Secret consultation documents finally released after the Morning Star’s two-year freedom of information battle show the Home Office misrepresented public opinion, claiming support for policies that most respondents actually strongly criticised as dangerous and unfair, writes SOLOMON HUGHES

THE recent rise of far-right ideologies and white supremacists in Europe has been associated with their appropriation of Viking iconography — and the appeal of the Viking myth to white supremacists is easy to see.
The ubiquity of the image of the violent sea-warrior resonates with half-formed ideas that we all carry as somehow associated with white skin and blond hair, the “Scandinavian looks” that can act as a helpful euphemism to bolster investment in “whiteness” now that Aryanism has fallen out of fashion.
Association with Vikings can be rightly identified as a historically meaningless fairytale for racists. Scientific, archaeological and historical work continues to shed light on who “the Vikings” really were. Between 800 and 1000AD, a number of seafaring cultures in northern Europe were particularly dominant. Rather than being identified as a single group, the term refers to a number of different populations that were prominent in colonisation and warfare.

A maverick’s self-inflicted snake bites could unlock breakthrough treatments – but they also reveal deeper tensions between noble scientific curiosity and cold corporate callousness, write ROX MIDDLETON, LIAM SHAW and MIRIAM GAUNTLETT
Science has always been mixed up with money and power, but as a decorative facade for megayachts, it risks leaving reality behind altogether, write ROX MIDDLETON, LIAM SHAW and MIRIAM GAUNTLETT

