Lois Heslop

Lois Heslop is a Spectator intern. She is studying physics at Oxford

Thursday

Lois Heslop

Identity crisis

From our UK edition

28 min listen

On the podcast: In his cover piece for the mag this week, political scientist, Yascha Mounk has written about why identity politics has polarised our understanding of race. And why the left has come to divide groups into oversimplified categories of ‘the oppressors’ and ‘the oppressed’.  Also this week:  Can we trust photographs to paint a true picture of a story? The Israel-Palestine conflict has been one of the most documented wars to date. But with AI manipulation and staged imagery, is there a way of differentiating between real and fake news? Bryan Appleyard CBE and Eliot Higgins from Bellingcat discuss.

Wednesday

Lois Heslop

The rise of WitchTok

From our UK edition

Halloween might be over, but Witching Hour has accelerated on TikTok. #WitchTok (or Witch TikTok) is the viral take on spirituality – think Paganism, psychics, and seances in 60 second videos. The hashtag #WitchTok currently has over 20.7 billion views on the video app. In comparison, #Kardashian only has 6.4 billion, and #LoveIsland clocks up a mere 4.9 billion.  As an enthusiastic TikTok user, I started liking WitchTok videos during lockdown. I found myself drawn in by beautiful witches with their crystals and soft-spoken voices. Influencer branding has inevitably pounced on this spiritual trend; the creators of this content practice both magic and sales, and while I can’t speak for the former, the latter is extremely effective.

Tuesday

Lois Heslop

Should Britain brace itself for a major flu outbreak this winter?

From our UK edition

Could flu be a bigger problem than Covid this winter? Professor Anthony Harnden, the deputy chair of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, has warned that it might be, suggesting that the low prevalence of flu over recent months could come back to 'bite us' as the weather worsens. There are also fears that reduced levels of flu in recent months could make it much harder to develop a successful jab. In a normal year, the route to a flu vaccine is well trodden. The annual flu vaccination programme first began in England in the 1960s, and since 2000, all over 65s have been offered the jab every year. Healthy children have also been offered a live attenuated influenza vaccine (LAIV) in school, administered as a nasal spray, for the last eight years.

Lois Heslop

No fun, no sex, and Zoom: the misery of the Covid campus

From our UK edition

Usually I can’t wait for the start of a new term at university. But not this year. When students return, the rules are clear: no fun, no sex, lots of screen time – and the same high fees.  A number of universities – including Cambridge – have said all lectures will be online-only until next summer. As for Oxford, where I study physics, masks will be compulsory in tutorials and students will be stuck for the most part in small ‘households’ within their colleges. In some ways, we can count ourselves lucky: other university students will have no in-person contact hours at all. But either way, is this really worth over £9,000 a year? For those already on courses and going into their second or third years, the options are limited.

Thursday

Lois Heslop

The strange world of sororities

From our UK edition

Until very recently, the opaque world of American sororities was a mystery to me. I’m a British student at a British University, and these highly selective, members-only groups for American female students were about as foreign to me as guns sold at the supermarket. All of that changed when a hoard of long-haired, glossy-lipped girls at the University of Alabama started appearing on the homepage of my TikTok. I had gained a new obsession. I was addicted to watching Southern Belles vlog what’s known as 'rush week' - a uniquely American phenomenon where thousands of girls spend a week or more interviewing at sororities to get a 'bid' - an offer to join the house.