Steven Courtney

@CatWorkers Their pawdcast

I would listen to their podcast.

We need your help to #SaveDenby! We are sad to share that we may be forced to close and a British institution could be lost. We need your help: 1. Share this post 2. Sign the government petition 3. Buy Denby 4. Visit us at the Pottery Village Read more: denbypottery.com/pages/save-den…

@JChimirie66677 @CourtneyWilding @Cllr_R_Adamson @CeeMacBee Agree entirely @JChimirie66677 I put a long-form piece together on this exact subject for those interested: x.com/andyoattes/sta…

@NABurkinshaw I have always found nemeses vitally galvanising, and try to maintain at least three at any one point. Good on him.

The boy has come home absolutely FURIOUS at coming 2nd in his Maths test. He was defeated by his nemesis by one mark. He has stalked off to his room to plot his revenge.

Last week, I lost a 35-year-old patient to AIDS. The worst part? He had no idea he was even sick. From history we got to know, he was having recurrent fevers for many years, lost a few kilos, he used to just pop a paracetamol, and go back to work. He thought he was just tired from life. By the time he reached our hospital, it was already too late He didn’t look like the dying patients you see in movies. He looked like any other guy. But internally, he was fighting a war for maybe a decade? without any weapons. When his labs came back, his CD4 count (the soldiers of the immune system)was less than 50. A healthy person has 500–1,500. He had almost nothing left. HIV is a very manageable condition today. ART (Antiretroviral Therapy) works wonders, it can make the virus undetectable and let you live a full, normal life.. But the medicine only works if you recognize the signs early. If you wait until the house is already burned down, there is very little we can do.. Let me quickly brief you the stages of HIV First: The "Flu" 2–4 weeks after exposure, you get a fever, sore throat, or a rash. It feels like a standard viral bug. You "recover" in a week and think you are fine. Stage 1: The Silence (Clinical Latency) This is where my patient lived for years. The virus reproduces slowly. You have zero symptoms. You feel healthy. Maybe a random fever once a year that you blame on the weather. Because you feel fine, you never get tested. This is the most dangerous stage because you are still infectious and don't even know it. You might have Persistent Generalized Lymphadenopathy-swollen, painless lymph nodes in the neck or armpits for >3 months. Most ignore these! Stage 2: Mild Symptoms The immune system is starting to slip. Look for: >Moderate unexplained weight loss (<10% of body weight). >Recurrent URIs (sinusitis, tonsillitis, otitis media). >Herpes Zoster (Shingles) >Minor skin issues (Seborrheic dermatitis, fungal nail infections). Stage 3: Advanced Symptoms The breaking point is near. This is where symptoms become hard to ignore: >Unexplained severe weight loss (>10% of body weight). >Chronic diarrhea or persistent fever >Oral Candidiasis (Thrush). >Pulmonary TB. Stage 4: AIDS (Severe Symptoms) This is the stage my patient was in. CD4 count <200 plus "AIDS-defining" conditions like HIV wasting syndrome, Pneumocystis pneumonia (PCP), or extrapulmonary TB. By the time he reached us, he had opportunistic pneumonia. Without an immune system, even the strongest antibiotics can't save you. He succumbed last week because he spent years managing symptoms with paracetamol instead of finding the cause. In 2026, no one should be dying of AIDS. Don't trust the mirror. Trust a blood test. It's the only way to know before it's too late

@nxd1979 I have a Turkish friend called Deniz, whom I will now rejoice in calling Deniz Meniz.

my favorite linguistic quirk in any language has to be the m-reduplication in turkish, which consists of repeating a word with an m-prefix to mean "and other things like this". so e.g. "kitap" is book but "kitap mitap" is "books and some other book-like things"

Detransitioners will end gender ideology for good because they are the undeniable proof that the entire dogma is absolute nonsense, and nothing ends nonsense like having to pay a lot of people a lot of money.

@roisinmurphy Love this.

First one, starring my fella and a smattering of close friends. youtu.be/NjSwFsPCeJ4?si…

I put blood, sweat and tears into every video I’ve directed, for zero money, and I loved every minute of it.

@intel_lady Just watched it. Hilarious. Fabulous work.

Incoming Olivia Colman roast....

I’d like to wish all my Jewish friends here & abroad a Happy Chanukah & please know that so many stand with you at this appallingly heartbreaking, tragic & difficult time. You are NOT alone. Just wanted you to know…

This excellent piece provides welcome food for thought for any who've had to endure unpleasant dealings with 'therapy scholars'. For us at @AntigoneJournal it has been a frequent task. unherd.com/2025/12/tears-…

@akuareindorf Logic is not a motivating force when grifting.

If it were otherwise, the outcome of FWS would be that a person can be treated as the opposite sex under the EqA so long as they *don’t* have a GRC. Which is a bold submission.

Because it was already established that anyone without a GRC is their biological sex for the purposes of the EqA. Literally the entire point of the FWS judgment is that having one rule for trans people with GRCs and another rule for those without made the EqA incoherent

@GayTory I recall being astonished at the size of the garlands last year in The Range in Walkden. They might repeat the feat this year.

We’re missing a garland and a stocking, but nowhere sells garlands big enough for the new fireplace 🙄

Christmas declared.

Mamdani is the manifestation of a new ideology that is spreading in the United States: Third-Worldism. I explain how it operates, how it frames Israel and the U.S. as the bourgeois oppressors, and why the ideology is appealing. zinebriboua.com/p/zohran-mamda…

The lady at the charity shop today told me that she wishes people would clear out their children's old toys in the lead up to Christmas rather than after because she always sees a number of parents in the days before Christmas looking for toys for their little ones who might be strapped for cash. She said there's very rarely anything in just before, but that they get inundated with toys in the days after. And it really made me think about it in a way I never would have before. If you know your child is going to get lots of presents from Father Christmas this year, by clearing out your cupboards a few days early, you could make another child's Christmas a lot more special too. Saw this & thought I'd repost.

Appalling antisemitic harrassers disrupting Prof Michael Ben-Gad's economics lecture at City University today. Academics: please sign to support Michael. docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAI…

Academics: please consider signing the open letter in support of Prof Michael Ben-Gad docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAI…

No female hostage is still alive. Think about that for a moment.