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Jun 27, 2024 | 
the-fence.com | Margaret McCartney |Francisco Garcia |Francisco García |Thomas Gorton
A general practitioner in Glasgow unpacks how the hand-in-glove relationship between the pharmaceutical industry and the NHS has changed – for the worse. Junior doctors are overworked, underslept, abused by the healthcare system and generally downtrodden. So, a few decades ago, when a kindly lady knocked upon the hospital office door (a cupboard, really) to offer us juniors an educational session with free dinner, I felt momentarily loved.
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Jun 25, 2024 | 
the-fence.com | Francisco Garcia |Francisco García |Thomas Gorton |Sophie Elmhirst
Meeting a Dutch sexual terrorist. The Dutch far-right personality Sid Lukkassen and the French novelist Michel Houellebecq have a lot in common. Both have publicly bemoaned the fate of unattractive men in the ‘sexual marketplace’. Both have written novels pondering a jihadist takeover of their respective countries. Both have found themselves appearing in, and then distancing themselves from, pornographic films, with a woman who taunts their inadequacies in the name of artistic provocation.
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Jun 18, 2024 | 
the-fence.com | Francisco Garcia |Francisco García |Thomas Gorton |Sophie Elmhirst
The Fence toes the party line. You’ve felt it at some point, surely, when the £250 bar tab runs out at some miserable adult playground picked out for your team by the ‘socials coordinator’. Your hairs have stood on end as the startling thwack of axe against target board is the only sound that punctuates the din of Hotline Bling. ‘All work parties can’t be this lame,’ you wonder. ‘There’s got to be some cool ones out there.’Don’t quit your day job just yet.
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Jun 17, 2024 | 
the-fence.com | Francisco Garcia |Francisco García |Thomas Gorton |Sophie Elmhirst
Pondering the future of crime reporting. On a comically miserable February morning, I made my way to Inner London Crown Court, a few minutes’ walk from the sodden chaos of Elephant and Castle station. Having jostled through security, a helpful staff member directed me across the building to a thin corridor populated by a smattering of uncomfortably suited coppers and crumpled solicitors. A few pensive defendants completed the scene, staring hard ahead or into phone screens.
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Jun 11, 2024 | 
the-fence.com | Francisco Garcia |Francisco García |Thomas Gorton |Sophie Elmhirst
Raising a toast to the worst new building in Britain. The results are in. The Fence has found a winner for the Carbuncle Cup, crowning what we believe to be the very worst new building in Britain to be opened since 31 August 2018, the last time the award was handed out. The buildings were nominated by the public and then judged by a panel of experts.
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Jan 10, 2024 | 
the-fence.com | Patrick Galbraith |Margaret McCartney |Francisco Garcia |Francisco García
Remembering a singular teacher. I’ll always remember him leaning against that old oak with his testicles hanging down out of the crotch of his shorts. It was a Sunday afternoon, we were on a school camping trip, and it had rained all weekend long. We must have been 11 or 12 at the time, and I can’t remember now who started laughing first, but soon we were all laughing; naughty little boys all elbowing each other, and glancing down between the old man’s legs.
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Oct 6, 2023 | 
the-fence.com | Patrick Galbraith |Alex Fleming-Brown |Francisco Garcia |Francisco García
Is it ever going to be possible to ban the XL Bully? For the first time in my life, I watched the Farrelly Brothers’ 1998 film, There’s Something About Mary last week. Quite drunk, I decided for no particular reason to let my young spaniel come upstairs and watch it with me. She sat there, completely transfixed, her little head bobbing and weaving, seemingly trying to work out if she’d seen Cameron Diaz kicking around Camberwell anywhere before.
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Sep 21, 2023 | 
the-fence.com | Alex Fleming-Brown |Francisco Garcia |Francisco García |Ophira Gottlieb
A new city in Europe is being dreamt up in the scuzzy bars of lower Manhattan. I first heard about it in The River, a trendy new saloon in Manhattan’s Chinatown. A girl had lassoed me with a dog tag (etched with the slogan ‘Meet me in the Eternal City’) and started evangelising about a company building a new city in Europe. I felt sure something was off.
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Sep 20, 2023 | 
the-fence.com | Ophira Gottlieb |Francisco Garcia |Francisco García |Sally Howard |Jimmy McIntosh
Why does Britain have such a tepid sauna culture? It seems odd that the UK just can’t get saunas right. After all, we’re cold, too. It’s dark here, too. We’re all bored out of our minds here just like they must be over in Iceland. So why is it that the UK can’t recreate its own ‘hygge’ or ‘lagom’ or whatever infantalising Scandinavian word for twee is trending at the moment? Take Brighton’s Beach Box Spa, pioneers of the luxury horse trailer-style sauna.
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Sep 7, 2023 | 
the-fence.com | Archie Cornish |Francisco Garcia |Francisco García |Sally Howard |Jimmy McIntosh
A meeting with a remarkable woman hoping to revive an almost unknown British sport. The final of the world championships this spring saw a flurry of first-half goals. Finland had pegged back Sweden to 1-1 after they took the lead, but two scores in as many minutes from Joel Broberg and Christoffer Edlund earned the Swedes a comfortable buffer heading into the break. There was no way back for Finland, and when the 90 minutes were up Sweden celebrated their 13th title.
