When you see hatred directed towards a people, a race or a religion, and someone explains that it is justified because of X, Y or Z, something has gone profoundly wrong. Has society drifted so far, and lost its soul to such an extent, that hatred of innocent people has become acceptable because of the alleged or real actions of an individual - or even a government? Are we no longer capable of distinguishing individual responsibility from collective guilt? History is riddled with examples of the actions of individuals being used, or more frequently, deliberately manipulated, to condemn an entire group. That is how prejudice is legitimised, persecution is rationalised and, ultimately, atrocities are made possible. People who excuse or justify hatred towards innocent human beings, whether on social media or in the streets, based purely on association of race, religion or identity, are embracing the very logic that has enabled humanity’s worst crimes. You cannot condemn evil while defending hatred. Justifying evil is itself an act of evil.

The Morning After What kind of society are we building once the common enemy is gone? mikeabel.substack.com/p/the-…

Jeepers. Can’t believe Spurs beat Chelsea at home. Wow!! What a result. Truly historic stuff 👏👏👏

#WestHam that was shambolic!!

KWP you beauty 🔥 @WestHam

Destroyed 💔 Just seeing these pics on social media of the building in Limoges that was burned down a few days ago in those riots is heartbreaking and bewildering. It survived both world wars… Irreplaceable 💔 #Culture

Sometimes a statistic can mislead you. - unless you look below the surface. I read an article this morning in a highly regarded publication. It said that one in five people globally will develop cancer. In some wealthier countries, it’s closer to one in two. Quite a difference. My immediate thought was: what are people in wealthy countries eating, drinking or being exposed to that makes the risk so much higher? But when I looked into it, and researched it, there was more to the story. An important part of the explanation is that people in wealthy countries live longer. Cancer becomes more common as we age. Better detection also means more cancers are found. So some of what looks like a consequence of an unhealthy lifestyle is actually a consequence of living longer. Not all of it, of course. Lifestyle matters too. The point is that the number alone doesn’t tell us how much each factor contributes. To be fair, the article mentioned rising life expectancy. It just didn’t unpack what that meant for the comparison. And that’s what interested me. We increasingly read in headlines. We see a number, form a view and move on. I caught myself doing exactly that. In a headline driven world, we need to look below the surface more today than ever before. Not because the data or statistic is wrong, but because what we think it means may not be what it’s telling us. There is a separate food lesson here, though. We know this but my digging resurfaced this in my mind. There’s a lot to be said for simple meals with wholegrains, beans, lentils and plenty of fibre. And for limiting processed meat, red meat and alcohol consumption. Affluenza. Being able to afford more doesn’t necessarily mean we’re eating better. Heartier sure, but healthier? Not so much. My grandfather, Dr Philip Perl, would always say: “Everything in moderation. Including moderation.” So of course, enjoy your life to the fullest. But there are little daily decisions we can each make that will (statistically) extend the amount of time we have too. And then of course, there is the lotto of genetic good luck and bad luck. But wise choices help too.

Watching what’s happening in France, their much loved and provocative term “enfant terrible” takes on a whole new meaning… Where this only goes from here is entirely unclear. Vive le France 🇫🇷 comes to mind. What a time.

Garbage in. Gospel out. We have never been more connected. Or more divided. In 1710, Jonathan Swift wrote: “Falsehood flies, and truth comes limping after it.” A version of that thought is often attributed to Mark Twain. Which rather proves the point. Swift had no internet. No feeds. No algorithms. Just pamphlets and social gossip. Imagine what he’d make of today, when so much of what we know sits in our pockets, and yet the lie still gets there first. That’s no accident. The platforms that carry our words only reward outrage. Anger is their sugar. A calm voice rarely travels as far. A kind one rarely trends. So the feed fills with fury, and the fury starts to look like world opinion. Intentionally. Now lies are also being deliberately farmed. Planted daily, by the thousand, in the very places we go to check the truth, where search engines and the machines we ask can hand them back to us as fact. Garbage in. Gospel out. Those of us who grew up before the algorithmic world should know better. We weren’t immune to propaganda. But we remember forming our views without a personalised feed deciding what we’d see next. That gives us a particular responsibility to pause, question and think. The younger generations are not foolish. They’re simply being hyper targeted and algorithmically manipulated. None of us is immune. But no one should mistake a constant stream of disinformation for sudden understanding. Ask what you’re being shown, why you are being shown it, who benefits from it, and what evidence supports it. So where is north, when someone is bending the compass? We find it by thinking for ourselves without assuming we are always right. By testing what we believe, especially when we want it to be true. Beware of unconscious bias. And always, by choosing how we treat one another. Choose light. Choose kindness over cruelty. Knowledge over noise. Choose science, and the plain truth of our shared humanity: we bleed the same blood, know grief, and each deserve the same dignity. Be wary of any idea that asks you to despise a group of people in order to belong. Belonging that costs someone else their dignity isn’t belonging. It’s a mob with good branding. So much today is just this. And be wary of virtue built on things that simply aren’t true. Signalling virtue on a lie isn’t virtue. It’s just the lie, wearing a trendier outfit. Keep a watchful eye on how societies treat their minorities. How readily their dignity can be denied, should trouble anyone who truly believes in shared humanity. Notice whose pain is acknowledged, and whose is explained away. Notice whose right to safety is treated as self-evident, and whose is endlessly put on trial. That is where our values become entirely visible. Standing up for a cruel thing never made anyone good. Not even when it’s popular. Especially when it’s popular. In the end, it comes down to something very simple. Am I choosing to build, or to break? To unite, or to divide? “A candle loses nothing by lighting another”. The light multiplies. It fills the room. Hatred spreads too. It goes viral. It metastasizes. It passes from one person to another until poison begins to feel like truth. So ask yourself: Will I be a candle, lighting other candles and bringing more light into the world? Or will I help spread the poison? Evil can flourish for a time. Goodness survives because someone keeps choosing it, and passing the light on. It endures. It’s not left. Not right. It’s build or break. Unite or divide. Choose wisely.

Garbage in. Gospel out. We have never been more connected. Or more divided. In 1710, Jonathan Swift wrote: “Falsehood flies, and truth comes limping after it.” A version of that thought is often attributed to Mark Twain. Which rather proves the point. Swift had no internet. No feeds. No algorithms. Just pamphlets and social gossip. Imagine what he’d make of today, when so much of what we know sits in our pockets, and yet the lie still gets there first. That’s no accident. The platforms that carry our words only reward outrage. Anger is their sugar. A calm voice rarely travels as far. A kind one rarely trends. So the feed fills with fury, and the fury starts to look like world opinion. Intentionally. Now lies are also being deliberately farmed. Planted daily, by the thousand, in the very places we go to check the truth, where search engines and the machines we ask can hand them back to us as fact. Garbage in. Gospel out. Those of us who grew up before the algorithmic world should know better. We weren’t immune to propaganda. But we remember forming our views without a personalised feed deciding what we’d see next. That gives us a particular responsibility to pause, question and think. The younger generations are not foolish. They’re simply being hyper targeted and algorithmically manipulated. None of us is immune. But no one should mistake a constant stream of disinformation for sudden understanding. Ask what you’re being shown, why you are being shown it, who benefits from it, and what evidence supports it. So where is north, when someone is bending the compass? We find it by thinking for ourselves without assuming we are always right. By testing what we believe, especially when we want it to be true. Beware of unconscious bias. And always, by choosing how we treat one another. Choose light. Choose kindness over cruelty. Knowledge over noise. Choose science, and the plain truth of our shared humanity: we bleed the same blood, know grief, and each deserve the same dignity. Be wary of any idea that asks you to despise a group of people in order to belong. Belonging that costs someone else their dignity isn’t belonging. It’s a mob with good branding. So much today is just this. And be wary of virtue built on things that simply aren’t true. Signalling virtue on a lie isn’t virtue. It’s just the lie, wearing a trendier outfit. Keep a watchful eye on how societies treat their minorities. How readily their dignity can be denied, should trouble anyone who truly believes in shared humanity. Notice whose pain is acknowledged, and whose is explained away. Notice whose right to safety is treated as self-evident, and whose is endlessly put on trial. That is where our values become entirely visible. Standing up for a cruel thing never made anyone good. Not even when it’s popular. Especially when it’s popular. In the end, it comes down to something very simple. Am I choosing to build, or to break? To unite, or to divide? “A candle loses nothing by lighting another”. The light multiplies. It fills the room. Hatred spreads too. It goes viral. It metastasizes. It passes from one person to another until poison begins to feel like truth. So ask yourself: Will I be a candle, lighting other candles and bringing more light into the world? Or will I help spread the poison? Evil can flourish for a time. Goodness survives because someone keeps choosing it, and passing the light on. It endures. It’s not left. Not right. It’s build or break. Unite or divide. Choose wisely.

My feed keeps serving me ridiculous viral videos claiming to teach Gen Z how successful people speak. The advice? Don’t introduce yourself by name. Make the other person tell you theirs first. Never apologise for being late. Say, “Thank you for waiting” instead. It’s absolute rubbish. Pure tosh. Introduce yourself. Offer your firm hand. Look people in the eye. Be on time. And if you’re late, apologise. “Thank you for waiting” isn’t an apology. It’s rude. These videos are teaching young people to mistake rudeness for confidence and arrogance for presence. That’s not how you build a positive relationship, earn trust or build a career. It’s how you make a really bad first impression. And a last one at that…

The human imagination that gave us the Taj Mahal also gave us AI The Taj Mahal never fails to take my breath away. It’s an extraordinary, inspiring and enduring love story and creation that captures the imagination on multiple layers and levels. So do so many of the great buildings and works of art created long before any of the technology we take for granted and have become so reliant on today. What gets me every time, is that each one began as a fragile grain of an idea. Construction of the Taj Mahal began in 1632. The main mausoleum was completed in 1648, and the wider complex in 1653. Thousands of people spent more than twenty years bringing that vision to life. By hand. Hundreds of years before anyone had heard of a computer, let alone AI. As I write this, Vivaldi’s Winter (c. 1720) is playing. Another extraordinary creation that began in a human mind, and reached us through the hands and instruments of musicians. I keep coming back to that, and it gives me real hope. I’m always excited by what AI can do, and of course I use it. Extensively. My worry is that we might reach for it as a solution today, far too soon: before we’ve sat with a thought, wrestled with a problem, or let an idea wander far enough to become something that is truly ours. Inherently human: It would be a pity to be so impressed by what a machine can make that we forget to be astonished by our own proven ability. To further the conversation, what human-made place, work of art or piece of music has inspired you? It might be the Sistine Chapel, St Peter’s, a little church in a village nobody’s heard of, or a piece of music that stops you in your tracks. Share a picture or tell us what it means to you. I think we could all use the reminder of what we’re truly capable of. And yes, the free image accompanying this post was made with AI. The Taj Mahal itself was imagined, designed and built by people, centuries before AI. I rather like the little irony in that 😉

The boy in the first photograph, Mikey, had no idea he was keeping a careful record. He was just being eleven at the time: living through the summer days in Port Elizabeth, the friendships forged, the eccentricities of family, and all the details that quite seemed ordinary at the time - but many that weren’t. The man, Mike, in the second photograph has gone back to those details, with almost fifty years of life between them. That, for me, is the curious double life of writing a memoir: the child lives it - and records it. The adult gets to tell it. “Being Abel in a World of Cain” is now in its final edit. I expect to have the full manuscript back on Friday. After that comes the next stage: finding its publishing home. What a wonderfully rewarding journey this has been so far. Going back, way back, and spending lots of quality time with those deeply loved and long passed. Those incredibly funny moments, the embarrassing ones, the meaningful ones - some that were really hard to revisit, but exceptionally important to do. Rediscovering their importance and lasting impact. (The cover shown here is the provisional concept, not the final design).

Thank you to #Environ for inviting me to deliver a keynote at your 2026 global conference today. I greatly enjoyed sharing some thoughts ideas and case studies on branding and marketing. It’s always energising spending time with a business so focused on its future and committed to investing in innovation and growth 🙏

A special sunset tonight 🌅

Well, one good thing about the match, our Sunday can only improve from here… 🍺

The commentators keep saying “it’s not over yet” I’m not seeing 12 points in 4 minutes? Let’s see…