The Spectator

The Spectator was established in 1828, and is the oldest continuously published magazine in the English language. The Spectator’s taste for controversy, however, remains undiminished. There is no party line to which The Spectator’s writers are bound - originality of thought and elegance of expression are the sole editorial constraints.

The trial issue contains a “Thought Crime Special” with articles from Melanie Phillips, “I think, therefore I’m guilty”; Christopher Booker writes about “Scientists in hiding; the demonisation of academics who question the consensus”; Alan Rusbridger explores “How to stifle the press” and how England’s libel laws make it easy.

UK politics come under scrutiny from James Forsyth, Brendan O’Neill ponders if teenagers could ever be “Drunk and orderly”; while Tom Hollander writes his diary and James Delingpole says eat local organic food if you like, but don’t kid yourself that it’s ‘green’. 

The Spectator’s regular arts coverage includes books, theatre, opera, cinema and exhibitions.

Louise Perry and Michael Simmons: what really makes young women sell their bodies on OnlyFans? ‘OnlyFans,’ writes Louise Perry, ‘is the most profitable content subscription service in the world.’ Yet ‘the vast majority of its content creators make very little from it’. So why are around 4 per cent of young British women selling their wares on the site? ‘Imitating Bonnie Blue and Lily Phillips – currently locked in a competition to have sex with the most men in a day – isn’t pleasant.’ OnlyFans gives women ‘the sexual attention and money of hundreds and even thousands of men’. The result is ‘a cascade of depravity’ that Perry wouldn’t wish on her worst enemy. In business terms, however, OnlyFans is a ‘staggering success’, according to Michael Simmons. ‘Britain’s sex industry brings in far more to the economy than politicians are comfortable admitting’; OnlyFans might just be Britain’s most profitable tech start-up. ‘If we are going to wage a moral war on porn,’ Simmons argues, ‘we should at least be honest about what we’re sacrificing.’

 

Piers Morgan: in defence of Piers Morgan. ‘What happened to Piers Morgan?’ asked Spectator writer Jonathan Sacerdoti last weekend. Right where he wants to be, Morgan writes in this week’s diary – criticised by both pro-Hamas and pro-Israeli trolls. He is becoming ‘more critical of how Israel is prosecuting its war in Gaza’ over recent aid blockades and civilian bombardments. But Morgan also criticises Dawn French for downplaying 7 October and labels Greta Thunberg ‘an attention-seeking narcissist’ for her yacht stunt. Meanwhile, he has received texts from a Rishi Sunak impersonator. Alarm bells rang after the would-be ex-PM signed off a text with a kiss. It reminded Morgan of a prankster who once phoned Donald Trump pretending to be him; ‘all hell broke loose’ when the President’s team later asked how the call had gone. Morgan also reveals he’s ‘33-1 to be London’s next mayor’. Following Keir Starmer’s recent winter fuel, tax and housebuilding U-turns, if he were ever to become a politician, Morgan writes, his ‘only pledge will be to make no pledges’.

 

James Heale: the Iron Chancer. ‘Gordon Brown may not be every teenager’s political pin-up,’ says James Heale, but ‘Rachel Reeves proudly kept a framed photo of him’ in her Oxford bedroom. Brown introduced the first multi-year spending review in 1998; ‘his successor’s speech on Wednesday showed the level of constraints facing the Treasury this decade vs the 1990s’. Reeves has ‘staked her government’s future on a series of political bets’ – but changing Treasury rules to borrow and spend makes her less ‘Iron Chancellor’ and more ‘Iron Chancer’. She has also bet big on Health. ‘If we don’t fix the NHS, we won’t win re-election,’ Wes Streeting has argued to the Treasury. Rival parties spy an opportunity, with Richard Tice schmoozing 15 hedge-fund managers over breakfast on Tuesday morning. Labour MPs want the Chancellor to spend as quickly as possible, but she faces two challenges Brown never had: ‘a stuttering economy and the end of the Cold War peace dividend’. Will Reeves’s gamble pay off?

 

John Power: how to game the social housing system. Britain has a social housing problem, John Power believes. This week, Angela Rayner has secured £39 billion more for social and affordable housing and Westminster council has announced that every single social housing tenant in the borough will receive lifetime tenancies, paying around a fifth of what renters on the open market do. For ‘many young professionals dreaming of their own home’, Power writes, it looks like ‘a bribe’. Working hard doesn’t make sense when a couple in London on £100,000 can’t afford to live in Westminster. ‘Middle-income earners are paying for a model that rewards dysfunction,’ Power laments. ‘Once housed, few ever leave’, with no incentive to move, and ‘gaming the system’ is rife. But ‘a new politics may be emerging from this tension’ – not one of ideology ‘but of exasperation’. Voters ‘want a system that… rewards people who play by the rules’ – as highlighted by the popularity of Robert Jenrick’s recent video confronting fare dodgers on the Tube.

 

Francis Pike: could Xi Jinping’s time be up? Whatever happened to Xi Jinping? As Francis Pike explains, China’s leader has ‘seemingly disappeared from public view’ in recent weeks. His face has been missing from newspapers, who have switched from eulogising his spirit to praising collective leadership. Long-absent enemies are crawling out of the woodwork; Politburo meetings have been skipped; and close allies have been arrested, investigated, or dismissed. What is going on? ‘By Chinese standards, post-Covid recovery has been anaemic’; it is ‘widely recognised that Xi’s repressive handling of the Covid pandemic was catastrophic’. Unemployment is up and foreign direct investment has crashed – a fall blamed on Xi’s much-vaunted ‘wolf-warrior’ diplomacy. Party bigwigs ‘are disillusioned by a leader who has assumed dictatorial powers but is deemed to have failed’. Two years ago, Xi ‘presumptuously declared his intention to rule until 2032’. Now he might not last the year – and ‘the consequences for Taiwan and US-China relations could be dramatic’.