iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Strathclyde university better be bringing disciplinary proceedings against Matthew Smith. He’s putting lives at risk, when it’s not his area of expertise.

Teaching
1 am happy to supervise a variety of MRes and PhD projects in the history of health and medicine. These include mental health and psychiatry, food and nutrition, allergy and immunology and child health. I am also happy to consider supervision of other topics examining the history of health and medicine in Canada, the United States and Scotland. Please get in touch if you have a research idea!
I teach on a wide range of undergraduate and postgraduate classes, focussing primarily on the history of health and medicine, but also North American history. My specialist courses include Madness and Society from Ancient Times to the Present; Bedlam and Beyond: The Controversial History of the Asylum; The Price of Health: The UK, US and Canada since 1800; and Food and Health in the West in the Twentieth Century. In addition, I have taught on Disease and Society, USA History, Historiography, Cultures of Empire, Glasgow: History, Culture and Identity and other classes.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

This is a map of Scotland showing where witch trials happened. If you go by per head of population Scotland and Germany were the worst in Europe. We had 4000 witch trials and killed 2500 people, mostly women. (Orange is women on trial, blue is men, purple is a trial had both men and women)

A map of Scotland showing where witch trials happened. You can see some areas of the highlands and western isles, but the rest of the country is covered due to there being 4000 witch trials in Scotland

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

I refused to read the New York Times after this story

The New York Times
Sweethearts Forever. Then Came Alzheimer's, Murder an...
29 Dec 2019 — Sweethearts Forever. Then Came Alzheimer's, Murder and Suicide. "They were absolutely soul mates."

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 04/02/2026

Just finished The Dying Light by Daniel Aubrey. It had me absolutely gripped from start to finish. As for the MC, I don’t think any book character means more to me than Freya Sinclair. She is a gift to autistic women in Scotland, thank you @spacemandan13.bsky.social

The cover of The Dying Light by Daniel Aubrey

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 13/12/2025

Back for the first time since May 2024 In hospitality to celebrate my 50th

Tannadice Park as viewed from behind the dugouts

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 27/10/2025

So @moonshoterin.bsky.social thinks the UK should be isolated and urban areas destroyed I see most terfs are protected from destruction, but not trans people or their allies. Also, what did the Republican of Ireland do to merit three cities marked for destruction?

Erin @moonshoterin.bsky.social • 4m

I'd like to offer a world a solution to the UK until the powers that be learn to stop treating everyone thats different like shit.

And Paris too because of Macron & his wife.

There is a map of the UK and Ireland with every major city marked for destruction.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 22/08/2025

According to her book and public record, her ministerial duties changed because of the independence referendum. That quote is what Salmond said to Alex Neil, sounds like Salmond shit stirring. This is what Sturgeon says:

We were in his study in Bute House on a Tuesday afternoon, just before a meeting of Cabinet. I had collared him to say I wanted the equal marriage decision on the agenda the following week. What started as a calm discussion very quickly descended into a shouting match. Alex very rarely raised his voice to me - or vice versa - so I knew that I had a real battle on my hands to get him to agree. He was implacably opposed. Couldn't I see that pushing gay marriage would lose us support in the referendum? I countered that not doing so would lose us support too: one of the concerns many people had about an independent Scotland was that the forces of social conservatism would hold too much sway. And anyway, surely it was a decision we should reach on prin-ciple, not from crude political calculation? Eventually, I realized that my approach wasn't working. Far from winning him over, my arguments were making him more obstinate, so I decided to beat a tactical retreat instead.
The consequent delay in us reaching a decision led to mounting speculation about which way the government would go. Would we strike a blow for equality or bow to the pressure of the churches and right-wing media? For a while, I wasn't at all confident of the answer. However, by the time it came to

Cabinet for a decision, and after several more discussions, none of them as heated as the first one thankfully, I was sure I had persuaded Alex that we should proceed; that even if he personally wasn't convinced it was the right thing to do, at least he understood the political cost of abandoning the com-mitment.
I was wrong. A meeting of the Cabinet held on 17 July 2012 was meant to give the go-ahead. It didn't. The atmosphere around the table was grim as Alex dug his heels in. He claimed that the law would be a slippery slope and made arguments that seemed rooted in the prejudice which had put Section 28 on the statute book. He claimed that priests and ministers would be forced to conduct gay marriages despite the teachings of their faiths; that children would be taught about gay marriage against the wishes of their parents; that the freedom of speech of those who believed that marriage could only be between a man and a woman would be eroded; and that we would haemor-rhage independence support if we went ahead.
Some others in Cabinet also had doubts but expressed them more moder-ately. I was instructed to go away and work out how the detail of the proposed legislation might address Alex's 'concerns.

I was determined to get it over the line. I insisted to Alex that the proposed safeguards for freedom of speech and religion were already as strong as pos-sible. I also emphasized that any chances we had of building a progressive coalition for independence would be fatally undermined if even David Cameron's Tories were seen as more liberal on gay rights than we were. He finally very reluctantly conceded and I was given the go-ahead to confirm our intention to legislate. I made the announcement on 25 July, before he had any chance to change his mind.
When my government responsibilities changed a few months later, my biggest worry was that Alex might kick our commitment to equal marriage into the long grass. To be fair to Alex Neil, who succeeded me as Health Secretary, he kept the legislation on track. The heat also went out of the issue when the Catholic Church in Scotland found itself engulfed by sexual misconduct allegations against its leader, Cardinal Keith O'Brien. Suddenly there was a strong reek of hypocrisy around its claim to be the defender of so-called traditional family values and it sensibly decided to lower the volume of its opposition.
The Marriage and Civil Partnership (Scotland) Act would eventually be passed by the Scottish Parliament on 4 February 2014 and the first same sex weddings took place eleven months later, on New Year's Eve.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 17/08/2025

This is @drgavinfrancis.bsky.social admitting doctors are trained to see patients as irrational. He along with the woman beside him Dr Suzanne O’Sullivan don’t believe autism or ADHD should be diagnosed, despite much research showing the benefits.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 13/08/2025

I knew @tinywriterlaura.bsky.social would have some spicy takes in her book about chronic illness and the way society treats those affect. But she was right in there in Chapter 1 like Greg Taylor on Joey Barton. *chefs kiss*

Kilmarnock’s Greg Taylor is on the ground having just tackled Rangers Joey Barton who is several feet in the air.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 08/06/2025

Politicians insulted at a football match, that would never happen in Scotland 👀

An image of the crowd a Celtic park and a banner that reads

VAR DECISION:
DOUGLAS ROSS IS ACUNT

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 31/05/2025

If you wonder how far off from any Labour values the UK government is, this is the right wing of the party.

From twitter
John McTernan
How any Labour MP can support cuts on this scale for people with disabilities is beyond me.
When the question "Socialism or Barbarism?" the answer is never
"Actually, I'll take Barbarism, thanks for asking!"

Quoted tweet:
Resolution Foundation
The announced changes to disability benefits will lead to very substantial falls in income for some families.
While some families will gain a small amount from the changes, others will lose thousands of pounds a year.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 29/05/2025

Blue from @overlysarcastic.bsky.social showing yet again why we need to ban Americans from doing anything Scottish history related. From OSPod 119:

Oh, right. It was genuinely the first time in 400 years where Scotland legitimately felt like a will was being imposed on them that they did not agree with and have any power to contravene.
Whereas Scotland was ballin throughout the entirety of the British Empire, with a few notable exceptions, don't get me wrong, but Lowland's urbanized Scots in Glasgow and Edinburgh are like, oh, we're having a blast, this rules.

We get on the ground floor, we get all the empire money, all of our cities get remade. Obviously, you know, like, poverty still existed and stuff like that. But in general, like, Scotland was broadly okay with the arrangement of empire until they felt like they were no longer being represented.

It's like, you can't treat us like Ireland. What the fuck is this?
And Brexit was, like, genuinely the first time in hundreds of years that Scotland felt, oh, we are completely, like, unified on the other side of an issue compared to England on this.

But, like, also we lose our EU membership and we really want that. So it's really just like a philosophical thing of, like, wouldn't it be nice if, but post-Brexit, and especially the way that COVID was handled, the difference is like, oh, what they're doing down in Westminster, whichever
government is in charge, labor or conservative, like, they want things that are different from what we, like, almost unified as a Scottish populace, want. Failures of the SNP, numerous as they are, notwithstanding.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 05/05/2025

I’m sure Alasdair was on Conrad’s side here. They were clearly in the good guys. 🙄

Conrad from the Doctor Who’s episode Lucky. Subtitles of Shirley’s line “if you want evidence”

Conrad from the Doctor Who’s episode Lucky. Subtitles of Shirley’s line “I’ve got plenty of it, so you can…”

Shirley, a wheelchair user from the Doctor Who’s episode Lucky. Subtitles of Conrad’s line “This one’s collecting benefits,”

Shirley, a wheelchair user from the Doctor Who’s episode Lucky Day. Subtitles of Conrad’s line “stealing our taxes while she lies to us”

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 13/03/2025

This is a perfect description of Newsom

AdaE@ @TheM...•09/11/2024
I've been reading Gavin Newsom's Wikipedia page out of curiosity and I'm now convinced that this dude is actually insane. It's like he flip flops from extremely progressive bills to the most cartoonishly evil vetos you've ever seen, every
paragraph.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 06/03/2025

The entire east coast of Scotland describes every visit to Glasgow like that. 😂

FEAR
#2 in the UK
Season 1
A young family's fresh start in Glasgow soon turns into their worst nightmare.

Text is alongside a picture of Martin Compston.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 01/03/2025

February reads and ratings: The Bonnie Dead by Andrew Raymond 3.75 Witchcraft: A History in 13 Trials by Marion Gibson 1.0 How Story Works by Lani Diane Rich 5 The Kings Witches by Kate Foster 2.0 A Language of Dragons by SF Williamson 4.5 The Age of Diagnosis by Suzanne O’Sullivan 0.25

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 22/02/2025

These are maps from Fourth Wing (left) and A Court of Thorns and a Roses (right).

A map of where we Fourth Wing takes place. It’s like Ireland has been rotated 45 degrees and then flipped horizontally

A map of where A court of thorns and roses takes place. Prychian is basically the shape of Britain. The neighbouring island of Hybern is the shape of Ireland.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

Terfs are so weird about height. This is from the Cass Report.

6.9 In the UK, the average male is 5'9" tall and the average female 5'4". Some females are taller than some males, and this is part of normal variation. It would be very difficult to guess whether a 5'7" person was male or female from their height alone, because this falls right in the middle of the overlap.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 14/02/2025

We have a winner in the ‘most ignorant response from a GP to someone seeking an ADHD diagnosis’

Me.... Can I be referred for an ADHD diagnosis
GP..... *weighs me* Have you ever tried the
NHS tier 3 weight management services?
I wish I could say I was lying.

ADHD Threads

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 02/02/2025

So black women were ignored every time they warned about Trump, and now you’re supposed to save everyone. It made me think of this tweet

Julie Plec 0 @julieplec
Replying to @theestallion
I believe black women are going to save us all and i am so sorry to put that pressure on you, but white women are continually failing all of us. I hope you understand that me seeing you as a hero is not meant to add to your anxiety — rather it's to lift you up and celebrate you.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 13/01/2025

I would love to be able to afford 128* copies and give one to every MSP in the Scottish parliament. (Also a copy of Its Not a Bloody Trend would be good) *The MSP mentioned in the book probably doesn’t need a copy.

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Jay Rattray @msjayteer.bsky.social · 04/01/2025

This is worrying. The director of Beira’s Place (the centre JK Rowling set up) is asking about private diagnosis of ADHD. They’re going to go after the diagnosis of ADHD and the prescription of meds.