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April 2, 2026

I watched Artemis II lift off — and witnessed the first humans venture to the Moon since 1972

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Gordon Osinski, Professor in Earth and Planetary Science, Western University

Even from a distance of several kilometres, the Artemis II rocket looked huge.

Then, there was a moment that felt like an eternity, as around 2,600 metric tons of spacecraft lifted off.

I was honoured to receive an invitation from the Canadian Space Agency to attend this historic launch at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. I am a professor, an explorer and a planetary geologist. As a member of the First Artemis Lunar Surface Science Team, I have been supporting NASA in developing the geology training for Artemis astronauts.

This launch was one of the most thrilling, but stressful few minutes of my life. Space missions are hard and can be dangerous, especially missions like this where there are so many firsts.

The final 10-second countdown seemed to come so quickly, and then at 6.35 p.m., EDT, on April 1, 2026, the NASA launch commentator uttered those famous words: “We have liftoff.”

I think everyone around me held their breath for those first few critical seconds, and then the significance of the moment sank in. We had just witnessed history in the making. This was the launch of the first crewed flight of NASA’s Artemis program, and the first time since 1972 that humans have ventured to the Moon.

Jeremy Hansen will be the first non-American to fly to the Moon and will make Canada only the second country in the world to send an astronaut into deep space.

Christina Koch and Victor Glover will also make history as the first woman and person of colour to fly to the Moon.

The build up to launch

The first launch windows for Artemis II came and went earlier this year, following issues discovered during wet dress rehearsals. But this time felt different. NASA rolled out the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket on March 20 and decided to skip the wet dress rehearsal and go straight for launch.

You could sense the confidence building.

On the evening before launch day, the Canadian Space Agency held a reception for all the Canadian invitees, as well as several NASA guests. It was like a “who’s who” of the Canadian space program, including most of Canada’s retired astronauts.

There were some lighthearted moments — like when MDA Space CEO Mike Greenly announced there were the limited edition Tim Horton’s “moonbits” for all — but you could tell there was also a lot of emotion in the room.

There were some tears as a video message from Jeremy Hanson’s son, Devon, was played. For me the moment came when I spoke with Jeremy’s parents, who I had met several years earlier. They still live in Ingersoll, not far from London, Ontario, where Jeremy went to high school.

Returning humans to the Moon

At the time of writing, the crew have now had their first sleep in Integrity, the name of their Orion spacecraft.

They are now in a high-Earth orbit, reaching a maximum of 74,000 km from Earth. This is already a huge distance when you consider the orbit of the International Space Station is only around 400 km.

During this first 24 hours, the crew are testing the environmental controls and life support systems, ensuring that everything they need to survive for the next 10 days in space works. If everything looks good, NASA will clear the crew to conduct the translunar injection, and send Integrity to the Moon.

While they won’t be landing, in addition to testing out the Orion spacecraft, the Artemis II crew will be conducting science. They will be working with scientists and engineers in a new science evaluation room in mission control at the NASA Johnson Space Center, to collaborate during operations in real time.

This builds on years of testing and simulations the teams have done together and lays the groundwork for the first surface Artemis mission.

Before the launch, NASA astronaut Christina Koch summed up the feelings of everyone I’ve met on the Artemis program: “It is our strong hope that this Artemis mission is the start of an era where everyone, every person on Earth can look at it and think of it as also a destination.”

I couldn’t agree more.

Gordon Osinski founded the company Interplanetary Exploration Odyssey Inc. He receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and the Canadian Space Agency.

– ref. I watched Artemis II lift off — and witnessed the first humans venture to the Moon since 1972 – https://theconversation.com/i-watched-artemis-ii-lift-off-and-witnessed-the-first-humans-venture-to-the-moon-since-1972-279822

April 2, 2026

Danielle Smith’s immigration referendum fuels an ‘us versus them’ divide in Alberta

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Esra Ari, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Mount Royal University

In 2023, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith mused that she would like to see the province’s population to grow 10 million people. But by 2026, faced with an astronomical budget deficit of $9.4 billion, Smith recently said the “federal experiments in open borders” have contributed to Alberta’s current fiscal woes.

Smith is inviting a public debate on immigration, proposing five immigration-related questions in an October referendum.

Leading questions

The immigration referendum questions are replete with mis- and disinformation, confusing, inaccurate and leading language, and shaped by problematic assumptions unsupported by evidence.

For example, one question asks whether respondents support giving Albertans “first priority to new employment opportunities” while another asks whether only those with “Alberta-approved immigration status” should be eligible for provincially funded social programs

Another question asks if Albertans “support the Government of Alberta introducing a law requiring individuals to provide proof of citizenship, such as a passport, birth certificate, or citizenship card, to vote in an Alberta provincial election.”

Taken together, these questions present the voting public with an “us versus them” narrative, suggesting there’s one group of people called “Albertans” and another called “immigrants.”

While race is not explicitly mentioned in these questions, they enact what French philosopher Étienne Balibar, whose scholarship is seminal to understanding new forms of racism, has described as “racism without race” — when cultural differences are mobilized to marginalize minority communities; in this case, immigrants to Alberta.

An example of this can be seen in a recent social media post written by Bruce McAllister, executive director of the premier’s office: “Why import nations with failed systems when our Judeo-Christian heritage and principles have worked so well here?” Smith defended his statement.

Far-right playbook

Who is considered an Albertan by Smith’s United Conservative Party? Is it people born in Alberta? People born in Canada? Or those who have “Judeo-Christian” heritage?

Like other initiatives by Smith’s government, the scapegoating of immigrants follows a far-right playbook that has been effective in other places, including, most visibly, the United States and parts of Europe.

Ultra-nationalist policies are evident in both the Alberta separatist movement and in the provincial government’s attacks on trans kids in the name of parental rights, book bans and cancelling equity, diversion and inclusion programs.

Alberta’s population has grown by about 600,000 people in the last five years. At least some of this growth is likely attributed to a multi-million dollar campaign by the Alberta Government called “Alberta is Calling” that sought to recruit people to the province.

Alberta has what scholars have described as a “prototypical boom region economy” with no provincial sales tax and the lowest corporate and personal tax rates in the country. Spending for social programs, health care and education is contingent on the price of a barrel of oil.

A possibly apocryphal story in Alberta describes a famous bumper sticker that read: “Please God, let there be another oil boom. I promise not to piss it all away this time.”

Unacknowledged contributions

The combination of Alberta’s petro-economy and the rise of far-right conservative ideology is leading to a more explicitly reactionary and xenophobic politics in the province.

In the years following the Second World War, Germany brought in thousands of “guest workers” from Turkey to help rebuild the country. Eventually, these mostly male workers sought to remain in Germany and bring their spouses and children. There is a quote attributed to the Swiss novelist Max Frisch about these guest workers: “We asked for workers; we got people instead.”

This quote applies to Alberta: The provincial government has spent millions of dollars attracting needed workers to the province. Immigrant workers are over-represented in critical parts of the economy including agriculture, care work and tourism. Other Albertans have benefited — and continue to benefit from — the enormous economic contributions that immigration provides.

Much of this economic contribution is unacknowledged because often the work that immigrants do is out of sight, including jobs in meatpacking plants, trucking, cleaning and low-wage service jobs, often performed under precarious conditions.

Immigrants have been essential to the Albertan economy, but they are, most importantly, human beings. Immigration to Alberta has not been accompanied by investment in housing, health care or education. In fact, investment in K-12 education remains the lowest in the country. The scandal-ridden health-care system is in disarray, with people dying in the emergency rooms and doctors describing it as a “crisis.”

Causing harm

When Smith, the most politically powerful person in the province, launches a frontal attack on marginalized communities using the sanitized language of “direct democracy” and “public debate,” there can be real consequences and harm.

Even before the proposed October referendum, immigrant-serving organizations have reported an increase in racism in Alberta. In the premier’s own riding — the small community of Brooks, Alta., population 15,000 with a large immigrant population — stickers with the words “Make Brooks White Again” have appeared around town alongside racist graffiti.

Historically, targeting racialized groups is a dangerous tactic that has culminated in violence and death. We must resist and call these politics out wherever possible.

Bronwyn Bragg receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Esra Ari does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Danielle Smith’s immigration referendum fuels an ‘us versus them’ divide in Alberta – https://theconversation.com/danielle-smiths-immigration-referendum-fuels-an-us-versus-them-divide-in-alberta-278577

April 2, 2026

Neuroscience explains why teens are so vulnerable to Big Tech social media platforms

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Salima Kerai, Research Fellow, Centre for Global Child Health, The Hospital for Sick Children; Adjunct Faculty, Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto

In a landmark decision, a Los Angeles jury has found that social media company Meta and video streaming service YouTube harmed a young user with addictive design features that led to mental health distress, including body dysmorphia, depression and suicidal thoughts.

Commentators have referred to this as social media’s “Big Tobacco” moment and further lawsuits are pending. The verdict has escalated calls for more regulation of social media platforms across jurisdictions.

Countries like Australia, France and Spain have already introduced age restrictions for social media use. Canada still lacks online harms legislation.

As parents campaign and policymakers consider how to address online harms, one crucial question is often overlooked: Why are teenagers so uniquely vulnerable to these platforms in the first place?

Dopamine hits to immature pathways

Imagine Sara, who at 14 was found unconscious on her bedroom floor after an attempt to take her own life. By every measure, she was thriving: strong in school, supported by family, living in a vibrant community. But behind her bedroom door, she was struggling with something no one could see. She spent hours scrolling, posting and chasing likes until the validation stopped coming.

A quiet sense of not being good enough slowly took root. Despite 150 online followers, she had no one she felt she could truly talk to. She became convinced she was completely alone.

Sara is a composite drawn from clinical and research experience, but her story is common. Like many teenagers, Sara turned to social media to connect, express herself and find a sense of belonging. At first, it felt good. Each quick hit of dopamine drew her back until the habit became hard to control.

Neuroscience shows that heavy social media use can overstimulate the teen brain’s still-developing reward pathways in ways similar to addictive behaviours like gambling.

This immature system also makes teenagers more sensitive to social feedback and less able to cope with rejection. This leaves them vulnerable to highs and lows of online interaction, including the rapid, repeated negative comments that can intensify emotional stress.

Think of the teen brain as a highway under construction. The emotional expressway — the limbic system — is wide open for speeding. The pre-frontal cortex — the brain’s traffic-control centre responsible for judgment and impulse control — is still being built.

This imbalance means that the fast emotional traffic often outruns the signals from the control centre, creating traffic jams in judgment and rational thinking and making it harder for teens to pause, reflect and assess consequences.

Social comparison fuels anxiety

Social comparison deepens this strain further. As Sara scrolled through images of seemingly perfect lives, she felt increasingly inadequate. Envy, insecurity and fear of missing out chipped away at her confidence. At the same time, social media encouraged constant self-monitoring, as she tracked her likes, comments and appearance online.

Research links this kind of inward focus to higher levels of anxiety, especially in teens already under pressure.

Puberty adds another layer. During this stage, the brain becomes more sensitive to social and emotional cues. For girls, these changes often occur earlier and more intensely, helping explain why adolescent girls are disproportionately affected by social media-related anxiety and depression.

CBC’s Christine Birak breaks down what research shows about how using social media is changing kids’ behaviour.

Connected online, disconnected in life

Most time spent on social media is not active or social — it is passive. Trial data in a case between the U.S. Federal Trade Commission and Meta show that only a small fraction of time on Meta platforms involves engaging with friends — about seven per cent on Instagram and 17 per cent on Facebook. The rest is mostly scrolling and watching rather than interacting. This results in an illusion of connection while deepening a sense of isolation.

Large studies across high-income countries consistently link heavy social media use to poorer physical health outcomes too, including shorter sleep and higher rates of obesity. Loneliness is a serious risk. The human need to feel seen and understood is fundamental. When it is not met, the body registers it as stress. Chronic loneliness has been compared to smoking 10 cigarettes a day in terms of its impact on health.

Many Canadian teens describe this paradox clearly: constantly connected online, yet increasingly disconnected in real life. They report pressure to present idealized versions of themselves and to keep up with peers. Online communication, they say, is easy to misinterpret, which can strain relationships and deepen isolation. They feel caught in a push and pull — drawn to connection, but often left feeling worse.

Now what? A call to action

We would not hand a 14-year-old the keys to a car without training, rules and safeguards. Yet we allow that same teenager unrestricted access to platforms designed to capture attention and maximize engagement.

The impacts on their physical and mental health are clear. Research involving more than 9,000 adolescents across eight countries found a strong association between problematic social media use and higher rates of depression and anxiety.

In Canada, suicide is the second leading cause of death for youth aged 15 to 24. Mental illness already costs us $51 billion a year, and 70 per cent of those affected show symptoms during adolescence.

Regulating social media is essential. And it requires a layered approach, much like road safety.

Platforms must be designed more responsibly. Age limits should be clearly defined and meaningfully enforced. And digital literacy education should help young people understand and manage their online experiences.

The question is no longer whether action is needed, but whether it will come in time to protect the next generation.

Salima Kerai does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Neuroscience explains why teens are so vulnerable to Big Tech social media platforms – https://theconversation.com/neuroscience-explains-why-teens-are-so-vulnerable-to-big-tech-social-media-platforms-278521

April 2, 2026

Effective storytelling can encourage climate action from policymakers and the public

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Snigdhodeb Dutta, PhD Student, Department of Biology, Concordia University

Scientists know more about climate change than ever before. So why isn’t the world moving faster to address it?

That was the question at the heart of a round table I recently moderated at Concordia University, and the answers were more practical and more urgent than many in the room expected.

The session, entitled “Communicating Climate Research to Policy and the Public,” took place on March 10 and featured Concordia professor Damon Matthews, Montréal city councillor Peter McQueen and Dominique Paquin, a climate simulation and analysis supervisor at the climate research organization Ouranos.

Their shared diagnosis: the problem is not a lack of data. It’s a failure of translating that data into a message that resonates.

As Paquin noted:

“We have enormous amounts of information on climate resilience strategies. The challenge is that this information rarely makes it into the rooms where decisions are actually made.”

During the session, participants were split into mixed groups and given a single climate finding. Their task: communicate it to three completely different audiences — policymakers, the general public and those working in operational or applied settings. The results were revealing.

Making the abstract clear

people sit in a row behind a table in discussion. behind them is a large screen displaying the words Communicating Climate Research to Policy and the Public — The Communicating Climate Research to Policy and the Public rountable session at Concordia University on March 10.
(Snigdhodeb Dutta)

McQueen said:

“Effective climate communication is not about dumbing down the science. It’s about understanding who you’re talking to and what actually matters to them.”

Nowhere was this clearer than in the skating rink example that drew an audible reaction from the room. Telling someone the global average temperature has risen by 1.2 C lands differently than telling them climate change is already shortening outdoor skating seasons across Canadian cities.

Research shows that rising winter temperatures are reducing the viability of outdoor rinks, with future projections for cities like Montréal, Toronto and Calgary pointing to fewer cold days even under optimistic low-carbon scenarios.

By presenting climate change through such examples, the abstract becomes concrete, the distant becomes local and the data becomes a loss that people can picture.

Panellists argued that framing the issue for different audiences needs to become standard practice, not an afterthought. For policymakers, the groups focused on discussing feasibility and regulatory alignment. For the public, emotional resonance and relatable stakes took over.

For operational audiences — those working in applied or technical roles, such as urban planners, engineers and municipal staff — the focus shifted to implementation and cost.

One proposal that generated discussion was embedding climate context into everyday digital information. Many of us today have smartphones that display the daily weather forecast. Rather than just displaying the current temperature and conditions, devices could also show how those readings compare to pre-industrial baselines.

Small changes in the information environment could shift how millions of people perceive climate change over time.

Engaging communities is critical

The session, ‘Communicating Climate Research to Policy and the Public,’ at Concordia University.

Another key issue that came up is the structural barriers that hinder effective communication. Even when climate messaging lands, it runs into algorithmic filters, media fragmentation and political resistance.

Participants pointed to carbon pricing and stronger enforcement mechanisms as examples of policies that work when the public understands and supports them. Communication and policy, in other words, are not separate challenges. Each depends on the other.

The session also pushed back against the dominance of top-down, global-level climate narratives. Real engagement and climate action, participants agreed, happens at the community level through local voices, grassroots initiatives and youth movements that give people a sense of agency rather than helplessness. Media platforms that amplify these efforts, rather than drowning them out, were seen as part of the solution.

Involving students and young people, sharing successes through local and national media and making initiatives relatable and interactive can help build broader awareness and motivate participation across communities.

Communication is part of research work

Climate researchers should not treat communication as the final step in research and start seeing it as central to the work itself. They shouldn’t just focus on sharing data, but also take part in real engagement and conversations with the general public.

The science is there. The challenge is to make it resonate. From policymakers and community leaders to students and citizens, climate action depends on telling stories that make an impact, clarify stakes and inspire action.

Only when abstract data becomes tangible — whether through a disappearing skating rink, a parched wetland or a vanishing stream — does the urgency of climate change truly hit home. And it is this kind of storytelling, grounded in both evidence and lived experiences, that may ultimately drive the action this moment demands.

Snigdhodeb Dutta does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Effective storytelling can encourage climate action from policymakers and the public – https://theconversation.com/effective-storytelling-can-encourage-climate-action-from-policymakers-and-the-public-278522

April 2, 2026

How ‘eco-dystopian’ novels from Asia and Africa are pushing boundaries

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Alastair Bonnett, Professor of Geography, Newcastle University

Speculative and futuristic visions of environmental calamity are being imagined globally through environmental fiction. Eco-dystopian novels can help people process their fears or mourn the loss of a more stable climate.

My forthcoming book, Nature’s Return, shows that while anti-environmentalism is gaining traction in the west, the diversity and urgency of environmental visions from across Africa and Asia are coming into view.

Here are my favourite examples from China and Taiwan, Nigeria and India.

China and Taiwan

“You are bugs” is the sobering message of the aliens in Liu Cixin’s bestselling trilogy, Remembrance of Earth’s Past. Series two of Netflix’s adaptation, titled after the first volume, The Three Body Problem, is scheduled for release in late 2026. Liu’s vision of environmental retribution is anchored in a visceral portrait of Mao’s so-called “war against nature”, which reshaped the environment through things like mass irrigation and deforestation to boost economic production.

The trilogy is a leading example of a wide-ranging ecological turn in Chinese culture and Chinese science fiction. As the cultural critics Yue Zhou and Xi Liu explain, the story routinely takes aim at “rampant pollution, water shortage, natural resources depletion, overpopulation and electronic waste”.

Cara Healy, a professor of Chinese Studies at Wabash College in Indiana, US, argues that “for centuries, Chinese intellectuals wrote about the past as a way to critique the present”, but today it is the future that is employed and deployed “to comment on our contemporary world”.

In Waste Tide by Chen Qiufan, readers are told that science fiction is “the greatest realism at the present time”. Set in a gang ridden island covered in tech trash, and populated by desperate migrants and mutant humans, Waste Tide is a bleak parable of China’s abundance of garbage: “This island has no hope. The air, the water, the soil and the people have been immersed in trash for too long.”

The themes of tech waste and contamination have a particular resonance in modern China, but are understandable to readers everywhere. This explains the lively translation market for comparable Taiwanese titles, such as Chi Ta-wei’s The Membranes and Wu Ming-yi’s The Man with the Compound Eyes.

Nigeria

Climate catastrophe frames the drama and ethical vision of Lost Ark Dreaming, by Nigerian author Suyi Davies Okungbowa. Lagos has been drowned, and people are crowded inside the Pinnacle, a vast, partially submerged, high rise in which the wealthy and powerful live on the upper levels, trying to keep the poor and the rising waters at bay. In Nigeria as in China, the eco-dystopian imagination is animated by images of injustice and cruelty, often in ways that refract colonial history. Other Nigerian-American examples include Nnedi Okorafor’s Noor and Tochi Onyebuchi’s War Girls.

India

Indian contributors to the genre include Lavanya Lakshminarayan’s
Analog/Virtual and Varun Thomas Mathew’s The Black Dwarves of the Good Little Bay. The latter is set in the year 2041 in a post-Mumbai in which the population has also crowded into a towering redoubt, though this one is called the Bombadrome and is surrounded by a barren wasteland.

The mistrust of technologically driven change is a distinctive feature of Indian science fiction, but the new wave of eco-dystopias is part of a global conversation. They are diverse but united in their effort to make use of the future to register loss, yearning and possibility.

Malformed landscapes, biodiversity loss and tides of industrial debris are encountered throughout the genre, though climate change looms large in many examples from south Asia and Africa.

The Egyptian science fiction author Emad El-Din Aysha once speculated that dystopia was a distinctly western genre because those with “real-life anxieties around every corner” have no need to invent them. But it appears that real-life anxieties are not a brake but an engine for the imagination. Today’s dystopian imagination is ecological and urgent and asks us to travel far into the future and into every part of the world.

This article features references to books that have been included for editorial reasons. If you click on one of the bookshop.org links and go on to buy something, The Conversation UK may earn a commission.

Alastair Bonnett does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. How ‘eco-dystopian’ novels from Asia and Africa are pushing boundaries – https://theconversation.com/how-eco-dystopian-novels-from-asia-and-africa-are-pushing-boundaries-275264

April 2, 2026

The Untold Stories of Women Football Fans: celebrating memories, calling out prejudice

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Stacey Pope, Professor in the Department of Sport and Exercise Sciences, Durham University

It’s one of the clearest things about me. I’m black and white … I think I cried for a month when we lost the FA Cup Final in 1974. I was only ten and it was near my birthday as well. I was absolutely gutted. [Jo, Newcastle fan since the 1970s]

Sexism in football, according to a recent BBC report is “a problem that isn’t going away”. When working on my book The Feminization of Sports Fandom, I discovered that the increasing opportunities for women to become football fans over the last three decades has not automatically led to equality.

Now a University of Durham exhibition based on my work will play a role in challenging negative attitudes and help reimagine a more positive future for women football fans.

My research draws on more than 200 interviews with women sports fans in the UK. These accounts demonstrate that sexism and misogyny have been, and continue to be, rife in football. This work has contributed to several UK parliament select committees, with findings providing evidence for the urgent need for safer, more welcoming and inclusive environments for women fans.

It shows how various strategies are used by men to undermine the status of women as “real” or “authentic” fans, and that women are routinely required to “prove” themselves as such. This is supported by statistics from football’s anti-discrimination organisation Kick It Out, which received reports of more than double the number of sexist incidents at football matches this season (2025/26) compared with the same point last season.

Colleagues and I also undertook the first research on UK male football fans’ attitudes towards women, surveying 1,950 men. It revealed that openly misogynistic attitudes still dominate football fandom in the UK. Three-quarters of men held either overt or covert misogynistic attitudes towards women in football.

To address this, we wanted to stage an exhibition that would call out common misperceptions of female fans. Away From Home: The Untold Stories of Women Football Fans is in equal measure about celebration and challenges. Co-designed with David Wright from Durham University’s Museum’s Galleries and Exhibitions Team, it recognises women’s memories and experiences as football fans – past and present – preserving these stories for the future.

Raising the profile of female fans

The lack of visibility of female football fans in popular and academic accounts, combined with assumptions that women did not attend football matches in the past, has contributed to the widely held views that women fans are less “authentic”. Or they are perceived as newcomers to football with less knowledge and thus treated with less respect.

Our exhibition, currently on show at the Beacon of Light in Sunderland, shares personal accounts of women fans of Newcastle United and Sunderland AFC from the 1950s to the present day, and reveals such assumptions and prejudices to be completely false.

This pop-up show is also about opening up challenging conversations regarding the work that is still needed to create safer spaces for all girls and women. Giving a platform to the experiences of female fans – both positive and negative – can help lead to changes in attitudes and a new appreciation for these women.

Despite football playing such an important part of culture, exhibitions on football are rare. Exhibitions with a fan focus even more so, and those focusing on female fans almost non-existent until now. Designed in the style of matchday stalls, the exhibition is popping up at sports centres and supporter fanzones such as Sunderland’s Beacon of Light.

Each fan featured is represented by a homemade football scarf, produced by supporters in a reference to an age before mass-produced official merchandise. Visitors can wear these scarves as they browse the stories, creating connection and emphasising the universal elements of football fan experiences. This familiar space and accessibility is critical if we are to unlock some of the challenging issues of sexism and misogyny that lie at the heart of this research.

Many of the stories emphasise the lifelong connections between fans and clubs that will be relatable to all fans, irrespective of club or gender. Margaret, a regular at Sunderland since the 1950s, sums this up:

Your football team gets into your heart and that’s where it stays. You cannot change that. My heart is with Sunderland Football Club, has been since my dad took me, and that’s the only place I would ever go.

Many featured fans describe gender inequalities in their experiences. This includes the expectation of giving up attending matches after marriage or starting a family, despite male partners continuing to attend.

There are also examples of sexism and extreme hostility towards women’s presence in the football stadium across all generations – as Beryl, a fan since the 1950s, describes: “The men just assume that you’re an idiot. Because they’re a man and football’s their game.” Lynsey, a fan since the 1990s, agrees: “We hear comments like: ‘What would you know about football? You’re a woman.’”

Creating better spaces for women

Highlighting these experiences can help us to reconsider negative attitudes to women fans today and imagine what the future could look like for them.

For a long time, women fans have felt they needed to accept what Newcastle fan Tracey describes as “football’s terrible sexist culture”, but there is a sense that this is changing.

As the exhibition tours, our work in collaboration with police and other major groups and organisations is developing solutions based on evidence that will help create safer, more welcoming and inclusive spaces for women fans. This includes improvements in national mechanisms for reporting and responding to violence and abuse.

Football can be an important force for positive social change. This exhibition and the research that underpins it forms part of these wider collective efforts to increase public awareness and understanding of the challenges women fans face. But crucially, it also celebrates these women’s lifelong memories, and the powerful sense of identity being a football fan can provide.

This exhibition work and article was co-designed and produced with David Wright from the Museums, Galleries and Exhibitions Team at Durham University.

Stacey Pope receives funding from Arts and Humanities Research Council, Economic and Social Research Council and Foundation of Light National Lottery Heritage Fund.

– ref. The Untold Stories of Women Football Fans: celebrating memories, calling out prejudice – https://theconversation.com/the-untold-stories-of-women-football-fans-celebrating-memories-calling-out-prejudice-279703

April 2, 2026

Why Benjamin Netanyahu needs the Iran conflict to continue

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Leonie Fleischmann, Senior Lecturer in International Politics, City St George’s, University of London

Before Donald Trump delivered his prime-time address to the American people on April 1, many commentators predicted he would claim victory and signal that the US air campaign against Iran would be wound down – even without a deal with Tehran to open the Strait of Hormuz. As it turned out, Trump said he would double down on the violence, promising to hit Iran “extremely hard” in coming weeks.

The White House simultaneously released a document headlined: President Trump’s Clear and Unchanging Objectives Drive Decisive Success Against Iranian Regime. “From day one,” it stated, “the objectives have been clear: obliterate Iran’s missiles and production, annihilate its navy, sever its support for terrorist proxies, and ensure it never acquires a nuclear weapon.” These objectives, Trump said, were nearly complete and he expected to finish the job “very fast”.

For the US president, the key marker of the success or otherwise of this foreign policy gambit will come in November’s midterm elections. So his strategic decisions are likely to be heavily influenced by the need to be able to claim victory, while also limiting any negative outcomes from the energy price shock engulfing the world. To do this, he must declare victory fairly soon.

But Trump’s partner in the war, Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has a markedly different set of strategic priorities (although electoral politics will also play a big part in his thinking).

Launching Israel’s air campaign on February 28, Netanyahu said the goal was to “put an end to the threat from the Ayatollah regime in Iran”. He framed this as having been an existential threat to Israel for all of the 47 years that the Islamic Republic had been in existence, insisting that regime change was “not the objective, but … could certainly be the result”.

In the five weeks of the conflict, Israel’s strategic goals have both widened and lengthened. In Iran, while clearly working in partnership with the US, it wants to reserve the right, unilaterally, to “go back and hit Iran every time the nuclear and missile programmes are being rebuilt”.

Meanwhile, Israel has responded to attacks from Hezbollah forces in Lebanon by occupying the southern part of the country up to the Litani river. This area was designated by UN security council resolution 1701 in 2006 as a buffer zone in which only the Lebanese national army and UN peacekeepers were authorised to operate.

The Israeli defence minister, Israel Katz, has warned that Lebanese citizens who had fled would not be allowed to return “until the safety and security of northern Israeli residents is ensured”.

It appears that Israel plans a long-term occupation of the region. It already maintains a buffer zone in southern Syria, which it occupied after the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime in December 2024. This, it says, is also to deter Hezbollah attacks on northern Israel.

Netanyahu’s war aims

The focus of Netanyahu’s security policy has consistently been directed at Iran and its proxies. My research with Amnon Aran has demonstrated that in perpetuating an “Iran-as-evil” framing, the Israeli prime minister effectively precluded any possibility of engaging with the regime diplomatically.

Netanyahu’s political worldview has been enormously influenced by the founder of Revisionist Zionism, Ze’ev Jabotinsky. Under Jabotinsky’s “Iron Wall doctrine”, reinforcing the might of Israel is the only responsible response to the threat posed by Iran and its proxies. It is a strategy of strength first, diplomacy second.

In the past, Netanyahu has talked of defeating Israel’s enemies as his “supreme objective”. But more recently, analysts are describing what they refer to as the “Netanyahu doctrine”. According to this security stance, Israel must be prepared to launch “pre-emptive” attacks against any perceived threats, maintaining a permanent readiness for war.

So regime change of the Islamic Republic is not a direct goal – even if, as noted, the Israeli prime minister believes it might result from the pressure he is putting on Tehran. He is aiming to “create conditions that will enable the brave Iranian people to cast off the yoke of this murderous regime”.

But there is another important dimension to this “permanent conflict”. Netanyahu must call a national election before October. Polls suggest Israeli public support for the war in Iran could give him a boost in time for the election. Unlike the war on Gaza, which polls showed a majority of Israeli citizens wanted to end, there has been overwhelming support in Israel for the war on Iran.

Even ministers in Netanyahu’s government recognise that domestic politics has formed a big part of his motivation for launching this conflict now, saying that – as far as Netanyahu is concerned – “the road to the polling stations runs through Washington and Tehran”.

So far, however, there is little evidence that support for the war is translating into electoral support for Netanyahu. A lot depends on how the conflict plays out. A long war with heavy casualties and significant damage to civilian areas in Israel has the potential to damage Netanyahu’s election chances.

A poll taken on March 19 found that while the prime minister’s Likud party would receive the most votes, he would find it difficult to form a ruling coalition. And if he loses power, there is the prospect of his corruption trials proceeding.

So, a lot hangs on the outcome of this conflict. An early and decisive victory might have given Netanyahu the confidence to call a snap election. But this now looks unlikely. And if Trump decides to bring an end to hostilities without achieving the far-reaching change Netanyahu has promised, things could go badly for Israel’s longest-serving leader.

Leonie Fleischmann does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Why Benjamin Netanyahu needs the Iran conflict to continue – https://theconversation.com/why-benjamin-netanyahu-needs-the-iran-conflict-to-continue-279777

April 2, 2026

There may not be a Christian revival, but Britain’s traditional churches aren’t doomed

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Linda Woodhead, F.D. Maurice Professor of Religion, King’s College London

In the same week that a new archbishop of Canterbury was installed, YouGov admitted that a poll suggesting there was a “quiet revival” of Christianity was a dud. It had been inflated by fraudulent results and should be ignored.

To those of us who study the bigger picture of religion in Britain, this comes as no surprise. There are good reasons to doubt that Britain is experiencing a Christian revival today – but that does not mean it is dying out.

To understand what is happening in Britain, it is helpful to compare it with the US, which has has long been viewed as exceptionally religious in comparison. Recent evidence suggests something less clear-cut.

In a major recent study, sociologist Christian Smith assembles the data. In the 1970s and ’80s, only around one in ten Americans identified as “nonreligious”. But from 1991, the proportion of people who identify as such has risen steeply, reaching 29% in 2021.

Today, 43% of young American adults aged 18-29 say they are nonreligious, and only a quarter of generation Z are regular church attenders.

In Britain, being nonreligious was much more common, much earlier. Today, around half the population say they have “no religion” – a proportion that has remained rather stable since the 2010s, according to the reliable British Social Attitudes survey.

By contrast, the proportion saying they are Christian has fallen steadily to around 40% today. Levels of regular weekly churchgoing are around 5%.

In other words, the decline of Christianity started later in the US than in Britain, and has not yet gone as far. But in America, it has been swifter, more dramatic and shows no sign of slowing down.

American-style Christianity can no longer be assumed to be the future for the churches in Britain. Such religion has always been more enthusiastic, congregational and separate from the state.

When Christianity last experienced a revival in the US, with the rise of the New Christian Right and televangelism in the 1980s, conservative and fundamentalist churches were prominent, and megachurches did well. Some blamed the decline of churches in Britain on the fact that they were not more like American ones. They were said to be insufficiently enthusiastic and self-promoting.

Megachurches never really took off in Britain, except for a few examples in big cities that tend to serve diaspora communities. And though the last archbishop, Justin Welby, hoped that an evangelical revival would reverse church decline, this failed to materialise.

The resilience of old churches

But Britain’s churches are not doomed. In light of the recent Christian decline in America, the stately power and traditional ways of the UK’s older churches may turn out to be an asset.

Though few people attend regularly, the Church of England, the Roman Catholic Church and the Church of Scotland are still the largest and most powerful of the UK churches. Institutional embeddedness matters.

The Church of England is constitutionally established, and all these churches play a central role in the school system by way of state-supported faith schools. Although the Church of England is not funded through taxation like some of its sister churches in Scandinavia, its considerable wealth – around £11 billion – protects it.

If generation Z show an interest in religion, it is traditional forms that appeal to them as much as the trendier forms that seek the attention of youth. We see this not just in Christianity, where both the Roman Catholic Church and Orthodox Churches are reporting new interest, but also in Orthodox Judaism and, to some extent, in Islam.

Still, the traditional churches are unlikely to return to a position like they held in society as recently as the 1980s. Today, revival is virtually impossible. When American evangelist Billy Graham won converts in Britain, he was not winning over people who had grown up nonreligous, he was speaking to people with a Christian background.

It is sometimes suggested that war or social collapse could lead to a revival of Christianity. That is possible, but history suggests that a plethora of different intense, sectarian kinds of religion and spirituality emerge in such situations.

Others argue that the Holy Spirit stirs individual hearts and minds, irrespective of the state of the churches. That is how Protestant Christians have often thought about revival, perhaps recalling Methodist enthusiasm or the chapel movement in Wales.

The striking thing about such revivalism, however, is how quickly it can fade. The chapels are mostly closed now. The Methodists are dying out. “Nonconformity” as a whole, still a major force in England in the 1950s, is almost forgotten.

Though the Christian nationalists on the American right are currently very loud, they have had no impact on the continued decline of Christianity in the US or the alienation of young people. Attempts by some on Britain’s political right to talk up Christianity are even less likely to succeed. They are reviving words, not religion.

What we have in Britain today is a landscape in which the historic churches appear a little stronger than once thought, and revivalist forms of Christianity weaker. Overall, however, Christianity occupies a much diminished space. Other world religions, especially Islam, are stable or growing.

“Nonreligion” is the biggest affiliation after Christianity, but that label hides diversity. Some of the nonreligious are atheist, some agnostic, and some are actively interested in new forms of spirituality, magic and supernaturalism. Although old landmarks remain, like church steeples on the horizon, the religious landscape of Britain is greatly changed.

Linda Woodhead receives funding from the Economic and Social Research Council and the Arts and Humanities Research Council (UK research councils)

– ref. There may not be a Christian revival, but Britain’s traditional churches aren’t doomed – https://theconversation.com/there-may-not-be-a-christian-revival-but-britains-traditional-churches-arent-doomed-279291

April 2, 2026

Our modern vision evolved from an ancient one-eyed worm creature

Source: The Conversation – UK – By George Kafetzis, Research Fellow in Neuroscience, University of Sussex

It’s easy to take our eyes for granted. But our recent research shows they took an incredible evolutionary journey to reach their current familiar form.

It has long been known that our (vertebrate) eyes differ fundamentally from the ones of our distant relatives (invertebrates), because of their cell composition and how they develop before birth. However, answers to why or how these differences first emerged long remained elusive.

Our study suggests that our eyes descend from a worm-like ancestor that was roaming the oceans 600 million years ago. The same also applies to all bilateral animals, meaning animals whose bodies can be divided into roughly mirror-image left and right halves.

As part of our study, we surveyed 36 major groups of living animals (covering nearly all bilateral animals) to see where their eyes and light-sensing cells are located and what they do.

A pattern emerged. We discovered that eyes and light-sensing cells are consistently found at two separate locations: paired on both sides of the face, and at the midline of the head, on top of the brain. Across the animals we looked at, cells in the paired position are used to steer movements, while their midline counterparts tell day from night and up from down.

We concluded that an ancient worm-like ancestor of all vertebrate animals lost the “steering” pair of eyes when it adopted a mostly stationary lifestyle 600 million years ago, burrowing into the seabed. In becoming a filter feeder with no need to move around, the energetically expensive type of paired eyes was rendered useless and costly.

However, this lifestyle change left the light-sensing cells in the middle of its head unscathed, because the animal still needed to sense the time of day and distinguish between up and down. Although the paired eyes were gone, the light-sensing cells in the midline developed into a small midline eye.

Close up of woman's face — Our eyes have a surprising history.
PeopleImages/Shutterstock

Possibly within a few million years, this animal changed lifestyle again. A return to swimming reintroduced the need to control steering and measure its own body motion for efficient filter-feeding (sifting food out of water) and avoiding predators.

This pushed evolution to develop the midline eye by forming small eye cups on each side. These eye cups later separated from the midline eye, moved out to the sides of the head and formed new paired eyes: our eyes.

The loss and regain of vision happened between 600 and 540 million years ago. Components of the midline eye remained and became the pineal organ in the brain, which produces and releases the sleep hormone melatonin.

In many vertebrates, the pineal organ receives light through a transparent (unpigmented) region in the middle of the head. However, in the mammalian lineage the pineal organ lost its light-sensing capacity – possibly because early mammals were active at night and hid during daytime. So the eyes, which were more sensitive, took over the light detection which drives melatonin release and sleep.

Eyes of all shapes and sizes

Those animals that did not lose the worm-like ancestor’s original paired light-sensing cells comprise most invertebrates around today, since they descended from a branch of the evolutionary tree that never adopted a static lifestyle. Such animals include crustaceans, insects, spiders, octopus, snails and many groups of worms. These animals still have modern versions of the original sets of light-sensing cells.

The paired eyes of insects and crustaceans are compound eyes, with an array of tiny and densely packed lenses per eye. Instead of compound eyes, octopus and snails have camera-type eyes with a single lens.

In fact, octopus and snails independently evolved the same eye design and visual performance as us vertebrates. However, our retina – the light sensitive layer at the back of our eyes – has over 100 types of neurons (mice have even more – 140), compared to a mere handful in octopus and snails. This makes it almost as complex as our cerebral cortex – the outer and largest part of our brain.

Scientists have thought that in the evolution of our eyes, this complexity emerged fairly late. Similarities between light-sensing cells in the brain and paired eyes informed earlier hypotheses about a simple, pineal organ-like eye early in its evolution. In our work, however, we argue that a lot of this complexity predates the retina.

As such, it is likely to have been present already in the “cyclops” ancestor eye. This has broad implications for the origin and wiring of neural circuits in our retina and brain alike.

For us vertebrates, the evolution of our eyes and brain is intimately linked. The emergence of new paired eyes is a fundamental part of this picture, since the eyes allowed for the complex behavior that call for cognition and large brains. Without the eyes, we would not just be humans without eyes; we would not exist at all, nor would any of the other vertebrates.

George Kafetzis receives funding from the European Research Council and the Leverhulme Trust.

Dan Nilsson receives funding from The Swedish Research Council, and The EU Horizons program.

– ref. Our modern vision evolved from an ancient one-eyed worm creature – https://theconversation.com/our-modern-vision-evolved-from-an-ancient-one-eyed-worm-creature-278120

April 2, 2026

Nato has survived some serious rifts but the Iran war shows how the US has soured on the transatlantic alliance

Source: The Conversation – UK – By David J. Galbreath, Professor of War and Technology, University of Bath

The US president took the opportunity of a prime-time speech to the US public on April 1 to repeat his by now-familiar criticism of America’s Nato allies for not joining the war in Iran. He told them to “build up some delayed courage. Should have done it before. Should have done it with us as we asked.”

Trump’s anger at Nato in the past fortnight has been focused on the reluctance of the likes of the UK, Germany and France to land a hand in forcing Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz. This vital waterway, through which ordinarily one-fifth of the world’s oil and gas transits, has been effectively closed by the threat from Iranian missile strikes to all but a few tankers approved by Tehran. The result has been dramatic, as energy prices have rocketed and supplies to countries dependent on Gulf oil have rapidly diminished.

The US-Israeli assault on Iran has failed to topple the regime or curtail its ability to pose a security threat in the region, leaving Tehran to wreak economic havoc. This flies in the face of the Trump administration’s claims of the overwhelming success of Operation Epic Fury. So the US president and his national security team are, at least in part, blaming Nato’s reluctance to get involved.

It’s important to stress that Article 5 of the Nato treaty mandates that Nato members must come to the aid of any fellow member which comes under attack. In the case of the US-Israeli military operation against Iran, Article 5 has not been invoked – nor does it apply. Further, many Nato members are mindful of the legacy of the disastrous war in Iraq. This sowed deep divisions within Nato after some members (notably the UK and Poland) lined up beside the US and others (France and Germany most vociferously) opposed the invasion. It also became a byword for an ill thought-out military campaign with dubious legitimacy and no exit plan.

As a result, most Nato member states are reluctant to get involved in the US-Israeli campaign against Iran. In any case, many of Nato’s European members are far more concerned about the war going on at their borders between Russia and Ukraine.

Nato reluctance has clearly stung Trump and his senior advisers. On March 31, the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, told Fox News’s Sean Hannity that: “We’re going to have to reexamine the value of NATO and that alliance for our country. If Nato is just about us defending Europe if they’re attacked, but them denying us basing rights when we need them, that’s not a very good arrangement. That’s a hard one to stay engaged in.”

Asked by The Telegraph the following day whether the US was reconsidering its membership of the alliance, Trump said “Oh yes… I would say [it’s] beyond reconsideration”. He went on to question the Nato’s effectiveness, saying: I always knew they were a paper tiger, and Putin knows that too, by the way.“

Scepticism about Nato has been growing within senior US national security ranks for some time. At various times, Rubio, vice-president, J.D. Vance, and defense secretary Pete Hegseth have all questioned how an alliance based around the principle of US-led defence of Europe against Soviet aggression now fits America’s interests.

This is not a view shared by the alliance’s European members, who remain deeply integrated into Nato’s command and control systems and, until now at least, have placed a great deal of trust in its role as a key security and defence partnership with Washington. And not just Nato – the fact that Ukraine was being considered for membership was cited by Vladimir Putin as a reason for the Russian invasion in 2022.

Nato has changed – but it has endured

The alliance’s focus has shifted over the years, at times moving from being an organisation focused on collective defence to one aiming at collective security. This distinction can be summed up thus: collective defence is just what it says, pledging to come to the assistance of a fellow member whose territory is threatened by a third party. Collective security is more about mobilising to address sources of regional insecurity such as ethnic conflict in the former Yugoslavia.

But the 2014 annexation of Crimea (which raised the possibility of Russia’s “little green men” crossing the border into Narva in Estonia, a member state) and the full invasion of Ukraine in 2022 further underlined the need for Nato to have a strong focus on defence against a newly aggressive Russia.

The question is whether, as Rubio, Vance and Hegseth have all suggested – and as the national security strategy released by the Trump administration last November spells out – the US no longer sees European security as either its responsibility or its focus. Or, as Trump appears to believe, whether an alliance that won’t do his bidding is worth America’s while.

But even in the cold war, Nato was not involved in its members’ military adventures. The US actively worked against the UK, France and Israel during the Suez Canal episode in the mid-1950s. Britain refused to join the US in Vietnam. Precedents such as these would suggest that the Iran war would ordinarily not be a place for Nato involvement, even if individual member-states could contribute.

Nato has been through crises before, but the fact that its European members have heeded the US president’s demands for them to increase their defence budgets shows that for them, at least, the alliance has enduring importance. For it to fall apart after nearly 80 years over Iran would be an unbecoming end to one of the most important collective defence arrangements the world has ever seen.

David J. Galbreath has received funding from the UKRI.

– ref. Nato has survived some serious rifts but the Iran war shows how the US has soured on the transatlantic alliance – https://theconversation.com/nato-has-survived-some-serious-rifts-but-the-iran-war-shows-how-the-us-has-soured-on-the-transatlantic-alliance-279799