thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-21--The Crown: How Gillian Anderson And Emma Corrin Were Transformed Into Thatcher And Diana

The pressure to create authentic hair and make-up design on the new season of The Crown felt higher than ever, one of the show’s creative leads has told HuffPost UK.
Season 4 of the Netflix series dramatises fictitious accounts between the royals set in the years between 1979 until 1990 and introduces two of the century’s most iconic females, Princess Diana (played by Emma Corrin) and former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher (played by Gillian Anderson).
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Reviews have been favourable, and key moments in the early episodes include a hilarious scene in which Margaret Thatcher plays Ibble Dibble with the royal family, before heading out on a shooting trip with the Queen at Balmoral, dressed in one of her iconic blue two-piece suits.
Princess Diana and, on the right, Princess Diana in The Crown, played by Emma Corrin Supplied
Cate Hall, the hair and make-up design lead on the show, revealed how the stakes have never felt higher as the show approaches more modern times. “Of course, the more familiar a period is to the audience, the greater the pressure to get it right,” she says.
“Everyone engaged in the show is so committed to realising a world which is believable, that the pressure motivates us to try harder to do justice to the audience’s memory,” adds Cate. “I used loads of my family photo albums for reference which was particularly useful.
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“We’re trying to mostly replicate ‘normal’, every-day rather than high fashion looks. The dangerous element comes from feeling like you know it, when of course memory is fallible, so you still need to research everything thoroughly in order to achieve the kind of precision The Crown is known for.”
Cate says that nostalgia has a “wonderful, but possibly dangerous effect” because of how subjective it is.
“During prep as we were developing the look for Thatcher at the start of the series, [writer] Peter Morgan gave us a useful note reminding us not to let our memories and feelings about her interfere with the process as despite what she became know for, when we establish the character she is full of promise and passion” Cate explains.
“I had to leave my own judgement at the door. I was grateful to recognise that so early on.”
When it comes to recreating the familiar looks of Diana and Thatcher and the cohort of royals, Cate says “the truth seems to lie somewhere between accuracy and believability.”
“If we do something distracting in trying to replicate a real character, then we take the viewer out of the show, so that’s a real no,” she adds.
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Gillian Anderson as Margaret Thatcher in The Crown and, on the right, actual Margaret Thatcher Supplied
For Diana, Cate aimed to tell the story of her growth and development, from relatively ordinary girl living in Earl’s Court with friends to being on the front of every newspaper and magazine - as well as representing the potential changes in her state of mind, which comes with that.
“The extent to which her look became deliberate and manufactured for the media is a key for our visual journey,” Cate explains. “She transforms in season 4 from a natural looking teenager to a media-savvy icon who uses hair and make-up styling as a suit of armour.”
As for Margaret Thatcher, Cate isn’t lining up to praise her sartorial choices.
“I know people call her a fashion icon but I can’t see it from a hair and make-up point of view,” she says.
“Her hair is a kind of 80s re-hash of a classic 1960s roller set and brush out. She was definitely iconic from a stateswoman perspective with a very precise and consistent visual brand, but I think her look was recognisable rather than leading.”
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Once the looks were finalised, it was Cate’s job to work out how to achieve them logistically, and the main factor to bear in mind was how advancements in technology in the era meant styles changed dramatically.
“From my view, the 1980s are a real gift,” reveals Cate. “It was the first period in a few centuries where women were emphasising every feature of the face simultaneously.”
It was the era in which make-up became accessible - but it lacked the sophisticated chemical technology which today allows for the naturalistic looks Cate describes as “smooth, shiny and easily blendable.”
Hence, Diana’s patchier blusher in scenes set in the early 1980s when she was self-styling at home before she moved into the palace.
Princess Diana and, on the right, Princess Diana in The Crown, played by Emma Corrin Supplied
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In terms of hair, the Eighties were the era in which perming and highlighting became en vogue. “This gave us a great palette of texture to play with as well as colour. We had great creative license to move the show into a new era with a look you could almost feel as well as see.”
As the shoot approached, and the focus turned to applying the look on an actor, more was definitely more.
“Typically we start with all the artifice at our disposal; false teeth, wigs, contact lenses, and gradually strip it away until what is left is believable,” says Cate.
She says the key is finding a balance between literal recreation and allowing the actor to embody the person in their performance.
“Typically I find that if we get the silhouette precisely correct then the outline is all the viewer really needs: the actor does the rest with their performance and hopefully we leave enough space that the viewer’s mind fills in the gaps,” she explains.
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Gillian Anderson as Margaret Thatcher in The Crown and, on the right, actual Margaret Thatcher Supplied
With Margaret Thatcher, one sacrifice made in terms of recreating her look was her teeth.
“Margaret Thatcher had some serious dental work throughout the 1980s, but when we tried a series of prosthetic teeth appliances and they seriously compromised [Gillian Anderson’s] performance, it was clear we didn’t need to tell the teeth story to tell Thatcher’s story,” says Cate.
Cate was more hands-on with Thatcher’s wig though, which was aged by removing hair and making what remained more grey for her final episode. “If you can infer strength with a hair-do, we tried,” says Cate.
Creating these two entirely different world famous looks - one polarising, one the subject of the nation’s adoration - awarded Cate more than just another line on her CV: she was constantly taken away from the immediacy of her work and reminded about how both women shaped her own life.
“I was a child in a single parent family in the 1980s so the politics feels acutely relevant to me,” remembers Cate. “It felt really familiar to me and there was a definite sense of comfort in recreating the looks from my childhood.”
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thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-21--Harry Styles Proves What I've Always Known: Effeminate Men Aren't Any Less Masculine

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Harry Styles Tyler Mitchell/Vogue
In November, Harry Styles became the first male cover star in Vogue’s 150-year history.
If that doesn’t feel surprising, perhaps there’s a good reason: Harry Styles wearing a dress, in itself, doesn’t feel like that much of a surprise. Male musicians wearing dresses have been the sartorial canaries in the coal mine when it comes to gender-bending fashion since The Rolling Stones did similar half a century ago.
But while I’m not surprised by the pics of Harry wearing dresses, I am upset Styles’ masculinity has been pulled into question.
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I’ve fancied men who have effeminate ways of presenting ever since I first started finding men attractive – but importantly I’ve always viewed them as intrinsically masculine. That’s because being camp or effeminate with your gestures, or your clothing, does not remove from the other things that make a man a man, such as your physicality or gender expression.
For me, there is something intensely masculine about a man wearing a dress – or more, having the confidence to do so. They may be wearing a piece of clothing designed for women, but there are other powers also at play which suggest a broader sense of masculinity: body language, body shape, even hairy legs or a deeper voice.
“For me, there is something intensely masculine about a man wearing a dress – or more, having the confidence to do so.”
He may have a controversial past, but on this occasion I am thankful to social media personality Logan Paul for calling BS on the idea that Harry seems any less of a man. On an episode of his podcast, Impaulsive, when Logan’s co-star George Janko said the Harry pics “weren’t manly”, Logan replied: ”Bro, why? What is manly to you? What does it mean? Is manly being comfortable in your skin? Being comfortable with who you are, regardless of what you’re wearing?”
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Quite.
And at the crux of any furore around masculinity and femininity lies the question: what even is ‘masculinity’ anyway? I’d argue that in today’s genderfluid world, the relevance of the gender binary (the idea that there is only two genders, male and female) is sliding into irrelevance, much like the Jack Wills tracksuits Vogue writer Hamish Bowles nostalgically remembers from the singer’s One Direction days. Men’s magazines have been trying, and failing, to answer the baggy question about just what denotes a ‘modern man’ for the past decade or so. Many of them feel as if they only exist so publishers have content to put adverts next to.
I’ve always been interested in the question of what a ‘modern man’ is meant to looks like. I am no closer to discovering the answer, except to say that nearly all of my partners have presented as effeminate, but have felt more masculine than me despite this ‘effeminate’ badge.
Perhaps one reason they felt more masculine to me than I do to myself is because I am often told by people that I’m ‘masculine’ for a queer guy, even though I don’t feel particularly ‘masculine’ certainly not any more than one of my camp-presenting friends.
“Queer culture is becoming more mainstream. Perhaps men hiding within the brittle confines of ‘conventional’ masculinity feel threatened by that.”
For me, calling a man non-masculine feels particularly toxic, because saying so implies that the man in question is less good at being a man. To me, what the criticiser is really saying is that they themselves are less good at conforming to the stereotypes about how a man should look and act.
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I’ve learned from dating lots of men that queer culture is the best place to assess what a ‘modern man’ might look like. Free from the rigours of societal expectation and conventional thought, they may dress differently, think differently and act differently – but those queer men are still men. Trust me, I’ve dated enough of them to have developed a pretty good sense for what makes one.
Queer culture is becoming more mainstream, as Harry’s queer af cover shoot for Vogue suggests. Perhaps men hiding within the brittle confines of ‘conventional’ masculinity feel threatened by that.
Feeling offended or outraged by what Harry’s boldly wearing in those photos, instead of cheering him on, makes you far less of a man than any dress possibly could.
Adam Bloodworth is a journalist at HuffPost UK. Follow him on Twitter at @Adamzx


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-21--Here's How To Explain Coranavirus Developments To Your Kids

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To say it’s hard to keep up to date with the latest Covid restrictions, from lockdown to the ‘rule of six’ to support bubbles would be an understatement.
As time stretches on, things only seem to be getting more confusing – particularly when different parts of the country are doing different things.
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There’s the hope and promise of a vaccine in 2021, but we’ve still got Christmas to get through, first, with Public Health England warning that for every day ‘off’ restrictions over the festive period, we will need five extra days of strict lockdown measures in compensation. Bah, humbug.
So, when it’s this hard for grown-ups to keep track of what’s going on in the age of Covid-19, how on earth do we explain it all to our kids?
Ksenia Zvezdina via Getty Images
If yours are anything like my four and eight-year-old, they will likely adopt a world-weary tone when discussing the “ronavirus” – my youngest has never washed his hands so thoroughly as he does right now, and my eldest is a dab hand at FaceTiming her friends, now they can’t have playdates anymore.
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But they still have questions: namely, what will happen at Christmas: will Santa have to wear a mask, and will they get to see their grandparents?
Amanda Gummer, child psychologist and founder of the Good Toy Guide, tells HuffPost UK that being “simple, honest and age-appropriate” when we’re talking to our kids is the best rule of thumb.
Here are her five key tips for how to talk them through the ever-changing restrictions:
Keep it simple – and be honest
“Simple and honest is best,” says Gummer, “and it’s all about age-appropriate information. One of the best parenting tricks is to ask what they think, what they’ve heard about the virus, and get some more context about where they’ve heard it.” As for working out what’s ‘age appropriate’, Gummer uses this motto: “If kids are old enough to ask a question, they’re old enough to hear an answer.”
Avoid overloading them with too much detail
“The worst thing is if you get a two-year-old asking what coronavirus is, and you give them a full breakdown of immunology,” Gummer says. “Make sure you’re answering the question they’re asking right at that moment, so if it’s about Christmas – answer just that. Try not to go off on a big tangent. Leave the opportunity open for kids to ask another question if they want to.” If your child asks you what the rules are around lockdown now, you don’t need to worry about giving them a pop history of the way things have been to date.
Be willing to say you don’t know
Parents should always be able and willing to say they don’t know the answer, Gummer advises. “If you’re never wrong and act like you know all the answers, kids can feel inadequate and inferior and feel like they shouldn’t speak up, in case they get it wrong. It’s lovely to be authentic and to role-model that it’s okay to admit you don’t have all the answers. You can say, “let’s Google that together and see what we can find” – and that in turn can teach them digital literacy – how to know whether a source is trustworthy, and what is ‘fake news’. It can teach them critical thinking.”
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Let them lead the questions
Gummer says it’s important to wait for kids to ask what they want to know, rather than volunteering too much information from the outset. “As awkward and frustrating hearing the word, ‘why?’ can be, over and over again, it’s a really powerful tool to build up trust between you and to teach them questioning and answering skills.”
Find out what they know


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-21--Burnout Is Our Next Big Threat

Burnout Is Our Next Big Threat

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During the tense and frustrating hours that turned into endless days of election coverage, where maps of Arizonan counties began taking up as much mental real estate as concepts like “go to bed” and “you’ve never even been to Arizona”, I kept wondering something.
No, not why a country that voted for Donald Trump four years ago almost voted for him again. Not why infamously sore winner Trump was turning out to be a sore loser too. What I really couldn’t fathom was at what point during the rehearsal for this fluorescent parade of antiquated ballot-counting techniques did then New Yorker writer Jeff Toobin decide that it was time to touch himself.
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Because during an election rehearsal, that’s what the esteemed lawyer did – exposed himself on a Zoom with colleagues. He’s long since apologised for the mistake, explaining he didn’t know his camera was on. He was suspended impending investigations into the incident, and has since been sacked.
Alistair Berg via Getty Images
While Toobin’s colleagues will know the incursions of using a home as a workplace, seeing a colleague’s penis was never meant to be one. It’s very clear from this incident that boundaries were crossed.
The issue of delineating those boundaries has never been more pertinent since covid has forced a large proportion of the workforce to transition to home working.
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And boundaries will continue to be crossed – in smaller, or shall I say less revolting ways – so long as people continue to work from home. And yet, this week, Google’s CFO Ruth Polat spoke with glee at how more micromanaging and “check-ins” have upped employees’ productivity as they continue to adjust to this “new normal”.
This is hot on the tails of Deutsche Bank recommending work-from-homers be taxed for the privilege at a rate of 5% because they’re saving on the commute and a trip to Pret. The implication of the bank’s suggestion is that working from home is an easy ride. But as Sartre put it, hell is other people. And when you’re working from your own home, other people are right there with you.
From the two-metre rule to the borders of our lockdowns, from the graded tier system to the Nando’s flavour chart of risk, the rubrics to order this disordered time are as much a talking point as the fear of the actual virus. The only good thing about lockdown 2.0, truly, is that we don’t have to keep track of the rules. At least until discussions of Christmas come up.
The cost of all these public boundaries is the erosion of our private spaces. Back-to-back video-conferences that could’ve been a call. Work WhatsApps into the small hours that we actually respond to. And if we don’t, well, what’s our excuse? Those able to work feel a grateful obligation, and it’s not like there’s much else on.
“The digital age has offered us flexibility, and too often employers – sometimes with the government’s blessing, sometimes thanks to our fearful, dog-loyal desperation to retain work – have bent this to suit them.”
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Some argued that if Toobin made an honest mistake he should be given a break – after all, who is obliged to be 100% professional at home?
And while perhaps it’s hard to feel sympathy for Toobin, that side of the argument has some better test cases. In the same week Toobin was suspended, Loose Women presenter Stacey Solomon, Zooming in from her sofa, was asked to blow out a nearby candle by a fellow panellist. Upset viewers had been calling in to complain that Solomon may have risked setting her curtains alight.
Is it really up to people nowhere near someone else’s house to police what they do in there? Is the constant access we have to each other’s homes, our intimate lives, really something we should get used to? Is the freedom to do what we want in our own homes at risk the moment we let others in, even virtually?
Over 60% of adults are experiencing mental health issues related to the pandemic and the HR professional body the Chartered Institute for Personnel Development has warned: “Some employees are working longer or more irregular hours and many are combining work with home-schooling and other family responsibilities, leading to a poor work-life balance.”
The biggest risk of blurring the boundaries of personal and professional, of always feeling “on”, is burnout. This will harm us and our economy.
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Any safe vaccine spells a cure to this horrific virus. The “new normal”, as we called it in the earlier stages of this pandemic, when the prospects of Danish mink upsetting football games, a post-Christmas quarantine of a month and cronyism running to the billions were still quite alien, is back in our sights. But we also need a cure to the notion that it’s fine for the boundaries between work and play to be as blurry as a masked glasses wearers’ vision on a foggy November morning.
My wifi connection understands the logistical difficulties of working from home, but what are the ethical? When our laptops beam blue-lighted portals into our homes, mutually revealing our sanctuaries to one another, what is work and what is not?
The digital age has offered us flexibility, and too often employers – sometimes with the government’s blessing, sometimes thanks to our fearful, dog-loyal desperation to retain work – have bent this to suit them.
We must all heave the line back in place; not text about work outside of work hours, actually leave work – wherever that may be – during lunch breaks and not feel obliged to work in the evenings just to get ahead of the next tired day.
First, just with all Coronavirus-era rules we long to break, we need to know it’s safe to do so.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-21--England Will Enter 'Strengthened' Three-Tier System When Lockdown Ends

England will enter a strengthened three-tiered system of local restrictions when the national lockdown ends on December 2, Downing Street has said.
Boris Johnson is expected to detail his plan for winter, which includes details on how families can see their loved ones at Christmas, to MPs on Monday.
The “Covid winter plan” is expected to place more areas into the higher tiers to keep the virus under control to ensure further restrictions are not needed, No 10 said.
And while some local measures will be the same as those in the previous system, some tiers will be strengthened to safeguard the gains made during the national lockdown.
The PM will accept that the measures are difficult but will make clear they are not to last longer than is absolutely necessary and will take into account the need to support the economy.
The cabinet is expected to discuss and sign off the plan on Sunday before Johnson announces it to parliament the following day when the full details are expected.
The plan will set out how people will be able to spend their Christmas, but ministers have made clear that the festive season will be different to normal, with some restrictions expected to remain in place.
Ministers will set out what tier each area will be placed into on Thursday and MPs are expected to be given the vote to approve the new tiering system, as promised by Johnson, in the days before it comes into force.
They are optimistic that restrictions can be gradually reduced in the run-up to spring, providing vaccines are approved by regulators, allowing a plan for the roll-out to begin next month before a wider programme in the new year.
But the PM will be wary of a rebellion from backbench Tory MPs who are opposed to new restrictions.
During a vote on the current four-week system earlier this month, 32 Conservatives rebelled to oppose the measures and 17 more, including former prime minister Theresa May, abstained.
Subsequently, a “Covid recovery group” led by former chief whip Mark Harper and ex-Brexit minister Steve Baker has formed to resist new measures, with suggestions 50 Tories have enlisted.
But Downing Street will hope an easing at Christmas, potential vaccines on the horizon and new scientific evidence will lessen the scale of a rebellion, with the government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) expected to publish papers on Monday stating that the previous tiers were not strong enough.
Labour has so far been supportive of the need for restrictions to slow the spread of Covid-19, and a full-scale Commons defeat on the plan is unlikely.
A No 10 spokeswoman said: “Everyone’s efforts during the current national restrictions have helped bring the virus back under control, slowed its spread and eased pressures on the NHS.
“But the prime minister and his scientific advisers are clear the virus is still present – and without regional restrictions it could quickly run out of control again before vaccines and mass testing have had an effect.
“That would put in jeopardy the progress the country has made, and once again risk intolerable pressure on the NHS.”


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-21--More Republican Senators Have Covid Than Have Acknowledged Biden's Election Win

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Here’s a guessing game that perfectly suits the sad state of affairs in the US senate: How long until the number of Republicans who accept Joe Biden as the president-elect surpasses the number of them who have tested positive for the coronavirus?
At the moment, the virus is winning.
Rick Scott of Florida announced Friday that he has tested positive for Covid-19, making him the seventh Republican senator infected with the deadly disease. The others are Chuck Grassley (Iowa), Mike Lee (Utah), Bill Cassidy (Louisiana), Rand Paul (Kentucky), Thom Tillis (North Carolina) and Ron Johnson (Wisconsin). Paul was the first to test positive, back in March; Grassley and Scott revealed their infections this week.
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Meanwhile, it’s been nearly two weeks since Biden won enough states to become the president-elect but the vast majority of Republican senators are refusing to publicly acknowledge it.
As of Friday, HuffPost counts just five senate Republicans who have said Biden won or referred to him as the president-elect: Mitt Romney (Utah), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Susan Collins (Maine), Ben Sasse (Nebraska) and Marco Rubio (Florida).
That leaves the remaining 48 Republican senators complicit in Donald Trump’s efforts to undermine people’s faith in democratic institutions to try to make it look like he won the election.
Some of these senators are echoing his lies about voter fraud. Some are backing his baseless lawsuits and efforts to review ballots despite no evidence of widespread fraud or vote margins so thin that a recount would be warranted. None of them publicly objected as Trump summoned two Michigan Republican leaders to the White House on Friday ― in plain view ― for a meeting aimed at subverting the democratic process that handed the state to Biden in the election.
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Some are trying to have it both ways: appease Trump’s ego but also acknowledge how reckless the current situation is. It doesn’t work, though.
Senator Lamar Alexander (Tennessee) said in a Friday statement that the Trump administration should help Biden’s team transition into power – but only if Biden wins the election, which he already has, by a lot.
Alexander’s statement only vaguely touches on the outrageous situation of Trump’s top appointee at the General Services Administration refusing to sign off on paperwork that triggers a transfer of power, which is preventing Biden’s team from getting up to speed on all sorts of matters, most obviously responding to the pandemic that is again spiking throughout the nation.
“If there is any chance whatsoever that Joe Biden will be the next president, and it looks like he has a very good chance, the Trump administration should provide the Biden team with all transition materials, resources, and meetings necessary to ensure a smooth transition so that both sides are ready on day one,” Alexander said. “That especially should be true, for example, on vaccine distribution.”
He sounds reasonable enough in his plea for a peaceful transfer of power, saying it is “the most enduring symbol of our democracy.” But like so many of his Republican colleagues, he can’t seem to acknowledge that Biden won the election and leaves the door open just wide enough to suggest the election results may be invalid, with zero evidence.
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“Recounting votes and resolving disputes after a close election is not unprecedented and should reassure Americans that election results are valid,” Alexander said.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-21--Donald Trump Will Lose One Of His Twitter Accounts To Joe Biden On Inauguration Day

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Donald Trump will lose control of the official @POTUS Twitter account – which he currently uses to retweet his conspiracy theories and vitriol – on January 20, president-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration day.
The current content of the feed will be archived and wiped. The profile will then be passed to the Biden administration, the platform confirmed Friday.
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Around a dozen other official government accounts – such as the vice president’s @VP handle and the first lady’s @FLOTUS profile – will also be transferred to the Biden White House, said the company.
“Twitter is actively preparing to support the transition of White House institutional Twitter accounts on January 20th, 2021,” Twitter spokesperson Nick Pacilio said in a statement to CNN.
The process is being conducted “in close consultation with the National Archives and Records Administration” as it was for the transition of power between Barack Obama and Donald Trump following the 2016 election, Pacilio added.
Trump will retain control of his personal @realDonaldTrump account, which he frequently uses to spew conspiracy theories, share inflammatory content and launch vitriolic attacks.
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But once he is out of office, Trump will lose the protections the platform has afforded him due to his status as a world leader, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said this week.
It means Trump may, in theory at least, face suspension or even being banned from the platform for posting the kind of incendiary things he’s tweeted in the past, which would have gotten non-presidents kicked off.
Trump has used his personal @realDonaldTrump handle since the 2020 election to promote baseless allegations of widespread voter fraud to his 88.9 million followers.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-21--Holly Willoughby Reveals This Morning Absence Was Because Two Of Her Children Got Sick With Covid Sy

Holly Willoughby Reveals This Morning Absence Was Because Two Of Her Children Got Sick With Covid Symptoms

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Holly Willoughby has revealed why she was unexpectedly absent from This Morning for two days this week.
The presenter was a no-show on the ITV morning show on Wednesday and Thursday and viewers were given no explanation why.
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Holly has now revealed that two of her children became ill with Covid-19 symptoms.
The mum-of-three updated fans in an Instagram post shared on Saturday.
Holly Willoughby Karwai Tang via Getty Images
“Just wanted to say thank you for all your kind messages. Over the last few days two of our children were unwell and had symptoms of Covid,” she explained.
“In line with government guidelines we were waiting for results of the tests before I return to work.
“Couple that with just wanting to look after two poorly children, it meant having two days away from This Morning.”
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“I chose not to alert everyone to this because my focus was on looking after them.
“Thankfully all tests came back negative and everybody’s feeling much better... see you Monday!”
Holly Willoughby Holly Willoughby/Instagram
Holly was also tested, despite having no symptoms, and the family received the all-clear last night – meaning the 39-year-old will be back on our screens presenting This Morning on Monday.
Holly shares children Harry, 11, Belle, nine, and Chester, five, with producer husband Dan Baldwin.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--BBC Faces Backlash As 'Malicious' Radio Caller Repeatedly Uses N-Word

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The BBC has faced criticism for failing to act quickly when a ‘malicious’ caller repeatedly used the N-word during a live radio show.
The incident took place on BBC Radio London’s Sunny and Shay show – presented by husband and wife duo Mandeep ‘Sunny’ and Gursharonjit ‘Shay’ Grewal – on Saturday evening.
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During a conversation about board games in light of National Monopoly Day in the US on Friday, Sunny asked the caller what game they play.
“In my country we play a game where you are a white nationalist and kill all the N–s and gays,” the caller said.
″I want to say that I f–ing hate N–s,” they added before the call was terminated.
The bizarre exchange lasted over two minutes and the person used the racial slur around ten times speaking with a thick Italian accent, claiming to be from Greece.
After the conversation ended, Sunny said: “I’m sorry. (...) I don’t understand what he was going or where he was going with that conversation but he’s obviously someone who doesn’t understand the rules of how you come to engage here on the radio.”
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However, upset listeners have criticised the corporation for allowing the exchange to air for so long after the caller first used the racial slur.
Some have also taken issue with the BBC for a generally inadequate response to the matter – from the host’s apology to lack of public statement from the broadcaster.
One listener remarked: “From the minute the caller came on it was pretty obvious he was a prank. The accent was appalling and the producer and presenter should have been on the ball ready to get him off air. The response afterwards was lame.”
Another said: “It’s utterly bonkers that he wasn’t cut off immediately”.
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A BBC spokesperson told HuffPost UK: “An on-air apology was made and it has been removed from BBC Sounds.
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“This was one of several malicious calls made to our local stations in recent days. We have now further strengthened our protocols around phone-ins and referred the matter to the police.”
This comes after the BBC apologised for a news report which contained the N word in August.
More than 19,000 people complained to the BBC over the broadcast, which saw social affairs correspondent Fiona Lamdin repeat the racial slur allegedly used in a suspected racially-motivated attack in Bristol.
After the broadcaster initially defended the report, former director-general Tony Hall said in a statement that the BBC “now accepts that we should have taken a different approach at the time of broadcast and we are very sorry for that”.
The InfluencHers, a group of over 100 professional British women of African and Caribbean origin, called for a boycott of the BBC in response to its use of the slur.
BBC Radio 1xtra presenter Sideman quit the corporation over the broadcast.
Announcing the move on social media, he said: “This is an error in judgment where I can’t just smile with you through the process and act like everything is OK.
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“I’m happy working with organisations until we all get it right, but this feels like more than getting it wrong.”
The BBC also issued an apology for Lucy Worsley’s use of a racial slur in a recent documentary about the American Civil War.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--Rishi Sunak Hints At Public Sector Pay Freeze While Ruling Out Spending Review 'Austerity'

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Rishi Sunak has suggested he could freeze public sector pay in this week’s spending review, which he insisted would not be a return to austerity.
The chancellor will set out a multibillion pound plan to invest in long-term infrastructure projects and fund the fight against the coronavirus pandemic on Wednesday.
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But despite the fury of unions – who branded the plan “morally obscene” – Sunak suggested he could cap the salaries of millions of public sector workers outside the NHS, pointing out that he stressed the need to “exercise restraint” in pay awards earlier this year.
Are you considering a pay freeze for public sector workers?
Chancellor Rishi Sunak says he can't comment and will not say whether it has been ruled out. #Ridge
Read more here: https://t.co/7gDg3UeJWP pic.twitter.com/CCL4SJ9GoH — Sophy Ridge on Sunday (@RidgeOnSunday) November 22, 2020
The freezing of public sector pay was one of the totemic policies of the austerity era presided over by David Cameron and George Osborne as Tory PM and chancellor.
But Sunak told Sky’s Sophy Ridge On Sunday: “You will not see austerity next week, what you will see is an increase in government spending, on day-to-day public services, quite a significant one coming on the increase we had last year.”
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But, while he said that he “cannot comment on future pay policy”, Sunak added: “When we launched the spending review I did say to departments that when we think about public pay settlements I think it would be entirely reasonable to think of those in the context of the wider economic climate.
“I think it would be fair to also think about what is happening with wages, with jobs, with hours, across the economy, when we think about what the right thing to do in the public sector is.”
Sunak revealed his concerns about the ballooning scale of borrowing to pay for pandemic-related measures such as the furlough scheme, and a pay freeze would save the Treasury billions of pounds.
But the chancellor insisted now “in the fog of enormous economic uncertainty”, is not the time to impose tax hikes that are opposed by many Tory MPs.
Trades Union Congress chief Frances O’Grady appealed to a “sense of fairness” as she urged Sunak not to introduce a pay freeze.
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'If you want to motivate a workforce when we're facing the second wave of the pandemic, the last thing you do is threaten to cut their pay'
Frances O'Grady warns it would be "morally obscene" to freeze public sector pay. #Ridge
More here: https://t.co/7gDg3UeJWP pic.twitter.com/PPbmxMdkh5 — Sophy Ridge on Sunday (@RidgeOnSunday) November 22, 2020
“We saw ministers join millions of us clapping firefighters, refuse collectors, social care workers – I don’t think this would be the time to reward them with a real pay cut,” she told Ridge.
“If you want to motivate a workforce when we are still facing a second wave of a pandemic, and we’re going to have a tough winter – we all know that – the last thing you do is threaten to cut their pay.”
The GMB union meanwhile warned that public sector workers outnumber the majorities of new MPs in 43 out of the 54 seats the Tories won from Labour in December’s election.
Despite the loss of almost a million public sector jobs since 2010, on average public sector workers outstrip the incumbent MP’s majority by 3,400 in seats won by the Conservatives from Labour in the Midlands and the north, the union said.
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Rehana Azam, GMB national secretary, said: “A new pay freeze would be an outrageous attack on some of the workers who sacrificed the most during the Covid pandemic.
“Eight months ago, Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak promised to put their ‘arms around every single worker’ - now they are coming for the wages of teaching assistants who earn under £14,000 a year, and are already finding it difficult to make ends meet.”
In the spending review, Sunak will unveil a £3bn package to support the NHS in recovering from the pandemic, with the Treasury saying the NHS will get £1bn to address backlogs by catching up on checks, scans and operations that were delayed by Covid-19.
About £1.5bn will be used to ease existing pressures in the health service and £500m will help support mental health services.
Sunak will also detail the much-delayed national infrastructure strategy for £100bn of long-term spending to help tackle the climate crisis and invest in transport.
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thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--Victoria Beckham Hilariously Rips Husband David’s Shiny Teeth: ‘Is He Wearing These In For Someone E

Victoria Beckham Hilariously Rips Husband David’s Shiny Teeth: ‘Is He Wearing These In For Someone Else?’

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Victoria Beckham has hilariously ripped into husband David Beckham and his pearly whites.
The fashion designer couldn’t resist having a dig at the footballer after she was gifted an advent calendar from a fan, which was personalised with a photograph of the Beckham clan outside their Cotswolds home.
Victoria couldn't resist having a dig at husband David's teeth in the picture used on the advent calendar. Instagram
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“So today I received this incredible advent calendar that was sent to me... How amazing are David’s teeth?” she wrote on Instagram.
“But this is a personalised chocolate advent calendar and it was given to me by Kevin, who is a Spice Girls fan – a fan for 25 years – and he has written the most incredible letter that’s really touched me actually.
“We really do have the most wonderful Spice Girls fans. I feel so blessed and so lucky and I love this. Thank you so much Kevin – and once again, check out my husband’s teeth.”
She then joked: “I mean… Is @davidbeckham wearing these teeth in for someone else?!?”
David and Victoria Beckham SIPA USA/PA Images
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It’s not the first time Victoria has publicly taken the Michael out of her husband.
Earlier this month she made another playful dig after a photo showing David in an eye-catching pair of boots went viral.
Victoria posted a photo of herself and David posing in their poppies in honour of Remembrance Day.
“Wearing our poppies with pride today!” she wrote, alongside a picture of herself and David wrapped up outside.
While the sentiment of the post was praised by many, a select few were distracted by David’s choice of footwear, which quickly began doing the rounds online.
But while David’s boots led to him being compared to everyone from Hagrid to Santa Claus, Victoria had a rather different character in mind when she made a savage comment about them on her Instagram story.
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thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--No, I Won't Be Baking Banana Bread This Lockdown – Or Doing Anything Else

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2020 has been many things. A lot has been said about what we may have all learned this year. But with learning also comes unlearning, and I think this year has provided ample opportunity to question what we already know.
Haven’t we all got a bit lost and distracted by external noise, and forgotten the very basics of what is meaningful in life? There is real value for our mental and emotional wellbeing in questioning the messaging we’ve internalised about productivity, and what it means to achieve.
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The first half of 2020 consisted of “get fit, learn a language, hone your skills as being the next master baker, organise your music into alphabetical order for different moods”, and so on and so forth.
Do you remember that immense pressure we put on ourselves during the first lockdown to “DO, DO, DO”? I certainly do.
TuiPhotoengineer via Getty Images A woman learns a musical instrument online
And a lot of us did. We found things to fill our time that we would never have imagined before. But did we find time to just be?
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Don’t get me wrong, hobbies, creativity and getting active are great for us, but not when they are layered and coated heavily in outcome. They are great when we allow ourselves to participate in them for the simple pleasure of just doing them. That is when we get the greatest benefit.
Back in the first half of the year, even these creative outlets were wrapped up in outcome and pressure. But constant productivity has become detrimental to our everyday mental wellbeing. Creativity should never be tied down and suffocated by the looming spectre of productivity.
One of the most joyous things I have done this year is to get on my bike, put on some music and cycle down to the shop to get an ice cream or some pickled onion Monster Munch, and go and sit in the park and just be. This was a simple joy for me when I was growing up in my summer holidays, when days were endless and there was no routine and no expectations.
“If you find yourself doing nothing, don’t fall into the trap of feeling guilty.”
It’s important to remember who we are, this year of all years. We shouldn’t feel guilt or failure if we are “unproductive” or rally against a culture of constant doing. It’s critical we identify what truly brings us joy and the value of the small, the simple, of play, of imagination, of time, of space and of not having a schedule for a small period of our day, to allow ourselves that feeling of being taken somewhere not related to outcomes or goals or “things to do”.
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Of course, we all have responsibilities of work, earning an income, family, life admin, caring for others and much more, and that is absolutely a reality that we cannot ignore.
But what if society and all of us individually recognised the importance of just being, and gave ourselves that gift? Even if for just five or 10 minutes each day, we stopped and were kind to ourselves.
What would happen, how would we benefit and what would we discover about ourselves? How would our mental and emotional wellbeing benefit? What kind of creative outlets would appear? What inspiration?
Maybe in this second half of 2020 and second lockdown we can stop, and rather than focusing on the external doing we can retreat to our internal worlds and find out who we are, remember what we actually enjoy, and allow ourselves to play, to find joy, to rest, to just be rather than do. Getting back to basics, our foundations, remembering what we always knew but have forgotten.
Big questions are daunting – but once we start to look at them, we find clarity, and we can live our lives more authentically. And that is where the joy lies.
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Unlearning what we are told is to find happiness in life, what should make us feel good. Remembering what that actually looks likes for each of individually is a lesson we will never be able to forget again.
So, if you find yourself doing nothing, don’t fall into the trap of believing that ‘inner critic’ or feeling guilty, or rushing to ‘do’ something immediately. Instead, congratulate yourself on ‘unlearning’ and remembering what you knew to be true all along – that life is here to ‘be’ lived and not ‘done’.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--Social Distancing Measures Could End In Spring, Sage Member Says

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Social distancing measures could end in spring once the elderly and vulnerable population is vaccinated against coronavirus, one of the government’s scientific advisers has said.
Professor Calum Semple, who sits on the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), said the UK would be “looking towards the summer” before most of the population is vaccinated.
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“And that’s what will give us the immunity, the broad immunity, that allows us to return to normal,” the Liverpool university virus outbreak expert said.
But asked on Ridge on Sunday on Sky News whether that meant social distancing continuing until summer, Semple said: “I doubt that, because if we can vaccinate the frail and the elderly, then that will take the pressure off for groups that will be coming into hospital with severe disease.”
Semple added: “I do think we will be seeing lifting of the restrictions in the spring and I think there’s a lot to be optimistic about here.”
Following the interview, the scientist admitted his comments amounted to “speculation” and his assessment would depend on having “good vaccination” of vulnerable groups and the wider population remaining careful to reduce transmission.
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I'm first to say this is speculation and assumes that we have good vaccination in our most vulnerable groups and the rest of society has learnt to reduce transmission through behavioural change. — Professor Calum Semple OBE (@ProfCalumSemple) November 22, 2020
It came after health secretary Matt Hancock said the NHS could start vaccinating people against Covid-19 in December.
The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has been asked to assess the suitability of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, which has been found to be 90% effective.
The UK has ordered 40m doses of the vaccine, to cover 20m people, with enough for 10m jabs expected to be delivered by the new year.
The government has in total secured deals for 355m doses of prospective vaccines from several separate developers at various trial stages.
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Semple’s comments came as Boris Johnson prepared to reveal a tougher three-tiered system of local coronavirus restrictions for England when the national lockdown ends on December 2.
The prime minister will also detail his plan to allow people to see their loved ones at Christmas in a virtual statement to the Commons on Monday.
"Christmas is not going to be normal this year" says Chancellor @RishiSunak but the government is "looking at how families can spend time together".
He also says the country will leave national lockdown at the start of December, as promised.#Ridge https://t.co/7gDg3UeJWP pic.twitter.com/MqsdSwNM7Y — Sophy Ridge on Sunday (@RidgeOnSunday) November 22, 2020
More areas will be placed into higher tiers to ensure further restrictions are not needed, while the 10pm pub curfew will be relaxed to ensure last orders are called at that time, with venues then forced to close by 11pm.
Chancellor Rishi Sunak on Sunday stressed that Christmas would not be “normal”.
He told Ridge: “I think the good news is we’re going to be exiting national restrictions, which is something that I think people at the beginning of this were doubtful of and we said that was very much what we wanted to deliver, and we are going to deliver that.
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“The prime minister will be setting out more details tomorrow about going back to a more localised approach, seeing what we can do to allow families to see each other at Christmas time.
“But it is not going to be normal.”
Johnson is facing a rebellion of 70 Tory MPs who have said they cannot support the return to tiered restrictions unless the government can demonstrate they will slow transmission and “save more lives than they cost”.
The MPs on the Covid Recovery Group also demanded a full cost-benefit analysis of the restrictions on a regional basis “so that MPs can assess responsibly the non-Covid health impact of restrictions, as well as the undoubted impact on livelihoods.”
But Sunak indicated this would not be possible, insisting “it’s very hard to be precise” on the economic impacts of individual restrictions.
Asked if the Government would publish a cost-benefit analysis of future lockdown measures, he told Sky’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday: “It’s very hard to be precise in estimating the particular impact of a one-week restriction.
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thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--Trump Skips Pandemic Session At G-20 Summit, Heads To Golf Club

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President Donald Trump participated in the opening session of this year’s virtual Group of 20 summit on Saturday but did not attend a side event dedicated to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Trump instead left for the Trump National Golf Club in Sterling, Virginia, while that session was underway, CNN, The New York Times and Mother Jones reported.
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President Donald Trump plays golf at Trump National Golf Club in Sterling, Virginia, on Saturday. AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta
The G-20 summit, an annual forum of leaders from 19 countries and the European Union, was initially slated to take place this year in Saudi Arabia but became a virtual event because of the ongoing pandemic.
Trump attended the opening session Saturday morning, during which he touted the United States economy and military and told world leaders he looked forward to working with them “for a long time,” The Guardian reported.
He also tweeted multiple times during the session, alleging voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election.
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Trump left the summit not long after he finished speaking, according to Bloomberg News. Other unnamed leaders also left after delivering their own speeches, Bloomberg reported, citing unnamed officials. Coming and going from the long G-20 summit is standard practice, Bloomberg reported, adding that Trump stayed for at least the first hour.
Following the opening session, the summit hosted an event on pandemic preparedness and response, which was largely made up of prerecorded speeches, according to The Guardian. Trump had already left for the golf club when that session kicked off.
The event included remarks from Italian PM Giuseppe Conte, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and South Korean President Moon Jae-In, among others.
Trump drives a golf cart at Trump National Golf Club on Saturday. AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta
More than 11.7 million Americans have contracted Covid-19 since the pandemic began. The United States saw 195,000 new reported infections Friday, a record for new cases in a single day.
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Health experts said cases are likely to surge following the Thanksgiving holiday, and hospitals around the nation braced for onslaughts of new coronavirus patients.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--US Election: What Happened In Pennsylvania Yesterday And Why It's Devastating For Donald Trump

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On Saturday a US judge dismissed in extraordinary terms, yet another lawsuit critical to Donald Trump’s bizarre, desperate and long-shot bid to overturn his election defeat to Joe Biden.
The Trump campaign had sought to prevent state officials from certifying the results of the election in the state of Pennsylvania where Biden won by 81,000-votes.
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This is as mad as it sounds and unsurprisingly the Trump campaign has already failed in similar bids in courts in Georgia, Michigan and Arizona.
In the latest ruling in Pennsylvania, US District Judge Matthew Brann described the case as “strained legal arguments without merit and speculative accusations”.
He added that he “has no authority to take away the right to vote of even a single person, let alone millions of citizens”.
“This claim, like Frankenstein’s Monster, has been haphazardly stitched together.”
For non-lawyers, this is what a complete ass-kicking of the president's legal effort looks like.🥳 pic.twitter.com/uGrTVHT0LX — Marc E. Elias (@marceelias) November 21, 2020
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Since Biden was declared the winner two weeks ago, Trump has launched a barrage of lawsuits and mounted a pressure campaign to prevent states from certifying their vote totals.
The Pennsylvania case had been presented by Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani who presented no evidence of the voter fraud he has repeatedly said was rampant during the election.
Giuliani did not immediately respond to HuffPost’s request for comment on Saturday evening.
Asked earlier whether he had made a deal with Trump in exchange for a preemptive pardon, Giuliani told a HuffPost reporter, “get lost”.
Biden got 6 million more votes than Trump in the November 3 election, and also prevailed 306-232 in the state-by-state Electoral College system that determines who will take the oath of office on January 20.
He has spent the past several weeks preparing to take office, though Trump’s administration has refused to provide funding and security clearances to do so.
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Critics say Trump’s refusal to concede have serious implications for national security and the fight against the coronavirus, which has killed nearly 255,000 Americans.
Trump skipped a global coronavirus pandemic meeting to play golf on Saturday. ASSOCIATED PRESS
In order to remain in office, Trump would somehow need to overturn election results in at least three large states - an unprecedented feat in US history.
A recount in Georgia only affirmed Biden’s win there, and officials certified the result on Friday. Trump’s campaign said late Saturday it would request another recount.
In Wisconsin, election officials have criticised Trump volunteers for slowing a partial recount that is not expected to overturn Biden’s victory.
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With recounts and lawsuits coming up short, Trump is now pressuring Republican-led state legislatures to throw out the vote totals and declare him the winner.
“Hopefully the Courts and/or Legislatures will have ... the COURAGE to do what has to be done to maintain the integrity of our Elections and the United States of America itself,” he wrote on Twitter after the Pennsylvania ruling.
On Friday, he summoned two top Republicans in Michigan’s legislature to the White House. After the meeting, they said they saw no evidence that would lead them to intervene. Biden is leading Trump in Michigan by 154,000 votes.
Election officials across the country say there is no evidence of significant voting fraud, and Trump’s own administration has called the election the “most secure in American history”.
But Trump’s accusations have continued to inflame his hard-core Republican base.
Half of Republicans believe the election was stolen from Trump, according to Reuters/Ipsos polling, and supporters have staged rallies across the country to protest the outcome.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--Journalists' Mental Health Is In Crisis. And That Matters For All Of Us

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We are both journalists, by training. We are both mental health campaigners.
One of us, in particular, after jumping the fence to politics, has had a lot to say about journalists and journalism over the years, not all good.
The other has spent years in journalism safety, knowing this is more than the elimination of physical risk. But today both of us are worried, for journalists.
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We are talking mental health. And asking, whether media owners and editors are taking sufficient account of the mental health implications for their journalists in the current environment.
Politicians targeting the media as enemies, even while claiming to support free speech. Technological change leading to the need for ever more output prepared and produced by, all too often, ever fewer people. Fake news. Never-ending breaking news. Harassment and abuse, especially online, especially of women.
Add to this the huge financial uncertainty of the media, all too often chronic job insecurity, with the pandemic thrown in, and you have something of a cocktail for mental ill health.
“Journalism at its best is about the pursuit of truth. Owners and editors need to face up to the truth that right now, a lot of people are pretending to cope when they aren't”
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fizkes via Getty Images
Most journalists thrive under pressure. Hence their gravitation to an industry which rewards risk taking, rails against regular hours, is sociable to a fault. But it is an industry that seeks to shine a light in dark places and yet often fails to shine a light on itself.
We have both suffered severe mental distress related to our work. We have both had breakdowns as journalists. We have both survived with the support of family, friends and colleagues, and have gained skills which allow us to deal better with the bad days – of which there are still too many. Not least openness, and the insight that talking helps.
But we know there are others who are struggling, and who are silenced, and we are worried.
The Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, the International Center for Journalists, along with the Tow Center for Digital Journalism, and the Dart Centre for Trauma and Journalism have all highlighted the high emotional toll on journalists in this year of global pandemic.
Journalists are exhausted by the impact of Covid-19, unable or unwilling to switch off from the biggest story of their lives, one which affects us all albeit in different ways.
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The industry has been forced to reinvent decades of work practice in weeks. Journalists are working remotely or on new frontlines of an invisible danger, with a vast visible impact, often infiltrating their own homes. The boundaries blur between work and home lives, with extra pressures for people who are isolated or impacted by limited space, noise, or having to share it children, housemates, or extended families. No different to anyone else, yes. But this is a community so used to social connection, suddenly disconnected, and yet which has to be hyperconnected too.
“We have both experienced the soul numbing emptiness of depression, the sense of being in a different orbit from everyone else.”
There has been huge progress in the debate on mental health and the openness to discuss it publicly, and the UK media can take much of the credit for that. But as employers, is the industry walking the walk?
All too often journalists are still fearful an admission they are struggling will impact their reputations, worried that speaking out will cost them a promotion, their next deployment, that it will make them a liability of sorts. This year has thrown into sharp relief the emotional burden carried by journalists of colour, who are often among the most marginalised and under-represented.
The two of us have been relatively fortunate, and we have the platform to speak out to show others they are not alone, to help people practise the skills that are needed to modernise outdated structures of management that reinforce taboos.
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We both know behaviour that might look like coping but is effectively unsustainable self-sabotage. We’ve both done it. Drunk too much. Worked too hard. Put work ahead of family.
We have both experienced the soul numbing emptiness of depression, the sense of being in a different orbit from everyone else, and yet most of the time been able to put on our coping cloaks and get through the day. And we both know this is not healthy.
Journalism at its best is about the pursuit of truth. Owners and editors need to face up to the truth that right now, a lot of people are pretending to cope when they are not, pretending to be fine when they are not. It is the job of leaders to let those journalists know, it is OK not to be OK, OK to say so, and it won’t be held against them.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--Euphoria Star Lukas Gage Calls Out ‘S*** Talking’ Director For Mocking His Flat On Unmuted Zoom Call

Euphoria star Lukas Gage has shared the moment a director insulted his home during a Zoom audition - without realising he wasn’t on mute.
As the actor joins the call to perform a scene, a male director can be heard telling someone else on the video call: “These poor people live in these tiny apartments. Like I’m looking at his background, and he’s got his TV and you know...”
The wincing star replies: “Yeah, unmuted.”
He adds: “I know, it’s a shitty apartment. That’s why give me this job, so I can get a better one!”
psa if youre a shit talking director make sure to mute ur shit on zoom mtgings pic.twitter.com/PTgMZcRhEw — lukas gage (@lukasgage) November 20, 2020
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Cue a whole load of backpedaling and apologising from the unknown director when he realises his mistake.
“Oh my God, I’m so, so sorry,” he tells him. “I’m mortified.”
Lukas later posted the video to his Twitter and Instagram accounts with the note: “psa: If you’re a shit talking director make sure to mute ur shit on zoom meetings.”
After he shared the clip, the 25-year-old, who plays Tyler in Euphoria, received support from fellow actors, including Downton Abbey star Hugh Bonneville and Glee actor Kevin McHale.
Well done for handling that patronising British twerp with such good grace. 👏 — Hugh Bonneville (@hughbon) November 21, 2020
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Thank u @lukasgage for posting this. Actors have to walk out on the plank and be open and vulnerable in an audition and too often the people on the other side have 0 regard for what that takes and how personal it is. fuck 'em. (also that room is nice & u handled that v well) https://t.co/7ZeVhuW3lF — Kevin McHale (@druidDUDE) November 21, 2020
As a young man I would have dreamed of an apartment like this one. Look at that sweet flat screen! The guitar! The moldings! https://t.co/cAEGxLy03G — Judd Apatow (@JuddApatow) November 21, 2020
Mad Men star January Jones commented: “Classy response Lukas. DM me who it was so I can make note not to ever work with that person.”


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--Everything We Know About The New 'Strengthened' Coronavirus Tier System

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As Christmas approaches and the weather turns ever bleaker, Boris Johnson will on Monday outline the coronavirus restrictions that look set to govern lives in England during the winter months.
The PM is expected to announce a strengthened three-tier system of local restrictions to replace the current national lockdown that ends on December 2.
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This is everything we know about that new tier system, starting with that most pressing of topics...
What are we allowed to do at Christmas?
Multiple households – potentially three – could be allowed to create a bubble temporarily between December 22 and 28, with the plans covering all four nations of the UK.
Restrictions on church services are also due to be lifted, allowing Christmas Day services to be held.
But while plans have not yet been set out, ministers have made clear that the festive season will be different from normal.
Leaders from all four UK nations have “endorsed a shared objective of facilitating some limited additional household bubbling for a small number of days”, the Cabinet Office said over the weekend, in words that would have been totally incomprehensible to anyone 12 months ago.
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What will change when lockdown ends on December 2?
Boris Johnson will on Monday announce the details of the “Covid winter plan” which will see every area of England re-enter the tiered system in place before the current lockdown was imposed.
We do know some of the details already – gyms and non-essential shops will be allowed to reopen and mass testing, currently being piloted in Liverpool, is set to be introduced in all areas.
The full rules of each tier will be announced on Monday but where they will apply will not be revealed until Thursday.
MPs are expected to be given a vote to approve the new system in the days before it comes into force.
What was the original three-tier system?
Johnson announced the original three-tier strategy in October, which split different areas of England into “medium”, “high” and “very high” alert levels.
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Areas in the first tier – medium alert – saw little change, being subject to the same base-level national measures that had already been in force. That meant a 10pm curfew for pubs and restaurants and a ban on most gatherings of more than six people.
Under the second tier – high alert – household mixing was banned indoors while the rule of six continued to apply outdoors.
Tier 3 – very high alert – banned social mixing both indoors and in private gardens, while pubs and bars were told to close unless they could operate as a restaurant.
Local leaders were to help determine whether other venues should be closed, such as gyms or casinos, in very high alert level areas. Initially, in Liverpool, gyms shut, while other areas under tier 3 kept them open. Eventually, gyms in Liverpool reopened.
But the system faced criticism as not being strong enough to reduce the spread of the virus.
People wearing face masks walk down Market Street, Manchester. PA
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Could easing restrictions backfire?
Possibly. Earlier this month Public Health England (PHE) said an extra five days of strict lockdown measures would have to be imposed for every single day the rules are relaxed over Christmas.
PHE deputy director Dr Susan Hopkins has said “hopefully” the PM would allow “some mixing” of people over the Christmas holidays, but added: “Then, I think, once we have got past the Christmas period if there has been a release and some socialisation we will all have to be very responsible and reduce those contacts again.” If as reported there are seven days of relaxed restrictions between December 22 and 28, that could mean 35 extra days of lockdown.
Why was the tier system criticised?
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said the toughest tier of restrictions was simply “a gateway to weeks and weeks, more likely months and months, of agony from which there’s no likely exit”.
Local leaders similarly complained that once an area was placed in Tier 3 it was not clear what it had to do to get out of it.
The British Medical Association (BMA) also said that the system was “inadequate” and did not contain the spread of the virus.
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A shop sells face masks on Oxford Street in London, Tuesday, October 13. ASSOCIATED PRESS
Did the tier system work?
There has been some indication that the system helped in parts of the country.
Dr Susan Hopkins, a Public Health England director advising the government’s coronavirus response, said recently that ter 1 restrictions had “very little effect”, tier 2 varied across areas and tier 3, especially “tier 3 plus”, had reduced case numbers in the north-west.
She said the government may have to think about “strengthening” tiers “in order to get us through the winter months”.
Experts on the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Modelling (SPI-M), which advises the government, believe infections will rise at the same rate as before if the three-tier system is brought back in December. That rise culminated, of course, in the introduction of a second national lockdown.
People walk in a shopping high street in Wrexham, North Wales on November 9. PAUL ELLIS via Getty Images
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How long will the new system last for?
The government is optimistic that restrictions can be gradually reduced in the run-up to spring, providing vaccines are approved by regulators, allowing a plan for the rollout to begin next month before a wider programme in the new year.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--Strictly Come Dancing’s Caroline Quentin Licked Partner Johannes During Cha-Cha-Cha Routine And View

Strictly Come Dancing’s Caroline Quentin Licked Partner Johannes During Cha-Cha-Cha Routine And Viewers Have Thoughts

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We’re used to seeing plenty of armography on Strictly Come Dancing, but on Saturday’s show, Caroline Quentin treated us all to some erm, tongue-ography.
It all got a little Woman Behaving Badly during the actor’s Cha Cha, with Caroline playing the role of a naughty housewife whose cat gets stuck up a tree and calls on a fireman - her professional dance partner Johannes Radebe - to come to the rescue.
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There was a lot of comedic face-pulling throughout, and then this happened...
#Strictly pic.twitter.com/RU3FNNU1Am
Caroline Quintin 100% inappropriate. Vile. Rest of show fantastic 👍👍👍 — Darran Bilton (@dalbydasher) November 21, 2020
Strictly viewers had never seen the likes of it before (and some never wanted to again)…
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Caroline and Johannes have big “the mother of the bride on a hen do meets twink in a gay bar” energy #Strictly — Tony (@AntMelia94) November 21, 2020
Put your tongue away Caroline 😂🤦🏼♀ #Strictly — Clare (@fiestyclare) November 21, 2020
But plenty of viewers were here for the comedy element of the routine...
Can’t remember the last time I LAUGHED with a dance. The joy that is Caroline Quentin 👏🏼 #Strictly — Alex (@AMG_Review) November 21, 2020
Caroline licking Johannes' bicep is absolutely a mood #Strictly — Davina Kesby (@Kesby_) November 21, 2020
Rarely strictly gets me crying with laughter but Caroline and Johannes managed it. Brilliant and such good fun. #Strictly — Tracy Ferris (@RootooTracy) November 21, 2020
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Caroline and Johannes can do no wrong I love everything they do she just never fails to make me smile another amazing performance #Strictly https://t.co/AfargN5Hx3 — Courtney 🎄🎅 (@Ben4eva) November 21, 2020
The Men Behaving Badly star ended up second from bottom on the scoreboard after bagging eight points from the three judges, including Craig Revel-Horwood who remarked: “I think Johannes is the only one that needs rescuing!”
He added: “We really could have done without your tongue. I felt like I was watching an episode of Are You Being Served?
“I’m sure you based your character on that... but I loved it, I absolutely loved it.”
Speaking about the dance afterwards, Caroline said: “I think we have enjoyed ourselves a bit too much probably.
“It’s been ludicrous the amount of fun we have had.”
Elsewhere on this week’s show, Jamie Laing wowed the Strictly judges – hitting the top of the leaderboard.
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The Made In Chelsea star and his partner Karen Hauer notched up 29 points for their street dance.
After topping the leaderboard last week, Radio 1 presenter Clara Amfo ended up at the bottom of it this week, receiving just 18 points from the judges for her samba with Aljaz Skorjanec.
Shirley Ballas told Amfo that her feet “missed the mark” and it was her “weakest performance so far”.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--'Things Are Getting Very Serious': Jordan Kristine Seamón Is Who She Is

Jordan Kristine Seamón is a name we’re all going to be hearing a lot more of.
The American actor plays one of two lead roles in perhaps the last big TV release of the year: We Are Who We Are.
Helmed by Call Me By Your Name director Luca Guadagnino, the drama has already generated huge groundswell in the States, not that newcomer Jordan would know: lockdown has prohibited the usual international press tours and because of face masks, she’s not been recognised – except for one slightly unsettling fan encounter.
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“It was really weird so I’m not looking forward to that happening again,” she tells HuffPost UK. “I was sitting in the eye doctor’s office and this young lady was looking at me, like a lot,” she says, laughing.
“She stared at me and looked back down at her phone then looked at me again. I wasn’t sure if it was something on my face... I was getting up to go and she got up and stopped me and said, ‘excuse me, do you know Jack Dylan Grazer?’
“I wasn’t sure how to respond but I didn’t want to lie so I said, ‘yes.’ She then showed me a picture that I took months ago with myself and Jack and said, ‘is this you?’ I said ‘yes’ and she said, ‘oh, that’s so cool,’ and then ran away.
“Not like walked away casually, she bolted out of the store, gone. I don’t know where she came from, I don’t know where she went. I just remember telling my mum that we needed to leave immediately so we could go home in case I saw her again.”
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We Are Who We Are also stars Jack Dylan Grazer angsty teen Frazer BBC
If being recognised is the downside for the 17-year-old actor, who admits she was focusing on music before she chanced it by sending in an audition tape for this role, the upsides include asserting herself as one of the brightest young acting talents around.
Another upside for Jordan is the discovery of her gender fluidity, which was the result of working on the show.
We Are Who We Are is the story of two Gen Z teens - Caitlin and Luca - growing up within the strict confines of an American military base in Northern Italy, who both experiment with their gender expressions.
“I had come out to my mum a few months before I even did my first audition, and I’ve just come out to the world a week ago on MTV News,” she says. “I hate that, but the world now knows about everything.”
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“I’m definitely thankful because the show helped me on my journey of self discovery and I’m still changing, still learning every day.”
She had identified as bisexual and used she/her pronouns, but since filming has realised she is gender fluid: which means she is happy being referred to as male, female or the non-binary pronouns they/them.
She finds each makes her feel comfortable. “A lot of people still refer to me as she/her but I have people that refer to me as they/them, and every once in a while I’ll get a he/him which feels good and I appreciate it,” she says. “I’m definitely thankful because the show helped me on my journey of self discovery and I’m still changing, still learning every day.”
The show’s themes are presented across a gorgeous-looking eight-part series, primed with balmy shots of desolate Italian beaches and endless swimming. It’s stylistic, with a distinctly Call Me By Your Name aesthetic, and if anything the characters and the conversations feel even more authentic: as if ripped straight from reality.
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Jordan, who plays Caitlin in the drama, is responsible for helping director Luca marry his vision with the reality of life for Gen Z teenagers.
“There are definitely a few scenes where we might have mentioned, ’Hey, that’s not something a teenager would say in 2014 [the year the show is set in] - that’s something somebody would say in 1947, so you should probably change that,” Jordan says. “[Director] Luca is very open to trying new things which I think makes the show so authentic.”
Jordan says she felt afraid of Luca’s intense directorial style when they first met, and hadn’t at first even realised he had helmed Call Me By Your Name, which she loved. But that fear ebbed away the more two worked together on set.
She highlights one particular scene in episode seven as an example of how the pair collaborated.
“Originally I’m supposed to read the message and cry into my hands,” she says of the scene. “I asked Luca if he thought it’d be good if I broke down and cried on my knees intensely. He said let’s just try it.
“I did it once, he liked it, I did it again, he liked it. I wasn’t sure if he actually liked it or was just saying that, but if you watch the show it’s actually in the scene, so he actually did like it which feels good.”
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Adapting the scene felt crucial to the storytelling for Jordan. “Throughout the rest of the season you see Caitlin vulnerable, but you don’t see the very, very true vulnerability, like, ‘I can’t even control this,’ to the point where she breaks down.”
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Luca had a similarly honest relationship with Jordan when he told her she was the only person he wanted for the role of Caitlin.
“He told me after we shot the show when the fifth or sixth episode was out in America that he knew that he wanted me from the very first self tape that I sent in and he was determined,” Jordan reveals.
Despite the odd cultural clash, Luca was an inspiration for Jordan. She hopes to go into writing and directing with his mantra of ‘just try it’ at the forefront of her mind. But for her next move, she may take a turn away from the themes of confinement, repression and angst that define We Are Who We Are.
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“As a Black person and a member of the LGBTQ community, I’m definitely very adamant about making sure that whatever role I do take is a good one with a good message.” - Jordan Kristine Seamón
She’s interested in working on a lighter project, although nothing’s in the diary yet. “Apparently my name is around, that’s always weird to hear but I’m thankful,” she says.
Starring alongside Jack Dylan Grazer, himself already a Gen Z star with 4 million Instagram followers off the back of roles in IT and Beautiful Boy, she may soon experience a similar level of attention.
There’s only one rule for future projects: that all she puts her name to is equally as representative as We Are Who We Are.
“As a Black person and a member of the LGBTQ community, I’m definitely very adamant about making sure that whatever role I do take is a good one with a good message, and people feel represented well, whether that be my gaybies or people of colour,” she states.
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She’s currently looking at potential managers. “Things are getting very serious,” she admits.
In the immediate future she’s on a mission to offset the severity of We Are Who We Are with something a little cheerier.
“I hope I get into some comedy as I like to laugh and like to have fun,” she reflects.
“Everything I’ve done so far is very dramatic and very heavy. I’d like to do something that is stupid and dumb.”


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--These People Were Killed In The UK's Second Wave Of Covid-19

On November 11 – just eight months after its first recorded fatality – the UK’s Covid-19 death toll passed 50,000.
In September, health secretary Matt Hancock told the Commons’ health and social care committee there was “no inevitability to a second peak”.
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Each day brings more news of fatalities in the hundreds. And with each day, it becomes harder to focus on the individuals behind the numbers.
As one grieving family member told HuffPost UK: “These victims aren’t just a sad statistic. Behind every one of those numbers is a human being who was loved, whose smiles lit up the room and who have left broken hearts behind them.
“They deserve recognition.”
Anne Chapman, 78
Died October 16 in County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland
“If you compare us to other families, we're very lucky." HuffPost UK
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A devout Catholic and former nurse, Anne Chapman was adored by her family and her entire community. Upon her death, the streets of her village of Newtownbutler were lined with mourners to pay their respects.
“She was just amazing,” her daughter Thérése told HuffPost UK. “She loved her children and her grandchildren. She did so much good and everybody loved her. She was an amazing example of how a human being should be.
“Mammy loved her faith and a good old Catholic pilgrimage, but she was also always up for the craic. She loved going on cruises with her friends and sun holidays, Mrs Brown’s Boys and Strictly Come Dancing.”
In 2016, Anne was diagnosed with blood cancer. A mother-of-eight, she was unfazed by the prognosis but within a short space of time went from walking 10 miles each day to not being able to go to the kitchen for a cup of tea.
“You only had to look at them to know the love they had for each other was evident and strong." HuffPost UK
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She had only just completed 10 months of cancer treatment at the beginning of October when she suddenly fell sick. A few days later, she tested positive for Covid-19.
“I couldn’t quite believe it,” Thérése said. “We come from a little village in Northern Ireland where nobody had it.” Just two weeks later, Anne became the village’s first Covid-19 victim.
Her husband, 78, also became sick and is now in his fifth week in hospital battling the virus. In a “bizarre” twist of fate, the couple ended up on the same ward together – the hospital’s first “Covid couple”.
When Anne passed, he was sitting right beside her. The family are optimistic about his chances of recovery but say he is “heartbroken” and hospital staff are worried about his emotional state.
“They weren’t a lovey-dovey couple but you only had to look at them to know the love they had for each other was evident and strong. Now that chain is broken, and Daddy’s grieving. He’s a broken man in every sense of the word.”
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Thérése was in Birmingham when she first learned of her mother’s Covid-19 test result and was unable to travel back to Northern Ireland in time. “We were so close so it was very difficult for me to not be with her.”
"She was an amazing example of how a human being should be." HuffPost UK
It’s something she struggles to come to terms with. In addition to speaking with her priests, Thérése has found support in the Alone Together network alongside other people across the UK who have lost loved ones to the pandemic. “To lose somebody in these circumstances... I just felt nobody else understood.”
“In Ireland, your funeral is a big, beautiful thing,” she continued. “It’s something to be celebrated like your wedding or baptism. Your coffin would be open for a day or two so your friends and family could sit and say their goodbyes.
“The church would be absolutely packed and the celebration provides a lot of comfort for people. But because of Covid, we didn’t get that comfort. It’s just not how we say goodbye in our faith.”
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Despite the sudden and irreplaceable loss of her mother, Thérése believes her family are the lucky ones. “If you compare us to other families, many have died alone. My father was with my mother, holding her hand.
“She was not on her own.”
Catherine Mehdaoui, 57
Died October 31 in Liverpool
"When one of us was feeling OK, the other could talk. Now there’s no one left to have those kinds of conversations with." HuffPost UK
In a heartwarming tribute in their local newspaper, Catherine Mehdaoui is described by her son, Dan, as an outgoing former punk with a “lust for life”. “There was never a time when she wasn’t smiling,” the tribute reads.
“It depends on how much reality you want,” Dan, 33, admitted to HuffPost UK. “I can celebrate so much about my mum; she had this great sense of humour and she was a fighter.
“But the truth is that towards the end, she was also very, very scared. She was literally petrified and alone and isolated.”
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Catherine was 57 when she died in hospital after testing positive for Covid-19. Earlier this year, she had been diagnosed with stage three lung cancer. “We always knew it was terminal but we thought she’d make it through Christmas.”
“She had this great sense of humour but towards the end, she was also very, very scared." HuffPost UK
While she was in hospital receiving radiation treatment and chemotherapy, Catherine was placed in a ward close to one that was treating patients with coronavirus.
In the weeks preceding her death, she sent messages to virtually everyone she knew. “Taking pain and sickness tablets but still in pain and sick with worry,” one said. Another talked about the lack of doctors and protection on the ward.
“She was convinced she was unnecessarily exposed to Covid-19. It wasn’t till she had passed on and I went through her phone, that I actually realised how scared she was.”
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Dan places the responsibility of his mother being infected with Covid-19 squarely on “bad policies on the hospital’s behalf”. Her death has left him – her only child – in a thousand pieces. “We were very close. We leaned on each other because we considered ourselves the last of our family. The ones I’ve got left I don’t even know.”
“There was never a time when she wasn’t smiling." HuffPost UK
They also supported each other when they were experiencing difficulties with their mental health. “The special thing about my mum is that she recognised part of my [depression]. When one of us was feeling OK, the other could talk. Now there’s no one left to have those kinds of conversations with.
“The most brutal thing is to have to face Christmas alone now. I had accepted the cancer but I wasn’t prepared for Covid. I’m in hell.”
In order to raise money for his mother’s funeral costs, Dan has set up a GoFundMe page on which he has written: “She was a special person with a witty personality. Those who knew her knew she could also be stubborn. She often went out of her way to help others in times of need.
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“Only those who knew her can feel the loss inside of such a special person and as for myself she was one of the pieces of my life that still made any sense.”
Wilbald Tesha, 60
Died September 2 in Eastbourne
“There were so many people who considered him as their best friend." HuffPost UK
Known to his friends simply as Tesha, Wilbald Tesha worked for the NHS as a psychiatric nurse after moving to the UK from Tanzania. His friend and former colleague, Jason O’Flaherty, described Tesha’s life as a “really positive story about immigration”.
“He gave 30 years to the NHS and he was really admired for that work,” Jason told HuffPost UK. “Throughout his time here, he helped lots of people – all of his colleagues and friends. He would do anything for anybody.”
Immensely proud of his Tanzanian heritage, Tesha would regularly take trips to his small village at the foot of Mount Kilimanjaro, where his seven-year-old son remains. “Anyone who knew him knew about where he had come from, and he was always trying to get people to go back to his village and support it in some way.”
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He and his brother helped build a high school and install running water in their village of Shimbwe, and even as he was in hospital being treated for coronavirus, Tesha was making plans to develop a new project to support the children in his village.
Tesha HuffPost UK
A fundraiser created in Tesha’s memory to support his former primary school and other schools in Shimbwe has received almost £10,000 in donations.
Tesha dedicated his working life to the NHS, where he largely spent at Eastbourne District General Hospital. “I have heard many, many wonderful things about Tesha and what a kind, caring and compassionate nurse he was,” said Samantha Allen, chief executive of Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation.
“A good friend to many and someone who would do anything to help another.”
In July, Tesha tested positive for Covid-19 after working night shifts assessing patients with acute mental health problems in the A&E department at the hospital. After more than a month in intensive care, Tesha became the 196th frontline healthcare worker in the UK to have lost their life to the pandemic, according to PA news agency. “He was taken too soon,” said Jason.
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“He was Black African, so he was at a higher risk and he was aware and concerned about that, but he was also really committed to his role as a nurse,” said Jason – who also works as an NHS nurse.
“Some of his colleagues definitely think [his dying of Covid-19] was preventable. We’ve had so many mixed messages around what PPE we should be wearing and he was definitely worried – we were all worried.”
Tesha and Jason met as students and stayed close friends in the decades that followed; Tesha was the best man at Jason’s wedding in 2015. “He was a lovely, kind person. We’ve had an amazing response from people about the impact he had on their lives.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-11-22--I Grew Up Surrounded By Religious Fanatics. Here's What I Know About Trump Supporters

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During the days immediately after the election, most of which I spent doomscrolling through social media on my phone in a kind of trance, my childhood best friend sent me a clip. Her caption was simple: “When people ask me why I don’t go to church anymore.” I gave the wry chuckle of someone who knows a joke before it’s told, and since my friend and I share a background steeped in religious fundamentalism, in a way, I did.
I clicked the link for a laugh, and there stood televangelist Kenneth Copeland with his unnaturally dark hair, his wizened, waxy face, and his fervent eyes. “The media says Joe Biden’s the president!” he exclaims before he begins laughing like a washed-up comedian who’s decided the best way to get a laugh is to cue the audience with one of his own, which is an apt description, all things considered.
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The clip dripped with the viral potential it would go on to fulfil in the coming days. A prominent man melting down in such a publicly awkward way was apparently the laugh so many people needed after several nail-biting days of election returns. But as I saw the familiar face twisted with delusional laughter, a chill came over me. I recognised the manic glitter in his eyes, and I couldn’t laugh.
I grew up in a home tinged with religious mania, and my Christian fundamentalist home-school family ran exclusively in circles where this mania was not only tolerated but encouraged. We attended a church where people barked like dogs “in the spirit.” Others, allegedly compelled by the Holy Ghost, ran at breakneck speed around the sanctuary, and some members, filled with apparent “supernatural” joy, laughed like Kenneth Copeland.
Not all of our worship crossed the border of the bizarre. Mostly we raised our hands in supplication and swayed to the rise and fall of a carefully orchestrated emotional experience like most Protestant praise services. There is something about a group of people connecting with their spirituality in unison that causes an electric response. The kind of response that one Sunday led to our entire congregation lining up, and, at the touch of a remarkably dynamic worship leader, falling to the floor like dominoes ― slain, as we were, in the spirit.
“It’s an emotional high ― this rush of belonging ― a sense that you’re part of something bigger than yourself that nudges you out of a plane because everybody else is doing it. And I recognize it in Trump’s supporters, who disavow credible news sites and march in the streets to 'stop the steal.'”
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In his early 20s, my father was a paratrooper in the U.S. Army. I asked him recently how he talked himself into jumping out of planes. “Were you excited about it? Like ... did you want to or something?” I asked, trying to square my ponderous dad who spends most of his evening curled up with a Louis L’Amour novel with the kind of adrenaline junkie typically associated with skydiving.
“No,” he answered, pausing to think. “I was pretty scared every single time.”
“So, then how did you get yourself to jump? Did they push you or force you?”
“Well, no. I guess ... it’s hard to explain,” he replied. “You’re just all in a line, one after another. The guy in front of you jumps and the guy behind you is waiting, and so you just ... jump.”
It’s the closest thing I’ve heard to describe the feeling of being “slain in the spirit.” It’s not that I really believed I’d been overcome by a supernatural force. In fact, I remember lying on the carpeted floor of the sanctuary and worrying that a prowling deacon would notice me chewing my gum, but despite knowing that it wasn’t really God that knocked me to the ground, it had still felt involuntary.
I recognise it now ― as an adult who’s been drunk and stoned a time or two ― that hazy, out-of-body feeling. It’s an emotional high ― this rush of belonging ― a sense that you’re part of something bigger than yourself that nudges you out of a plane because everybody else is doing it. And I recognise it in President Donald Trump’s supporters, who disavow credible news sites and march in the streets to “stop the steal.” There’s a euphoria that comes from being part of a mindless drama.
We took it home from church, of course. We didn’t laugh in the spirit on Sunday and then go about our weekdays in the mundane order of the unwashed masses. These extreme behaviours that our circle of friends termed “charismatic” came with a particular set of beliefs that informed every choice our family made. The world was literally always about to end, angels and demons were haunting all of us, and the nonbelievers we rarely came into contact with were either our mission field or our battlefield, depending on the focus of our daily devotional.
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You might interpret my story to this point as the eccentric childhood of someone who grew up in the space between regular Christians and snake handling fanatics, and I suppose you’d be right, but to label something “eccentric” implies a level of harmlessness that I can’t apply to my childhood. Because just like Trump and his supporters working to undermine our democracy illustrate, deluded fanaticism is always harmful, and my family was no exception.
The author, age 7, ready to head outside and explore her family's 50-acre farm. Courtesy of Olivia Christensen
I’ll never forget the day my mom hid my siblings and me in the attic because she saw a flash in the woods behind our house and thought we were being raided by agents of the shadow government. We spent hours in that hot, stuffy attic, wondering if our mom was alive or dead, wondering if we were going to be dragged from our home and executed for our faith.
On another occasion, my mom, frustrated by my little brother’s behavioural issues she believed were the result of demonic possession, sought help from a family psychologist who attended our dog-barking, spirit-slaying church. After a few quiet sessions of therapy and prayer in our living room, my mom and the psychologist realised that the issue must be confronted head on, and they scheduled an exorcism. Together they stood above the angry, tear-stained face of my 8-year-old brother huddled on our floor and summoned the spirits from him, rebuking them by name, and asserting their divine authority.
This ritual went on for over an hour. My mom told my dad about it when he got home, recounting the events of the afternoon like it had been an exciting sporting event. She told him things the demon had said to them (through the mouth of the little boy, of course), the commands they had responded with, and the palpable shift in the atmosphere when the demon eventually surrendered and fled.
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I remember inwardly calling BS ― my mom, as you may have gathered, has a penchant for melodrama, and having witnessed the event for myself, I knew what I had seen was something I didn’t have a name for yet, but as an adult, I call “abuse.” I remember wondering if my dad believed her, and I remember being afraid because it didn’t matter: Mom had jumped, the psychologist was right behind, and we were all going out the plane door with them.
“Having grown up surrounded by True Believers, I know firsthand that the danger comes from the origin of their beliefs. Their worldviews are not shaped by facts or research, but by the good feeling they derive from their sense of belonging and the rush of being right, even if no one outside their group agrees ― perhaps especially if no one outside their group agrees.”
The collective emotional high I recognise in Trump’s most ardent supporters is the kind of mass hysteria we typically associate with the Salem witch trials, and, as history shows us, it never ends well. It’s a cult mentality populated by True Believers. Having grown up surrounded by True Believers, I know firsthand that the danger comes from the origin of their beliefs. Their worldviews are not shaped by facts or research, but by the good feeling they derive from their sense of belonging and the rush of being right, even if no one outside their group agrees ― perhaps especially if no one outside their group agrees.
This contrarian groupthink is why I feel less amused than afraid when I see thousands marching in the streets of D.C. in support of the current administration or Donald Trump refuting irrefutable facts from the Oval Office, or Kenneth Copeland maniacally laughing in the face of the president’s defeat. Not all Trump voters are MAGA-hat-wearing Trump devotees, but all MAGA-hat-wearing devotees are members of a radical group that gets an emotional high from their own perceived subversion, and like any great high, this kind of fervour can lead to an aggressively protected addiction.
Growing up, I saw my parents’ beliefs as the ocean, and the people in our life outside of our church group ― our extended family, old friends and neighbours ― as the tether that was keeping us moored to dry land. The thing is, the closer they felt to the other boats that sailed on the sea of their beliefs, the more they resented that tether, and the closer they came to cutting it so they could float away entirely. They never quite did. A job opportunity and a move took us away from that group of friends, and over the years my parents’ fanaticism faded into a more mainstream brand of Baptist.
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But I remember the power of being part of something based entirely on the emotional experience of a couple of hundred people determined in their delusions, and when I watched the video of a televangelist laughing in the face of an inconvenient reality, I noticed the audience. For the briefest of moments, they are bewildered by his jarring laugh, and then they take their cue. It’s the same thing I’ve seen in audiences at so many Trump rallies over the last five years, and I’m convinced ― and terrified ― it will not disappear even if Trump finally leaves, or is removed from, office. In both that church and at Trump’s rallies, the crowd’s forced laughter gradually shifts to something real, not levity ― something more incendiary than that, something like religious fervour. And that, I’m afraid, is not a laughing matter.