Cognitive closure and the price of certainty

"during times of fear and anxiety — like, for example, right now — everybody’s need for closure increases. We tend to make judgments more quickly, regardless of the facts. We’re also drawn to leaders who are decisive and paint solutions in simple terms. After the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Dr. Kruglanski and his team of researchers found that as the color-coded terrorism threat system increased, support for President George W. Bush went up accordingly. The more uncertain our world seems, the more we compensate by seeking out certainty."

(Daniele Anastasion, 1 November 2016, The New York Times)

Face-replacement video cut-up prominent in UK General Election

"Young music fans seem energised by the Labour leader, unlike any other politician in recent times... Grime star Stormzy has endorsed Corbyn (he particularly liked his anti-Apartheid activism in the eighties), as have other grime scene mainstays like Novelist, AJ Tracey and Boy Better Know collective co-founder JME (brother of Skepta), who even had a photocall with the Labour leader the other week. You can’t buy these sorts of endorsements: #grime4corbyn is very much a grass roots movement, it hasn’t come from a youth wing of Labour or been manufactured by party apparatchiks in any way. ...

At the Brighton gig at seafront venue The Arch, there’s a friendly, positive vibe as various performers take their turns on the mic and decks. A stall in the corner sells #grime4corbyn t-shirts and prints, while in the smoking area outside some gritty artwork featuring assorted grime MCs is peppered with images of MC Jezza himself. “May try say she better than me/Tell my man shut up,” reads one, perhaps alluding to the video that some wag produced that transposes Corbyn’s face onto Stormzy’s ‘Shut Up’ promo. “Punishing pensioners and taking school meals away from our children,” Corbyn — throwing shapes in a red tracksuit — begins in the online skit, before his ‘posse’ add ‘SHUT UP’. The video has understandably gone viral."

(Carl Loben, 06 June 2017, Huffington Post)

Not I by Samuel Beckett (1973)

Sons of Gallipoli: award-winning interactive documentary

"While the story of Gallipoli has been told many times, never has it been told in such a rich and deeply immersive way. For the first time, the tragedy of Gallipoli is brought to life in a profoundly human way as two mothers imagine what it must have been like for other mothers, 100 years ago. Two women on opposite sides. So different. Yet each struggling to understand the meaning of war."

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Cream by David Firth