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Coverage of the recent student encampments at more than 50 universities across the United States has focused on confrontations between opposing groups of protesters or between protesters and police.

The spectacle of militarised officers being called on to campus grounds, or academics and students alike being pinned to the concrete, has dominated news broadcasts.

Having recently returned from the US, where I was conducting research at Columbia University’s library, I was able to witness these events at first hand. There are several features of the protests that haven’t received much attention, but are nevertheless worth exploring.

1. Religious celebration

While there have been instances of Islamophobia and antisemitism by some protesters and counter-protesters, the overwhelming majority of students protesting have been modelling the peaceful coexistence of religious expression. There has been a huge breadth of cultural celebration – including Latinx music and Punjabi and Dabke dancing. There have also been diverse religious services including by both Muslim and Jewish students, as well as liturgical readings by Union Theological Seminary speakers taking place within the encampments. These have been largely ignored by most media reports.

Students of different faiths – and none – facilitated each other’s rituals by holding blankets aloft as screens to form makeshift spaces of worship. Religious practices were also being modified, for example, as communities of Jewish students invited others to join them in celebrating the Passover Seder and adapted religious readings to satirise college administrators.

Seder Haggadah – Satire on the Four Children/Administrators.
Robert Jackson

Muslim students were also reclaiming the right to practice their faith publicly without fear. Students I spoke to viewed these acts as contributing to student safety, opposing the rise of Islamophobia and antisemitism in wider society. This provides a counterpoint to the frequent accusations of “anti-Jewish hatred” levelled against them.

2. Diversity

Earlier this academic year Columbia University suspended the student chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace. This action, along with complaints that “university disciplinary processes” were being used “to target Palestinian students and their allies on and off campus”, appears to have catalysed a wider alliance of dissent.

Thus, the Columbia encampment was organised by a “Divest” coalition of 116 groups that had far greater reach than the two suspended groups.

Columbia University Apartheid Divest Logo.
CUAD Website

A recent referendum by Columbia College Student Council on divestment from Israel passed with 77% in favour on a 40% turnout. This was a significant increase from comparable earlier votes.

3. Stress-testing university ethics

The protesters are conscious that, particularly since the rise of the #BlackLivesMatter movement and decolonising initiatives, institutions have sought to signal their values. An example of this is New York University recognising that the city of New York was built through the violent displacement of the Lenape people from their homeland.

The students involved in these protests feel that the values expressed in such statements don’t match the policies and investments that are being pursued by their administrations. Nor do they believe the treatment that they are receiving reflects those ethics.

This treatment has included being arrested by police, who have been invited onto campus for the first time since 1968. There have also been threats of suspension and evictions from university accommodation, for engaging in peaceful protest that questions institutional conduct.

New York City police officers entering Hamilton Hall at Columbia University where students had barricaded themselves in, April 30 2024.
EPA-EFE/Stephani Spindel

Members of the Columbia chapter of the American Association of University Professors have raised their concerns about the “administration’s blatant lack of respect for the safety of its students and the principles of higher education”. The actions of students at Columbia have placed on the public agenda a critical examination of the ethical legacy of their institution.

Minouche Shafik, President of Columbia University, acknowledges that “there is much debate about whether or not we should use the police on campus”, but states that the university has been “patient in tolerating unauthorized demonstrations”, and pursued a “collaborative resolution with the protesters”.

4. The protests are also about gentrification

The current protests are indisputably centred on Palestine. Students have been calling for transparency and accountability over their universities’ financial connections with Israel. But the student activists describe their campaigns as concerned equally with local issues as with global politics.

They link their discussions of displacement and occupation in relation to Gaza directly to gentrification conflicts, for example, between Columbia University and neighbouring (predominantly Black and Latinx) communities in Harlem. Students believe that Columbia’s expansion project is undermining low-income residents by acquiring property to connect its Morningside campus with the Columbia University Medical Centre.

This is a point of similarity with the 1968 Columbia protests. While those events are often framed primarily in relation to the movement against the Vietnam War, gentrification was also a significant trigger for campus occupations.

At that time, Columbia University proposed to build a gymnasium by developing land in nearby Morningside Park. Plans for a separate lower-level community entrance, seen by many as an attempt at segregation quite literally through the back door – circumventing the 1964 Civil Rights Act – provoked further opposition. The project was eventually shelved.

Placards at Columbia University Encampment.
Robert Jackson

5. Visibility as a battleground

Students camped on Columbia’s lawns chose initially not to occupy buildings as their 1968 counterparts had. This made their activities more visible to the world. It made the protests more accessible to allies and opponents alike. But it also enabled surveillance by university and government authorities.

This visibility raises the potential stakes for each person involved in the protests. It arguably involves a greater level of commitment and immediate risk than in 1968.

The encampments at Columbia and other Ivy League universities have received disproportionate attention from the world’s media, especially when measured against protests at less wealthy or prestigious institutions. The students at Columbia have tried to use this visibility as a mirror to persuade others of the conspicuous absence of Palestinian lives in public discourse, and the necessity of centring Palestinian voices.

‘American spring’

Behind the wave of student encampments is a constituency disillusioned with a lack of effective measures from the “international community” to achieve a ceasefire and an end to the conditions of famine in Gaza.

While the protests are student-led, there has been legal support from faculty academics as well as media interventions. Meanwhile there has also been an increasingly organised presence of academics during police interventions on campus.

There is a generational difference in outlook about the likely outcome of these protests. In conversation, staff tend to be more reserved about their expectations. By contrast, students exude a sense that the process is building towards a breakthrough moment. Their confidence in the possibility of realising their demands is reflected in the recurrent chant: “I believe that we will win.”

It is a marker of the dramatic reversal of conventional political assumptions about students in the US represented by these protests that some in Gaza have begun referring to them as the “American spring”. Läs mer…

A key part of the Albanese government’s political strategy is to fill the news cycle with its presence and messaging. Ministers are deployed to the maximum, even when they’ve little to say.

This week we’ve seen an opposite tactic. The government has done its best to limit, to the extent possible, ministerial visibility on a story that is bad for it.

Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil and Immigration Minister Andrew Giles went to ground after it was reported one of the about 150 former immigration detainees, released late last year, was among three people who allegedly committed a violent house invasion in Perth in April.

In the incident, the perpetrators allegedly posed as police officers to get into the house of the elderly couple. The wife, Ninette Simons, suffered severe injuries to her face. Her husband was allegedly tied up.

After the matter was reported, the ministers did a single interview each: Giles on ABC radio late Tuesday, and O’Neil on her regular Seven Sunrise spot on Wednesday. There should have been a full scale news conference.

The ministers tried to justify avoiding the media by arguing the former detainee, Majid Jamshidi Doukoshkan, is before the courts. He’s charged with aggravated home burglary, robbery, impersonating a public officer, assault and detaining a person.

The ministers’ excuse for their reticence doesn’t wash, because the matter goes to wider issues around inadequacies in how these detainees, including Doukoshkan, have been handled. There are serious questions about ministerial responsibility and administrative competence (or incompetence) that need to be answered.

It is not as though we’re dealing just with history. Given what’s happened so far with this cohort, it’s possible – even likely – there will be future incidents (indeed, another man was charged on Thursday over curfew breaches).

A significant number of the former detainees have run foul of the law since their release. On figures from early February, revealed in Senate estimates, some 18 had been charged with state or territory offences. Five people have been charged with visa breaches since March 13. There were others before that but because it was found invalid visas had been issued to the ex-detainees, those cases were dropped.

The government insists it has put in place all the measures it can to ensure the ex-detainees are monitored so they don’t pose threats to the community.

The opposition contests this. It also argues all these people shouldn’t have been let out in the wake of the High Court decision that related specifically to one person. The government says it had no choice but to release them all.

Let’s assume the government is right in its insistence about the mass release. What followed that release has been a shemozzle.

The ex-detainees are supposed to be fitted with ankle brackets, where that’s considered necessary for their close monitoring. This is done on the recommendation of an expert Community Protection Board the government set up.

Doukoshkan earlier had a bracelet; before his alleged role in the home invasion, this was apparently removed, on the recommendation of the board.

Pushed for an explanation on this on Thursday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told the ABC: “Well, the Community Protection Board is, of course, a board that’s independent of politicians”. As to whether the board had failed, “It’s not appropriate for me to comment on individual cases, particularly ones that are before the courts”.

This is a brush-off. Apart from the fact the board provides “recommendations” to the immigration minister (or his delegate), the public deserves to be told why this person was not wearing a bracelet. It’s hard to see how providing that information would interfere with the court case.

Born in Kuwait, 43-year-old Doukoshkan had been convicted in 2017 of drug trafficking.

This year he was released on bail three times. He was charged with a visa breach for curfew breaks – a federal offence. The other instances related to offences under WA law. He received bail the third time in mid-April after he faced a state drug charge.

There’s been much confusion on what precisely was the Commonweath’s position on bail in the federal case. Federal government talking points – revealed by Sky this week – wrongly said it had opposed bail. According to a report in the West Australian at the time, “Counsel for the Commonwealth did not oppose bail but warned: ‘Further breaches may not have the same response’”. The magistrate involved told Doukoshkan he was on thin ice and she wouldn’t have granted bail had the Commonwealth not been so “generous”. (Eventually that charge was withdrawn, because of the invalid visa hitch.)

State as well as federal authorities are involved in dealing with former detainees. But overall responsibility must be sheeted home to the federal government.

The Albanese government rushed through legislation to give it the power to apply to a court to preventatively detain these people if they were judged at a high risk of committing serious, violent or sexual crimes.

So far, no applications have been made. The government says it takes time to prepare strong cases. Albanese had all sorts of qualifications when pressed on Wednesday but said, “I want to see it happen as a matter of urgency”.

Next week we will get the report of the Senate inquiry into the government’s proposed legislation relating to people it is trying to deport. This legislation was driven by fears about another High Court case that, if the government loses, would pave the way for more people to be released. (The conventional wisdom is that the government will probably win this case.)

The legislation targets non-citizens who refuse to cooperate with their removal. They’d face a mandatory year’s jail, with a maximum of five years. Countries refusing to accept involuntary returnees would also face sanctions, with their citizens (with some exceptions) unable to get visas to come to Australia.

The government in the last sitting tried to accelerate this legislation through parliament on the assumption – which proved wrong – that the opposition wouldn’t dare delay it.

The bill has faced extensive criticism, but that coming this week from the Tamil family in Biloela must have been particularly galling for the government. Priya Murugappan said: “If this deportation bill was around a few years ago, my husband and I would have been put in jail because we did not agree to go back to Sri Lanka. Our girls would have been taken away from us by the government. We might still be in jail, instead of living safely here as a family. This shouldn’t happen to other people like us.”

One of the Albanese government’s first acts was to return the family to Biloela, promising them permanency. Läs mer…

In less than eight years, white sharks in South Africa have all but disappeared from their historical hotspots in False Bay and Gansbaai, on the Western Cape coast. These areas were once known as the “white shark capital of the world” and were home to a flourishing ecotourism industry. One possible explanation for this change would be a declining white shark population.

We are part of an international research team with expertise in shark ecology, genetics, fisheries and conservation, researching sharks for more than 20 years. This has included tagging sharks and monitoring their activities in the area.

We have published numerous papers on the species. These have included research into conservation plans for sharks in South Africa, white shark cage diving, and the importance of coastal reef habitats for white sharks.

Read more:
I spent the past seven years counting white sharks – the findings are troubling

Our most recent tracking data on white sharks tells a worrying story: 18 of 21 white sharks tagged since 2019 with internal 10-year transmitters in Mossel Bay by the Oceans Research Institute have disappeared. This represents the loss of nearly 90% of the tracked white sharks in less than four years. They have not been detected moving to the Eastern Cape or elsewhere: they vanished.

Furthermore, nowadays, white sharks larger than 4 metres in length, the big breeders, are rarely sighted. Combined with the known low genetic diversity of this population, it is an indication that the white shark population is likely not stable in South Africa.

Based on this, we urge the South African government to take a precautionary approach to white shark conservation. Otherwise, South Africa could go down in history not only as the first country to protect white sharks, but also the first country to knowingly lose its white sharks.

What’s known

As far back as 2011, between 500 and 1,000 individual white sharks were estimated to be left in South Africa. Today, we barely see any larger white sharks. This in itself is a sign of a population not doing well, because the fewer adult sharks there are, the greater the decline will be.

Although white sharks have been a protected species since 1991, large numbers are legally killed every year by shark nets and drumlines (anchored hooks with large baits) operated by the KwaZulu Natal Sharks Board. This is based on an outdated 70-year-old idea that sharks should be culled to reduce the chances of encounters with humans.

Read more:
How shark spotting can help reduce attacks. A Cape Town case study

Between 1978 and 2018, drumlines and shark nets captured 1,317 white sharks, of which 1,108 died. So, on average, 28 white sharks were killed every single year for the last 40 years.

We have estimated that even if tens of white sharks were killed per year, this would drive the white shark population into decline.

White sharks have also been affected by the demersal shark longline fishery. Boats use fishing lines fitted with thousands of hooks that can be kilometres long. The fishery is permitted to target and kill endangered and critically endangered small sharks. But as the smaller sharks get caught on the lines, so do larger predators chasing them, including white sharks.

This fishery is conservatively estimated to have killed an average of 40 white sharks a year, mainly from 2008 to 2019. Photographer Oliver Godfrey observed three white sharks being caught and killed by this fishery while he was on one of their boats. He confirmed dead white sharks were discarded at sea and not reported to authorities. Three white sharks killed in 10 weeks by one vessel equates to 40 white sharks killed by an average of 4 vessels operating for only 3 weeks per month, 10 months of a year (all conservative figures).

Nevertheless, South Africa’s Department of Forestry, Fisheries and Environment has no official records of any of those because it relies only on the records supplied by the same fishery. The lack of records should raise concerns within the department as it knows that during a test run of this fishery, its scientists set three longlines, caught two white sharks and killed one.

What’s in dispute

A recent study claimed that the population of white sharks in South Africa was stable. The study suggested that the sharks had simply relocated eastward, fleeing from a pair of shark-eating orcas. According to the authors of the study, the stability of the white shark population was “encouraging” and “reassuring”.

But our review of that study found that their results could not demonstrate a stable white shark population, nor that the sharks had relocated. Our analysis found several discrepancies between the results and conclusions.

Read more:
Low levels of genetic diversity are putting great white sharks at risk

The main discrepancies included the fact that the declines of white sharks in the Western Cape began before the appearance of the shark-eating orcas in 2015 as reported. And at present there is no evidence of any location with the same large numbers of white shark comparable to the numbers found 10-15 years ago in the Western Cape. If the sharks had only relocated, their numbers should be found elsewhere.

There have been only eight confirmed white shark deaths by orcas since 2017 but possibly a few more unrecorded. Nevertheless, the permitted nets, drumline and longline fishery have together probably been responsible for at least eight times more white shark deaths, every single year.

Next steps

South Africa is still permitting unsustainable shark fishing operations in its waters. This ought to stop.

We also advocate for a discussion on new approaches to bather safety that don’t kill sharks, as also advocated in Australia. Tethered drones, shark spotters, and “smart drumlines” that send alerts to quick response teams when sharks are caught are among available technologies to protect swimmers and surfers without culling sharks.

The journal article that this article was based on was co-authored by Chris Fallows, Monique Fallows and Matias Braccini. Läs mer…

People have a pretty intuitive sense of what is healthy – standing is better than sitting, exercise is great for overall health and getting good sleep is imperative.

However, if exercise in the evening may disrupt our sleep, or make us feel the need to be more sedentary to recover, a key question emerges – what is the best way to balance our 24 hours to optimise our health?

Our research attempted to answer this for risk factors for heart disease, stroke and diabetes. We found the optimal amount of sleep was 8.3 hours, while for light activity and moderate to vigorous activity, it was best to get 2.2 hours each.

Finding the right balance

Current health guidelines recommend you stick to a sensible regime of moderate-to vigorous-intensity physical activity 2.5–5 hours per week.

However mounting evidence now suggests how you spend your day can have meaningful ramifications for your health. In addition to moderate-to vigorous-intensity physical activity, this means the time you spend sitting, standing, doing light physical activity (such as walking around your house or office) and sleeping.

Our research looked at more than 2,000 adults who wore body sensors that could interpret their physical behaviours, for seven days. This gave us a sense of how they spent their average 24 hours.

At the start of the study participants had their waist circumference, blood sugar and insulin sensitivity measured. The body sensor and assessment data was matched and analysed then tested against health risk markers — such as a heart disease and stroke risk score — to create a model.

Using this model, we fed through thousands of permutations of 24 hours and found the ones with the estimated lowest associations with heart disease risk and blood-glucose levels. This created many optimal mixes of sitting, standing, light and moderate intensity activity.

When we looked at waist circumference, blood sugar, insulin sensitivity and a heart disease and stroke risk score, we noted differing optimal time zones. Where those zones mutually overlapped was ascribed the optimal zone for heart disease and diabetes risk.

You’re doing more physical activity than you think

We found light-intensity physical activity (defined as walking less than 100 steps per minute) – such as walking to the water cooler, the bathroom, or strolling casually with friends – had strong associations with glucose control, and especially in people with type 2 diabetes. This light-intensity physical activity is likely accumulated intermittently throughout the day rather than being a purposeful bout of light exercise.

Our experimental evidence shows that interrupting our sitting regularly with light-physical activity (such as taking a 3–5 minute walk every hour) can improve our metabolism, especially so after lunch.

While the moderate-to-vigorous physical activity time might seem a quite high, at more than 2 hours a day, we defined it as more than 100 steps per minute. This equates to a brisk walk.

It should be noted that these findings are preliminary. This is the first study of heart disease and diabetes risk and the “optimal” 24 hours, and the results will need further confirmation with longer prospective studies.

The data is also cross-sectional. This means that the estimates of time use are correlated with the disease risk factors, meaning it’s unclear whether how participants spent their time influences their risk factors or whether those risk factors influence how someone spends their time.

Australia’s adult physical activity guidelines need updating

Australia’s physical activity guidelines currently only recommend exercise intensity and time. A new set of guidelines are being developed to incorporate 24-hour movement. Soon Australians will be able to use these guidelines to examine their 24 hours and understand where they can make improvements.

While our new research can inform the upcoming guidelines, we should keep in mind that the recommendations are like a north star: something to head towards to improve your health. In principle this means reducing sitting time where possible, increasing standing and light-intensity physical activity, increasing more vigorous intensity physical activity, and aiming for a healthy sleep of 7.5–9 hours per night.

Beneficial changes could come in the form of reducing screen time in the evening or opting for an active commute over driving commute, or prioritising an earlier bed time over watching television in the evening.

It’s also important to acknowledge these are recommendations for an able adult. We all have different considerations, and above all, movement should be fun. Läs mer…

Responding to a resurgence in gender-based violence and deaths in Australia, the National Cabinet has committed almost A$1 billion to a range of strategies.

Tackling “online harms” was among the new commitments, including the introduction of a pilot program to explore the use of age-checking technologies to restrict children’s access to inappropriate material online.

Under-age exposure to adult content is considered to be a contributory factor to domestic violence through fuelling harmful attitudes towards relationships. Controlling access to adult material is also aligned with debate over access to social media sites and other age-related restrictions.

While the details are yet to come, a roadmap for this was proposed more than a year ago by the eSafety Commissioner. Recent events have clearly spurred action, but there are questions over the effectiveness of tools to check the age of website visitors.

Implementing and enforcing these will be challenging and there is the potential for people to bypass such “age assurance” controls. But while there’s no easy fix, there are some checks that could help.

What’s being proposed?

In March 2023, the eSafety Commissioner published a “Roadmap for age verification”, which outlined the risks of children accessing inappropriate content (primarily online pornography). This was a comprehensive report, identifying current approaches, views from various industry representatives, and highlighting existing legislative and regulatory frameworks.

Disappointingly, this was not the first such offering. A 2020 Parliamentary paper “Protecting the age of innocence” also discussed similar issues and made similar recommendations:

It’s now not a matter of “if” a child will see pornography but “when”, and the when is getting younger and younger.

Some of the data in the 2023 report is quite shocking, including:

75% of children aged 16–18 have seen online pornography
one third of those were exposed before the age of 13
half saw it between ages 13 and 15.

The report made extensive recommendations, including:

Trial a pilot before seeking to prescribe and mandate age assurance technology.

Assurance versus verification

While they may sound similar, there are distinct differences between age assurance and age verification.

Age assurance is most often seen in social media settings where an individual is asked for their date of birth. It’s effectively a self-declaration of age. This can also be found in certain applications (such as Facebook’s Messenger Kids) where a parent is nominated to confirm a child can have access to a service. It may also use biometrics to attempt to determine a person’s age, for example by using a webcam to visually classify a person’s age range based on appearance.

Age verification is a more rigorous approach, where some form of identity is provided and verified against a trusted source. A simple example can be seen in online systems where identity is verified using a driver’s licence or passport.

Will it work?

The concept of checking a person’s age seems to be a simple and effective solution. The challenge is the reliability of the mechanisms available.

Asking a user to enter their date of birth is clearly open to misuse. Even seeking secondary approval (say, from a parent) would only work if there was a mechanism to confirm the relationship.

Similarly, a biometric approach depends on access to a webcam (or other sensor) and would itself raise concerns over privacy.

In verifying a person’s age, we are really talking about verifying identity – a topic steeped in controversy itself.

While ID verification is potentially a more reliable approach, it depends on trust and the secure access and storage of our identity records.

Given recent data breaches (including Outabox just this week, as well as Optus and Medibank incidents), any proposed system would have to rely on more than simply entering a passport number or other identifier. Perhaps it could use the myGovID service the government is currently expanding.

It needs coordinated effort

It is worth noting that any solution would likely see a verification request pushed from the content provider to an Australian-based (likely government managed) service.

This would simply provide a confirmation to the content provider that a user has been confirmed as an “adult”. It is unlikely any proposed system would require the entry of identity data into an overseas website that would then be stored outside Australia.

But with so much of the adult content itself hosted overseas, it will require a coordinated effort to enforce and to ensure that providers have the ability to connect to age verification systems in Australia.

Won’t kids just bypass it anyway?

The reality is, no system is perfect. With age assurance, children can enter fake details – or genuine information from another person – to claim they are older. Even the use of biometrics can potentially be bypassed with the cooperation of an older relative, photo filters or future AI applications.

Age verification offers potential. But for it to work, the verification process must confirm not just the age of the claimed identity, but the authenticity of the person attempting to verify their age. For example, a child could access stolen identity documentation to enter a legitimate driver’s licence or passport.

Finally, these checks are likely to be specific to Australia, with service providers implementing a solution for connections originating within the country. With easy access to virtual private networks (VPNs) or the use of anonymised browsers, such as Tor, there are many ways to potentially evade these controls.

While we may not have a simple solution, imposing constraints that affect the majority of underage access is still a worthwhile project.

Some children will always seek to access illicit materials. Those determined enough will always find a way, just as plenty of children still find a way to smoke and drink.

But doing nothing is not an option – and this may well protect at least some impressionable minds. Läs mer…

Former foreign minister Jeremiah Manele has been elected the next prime minister of Solomon Islands, defeating the opposition leader, Matthew Wale, in a vote in parliament.

The result is a mixed bag for former prime minister Manasseh Sogavare’s Ownership, Unity and Responsibility (OUR) Party. The party won just 15 of 50 seats in last month’s election. But even though Sogavare declined to stand for PM this week, his party still had the upper hand in the vote after courting independent MPs.

So, what kind of leader will Manele be? Will he bring big changes to the country or its relationships with China, Australia and the United States?

Quality-of-life issues remain paramount

One of the authors here (Claudina) voted in Solomon Islands’ general election in November 2014. At that time, political campaigns were low-key and largely localised to particular areas in the country.

Ten years on, we have noticed a huge change in the way campaigns are staged. This year, the livestreaming of campaign events was ubiquitous on social media, which amplified and sensationalised the messages of candidates like never before. Frenzied parades involving floats and legions of supporters were common.

A candidate parade before the voting in the capital, Honiara, in mid-April.
Charley Priringi

Despite all the fanfare leading up to polling day, the primary concern of ordinary Solomon Islanders was not political wrangling, but the dire state of services in the country. The healthcare system is dilapidated, road conditions and infrastructure are poor and power cuts are constant.

The increased cost of living and lack of educational and job opportunities have only made daily life more difficult for residents.

For example, one voter in Isabel Province told us as part of our research that he did not care what political party his preferred candidate aligned himself with. His main concern was for his MP to continue to provide financial support through the Constituency Development Fund (CDF). The fund pays for iron roofing for homes, school fees, outboard motor engines for transport, chainsaws and other material needs.

Many voters similarly wanted their MPs to join the majority coalition so they would be able to access more benefits through the government. This was why nine of the independent MPs who unseated incumbents from the governing coalition came back to join that same coalition going into the PM’s election this week.

Voters wait for a polling station to open last month in Honiara.
Mick Tsikas/AAP

Manele got 31 votes from lawmakers, which included 15 from his OUR Party, three from Solomon Islands People First Party, one from the Kadere Party, nine independents and three other MPs who switched allegiances from Wale’s camp.

It was a smart move for Sogavare and his coalition to select Manele as their candidate.

Sogavare’s popularity has waxed and waned over the past two decades. He was forced to vacate the PM post after no-confidence votes in both 2007 and 2017. He survived another no-confidence vote in 2021, which led to violent protests on the streets of Honiara and the destruction of Chinatown.

Though Sogavare managed to hold onto his seat in last month’s election, he won by just 259 votes. It was his narrowest margin of victory since he was first elected to parliament in 1997.

To avoid a similar backlash from voters who did not want to see Sogavare become PM again, the sensible thing for his coalition was to select another candidate.

The 55-year-old Manele is from the same village (Samasodu) in Isabel Province as the governor-general, Sir David Vunagi, which means the two men in the highest offices in the country are closely related.

Manele will likely be an inclusive leader. He has a friendly and humble personality, as reflected in his maiden speech in which he acknowledged his rival, Wale, and members of his coalition.

Voters queue at a polling station in the capital Honiara on April 17.
Mick Tsikas/AAP

A more matter-of-fact foreign policy

One of the main reasons Sogavare courted controversy was his increasingly cosy relationship with Beijing since his government switched Solomon Islands’ diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to China in 2019.

He signed a secretive bilateral security deal with China in 2022 that raised alarm bells in Australia. Last year came another deal to boost co-operation with China on law enforcement and other security matters.

With Manele now at the helm, the country should return to a more business-as-usual approach to diplomatic ties with China. His experience as a career diplomat, public servant, opposition leader and foreign minister will help him navigate the country’s complex relationships without the fiery rhetoric his predecessor had become known for.

In addition, we may finally be able to see what the 2022 security agreement entails now that a former foreign minister is in charge.

Asked by the ABC whether his government would keep the deal, Manele said “yes”, then added:

If there is a need to review that, it will be a matter for China and Solomon Islands to discuss.

However, he may face some pressure from the opposition. Peter Kenilorea junior, the political wing leader of the Solomon Islands United Party (SIUP), has publicly expressed a desire to scrap the security agreement with China.

Manele should also maintain a cordial and perhaps more engaged relationship with Australia. When announcing his PM candidacy this week, he reiterated he would continue the long-held Solomon Islands foreign policy stance of “friends to all and enemies to none”.

What matters most to Solomon Islanders

The broader region must continue to see the plight of ordinary Solomon Islanders as separate from the decisions of its leaders, who at times may not necessarily reflect the wishes of the people.

Ask any Solomon Islander in a rural area what he or she thinks of the security agreement with China and the implications for traditional partners like the US, Australia and New Zealand. Chances are he or she might just shrug it off without uttering a response.

This is because Solomon Islanders have other pressing issues to worry about, such as how to pay school fees, how to feed their families, how to get their kids to school when the river floods and how to get fuel to take an expecting mother to the nearest health centre. This is what matters most to people’s lives, not diplomatic tussles between global powers. Läs mer…

Most young adult men in Australia reject traditional ideas of masculinity that endorse aggression, stoicism and homophobia. Nonetheless, the ongoing influence of those ideas continues to harm men and the people around them. These are some of the findings of a new survey of men in Australia.

The Man Box survey, led by The Men’s Project at Jesuit Social Services in partnership with Respect Victoria, spoke to 2,523 Australian men aged between 18 and 30.

We asked men how much they agreed with a stereotypical model of how to be a man. In this model, men are expected to always act tough, be aggressive, take risks, be stoic, heterosexual, homophobic and transphobic, emotionally inexpressive, hostile to femininity, and dominant.

Read more:
Politics with Michelle Grattan: Masculinity expert Michael Flood on boys and men behaving badly

The results showed most men don’t endorse this model of manhood, and most don’t think society is encouraging this version of manhood among them. This suggests healthier, more gender-equitable, and more inclusive norms of manhood are relatively common among young adult men in Australia.

That said, one-quarter to one-third of young men did agree with some of the attributes.

Although the results are largely encouraging, it’s discouraging that men’s levels of endorsement of traditional masculine beliefs have remained steady over the past five years.

Most men rejected that masculinity is defined by aggression and domination.
Unsplash

Comparing the most recent Man Box survey with the previous survey in 2018, there has been little change in men’s attitudes towards male aggression, stoicism and self-sufficiency, domestic labour as women’s work, homophobia, and hypersexuality.

The only substantial areas of change in young men’s own beliefs have been in their comfort with men spending time on grooming and fashion and their acceptance of men not always knowing where their intimate partner is. That is, young men these days may be spending a little more time in front of the bathroom mirror, and checking up a little less on where their wives or girlfriends are.

Although only a minority of young men support male dominance and control in relationships and families overall, this has not declined much in the past five years.

On the other hand, young men report less societal pressure to conform to those stereotypical masculine norms than five years ago. While they now report feeling less pressure to be self-sufficient, stoic, and act strong, large numbers say it remains an issue for them.

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Harmful for all genders

Young men’s endorsement of traditional masculine norms plays out in a range of problematic behaviours. These include behaviour that is harmful to women and also to men themselves.

Our survey shows one-quarter of young men have used physical violence against an intimate partner, and one-fifth have used sexual violence against an intimate partner. Both behaviours are more likely among the young men who more strongly endorse more traditional stereotypes of masculinity.

Traditional masculine norms also limit young men’s own health and wellbeing. Among the men we surveyed, some had considered suicide and self-harm, were drinking at dangerous levels, taking risks while intoxicated or drug-affected, or problem gambling. Again, all of these are more common among the men with the highest conformity to traditionally masculine stereotypes.

Promoting healthy masculinity

To address the harms of stereotypical masculine norms, three tasks are crucial.

First, we must highlight why these are harmful in the first place. This means alerting policy makers, service providers and the community to the costs of men’s and boys’ blind conformity to masculinity.

Second, we must weaken the cultural influence of stereotypical masculine ideals, particularly the ones that cause harm to men and the people around them. That may involve highlighting the positive diversity among men and boys, promoting spaces where men can support each other in breaking free of rigid masculine stereotypes, and amplifying alternative male voices.

Third, we must promote healthy alternatives to rigid masculine ideals, based on qualities such as gender equality, non-violence, respect and empathy. This can be done through schools as part of respectful relationships education. There can also be social marketing and communications campaigns and changes to the policies and workplace cultures that constrain men’s parenting, among other strategies.

Building work with men and boys

The “healthy masculinities” field is taking off in Australia. There are new programs aimed at boys and men, national violence-prevention frameworks for men and boys, and new funding opportunities. Most people in Australia agree men and boys will benefit from breaking free from traditional masculine stereotypes.

If this growing field is to make a real difference, however, there are some important ways forward. The work must be scaled up, beyond programs reaching small numbers of boys in schools.

Teaching boys what healthy masculinity looks like can be done in schools.
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Because gender norms and patterns of interaction are embedded in organisations and communities, work must be done in those spaces too.

Intensive intervention is needed in the settings that sustain unhealthy and gender-inequitable forms of masculinity. These may include particular workplaces, informal male peer groups, and online platforms and networks on Reddit, X/Twitter and elsewhere.

There is a rich body of scholarship on how stereotypical masculinity shapes men’s and boys’ poor health, use of violence, and other social problems.

Read more:
Why ’toxic masculinity’ isn’t a useful term for understanding all of the ways to be a man

However, we need to know more about the positives. What are the factors that shape healthy attitudes, behaviours and relations among men and boys? How do we then build on them?

We need to build services’ and practitioners’ capacity to work well with men and boys: through university teaching, professional development and practitioner networks.

Finally, we need standards for effective practice in work with men and boys, so initiatives and programs in Australia are not merely well-intended but actually make a difference. Läs mer…

How often do mountains collapse, volcanoes erupt or ice sheets melt?

For Earth scientists, these are important questions as we try to improve projections to prepare communities for hazardous events in the future.

We rely on instrumental measurements, but such records are often short. To extend these, we use geological archives. And at the heart of this research is geochronology – a toolkit of geological dating methods that allow us to assign absolute ages to rocks.

Scientists study rock surfaces in Antarctica to reconstruct past ice sheet change.
Shaun Eaves, CC BY-SA

In recent years, we have been using a state-of-the-art technique known as cosmogenic surface exposure dating which allows us to quantify the time a rock has spent on the surface, exposed to signals from outer space.

Using cosmic rays as a clock

Earth is constantly bombarded by high-energy charged particles, known as cosmic rays, coming from the depths of our galaxy. Most are intercepted by Earth’s magnetic field and atmosphere. But some are sufficiently energetic to reach Earth’s surface.

On impact, they break apart atoms of common elements in Earth’s crust, such as silicon and oxygen, to create new rare elements known as cosmogenic nuclides.

The presence of cosmogenic nuclides in rocks and sediments at the Earth’s surface is a clear indicator of atmospheric exposure. Their abundance tells us how long the rock has been exposed.

Cosmic rays break apart atoms in the Earth’s crust to create new rare elements known as cosmogenic nuclides.
Shaun Eaves, CC BY-SA

Cosmic rays were first discovered in the early 1900s, but it took almost a century until sufficiently sensitive particle accelerators became available to accurately count the small number of rare atoms produced when they hit Earth.

Today, cosmogenic surface exposure dating represents a primary technique for quantifying the rates and dates of several processes on Earth’s surface.

Timing mountain collapse

In southeast Fiordland, the Green Lake landslide is one of the largest landslides on Earth. Its large size is especially unusual given the relatively small stature of the mountains from which it came.

The Green Lake landslide, now covered in trees, is among the world’s largest.
Lloyd Homer/GNS Science (VML ID: 3918), CC BY-SA

Previous research suggested the landslide was induced by the retreat of a large glacier that formerly supported the mountainside.

Given ongoing glacial retreat today, we sought to test this hypothesis by collecting boulders on the surface of the Green Lake landslide. These rocks had previously been shielded from cosmic rays in the mountain interior before becoming exposed by the landslide.

Our measurements yielded an exposure age of about 15,500 years, which postdates the end of the last ice age in the Southern Alps by 3,000 to 4,000 years. From this result, we conclude that deglaciation is unlikely to have been the primary cause of this spectacular mountain collapse. Instead, our findings point to an extremely large earthquake as the more likely trigger.

How often do volcanoes emit lava?

Effusive (lava-producing) volcanic eruptions have built the large cone of Mt Ruapehu, the highest mountain in the North Island.

Despite some explosive episodes during the 20th century, there is no observational record of eruptions producing lava flows. Future effusive events could fundamentally reshape the volcanic cone, with potential implications for local infrastructure.

But how often do such eruptions happen?

Cosmogenic dating of rocks on Mt Ruapehu found the mountain ejects lava in clusters of eruptive activity.
Pedro Doll, CC BY-NC-SA

Supported by the Resilience to Nature national science challenge, we tested whether cosmogenic dating could help us determine recurrence intervals of lava-producing eruptions on Mt Ruapehu over the past 20,000 years.

We found the mountain ejected lava in clusters of eruptive activity which could last for millennia. The cosmogenic data also provided more precise dates for recent prehistoric eruptions, compared to those produced by other common volcanic dating techniques such as palaeomagnetic and radiometric methods.

Tracking the melting of ice

Before cosmogenic nuclide measurements, glacial geologists trying to determine the age of sediments relied on serendipitous discoveries of fossil plant material for radiocarbon dating. In alpine and polar regions, where most glaciers are, such matter is rarely available.

Cosmogenic nuclides solve this problem as glaciers quarry rocks from their base and transport them to the surface where they rest on hill slopes and moraines and begin accumulating their cosmic signal.

With support from the New Zealand Antarctic Science Platform, we have applied this technique to reconstruct the recent evolution of Byrd Glacier – a large outlet of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet.

Glacial cobbles, transported from the Antarctic interior and deposited on hillsides on either side of the flowing glacier, track how high the glacier was in the past.

Our study shows that the glacier thinned by at least 200 metres about 7,000 years ago during an interval of relative global climate stability. These results provide rare three-dimensional information that can be used to evaluate computer models used to simulate past, present and future ice sheet change.

Scientists scour rock outcrops at Byrd Glacier for evidence of past cover by glacier ice.
Shaun Eaves, CC BY-SA

Rising sea level is one of the biggest challenges facing civilisation this century. However, the uncertain response of ice sheets to climate change currently hampers projections.

Cosmogenic nuclide specialists are now ambitiously attempting to recover rock samples from beneath sensitive portions of the present ice sheets. Testing them for cosmic signals will yield important insights about the potential of future melting of ice sheets. Läs mer…

With winter sports swinging into action, adults around the country have volunteered or been volunteered by others (humorously known as being “volun-told”) to coach junior sports teams.

While most coaches are eager to work with children to build their skills, confidence and passion for sport, one aspect of the job that coaches may approach with trepidation is working with parents.

This can be especially difficult for the many coaches who are also parents, as they need to balance dual roles and relationships.

As researchers in sports coaching and family psychology, we know parents play a central role in supporting children’s participation, enjoyment and development in sport.

However, as coaches of junior teams ourselves, we understand that working with parents can be challenging. Indeed, lack of support from parents has been identified as a major reason for coaches deciding not to continue.

Community sports clubs rely on volunteers to coach teams but coaches often receive limited or no training or guidance about how to work effectively with parents.

Our approach is to consider the coach-parent relationship a positive dimension of the job, working together as partners to develop young people through sport.

So, what can coaches do to build strong partnerships with parents?

Help parents feel a part of the team

In the past, most parents had an arm’s length interest in their children’s sport. Today, parents develop social connections via their children’s sport.

Parents build an identity as a “sports parent”, viewing active involvement in their children’s sport as an important part of the parenting role, helping to cultivate their child’s character and development.

As a result, parents are looking for ways to be positively involved, but may not be sure what will be most helpful. Some parents may not have the confidence to assist directly with training or games.

As a volunteer coach, you can think of practical ways parents can help and actively invite them to give you a hand in ways that support, rather than interfere with your coaching. This might include asking them to assist with setting up and packing up after training, taking turns bringing fruit for halftime, or running the player substitutions on and off the field.

For younger children, you can ask parents to assist with “crowd control” at training, keeping younger children on task and listening to the coach. And for older children and teenagers, parents can be asked to keep team statistics and provide input into the player-of-the-day award.

As many leagues don’t keep score, this last suggestion presents an opportunity for teams to focus on things beyond winning or losing – parents might record the number of “touches” each player gets or note “highlights” for each player based on what they worked on in training.

More adventurous teams might work out how players can rate the performance of their parents as spectators.

It helps to view the team you are coaching as an extended team of players and parents. In the same way you would build your relationship with a child by praising and encouraging them for being valuable team players, remember to show your appreciation for parents and family members for their efforts.

Parents need to be on the same page as their children – and coaches – when it comes to junior sports.

Get on the same page as parents

Parents invest considerable time, money and emotional energy into their children’s sport.

Our research has shown that in some cases, this significant personal investment can result in unhelpful sideline behaviour from parents, like yelling and shouting, contradicting the coach or giving unsolicited advice.

Coaches sharing with parents their goals and expectations for the team is a good way to turn their personal investment into positive and constructive involvement.

In our experience, an open conversation at the start of the season about everyone’s expectations can help build alignment on goals between coaches, players and parents, providing a strong foundation for establishing parent and coach relationships.

A coach might say to parents:

As coaches of junior teams, we face a few trade-offs. We need to consider the different objectives of winning and performance, sports skill development and children’s personal enjoyment and development. I would be interested in your views on this. If you had 100 points to allocate, what would be your priorities regarding the number of points to: (1) winning the game, (2) sports skill development, and (3) player personal development?

While the weight of priorities might differ between parents of an under-7s team compared to an under-16s representative side, parents’ responses will help coaches see what values are important to them.

Coaches can then share their goals and invite discussion about how this might be similar or different to the priorities among parents or between parents, players and the coach.

Keep the communication channels open

Such a frank conversation sets the stage for open, transparent and regular communication throughout the season.

Encouraging parents to listen to post-match team debriefings is a good way to continue that communication, as are informal check-ins with parents sharing your observations about how their child is progressing.

Many coaches use messaging apps to stay in touch with parents about games and training schedules, but these can also be useful tools for reviewing team goals for the week or reinforcing expectations and priorities.

This effort from the coach to share goals and maintain open communication may not reduce the prospect of having difficult conversations across the season. But it should help parents feel comfortable approaching the coach in a way that is respectful and considerate of the partnership that already exists.

Building coach-parent partnerships is about finding constructive ways for helping parents feel included, positively involved and valued in their children’s sport.

An effective coach-parent partnership will help coaches stay in the sport and support children to have a positive sporting experience into the future. Läs mer…

Parents are often advised to burp their babies after feeding them. Some people think burping after feeding is important to reduce or prevent discomfort crying, or to reduce how much a baby regurgitates milk after a feed.

It is true babies, like adults, swallow air when they eat. Burping releases this air from the top part of our digestive tracts. So when a baby cries after a feed, many assume it’s because the child needs to “be burped”. However, this is not necessarily true.

Read more:
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Why do babies cry or ‘spit up’ after a feed?

Babies cry for a whole host of reasons that have nothing to do with “trapped air”.

They cry when they are hungry, cold, hot, scared, tired, lonely, overwhelmed, needing adult help to calm, in discomfort or pain, or for no identifiable reason. In fact, we have a name for crying with no known cause; it’s called “colic”.

“Spitting up” – where a baby gently regurgitates a bit of milk after a feed – is common because the muscle at the top of a newborn baby’s stomach is not fully mature. This means what goes down can all too easily go back up.

Spitting up frequently happens when a baby’s stomach is very full, there is pressure on their tummy or they are picked up after lying down.

Spitting up after feeding decreases as babies get older. Three-quarters of babies one month old spit up after feeding at least once a day. Only half of babies still spit up at five months and almost all (96%) stop by their first birthdays.

There’s not much research out there on ‘burping’ babies.
antoniodiaz/Shutterstock

Does burping help reduce crying or spitting up?

Despite parents being advised to burp their babies, there’s not much research evidence on the topic.

One study conducted in India encouraged caregivers of 35 newborns to burp their babies, while caregivers of 36 newborns were not given any information about burping.

For the next three months, mothers and caregivers recorded whether their baby would spit up after feeding and whether they showed signs of intense crying.

This study found burping did not reduce crying and actually increased spitting up.

When should I be concerned about spitting up or crying?

Most crying and spitting up is normal. However, these behaviours are not:

refusing to feed
vomiting so much milk weight gain is slow
coughing or wheezing distress while feeding
bloody vomit.

If your baby has any of these symptoms, see a doctor or child health nurse.

If your baby seems unbothered by vomiting and does not have any other symptoms it is a laundry problem rather than something that needs medical attention.

It is also normal for babies to cry and fuss quite a lot; two hours a day, for about the first six weeks is the average.

This has usually reduced to about one hour a day by the time they are three months of age.

Crying more than this doesn’t necessarily mean there is something wrong. The intense, inconsolable crying of colic is experienced by up to one-quarter of young babies but goes away with time on its own .

If your baby is crying more than average or if you are worried there might be something wrong, you should see your doctor or child health nurse.

If your baby likes being ‘burped’, then it’s OK to do it. But don’t stress if you skip it.
Miljan Zivkovic/Shutterstock

Not everyone burps their baby

Burping babies seems to be traditional practice in some parts of the world and not in others.

For example, research in Indonesia found most breastfeeding mothers rarely or never burped their babies after feeding.

One factor that may influence whether a culture encourages burping babies may be related to another aspect of infant care: how much babies are carried.

Carrying a baby in a sling or baby carrier can reduce the amount of time babies cry.

Babies who are carried upright on their mother or another caregiver’s front undoubtedly find comfort in that closeness and movement.

Babies in slings are also being held firmly and upright, which would help any swallowed air to rise up and escape via a burp if needed.

Using slings can make caring for a baby easier. Studies (including randomised controlled trials) have also shown women have lower rates of post-natal depression and breastfeed for longer when they use a baby sling.

It is important baby carriers and slings are used safely, so make sure you’re up to date on the latest advice on how to do it.

Make sure you’re up to date on the latest advice on how to use a sling safely.
Ground Picture/Shutterstock

So, should I burp my baby?

The bottom line is: it’s up to you.

Gently burping a baby is not harmful. If you feel burping is helpful to your baby, then keep doing what you’re doing.

If trying to burp your baby after every feed is stressing you or your baby out, then you don’t have to keep doing it.

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