not virtue signalling, it’s integrity.

When Justice Meets Impunity

The killing of Renee Nicole Good has forced the USA into a defining moment, one that exposes in painful clarity two competing visions of what the country is and what it ought to be.

On one side are those who believe that accountability must apply to everyone, without exception, that the rule of law only has meaning if it restrains power rather than protects it. They argue that when an American citizen is killed in the street by a federal agent, the response must be humility, transparency, and an independent search for truth. They insist that no uniform, no badge, and no political convenience should shield anyone from scrutiny. This vision is rooted in the belief that justice is fragile and must be actively defended, especially for those whose voices are most easily ignored.

On the other side is a far darker impulse, one that rushes to judgement, excuses violence, and treats state power as something to be obeyed rather than questioned. An administration that has already declared the agent innocent and the woman he killed guilty, before any meaningful investigation has begun, sends a chilling message about whose lives are valued and whose are expendable. That instinct embraces impunity over process, loyalty over truth, and force over fairness.

This moment is no longer only about one death, tragic as that is. It’s become a test of whether America still believes in equal justice under the law, or whether it is prepared to surrender that ideal in the name of power, fear, and political expediency.

The Fragile World Order

The world order is changing at an alarming pace, and what’s at stake reaches far beyond any single conflict or crisis. The credibility of international law itself is under pressure, tested by actions that appear selective, self-serving, or indifferent to agreed norms. When rules are applied inconsistently, or bent to suit the interests of the powerful, law begins to look less like a shared framework for justice and more like a tool of convenience. That erosion doesn’t happen overnight, but once trust is weakened, it’s painfully hard to restore.

Alongside this, the authority of the United Nations is being steadily undermined when its resolutions are ignored, bypassed, or treated as optional. The UN was never perfect, but it was built on the conviction that dialogue, restraint, and collective decision-making were preferable to unilateral force. When states act as though multilateral institutions matter only when they deliver convenient outcomes, they hollow those institutions out from within, leaving little more than symbolism where substance once stood.

At the heart of the matter lies a vital principle, that no state, however powerful, can appoint itself as judge, jury, and enforcer of the world order. Power without accountability breeds resentment, instability, and, ultimately, resistance. If might replaces right as the organising logic of global affairs, smaller nations are left exposed, alliances fray, and cooperation gives way to fear and calculation.

If that principle collapses, so too does the fragile trust on which global cooperation depends. Climate action, humanitarian protection, arms control, and peace itself all rely on the belief that rules mean something, and that no one is above them. Once that belief is lost, the consequences will be felt everywhere, and for generations.

Bent Bananas and Broken Truths

For decades before the Brexit referendum, much of the right-wing UK tabloid press presented the EU as a hostile, meddling force, not by accident but because it suited their politics, profits, and power. The EU represented shared rules, social protections, and limits on deregulation, all of which clashed with a free-market, low-regulation worldview. Brussels was distant, complex, and unfamiliar, making it an ideal target for caricature and distortion.

Sensational stories about “bent bananas”, bans on British traditions, or faceless bureaucrats dictating daily life were easy to understand and emotionally charged. They sold newspapers, drove outrage, and encouraged loyalty by framing readers as victims of an external enemy. The truth, that EU regulations were often co-designed by UK ministers and benefited consumers and workers, was far less clickable.

There were also clear political incentives. Successive governments found it convenient to blame the EU for unpopular decisions while quietly supporting those same policies in Brussels. Tabloid owners, some with global business interests, often favoured weakening EU rules and cultivated close relationships with politicians who shared that goal. Over time, myth became narrative, and narrative became identity.

Crucially, accountability was weak. Inaccurate stories were rarely corrected with equal prominence, and the EU itself was poor at explaining its role in plain, human terms. Journalists who challenged the myths were dismissed as elitist or unpatriotic. By the time of the referendum, decades of repetition had embedded a sense of grievance and mistrust so deeply that facts alone struggled to compete with emotion, nostalgia, and a carefully nurtured story of lost sovereignty.