Matthew Sweet
@DrMatthewSweet
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Writer & broadcaster. @BBCRadio4 @BBCFreethinking @eagleeyedrama @HodderBooks @BBCRadio3 Sound of Cinema. Victorianist til I die @drmatthewsweet.bsky.social
London
Joined April 2011
A real treat to have Jesse Eisenberg on @BBCRadio3 Sound of Cinema today. Chopin, family history, the legacy of the Holocaust - and we've a wealth of Polish film music for your ears.
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Lost my wing man today. Goodbye Tom. A good boy until the end.
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Elon Musk is like a Scooby Doo villain who dresses up as a ghost to scare everyone away from the theme park but forgets that his business is theme parks.
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Hi Laurence. Thanks for the offer. I think the editorial standards at @GBNews are so low that appearing on it is a threat to a person’s reputation. No serious person should go near it. It’s like being asked to debate on the pages of Sunday Sport or Razzle.
Would you like to come on my show on Friday for an interview? It would be interesting to listen to your thoughts in longer form conversation.
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ATTENTION ALL WOMEN: If you are working class and get one of the most important jobs in the country, do not mark the occasion by spending your money on clothes.
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Hi Katharine I think you’ve misunderstood this article. It’s a history MA. This is one of the liveliest and richest areas of scholarship right now. It’s really impossible to understand large swathes of our past, some of it quite recent, without and understanding of the occult.
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My choice for BBC chair. Independent, trustworthy, unimpeachable, actually knows about television.
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Do doctors still ask people who've had a knock on the head to name the Prime Minister?.
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She’s gone. Olivia de Havilland has gone. Showing, to the very end, the grit with which she took on the Hollywood studio system and won. I had one of the most perfect days of my life in her company. Sitting on that chaise, eating macaroons and gossiping about Errol Flynn.
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This will be quite hard as Britain is not a member of the WEF.
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Shout out to the two white haired ladies on Sydenham high street who found themselves in the path of eight pavement-filling male joggers and yelled: go and do that in the park, shitheads!.
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What I'd like to read: a story about owners of Kensington & Chelsea's 1,399 unoccupied homes lending their keys to #GrenfellTower survivors.
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Every time I hear the story of the wrongly convicted post office workers my blood boils. For the individual cases, and for what it says more broadly about the culture of management.
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I prefer “earned” .
Record numbers of state school pupils given Oxford places
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Hugh Grant being brilliant here. I once interviewed him and opened with some absurdly elaborate question and he said: "Look, you know I just do this for the money.".
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I see someone capable of conducting an interview has finally got in a room with the President. Someone who asks follow-up questions, knows the data, who frowns and flicks his foot impatiently like a normal human being in the presence of someone so powerful and so underwhelming.
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So. This is a letter I sent today, via my agent, to @marksteyneoline and his producer @danielhardaker4 at @GBNews. A Twitter thread version follows, to which I’ve attached some links.
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David Warner (1941-2022). I loved this beautiful man.
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I wonder if we could privatise the royal family to free them to compete with those actors on The Crown?.
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Paddy Ashdown’s last few tweets were quite something.
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The statue was put up in 1895, 174 years after Colston’s death. The 1890s were a decade of imperial anxiety, self-doubt and pessimism, not confidence. I think its creation and its destruction may, paradoxically, express the same idea: the end of empire.
The statue of Bristol slave trader Edward Colston had been unceremoniously dragged to the dock and dumped into the river Avon #BlackLivesMattters #Bristol
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Mike Pence likes gay conversion therapy AND Broadway musicals. I think we can guess how this story ends.
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It’s that moment when your obscure research subject pops up in the news. Yesterday @AOC was confronted by a woman claiming to be a climate activist at a town hall meeting. Her proposal to solve the climate crisis - “eat the babies”.
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Right now anti-vax conspiracy theorist Neil Oliver is ranting on @GBNews about the rise of a disease called "turbo-cancer", which he implies is caused by the vaccine. This disease does not exist. It is a fiction invented by conspiracy theorists. This is pure misinformation.
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Giddy after an evening with @ssrajamouli - director of @RRRMovie - my favourite film of the year. Have offered my services as a cold-hearted imperial civil servant in the sequel.
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Alan Hawkshaw donated the royalties for this to pay fees for underprivileged music students. Every time it plays, someone gets a bit of time in college.
R.I.P. Alan Hawkshaw …. a titan of TV music composition and a brilliant keyboard player for so many greats . too many to mention . I dont know a composer not in awe of his ability . Thanks for raising the bar x.
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I was a cleaner a long time ago. And rather like that character in Citizen Kane who thinks of the girl on the ferry, I doubt that a month has gone by without me remembering the person who once looked me in the eye as he tapped his fag ash onto the floor I was mopping.
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Good lord. He was saying goodbye and we never knew it.
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So maybe you should just get the @thecoastguy in again to brood darkly about Bill Gates and the WEF, or book Right Said Fred to share their expertise in epidemiology.
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Well, I was booked to go on @BBCRadio4 PM to challenge @johannhari101 about assertions made in his new book. He has pulled out for "personal reasons", so I'll just leave a thread about my concerns about his use of sources. I hope someone else will raise these questions with him.
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I think secondary school education should include a module on conspiracy theories. How to spot them, how to resist the way they seduce with simple explanations for complex phenomena and their appeal to prejudice and confirmation bias.
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Odd that people are offended by an art-historical commonplace plus an idea about a male/female God that’s in Julian of Norwich and, er, the Bible. Still, those capital letters look good and scary.
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These “eminent scientists” include a viscount who claimed to have cured herpes and whose publications are mainly sudoku books and an "astro economist" who appears to exist only in this document.
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So who was this woman? Not a climate activist. Not even, perhaps, someone with a mental illness. She is a representative of the bizarre political cult once led by Lyndon LaRouche. Previous targets for this kind of stunt include @Janefonda Olof Palme & Michael Dukakis. Now @AOC.
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Hey Nick. I’m sorry if you don’t like scrutiny. I’m a cultural historian and journalist who’s been writing about conspiracy culture for years.
How lost do you have to be to wake up every morning and think ‘How will I attack GB News today?’. I think about GB less than this guy and I’m on it three nights a week.
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I’m afraid that this thread contains some distressing, unpleasant and antisemitic material. It also contains questions that I think the @thecoastguy, @GBNews and its CEO @frangpolous would be wise to address before Neil Oliver does his show tonight.
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Here’s one of the great dumb ironies of conspiracy culture. Conspiracy theorists hate Bill Gates because they fantasize he wants to chip people’s brains. They love Elon Musk and he’s bragging about it here.
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Late-night WhatsApp from @beverleyturner. I was surprised to see the fact that she and I had coffee together at the Conservative Party conference used as a sort of threat, so I’ll describe it for the record & Bev can feel free to correct me if she thinks I've got anything wrong.
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Well fancy that. The editor of Country Squire magazine filed for bankruptcy two days before a judge found him guilty of libelling Chris Packham. Guess some wildlife charities won’t be getting that 90k.
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O God this is a malapropism innit. He means piece de resistance
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Why am I seeing tweets by racist jerks who I don't follow?.
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Just remembering all those times Esther McVey spoke out when they came for the Communists.
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How extraordinary that food banks have to issue statements like this. Some people's desire to punish is so strong. Let them eat cake.
Some followers have raised concern about us putting certain items on our shopping lists (eg crisps & chocolate). Let me clarify - whilst we agree that they are of little nutritional value, we also believe in blessing our clients with a treat from time to time. (1 of 2).
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A decision from @Ofcom - it is permissible to tell viewers that vaccines cause a fictional condition called "turbo cancer".
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The great Beano cartoonist Leo Baxendale died yesterday. Tonight's dinner was a tribute to him.
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Anyway, Tom Baker is 83 today. Here he is on the building site where he was working when he got the part of Dr Who.
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Hi guys. Think I can help here. The founding director of @RestoreTrustNT, Neil Record, is the chair of Global Warming Policy Forum, Institute of Economic Affairs; Former Advisor, Global Vision - all based at 55 Tufton St. Hope this helps! Maybe take this tweet down?
Unbelievable! The @nationaltrust's Communications Director @CeliaRichards0n, who spends much of her time on Twitter attacking @RestoreTrustNT without any basis, now claims (completely falsely) that we have links to Tufton St. We have reported this to Twitter for misinformation.
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Please can @BBCRadio4 give us a compilation of Tim Brooke-Taylor’s terrible high-pitched singing of pop songs massively inappropriate for a man of his age? It would warm my sad heart.
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. @AOC did not denounce this woman. She thought that she was suffering from some kind of mental illness, and treated her kindly. But all kinds of figures on the right and the alt-right have pounced on the story. Including the President.
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Little thread that I think shows how the plenitude of the online world allows newspapers to create something out of nothing in order to push a certain line - in this case, dislike of Meghan Markle.
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More conspiracist falsehoods on @GBNews – @thecoastguy declaring as fact the discredited Kremlin line that the US government had a network of bioweapons labs in Ukraine. This is materially misleading. Incredible that it was broadcast on British TV.
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O Doctor, my Doctor! The indomitable Tom Baker is 88 today.
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The LaRouchies are pretty exotic. They believe that the Queen controls the drugs trade. They think Prince Philip wants to start WW3. They think Bertrand Russell used the Beatles as part of a secret British psy war against the USA. They are, to use a technical term, nuts.
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Ugly stuff here. And more evidence of the cosiness between @GBNEWS presenters and the racist far right. Because a bunch of them came to my neighbourhood yesterday to protest about a children's story time event with a drag queen, I saw a lot of this first-hand.
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I think conspiracy theorists who think covid was a cold or a hoax - including several @gbnews presenters - should watch this and reflect on why they derive so much satisfaction from the fantasy that people like Kevin are part of a giant con.
Prof @Kevin_Fong giving the most devastating and moving testimony to the Covid Inquiry of visiting hospital intensive care units at the height of the second wave in late Dec 2020. The unimaginable scale of death, the trauma, the loss of hope. Please watch this 2min clip.
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Looks more like democracy at work to me. If an MP is radicalised by conspiracy culture he is free to share his fantasies in the Commons but nobody is obliged to listen.
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Just for clarity this means that none of the Restore Trust candidates or resolutions were successful.
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Rather unusual tweet for an MP to make about a journalist currently under investigation by his former employers.
Brave, heartfelt & powerful speech by @danwootton The left will stop at nothing to try to destroy those who have different views. We have your back Dan. You and @GBNEWS are a light of common sense in the political cancel culture we all find ourselves facing. Keep going.
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Judith Kerr planted so many warm thoughts in our lives. The greatest of which is the idea of going out in your nightie to eat sausage and chips in a cafe. For me, that is as evocative as anything in Proust.
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The Carry Ons will be rightly prominent in the obits today, but I want to think of Barbara Windsor like this today, as key member of Joan Littlewood’s revolution in theatre. In 2014 I met with her at Stratford East to discuss her part in Oh What a Lovely War!
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Well. Older readers may recall that 12 days ago @GBNews posted this from its twitter account. Oddly it wasn't emailed to me or my agent. Even more oddly nobody seems to have been daring enough to sign it. It’s just signed “GB News”.
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I have just seen that Giles Coren tweet and really can’t let it pass. Dawn was a Catholic. She thought quite a lot about hell and its entry requirements. She also knew bodily suffering. That tweet is a sin that requires penance.
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GB News loses its argument in court that it should be treated differently from other broadcasters.
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And really, anyone who can tweet something like this - use vaccination status as an insult - can’t really expect to be taken seriously by anyone.
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Good proof this morning that in the digital age, local radio also serves the nation.
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Oh dear. The editor of Dan Wootton’s @GBNEWS show doesn’t know the laws of libel and defamation. McAlpine vs Newsnight anyone?
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This is @MartinDaubney of @GBNEWS blaming the government for the suicide of a UK farmer. Has he checked whether this story is true? It’s an internet meme that some have suggested has been around since 2016. Journalists check sources. This is grossly irresponsible.
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Why are @GBNEWS presenters @LozzaFox @MartinDaubney & @calvinrobinson itchy about suggestions they are connected with the far right? Here they are this morning on a tiny demo standing firm with one of its most notorious figures, recently arrested after sieg-heiling on the street
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This is the @RRRMovie screening I’d like to attend.
@airnewsalerts @ianuragthakur @tarak9999 @ssrajamouli @TheNameIsYash Ma Alluri sitha rama SHASTRI ekkada ra unga 🥵😝😹
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Glad to see all this interest in the problem of @GBNews and its mainstreaming of conspiracy theorists. To retain its licence and raise its journalistic standards I'd suggest it requires thoroughgoing reform. They could call it the Great Reset.
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So farewell, Tony Soper. Said quietly & insistently, while observing an avocet or badger. He seemed Spock-like to me as a child - calm, wise, quizzical. TV had a few like him then - public intellectuals & experts who spoke only to children, and always as equals. I miss them.
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These Timpson initiatives don't get enough publicity. They remind me of c.19th industrialists who built parks, libraries & housing schemes because they felt stirred & shamed by the poverty around them.
Our uncollected duvets end up being very useful to those on our streets every night.
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I'm disturbed by the loose language in Number 10's denial of the @guardian story suggesting that Dominic Cummings is sitting on SAGE. They describe the story as "ludicrous" then say he observes and asks questions. This strikes me as sophistry. Like "present but not involved".
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1.3 bilingual British children. What a terrible burden to the nation.
1.3 million children do not speak English as a first language underlining strain immigration puts on schools.
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There's that moment in Citizen Kane when Kane has two front pages made up: one reporting his victory, one that says, "Fraud at polls". It's as if Trump has published both simultaneously, when neither is true.
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Very good to hear David Olusoga putting this so firmly. It’s not the job of historians to provide people with a cosy glow. Whisky and warm baths do that. The clearer our view of the past, the clearer our view of ourselves.
“History doesn’t really care about our feelings.”. Historian @DavidOlusoga tells @jonsnowc4 why acknowledging the negative aspects of British history isn’t a threat to British culture, but is simply “history in action”.
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I think winner of #bbcqt was that nice lady who seemed freaked out to discover she was in a room full of bald nuke-bothering Yorkshiremen.
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Love this. Sort of thing Top Cat would do.
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Amazing to think that in the 1970s two of the best known kids TV presenters were very active in radical politics without anyone batting an eyelid. (Except the anti-apartheid activists they went after with money thought to have come from the South African security services.)
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I find these "last train out of Saigon references" rather ironic considering how effectively the virus has been controlled in Vietnam. 35 deaths.
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Hardly surprising. If you believe the world has been secretly controlled for centuries by bankers and shadowy figures then you invevitably start paraphrasing the Protocols. Neil Oliver has been doing this on @GBNews for months and months.
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Rather surprised to read this, @AlStewartOBE If you can point to a single error in anything I have tweeted about @GBNEWS, then tell me and I will withdraw it. Otherwise it would be nice if you deleted your remark.
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Some say Darth Vader was the greatest leader of an evil space empire. But Jacqueline Pearce did it arms aloft, in high heels. Who didn't secretly yearn to be subjugated by her? Supreme Commander, we salute you.
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If a better and more respected channel asked me to appear with you - Sky or ITV or BBC News, that would be different. But I’d be really surprised if they thought it was worth their time.
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My Dad lighting the Christmas pudding like a crack addict
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At @SlapstickFest in 2012 Ian Lavender and Neil Innes lead us all in a singalong of the Dad’s Army theme. This is our little dressing room rehearsal. I always found this little clip very moving. Even more so now they’re both gone. The sweetest of men.
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@paulmasonnews @politico Oh Paul this is really patronising. Some great journalists in BBC local radio who are quite capable of being as alert as you at 8am. The problem is the brevity of the slots, not the broadcasters. Do me a favour and talk to some and ask them about their rate per show, too.
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Steve Bannon’s style is a weird mix of Serbian war criminal and Springwatch presenter.
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I wish critics of the @nationaltrust had a bit more knowledge of history. They're now attacking it for providing children's playgrounds - a concept more or less invented by the trust's founder, Octavia Hill.
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Surely one of the things that makes the Paula Vennells case so compelling is that we have all encountered such figures in our professional lives. I wonder how we could reform managerial culture to allow fewer of them to thrive?.
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The LaRouchies have been enemies of the green movement for decades. They used to carry signs that read “Feed Jane Fonda to the whales”. It’s linked with their conspiracy theory about the Queen’s “green fascism”. Piers Corbyn, by the way, was a member of their Facebook group.
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I asked Windsor what she’d say to the author if he walked into the room. She replied: “I’d say ‘fuck off’”
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