We need to ask what leads a person to rationalise an act of murder and see themselves as above the lawThe first suicide bombing I covered took place 11 years ago on Jerusalem’s Jaffa Street. My strongest memory remains not the sight of blood or the sme…
Online child abuse: perpetrators and voyeurs must both feel the full force of law | Observer editorial
Those who choose to view disgusting images are as guilty as the abusersMark Bridger, the killer of April Jones, was a consumer of unspeakably vile material on the internet that depicted horrific abuse of children. Britain’s child protection and obsceni…
Barbers make a high street comeback as men go retro and abandon salons
Neat hair is back – one reason why 150 men’s hairdressers have opened in Britain in the past yearThe return of the short back and sides as the must-have hairstyle for fashion-conscious teens and twentysomethings is having a helpful impact on the coun…
If the RAF can accept my gender transition, why can’t the media?
Ayla Holdom is a search and rescue pilot in the Royal Air Force. When she began her gender transition, she was supported by friends and family and by her employer. Yet she, like teacher Lucy Meadows, who killed herself in March, has had to endure artic…
Britain can no longer afford to bankroll the rich | Nick Cohen
Not only is the ever-growing wealth of the super-rich not trickling down, it is creating ever-growing instability in a future not worth havingA generation of “opinion formers” has assured us that the rich are none of our business. If others become extr…
Our satisfaction with rubbish trains means free beer money for rail execs | David Mitchell
News that Network Rail executives are to receive bonuses, despite missing several modest targets, reveals the incompetence the British public can be persuaded to think they’re happy withSir David Higgins is a lucky man. He’s the chief executive of Netw…
Women’s Institute votes to launch a campaign to rescue local shops
Call to action over disappearing high streets is carried at annual meeting despite criticism of ‘vague’ wordingThe Women’s Institute yesterday voted to make retail regeneration its next major campaigning issue to end the “crisis” of the continuing decl…
Think brain scans can reveal our innermost thoughts? Think again | Raymond Tallis
Increasing claims for neuroscience – that it can locate jealousy or Muslim fundamentalism – are ludicrousThe grip of neuroscience on the academic and popular imagination is extraordinary. In recent decades, brain scientists have burst out of the la…
Ovaltine, chocolate and a bottle of milk: choristers recall coronation highlights
It will be an emotional return to the abbey for a former choirboy who remembers the Queen’s great dayWhen boy choristers file into the choir stalls at Westminster Abbey on Tuesday, to mark today’s 60th anniversary of Elizabeth II’s coronation, they wil…
Thousands of childcare places lost as Labour says poorest families hardest hit
Fewer childminders and Sure Start centres as birth rate in England continues to climbThe number of childcare places available to parents in England has gone down sharply and providers have been dropping out of the industry, according to Ofsted figures….