Writing about a country that isn’t your own makes you prone to dumb errors.

But being British was an advantage when writing about the role of trans issues in the US election. 🧵 I had already lived through the British mood-change from regular voters having no idea what was happening — and progressives therefore accomplishing a short march through the institutions and thinking they’d won—to regular people finding out and … not liking it.

It feels an age ago now, but in 2015 I wrote for @NiemanLab about journalists handling stolen/leaked documents, in the wake of the iCloud hack and the Sony leak (1/) One thing that bothers me about the “Twitter Files” is that Matt Taibbi published them fast — he apologised to his Substack subscribers that he was caught up in something with “conditions”. And Musk seemed very sure of the schedule. So I presume timing was the bargain.

A few years ago, something strange happened in Tourette's clinics. The typical patient used to be a young boy aged 5-7, with simple tics such as blinking.
But now doctors were seeing something new: teenage girls with acute, explosive tic attacks. (1/7) theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/… In Germany, some of the most common vocalisations - such as "fliegende haie" (flying sharks) or "du bist hasslich" (you are ugly) - were the same phrases as a popular Tourette's influencer on YouTube, with his own channel and merchandise page. (2/7)