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A true horror story: The abuse of teenage boys in a detention centre

"My name's Kevin Raymond Young and I'm 52 years old." There's something desperate about the way Young says it, as if he's clinging to the wreckage of his identity. Young was 17 when he was sent to…
PUBLISHED: April 13, 2012
LENGTH: 18 minutes (4625 words)

How the royals became cool

The other day, Cheryl Cole had a lovely dream. "I married Prince Harry and was a real-life princess," she said. "It's true. And Charles was my father-in-law." The last bit sounds like every girl's…
PUBLISHED: April 11, 2012
LENGTH: 10 minutes (2595 words)

The US schools with their own police

The charge on the police docket was "disrupting class". But that's not how 12-year-old Sarah Bustamantes saw her arrest for spraying two bursts of perfume on her neck in class because other children…
PUBLISHED: Jan. 9, 2012
LENGTH: 12 minutes (3037 words)

My father abducted me

Janus Bakrawi: ‘I was so angry at my father. For the first few weeks I tried to run away.’ Photograph: Ty Stange for the Guardian Janus Bakrawi was seven when his father, Atif, announced…
PUBLISHED: Dec. 10, 2011
LENGTH: 5 minutes (1406 words)

Is the end of the world really nigh?

Judging by the run of successful natural disaster films in the past few years, people are fascinated by the idea of the end of the world. In Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later, a virus ravaged the UK and…
AUTHOR:Alok Jha
PUBLISHED: Nov. 20, 2011
LENGTH: 9 minutes (2363 words)

Daniel Kahneman: How cognitive illusions blind us to reason

Many decades ago, I spent what seemed like a great deal of time under a scorching sun, watching groups of sweaty soldiers as they solved a problem. I was doing my national service in the…
PUBLISHED: Oct. 30, 2011
LENGTH: 12 minutes (3013 words)

My child, the murderer

Andy Williams On the morning of 5 March 2001, Andy Williams, who had just turned 15, took his father's long-barrelled .22-calibre revolver and 40 bullets to hishigh school…
PUBLISHED: Oct. 28, 2011
LENGTH: 18 minutes (4515 words)
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