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The reality show is highly problematic, and attracts viewer complaints of all stripes. But one TV show can’t – and won’t – get to the root of bigger issues plaguing societyFor just over a month now, Love Island (and therefore, Love Island discourse) has dominated the summer. Not since Take Me Out’s 2010s reign has a British reality dating show generated so much conversation, alternately heralded as the best thing on telly and condemned as the most controversial. As predictable as the fast fashion collaborations are the complaints, whether it be Tweeters drawing up petitions or viewers escalating their grumbles to Ofcom.It goes without saying that Love Island, like any other reality show, is problematic. To date, the most complained about episode is from season four, when fan favourite Dani Dyer sobbed as she learned that the ex-girlfriend of her love interest Jack Fincham had joined the show. Ofcom received more than 2,500 complaints and the show was accused of “emotional manipulation”. And this week, after two years of forgoing the infamous postcard that caused such distress, it was brought back to spice up what has been a largely uneventful series. Producers showed images of castmate Teddy Soares kissing another woman during a challenge, despite spending most of his time in Casa Amor pining after Faye Winters. Watching Faye put her walls up once again, faced with the misrepresentation of his behaviour, was infuriating rather than entertaining. Continue reading...

This astonishing athlete’s greatest triumph may be to make us confront the mental demands our culture puts on athletesSimone Biles has given us many groundbreaking performances. This week she has pushed the boundaries of sport once more. Not by expanding her already extraordinary technical expertise as a gymnast but by challenging the persistent, macho narrative around what Olympic success and sporting strength should look like.Biles follows tennis players Naomi Osaka at the French Open and Emma Raducanu at Wimbledon, who are unafraid to speak up in the global spotlight and place mental heath on the same level as physical health. Sadly, all have had their integrity, sporting prowess and character questioned. Michael Phelps revealed the extraordinary pressures and mental health struggles that he faced in a recent documentary called The Weight of Gold: the title says it all. Amid the stacks of gold medals and trophies, it’s hard to dismiss Phelps, Osaka or Biles as “weak losers” (unless you’re a certain brand of tabloid commentator). That means we have to think again. Surely we have had enough warning shots to realise the scale of the mental health crisis in sport – one that is also a mirror for wider society. It’s going to take more than a few extra wellbeing advisers to address the issue. Continue reading...

Even in the face of laws that suppress turnout, activists – and voters – have optionsDespite the fact that they’re expensive and useless, voter ID laws aren’t going anywhere, unless the Senate abolishes the filibuster and passes the For the People Act, or the supreme court decides to prioritize voter accessibility instead of lies about fraud. Continue reading...

National Tsunami Warning Center canceled the warnings when the biggest wave, just over a half foot, recorded in Old HarborA powerful earthquake which struck just off Alaska’s southern coast early Thursday caused prolonged shaking and prompted tsunami warnings that sent people scrambling for shelters.Residents reported only minor damage, but officials said that could change after sunrise and people get a better look. Continue reading...

Missouri doctor says some people ‘disguise their appearance’ to avoid conflict with skeptical family, friends and co-workersThe increasing polarization and disinformation around the Covid-19 vaccine has led to some people attempting to “disguise their appearance” and get vaccinated in secret, according to a Missouri doctor.Dr Priscilla Frase, a hospitalist and chief medical information officer at Ozarks Healthcare in West Plains, said physicians had experienced a number of people who have asked to covertly receive the vaccine to avoid conflict with vaccine skeptical family, friends and co-workers. Continue reading...

Agreement, which follows months of talks between Democrats and Republicans, was hailed by Biden as ‘historic’The US Senate voted on Wednesday to begin work on a $1.2tn bipartisan infrastructure deal after negotiators reached agreement on the major components of the package that is a key priority of Joe Biden.Related: Americans are paying more for gas, hotels and cars – will Biden pay the price of inflation? Continue reading...

Agreement on package hailed as ‘historic’ by Joe Biden comes after months of negotiations

This Body explores the relationship between Black Americans and the medical industry. Sydney Hall, a participant in a coronavirus vaccine trial, grapples with questions of trust and the hope of saving lives while her community grapples with the historical fallout of the Tuskegee syphilis experiment and contemporary abuses that continue to this dayThis Body is a part of HINDSIGHT, a collection of six films by and from diverse communities across the American South and Puerto Rico supported by Firelight Media, Reel South, CAAM and the WORLD Channel. Continue reading...

After a moment of hope, much is sliding backwards. It’s not Biden’s fault; it’s Trump’s legacyDespair is worse after hope is briefly ignited. I don’t know about you, but I was elated earlier this spring when it seemed as if Trump and Covid were gone, and Biden seemed surprisingly able and willing to get the nation rapidly back on track.Related: ‘I went to hell and back’: officer condemns Republican lawmakers who spurned Capitol attack hearing Continue reading...

Over 10 million tenants are behind on rent, and only a fraction of the emergency assistance allocated by Congress has made it to tenants and landlordsAt the end of this week, the federal moratorium protecting renters in the US from eviction will end. As the Delta variant of Covid-19 spreads quickly across the country, and with vaccination rates still low in many areas at highest risk of eviction, millions of families could lose the safe haven of their homes. A surge in evictions will have dire public health consequences, but it could still be avoided.Originally enacted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) eleven months ago, the eviction moratorium was established to prevent the spread of the virus among families and individuals that could be made homeless. As a public health measure, the moratorium was unprecedented and offered uniform protections to renters across the country. Continue reading...

About 100,000 pounds of an acetic acid mixture – which can severely burn skin and is toxic if inhaled – was releasedA large chemical leak at a plant in the Houston area has killed two people and left 30 people hospitalized, officials have said.A statement from the LyondellBasell company said that about 100,000 pounds (45,359 kilograms) of a mixture that primarily included acetic acid was released in the leak that started Tuesday evening at its La Porte Complex. The company said that the “all clear” was given early Wednesday, and that the leak had been isolated and contained. Continue reading...

Simone Biles withdrew from the women’s all-around final while Daiki Hashimoto kept Japan top of the medals table on day five12.06am BSTOn that note, it’s time to bid day five sayōnara, and usher in day six of the Games. You can join Tom Lutz for all the latest via the link below. And you can still peruse the schedule, medal table, daily briefing and everything else on our website and app.Thanks very much, once again, for following our coverage and for all your comments, emails and tweets. Faster, higher, stronger – together, indeed. Goodbye!

Families brought the case to demonstrate to banks and insurers that gun manufacturers are a risky businessThe manufacturer of an assault rifle used to kill 20 schoolchildren and six adults in the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre has offered $33m to settle lawsuits from the families of nine of the victims.If accepted, the proposal by Remington would mean each of the families would receive $3.66m, substantially less than the sums they were seeking. In a February court filing, lawyers estimated the wrongful death claims likely totalled in excess of $225m, rising above $1bn with punitive damages. Continue reading...

Man arrested in connection with Corona shooting, which occurred at a showing of the horror movie The Forever PurgePolice have arrested a man in connection with a shooting that killed an 18-year-old woman and seriously wounded a 19-year-old man as they watched The Forever Purge at a southern California movie theater.Authorities say there is no known motive for the violence and that the shooting Monday appeared to be “an unprovoked attack”. Continue reading...

1,100 workers from two Warrior Met Coal mines in Brookwood have been on strike since April amid contract negotiationsCoal miners and union advocates from across the country rallied in New York on Wednesday morning in support of Alabama miners who are four months into a strike against their employer, Warrior Met Coal.Dressed in camouflage T-shirts with the slogan “We Are Everywhere”, members of the United Mine Workers Association (UMWA) gathered in midtown Manhattan in front of the headquarters of BlackRock, a hedge fund that is Warrior Met Coal’s largest investor. Continue reading...

The star of the US team has been struggling with a dangerous condition where gymnasts lose their sense of spacial awarenessSimone Biles almost never misses her Amanar vault. There are numerous times when she has peeled off during uneven-bar routines, when her landings on floor have contained steps the size of canyons and, certainly, when she has wanted to take a saw to the balance beam and split it in half. But the Amanar, as dangerous and difficult as it is, always has been one of her most trusty skills.So when she completely lost her way in the middle of its two and a half twists during the women’s team final at the Tokyo Games, it was clear something beyond the ordinary was wrong. Continue reading...

Black public figures from Simone Biles to Naomi Osaka are helping us put one simple word at the top of our vocabulary: noI can hardly do a proper cartwheel, so I’m hesitant to opine on Simone Biles’s decision to withdraw from the Tokyo Olympics this week, telling the press and the world: “I have to focus on my mental health.” I can’t stay silent, though, because I know she’s not alone.As a former college football player, I can imagine the psychological price Olympians pay to squeeze every ounce of greatness into a tiny window of life. As a Black man raised by a cadre of women, I can imagine the tax Black women pay because of our national commitment to “trust” them, which really just means “let them do all the work.” Or, in the case of Simone Biles, “let her put the whole country on her back”. Continue reading...

While the reaction to the gymnast’s withdrawal was broadly positive, familiar faultlines also emerged in the aftermathTwo days ago, when it was impossible to imagine Simone Biles would pull out of the Olympics team competition – and then later the all-around – it would have nonetheless been easy to predict the reaction in the United States. And, as with so many things in America, opinion was often divided along political lines.The immediate reaction was overwhelmingly positive. USA Today called Biles’ decision “important” and a “powerful message”. The New York Times lauded the 24-year-old for putting her “mental health first and the expectations of others, at best, second”. And after Biles spoke about the mental exhaustion endemic to being the best, the Washington Post asked, “What are we doing, breaking our athletes?” Continue reading...

Marchers set off from Georgetown on Wednesday morning, aiming to reach state capitol in Austin for a voting laws rally on SaturdayA group of civil rights activists from the Poor People’s Campaign started their four-day march through Texas on Wednesday morning, seeking to prevent a Republican plan to restrict voting rights in the state.GOP politicians in Texas are seeking to pass legislation which would make it harder to vote, in a state that saw its highest turnout in decades in 2020 – and little evidence of voter fraud. Texas Democrats abruptly left the state in mid-July in an effort to block the proposed laws. What is happening in Texas is one of the most egregious examples of widespread attack on voting rights in the US following the election in November. Continue reading...

DC officer Michael Fanone said the ‘indifference’ shown by House leader McCarthy and others is ‘disgraceful’One of the Washington DC police officers who gave emotional testimony to Congress about the violence of the 6 January Capitol insurrection said on Wednesday he had received a vulgar voicemail threatening his life while he was on the stand, adding: “This is what happens when you tell the truth in Trump’s America.”Michael Fanone, who suffered a heart attack after being beaten and Tasered by supporters of the former president while defending the Capitol, also criticized Republicans, including the House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, who chose not to observe Tuesday’s opening day of the select committee’s investigation. Continue reading...

CJ Cummings finished a disappointing ninth in the men’s 73kg final, and he may not have a chance to better that mark in Paris in 2024CJ Cummings surely has better days ahead, though whether they will involve the Olympics is an open question and a matter beyond his sinew-straining grip.The youngest competitor in Wednesday’s men’s 73kg weightlifting final, the 23-time American record holder and two-time youth world champion turned 21 last month and could be poised to peak in Paris, assuming his sport is not dropped like so much dead weight. Continue reading...

• CDC director Rochelle Walensky cites ‘new science’• People with outbreak infections can pass on virusThe director of the Centers for Disease Control and Protection spoke on Wednesday about evidence that vaccinated people can spread the Covid-19 Delta variant to others, after the nation’s top health agency expanded on its new guidance that fully vaccinated Americans wear masks indoors in certain places.Rochelle Walensky said “new science” observed in recent days demonstrated that new variants of the coronavirus were transmissible by people who have been fully vaccinated in some cases. Continue reading...

The world has looked away, but in Sheikh Jarrah the effort to dispossess us has not slowed downA few months ago, the world’s attention was on Sheikh Jarrah, my neighbourhood in occupied Jerusalem. For decades, Israeli settlers, backed by their state, have been trying to displace us from our homes and colonise our neighbourhood. The UN called these forcible expulsions a war crime. I call this theft – because it is.Related: Palestinians protest for fifth day in West Bank after death of activist Continue reading...

This project would rapidly deforest large areas of the Amazon, which would wreak havoc on the planetDespite increasing global concern, Jair Bolsonaro is determined to expand his exploitation of Brazil’s crucial natural resources. His latest project, one of the most destructive yet, would rapidly deforest large areas of the Amazon.Bolsonaro’s plan? To construct a 1,000km railway system extending right into the heart of the Amazon rainforest – with trains passing within 500 metres of 726 official environmentally protected areas. The new railway, called Ferrogrão, would also entail construction within 10km of another 18 priority conservation areas established by the ministry of the environment. Continue reading...

• Jake Ellzey defeats fellow Republican for vacant House seat• Susan Wright hoped to succeed husband who died of Covid-19Jake Ellzey of Texas won a US House seat on Tuesday night over a fellow Republican rival backed by Donald Trump, dealing the former president a defeat in a test of his endorsement power since leaving office.Ellzey’s come-from-behind victory over Susan Wright, the widow of the late Representative Ron Wright, in a special congressional election runoff near Dallas is likely to be celebrated by Trump antagonists who have warned against his continued hold on the GOP. Trump backed Wright from the start and had made one last attempt to give her a boost with a telephone rally on Monday night. Continue reading...

House select committee opens its first hearing with searing testimony from four officers who were attacked and beaten on 6 JanuaryGood morning.The House select committee investigating the 6 January attack opened on Tuesday with harrowing testimony from police officers who were beaten and assaulted while protecting the US Capitol. Continue reading...

Europe and the US are economically dependent on China now – and ‘change through trade’ is no longer on the cardsOn YouTube, you can watch a video clip of Volkswagen’s chief executive, Herbert Diess, denying that he knows what’s going on in Xinjiang. When the BBC correspondent helpfully spells it out – so-called reeducation camps for one million Uyghurs – Diess says: “I’m not aware of that.” Either he was being culpably ignorant about a region where Volkswagen has a factory, or he was lying.This was in the spring of 2019, and a company spokesperson soon declared that Diess was “of course aware” of the situation in Xinjiang. The case is particularly sensitive because Volkswagen was originally set up by the Nazis, and its use of forced labour during the Third Reich has been scrupulously documented by German historians. Continue reading...

We asked a panelist of experts on when we need to start changing our economies and ways of consuming and producing. Their answer: nowWe have zero years before climate and ecological breakdown, because it’s already here. We have zero years left to procrastinate. The longer we wait to act, the worse the floods, fires, droughts, famines and heatwaves will get. Continue reading...

My heart soars imagining how much anguish will be sidestepped by girls and women who pay attention to Simon Biles’ wise wordsThis week was not the first time I watched Simone Biles in action and thought “Wow, I wish I could do that!” It was, however, the first time I thought I might actually be able to. I myself am a writer, making me the natural opposite of an athlete. As I slump in front of my laptop and watch her flip and twist and fly through the air, I am dazzled. But when she tells a barrage of cameras and microphones that she is withdrawing from the women’s team final mid-competition at the Tokyo Olympic Games to focus on her mental wellbeing? I am awe-struck. I sit up immediately and listen carefully to what she says, on her social media and during press conferences, and I learn over and over that you’re allowed to step back when you need to. I see from her demeanour that it’s an extremely difficult thing to do, but that it is possible. No matter how much pressure you’re under you can simply state your needs, make your health a priority and fundamentally not feel you must do what everyone else wants you to do. Forget about the Yurchenko double pike vault, it is that move – the defensive retreat, the protective step back – that wins her all of my medals.Of course that’s a corny thing to say, and in any case I don’t have any medals except a battered one from my summer of 93 read-a-thon. Besides, Simone Biles stopped needing to win medals to prove her greatness a long time ago, although that has not stopped her from winning them. During the 2019 World Championships she won five gold medals and became the most decorated gymnast in World Championship history. She is a once in a lifetime athlete, perhaps the best there’s ever been. Even in all this week’s furore, herself and her team won silver medals, an achievement as much hers as her three team-mates. The others were extremely clear on that, with one of her teammates, Jordan Chiles stating: “But at the end of the day, we did though,” she said. “This medal was definitely for her because if it wasn’t for her, we wouldn’t be here where we are right now.” Continue reading...

The street skateboarding podium may be the youngest in Olympic history, and the Games’ newest sport is all about youthOn 3 August 2016, when skateboarding was officially approved for inclusion in the 2020 Olympics, Momiji Nishiya was looking forward to her ninth birthday later that month. Five years and one pandemic postponement later, she became her sport’s first female gold medalist, winning the street event in Tokyo earlier this week. She is just 13 years old.Rayssa Leal, the Brazilian who took silver, is eight months younger. And the third woman – or in this case, girl – who collected a medal Sunday, Funa Nakayama, is a comparatively ancient 16. Continue reading...

Electronic visit verification systems make homecare more difficult, trap people with disabilities, and cost more than paper timesheets. So why are they rolling out across the country?For years, LeDanté Walker set aside what little extra cash he could find so no matter the issue with his health insurance coverage, his caregiver was always taken care of.Walker, who sustained a spinal cord injury when he was ejected from the back seat of a car in a 1997 accident, relies on a home care worker for many day-to-day functions, from moving from his bed to his wheelchair every morning, to helping him shower, get dressed, go to the bathroom and prepare meals. Continue reading...

The album, purchased by Shkreli for $2m, was bought for an undisclosed sumAn unreleased Wu-Tang Clan album that “Pharma Bro” entrepreneur Martin Shkreli forfeited after his securities fraud conviction was sold Tuesday for an undisclosed sum, though prosecutors say it was enough to fully satisfy the rest of what he owed on a $7.4m forfeiture order he faced after his 2018 sentencing.The entrepreneur once boasted that he paid $2m in 2015 at auction for Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, the 31-track double album the Wu-Tang Clan spent six years creating. Continue reading...

Simone Biles pulled out of the women’s team gymnastics to “put mental health first”, Naomi Osaka was eliminated from the women’s tennis, and GB’s gymnasts won bronze12.03am BSTAnd I guess that’s as good a place as any to call it a day. I know it’s only the UK where it’s about to strike 12, but we’ve got to change over somewhere and this is where we’re doing it. So it’s goodnight from me and good evening to Tom Lutz in New York, who’ll guide you through the next bit. Join him by clicking below, and ta-ra.Related: Tokyo 2020 Olympics: rowing medals, cycling time trial, diving and more – live!11.57pm BSTThat talk of Olympic boxing minded of this from Seoul. There were simultaneous bouts in two rings, one using a bell and one a buzzer and one of the fighters, Chun Jim Chil, forgot which was in his. Continue reading...

Federal employees will be required to get Covid vaccine or submit to regular testing, according to CNNJoe Biden says requiring all federal workers to get coronavirus vaccine is “under consideration” as the Delta variant surges.Meanwhile, CNN has reported that the president will indeed announce a vaccine requirement for all federal employees and contractors, or submit to regular testing and mitigation requirements, according to a source the network said is close to the matter. Continue reading...

Secretary of state Antony Blinken says vandalism a painful reminder that antisemitism remains an issue in the USSecretary of State Antony Blinken has confirmed that a swastika was carved into an elevator wall at the state department’s main headquarters and said an investigation was underway.In a message sent to all department employees on Tuesday, Blinken said that the vandalism was a painful reminder that antisemitism remains an issue in the US and around the world and must be combatted relentlessly. Continue reading...