Reading for Battle
Battle Readings is a regularly updated compilation of articles, essays, and opinion pieces relevant to the themes of the Battle of Ideas.
Choose a theme from the listing on the left to narrow your search, or view all readings.
Liberty & Law
Drugs - Without the Hot Air: Minimising the Harms of Legal and Illegal Drugs
Prof Nutt puts the case for an evidence-based scientific approach to drugs. In straightforward languages for the lay person, he explains what drugs are, how they affect the body and the mind, and why people take them and get addicted to them. He shows how we can quantify the overall harms of a drug, addressing issues from direct danger of death, through to environmental, financial and family factors, to obtain a true indication of the overall effect of a drug.
David Nutt, UIT Cambridge, May 2012
Ban outdoor advertising
We can choose the magazines we look at. But we've no freedom to walk down the street without facing the advertisers' assault
Neal Lawson, Guardian, 20 April 2012
We can choose the magazines we look at. But we've no freedom to walk down the street without facing the advertisers' assault
Neal Lawson, Guardian, 20 April 2012
Smoking hot memo from David Hockney to Health Minister: Keep your mean, dreary views out of my life Read more: http://www.daily
Denying cigarette companies the right to decorate their cigarette packets is a draconian measure of which Stalin’s censorship police would have been proud. It suggests that the Government thinks it can control our thoughts and our desires.
David Hockney, Daily Mail, 15 April 2012
Denying cigarette companies the right to decorate their cigarette packets is a draconian measure of which Stalin’s censorship police would have been proud. It suggests that the Government thinks it can control our thoughts and our desires.
David Hockney, Daily Mail, 15 April 2012
Web freedom faces greatest threat ever, warns Google's Sergey Brin
Threats range from governments trying to control citizens to the rise of Facebook and Apple-style 'walled gardens'
Ian Katz, Guardian, 15 April 2012
Threats range from governments trying to control citizens to the rise of Facebook and Apple-style 'walled gardens'
Ian Katz, Guardian, 15 April 2012
Snobs' Law: Criminalising Football Fans in an Age of Intolerance
A generation ago football players 'telling tales' on one another for name calling, or fans being fined and arrested for singing offensive songs would have been unimaginable. Today the new laws and regulations in football are portrayed as modern and tolerant.
Stuart Waiton, Take A Liberty (Scotland), 30 March 2012
Let’s call it quits on the equality law
The Equality Act is less about ending oppression and more about enforcing state-approved behaviour.
Luke Samuel, spiked, 29 February 2012
The Equality Act is less about ending oppression and more about enforcing state-approved behaviour.
Luke Samuel, spiked, 29 February 2012
Turkey hails French court overturning Armenian genocide denial law
The Turkish government applauded France's highest court reversing a law making it illegal to deny Armenian deaths in the former Ottoman Empire over 100 years ago was genocide.
Christian Science Monitor, 28 February 2012
The Turkish government applauded France's highest court reversing a law making it illegal to deny Armenian deaths in the former Ottoman Empire over 100 years ago was genocide.
Christian Science Monitor, 28 February 2012
Judicial Politics & the Separation of Powers
Stephen Sedley on the separation of powers
Sir Stephen Sedley, London Review of Books, 23 February 2012
Stephen Sedley on the separation of powers
Sir Stephen Sedley, London Review of Books, 23 February 2012
Gender quotas are wrong and don’t work – it’s time to treat people as individuals
The left-wing clarion call for gender quotas and positive discrimination is not just anti-meritocratic in principle – it is also counter-productive in practice.
Dominic Raab, City AM, 13 February 2012
The left-wing clarion call for gender quotas and positive discrimination is not just anti-meritocratic in principle – it is also counter-productive in practice.
Dominic Raab, City AM, 13 February 2012
Rwanda journalists jailed for genocide denial launch supreme court appeal
Agnès Uwimana and Saïdati Mukakibibi are being supported by an international team of lawyers and human rights groups
Owen Bowcott, Guardian, 29 January 2012
Agnès Uwimana and Saïdati Mukakibibi are being supported by an international team of lawyers and human rights groups
Owen Bowcott, Guardian, 29 January 2012
Scared of the Kids - Adam Crawford - Generation Gap
"A superb brainstorming of gritty brinkmanship. Totally mind-stretching and wonderful."
Humphrey Hawksley, BBC World Affairs correspondent
follow the Academy of Ideas
