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Catherine Baker

@richmondbridge.bsky.social
2.6K followers 2.5K following 887 posts

PERFORMING QUEER NATIONS: THE EUROVISION SONG CONTEST IN POST-COLD-WAR EUROPE due from Manchester University Press in 2027. She/her.

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Reposted by Catherine Baker
Nancy Kelley @nancymk.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
This government has made life dramatically harder for trans children and their families. The human costs are enormous. Cal is not the first parent I know that has made the gut wrenching decision to leave the country. Read this then start fighting for a world where trans kids can live and thrive.
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
There is a microgeneration of baby millennial sapphics whose lives were never the same after this came out.
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Larisa Aitch @llarisah.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
“What’s perhaps most striking about these pictures of trans people is just how mundane they are. The person looking at them, cis or trans, sees these images and realizes, however much they didn’t before, that trans people are not mythical creatures, or monsters, but people.”
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
As expected, 🇸🇮‘s new right-wing government is strategising to take political control of RTVSLO - which would remove leadership who have backed #Eurovision boycott, as well as everything else balkaninsight.com/2026/10/01/w...
balkaninsight.com
With Jansa’s Return, Slovenia’s Media Landscape Is Being Reshaped
A free press in Slovenia is at risk from the return to office of the populist Janez Jansa and media ownership changes that are shaking up the sector.
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__________ @jenbren.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
September 30 October 1st
Siobhán Fahey from Bananarama circa 1985Siobhán Fahey from Shakespear's Sister circa 1992
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ESC Discord @escdiscord.com · 30/09/2026
🇮🇸 RÚV's board wants Iceland to continue its #Eurovision boycott. In a board meeting today, 6 of the 9 members signed a statement urging RÚV's Director General "to notify the EBU that RÚV will not participate in Eurovision 2027 unless Israel is barred from the Contest".
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Katherine Alejandra Cross @quinnae.com · 30/09/2026
Recently, I did a wonderful interview with the indefatigable @emilystjams.bsky.social about trans people's online information environment and why there are very strong incentives to spread panic. It was a wide-ranging discussion that I think is more relevant than ever.
episodes.ghost.io
What's the matter with trans panic media?
Scholar Katherine Alejandra Cross on why it's so profitable to "sell panic to trans people."
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Mark Watson @watsoncomedian.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
My son's history course this year includes a paper called 'Britain Transformed, 1913-1997' which means the events of 'history' for him include 'me doing history GCSE'.
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
‘This is a footballer with a future, and in a climate where billionaire stadium owners notify artists that they won’t perform if they say “Free Palestine,” taking such a stand puts that future at risk’
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Juliane Fürst @jcaf.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
This much for academia being somehow above or outside the war: this is the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences, and these are our colleagues, engaged in the same work we do. This is also late punishment for the instrumental role the Academy played in the late 1980s in the struggle for independence.
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
‘It almost sounds absurd to even have to say it - in the context of all that's wrong in world right now - but we will not report on the sporting action this time around’ www.irishmirror.ie/news/irish-n... Mainstream 🇮🇪 sport media now working through same decisions as #Eurovision fan media 3 yrs ago
irishmirror.ie
Israel v Ireland - the Irish Mirror's coverage will be different... here's why
The big decisions can sometimes be the most straightforward
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
‘Laibach insist they have “always been a pop group — even if we have not always looked or sounded like one.” Which is a bit like a Dalek saying it has always been a warm and approachable presence at children’s parties’ morningstaronline.co.uk/article/popa...
morningstaronline.co.uk
Popaganda
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Lee Hurley @hleehurley.com · 26/09/2026
The Ireland game v Israel looks like it will be going ahead with the Irish players wearing black armbands in memory of the victims. Players have also asked to be excused from any further media duties. Donations will be made. Just one player is refusing to play. The majority voted to play.
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Robin Hayward 🌳 🏳️‍⚧️ @canopyrobin.com · 25/09/2026
We're publishing new guidance to support trans people who do fieldwork (any work outside the office)! Now we need your help to get them seen so please share! inclusivefieldwork.leeds.ac.uk/trans/
a cartoon of three fieldworkers. One has a small trans flag. The logos of the university of leeds, research england, and canopy robin are shown, as well as the URL: InclusiveFieldwork (dot) Leeds (dot) AC (dot) UK (slash) trans
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
🇮🇪 men’s ⚽️ team drawn vs 🇮🇱 in Nations League, may be deciding now whether to take field: www.theguardian.com/football/202... 🔹🇮🇪 FA wants 🇮🇱 suspended from international competition 🔹Team’s 🇮🇸 coach has said they’d be ‘playing against genocide’ 🔹Irish Sport For Palestine calling on team not to play
theguardian.com
Israel’s match with Republic of Ireland will be an eerie occasion as political debate rages on
Despite fierce opposition to the Nations League encounters across Irish society, a boycott has not materialised
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
‘We’re not sending the right songs and we’re not giving young artists the chance to develop them. The small venues they ought to be performing at, where they can test out their songs on an audience, are closing down. Smaller or up and coming artists can’t afford to tour’
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Duncan Hothersall @dhothersall.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
The second attack in two weeks on an LGBT+ bookshop in Glasgow. STV posted this story on Facebook and there is an endless stream of comments underneath suggesting the answer is for them to stop using the word "queer", stop supporting trans rights, and stop being so visible. Mainstreamed hate.
news.stv.tv
Queer bookshop vandalised again two weeks after targeted attack
Category Is Books in Govanhill has been targeted twice within two weeks
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Today in unexpected impacts of city-based arena events.
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
‘The values everyone’s referring to today are the ones the Contest accepts. That doesn’t necessarily mean they are the ones its audience believes. For that to be at the centre, there needs to be a wider conversation between those 2 sides as to what Eurovision really is, & what it could & should be’
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Our headmistress quoted from Penelope Lively’s autobiography about growing up among British colonial community in Egypt so often that ‘oleander, jacaranda’ became school-wide 1990s equivalent of a meme.
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
‘Many readers, I suspect, will have a sense of just how dangerous the modern right has become. What I think is less understood is the enormous harm center-left elites can do when they adopt the wrong strategy for dealing with this unprecedented threat’
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Promises more decision-making power about #Eurovision governance will shift to EBU members (broadcasters) rather than contest management seem to have persuaded 🇧🇪’s VRT to return. 🇪🇸’s RTVE, in contrast, still unconvinced enough that its president is proposing staying out again.
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Announced on the same day a different 🇳🇱 public broadcaster, NPO, has taken over Dutch #Eurovision participation from AVROTROS.
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
‘For many young people, part of the pain they have felt in the past few years has been in witnessing the events in Gaza … why would they not increasingly expect artists to draw connections between their personal pain and what is causing it?’ www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
theguardian.com
Ed Sheeran thought fans didn’t want artists to be politically engaged. He’s finding out how wrong he was | Jason Okundaye
Twenty years ago, even Madonna faced radio blacklisting for being overtly political. But in our age of streaming, there’s less excuse for not speaking out, says Guardian columnist Jason Okundaye
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
‘The difference, said @dorianlynskey.bsky.social, is that Ukraine reads in the west as a “consensus position” – “like Chris Martin wearing the pride flag, subtly progressive without risk of a massive backlash”’ Again very like what #Eurovision faced in 2024
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
‘As sports owners transform their stadiums into concert venues and more artists use big stadiums for their shows, we are increasingly entering a world where the most powerful billionaires in sports will be inclined to take more blatantly political stances’
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KJ Charles @kjcharleswriter.com · 18/09/2026
in more writing-y skeets: I have a chunk in Think Write Edit Romance, talking about how you can't just slap a job title on an MC: to make a convincing mafioso/hairdresser/sculptor, you need to show what they know and do informing their general behaviour. re which, check out this delightful post!
askamanager.org
the very efficient Thanksgiving dinner, the threat assessments, and other ways our jobs follow us home
Last month we talked about what habits have followed you home from work, and here are some of the most delightful habits you shared. •  My husband is a captioner and uses a specialized voice-to-text s...
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John B @johnbc74.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Look. This is really simple. Whilst the RNLI is a charity, it forms part of the basic infrastructure of the country (whether this is a suitable arrangement is another matter). Due to intimidation parts of this infrastructure are unable to function.
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
From a creative industries perspective this makes more sense than the media want to suggest it does, especially since #Eurovision got bumped up the cultural policy agenda after 🇬🇧 hosting for 🇺🇦 in 2023.
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Maria W. Norris @mariawnorris.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Lookie here, the UK legal definition of terrorism! I'd say this falls under 1b, 1c, 2c, 2d. Again, this is the same definition used to proscribe Palestine Action.
Terrorism: interpretation.
(1)In this Act “terrorism” means the use or threat of action where—

(a)the action falls within subsection (2),

(b)the use or threat is designed to influence the government [F1or an international governmental organisation] or to intimidate the public or a section of the public, and

(c)the use or threat is made for the purpose of advancing a political, religious [F2, racial] or ideological cause.

(2)Action falls within this subsection if it—

(a)involves serious violence against a person,

(b)involves serious damage to property,

(c)endangers a person’s life, other than that of the person committing the action,

(d)creates a serious risk to the health or safety of the public or a section of the public, or

(e)is designed seriously to interfere with or seriously to disrupt an electronic system.

(3)The use or threat of action falling within subsection (2) which involves the use of firearms or explosives is terrorism whether or not subsection (1)(b) is satisfied.

(4)In this section—

(a)“action” includes action outside the United Kingdom,

(b)a reference to any person or to property is a reference to any person, or to property, wherever situated,

(c)a reference to the public includes a reference to the public of a country other than the United Kingdom, and

(d)“the government” means the government of the United Kingdom, of a Part of the United Kingdom or of a country other than the United Kingdom.

(5)In this Act a reference to action taken for the purposes of terrorism includes a reference to action taken for the benefit of a proscribed organisation
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Also not opening on Ed Sheeran’s tour.
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
‘Now the 90s are far enough away for us to understand them, it’s clear that there was a hidden architecture to those times, one that supported this burst of creativity. It wasn’t just the party venues that were easy to find’ www.theguardian.com/culture/2026...
theguardian.com
Hard parties, cheap rents and horrible flats: how 90s art and fashion redefined British culture
An evocative new Tate Britain show captures an era when the UK’s newly flush creative industries teamed up with a generation of skint dreamers to bring the decade into vivid colour
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Rachel Moss @menysnoweballes.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
CFP: Far-Right Archives in the Digital Age, a collaboration between @wienerlibrary.bsky.social and me (via my @britishacademy.bsky.social grant): 27 November, London: www.northampton.ac.uk/research-blo... Travel funds are available (probably only within UK)!! Please share. 🗃️
northampton.ac.uk
CFP: Far-Right Archives in the Digital Age | UON
Wiener Holocaust Library, London. Friday 27 November 2026, 10.30am-4pm Improved digital access to far-right material at archives, libraries, and beyond...
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Cal Horton (they/them) @fiercemum.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
I know GLP are up against a very hostile legal context but this is absolutely a depressing read. Highlighting minor ways in which schools can flex that still leave trans kids in a horrendous & harmful position. These flexes are no where near enough to protect trans kids.
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Ed Sheeran’s tour now that venues have dropped Macklemore appears to be speedrunning Eurovision 2024, except with 🇮🇪 support acts able to use stronger language and actually drop out.
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Senthorun S. Raj @senthorun.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
“The organisation said 50 activists had been detained, more than 10 taken after police raids on their homes. It said that authorities had blocked several websites and social media accounts linked to LGBTQ+ organisations.” Chilling to see Turkish authorities escalate their attacks against LGBT folk.
bbc.co.uk
Turkish police detain dozens in raids on gay bars and homes of LGBTQ+ activists
Human rights groups in Turkey have accused the government of using a family- values campaign to target the LGBTQ+ community.
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
‘At no point would a group on the left be given the levels of understanding or implicit praise that the black-shorted boot boys are getting. We’ve seen it happen enough times to know exactly what’s going on here’s
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Mass Observation Archive @massobsarchive.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Exciting news (well we think so)! We are looking for new people to regularly contribute to our archive! We accept applications from anyone based in the UK who has an interest in sending us their thoughts and opinions about life in the UK. #Skystorians massobs.org.uk/write-for-th...
massobs.org.uk
Write for the archive - Mass Observation Archive
Writing for Mass Observation You can apply to write for the archive here. Current Observers If you are one of our current Observers you may find our handbook for new Observers helpful. This has all th...
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European Research Council (ERC) @erc.europa.eu · 14/09/2026
🛡️ What does the Viking legacy look like today? Tom Birkett and his team have launched a project exploring how ideas and narratives about the #Vikings have evolved across Europe over the past 200 years. 👉 t.co/0L4WD9EsLL 📸 ©️Clare Keogh @norsemap.bsky.social @norseincork.bsky.social @ucc.ie
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
‘Joan, like her literary knightly kin, was reverted back to womanhood in spite of the known fact of her short hair … Artists gave her back her long hair, turning her into a woman, not a warrior’
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
Kateryna Pavlenko (ex Go_A, 🇺🇦 #Eurovision 2021) was on another evacuated train a few hours ahead in opposite direction, returning from a Ukrainian content creators’ visit to the European Commission
Kateryna Kobuta and Kateryna Pavlenko at European Commission headquarters, caption ‘And here we are looking at the European future of Ukraine’Pavlenko rubbing her eyes outdoors, caption ‘We were evacuated from the train’Text ‘I am staying in Ukraine because it is an experience that helps me grasp the scale of human cruelty and the extent of the indifference toward it’
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Catherine Baker @richmondbridge.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
‘The year is doing a lot of work before the plot has even bought its popcorn. … In 1994, culture could travel fast enough to become a rumour, but not fast enough to become a fact before bedtime. That is a lovely place for horror to live’
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Kieron Gillen @kierongillen.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
Great thread on the opening of YA. I can't think of a book where we nailed what we wanted to do as well from the off. The only downside is that I'm not sure we ever bettered it later. Still - to some, this opening says nothing, to others, it leaves nothing to be said. It seems this is Larkin week.
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Neil Lewis, Jr. @neillewisjr.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
Just re-read this great piece by @anildash.com "The constructed cultural narrative around the day bears almost no resemblance to the actual lived experience of anyone I know who was here that day. So maybe it’s worth telling a little bit of what I actually saw." www.anildash.com/2024/09/11/2...
anildash.com
23: What was 9/11? - Anil Dash
A blog about making culture. Since 1999.
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History Workshop @historyworkshop.org.uk · 10/09/2026
"Designed to provide access to public toilets for disabled people, the Radar Key reflects more than a material tool: it showcases wider debates around access, design, and spatial politics in modern Britain." Kirstie Stage on the radical nature of the Radar Key.
historyworkshop.org.uk
Radical Object: The Radar Key
The Radar Key is a small but crucial part of the history of disabled people demanding rights and independence in modern Britain. Kirstie Stage explores the little-known history of this radical object.
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Eric Gordy @ericgordy.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
This place is now the gym that I go to (if I am being good) 3 times a week. But the mirrored disco ball is still hanging from the ceiling. notchesblog.com/2026/02/17/a...
notchesblog.com
A Love Letter to Bolts Nightclub
Bolts was one of the most vibrant LGBTQ nightclubs in 1980s London, renowned for its Hi-NRG music and its weekly shows that were at the vanguard of gay culture.
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Scott Bryan @scottygb.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
Drag Race UK leaving the BBC Financial challenges to blame, but boy has a lot of queer content come to an end all of a sudden. variety.com/2026/tv/glob...
variety.com
‘RuPaul’s Drag Race UK: All Stars’ Set to Premiere on WOW Presents Plus (EXCLUSIVE)
'RuPaul's Drag Race UK: All Stars' is set to premiere on WOW Presents Plus in 2027.
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Sam Wetherell @samwetherell.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
My latest post: On the deindustrialisation of the university. And on being "in defence of history" at a time of extinction. thehistoryfactory.substack.com/p/the-histor...
thehistoryfactory.substack.com
The History Factory 2: The Deindustrialisation of the University
A few years ago, my employer, the University of York, commissioned a civil engineering firm named Tilbury Douglas to build a new nursery for the children of its employees and students.
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Selina Chen @minkfossa.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
Wake up to US tech as a weapon.
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