fact or fiction
Is it a fact or is it merely fiction? Fact or Fiction explores relationship myths and truths to get your head out of the clouds and back into romantic reality.
When the Train Didn’t Stop
The express train was not supposed to stop at Mehran Junction. It never did. People in the compartment had already arranged their bags for Karachi. Some were half-asleep. Others were scrolling through their phones, waiting for the familiar rush of the city to begin. When the train slowed down unexpectedly, a few passengers looked up, confused. Then it stopped. No announcement. No explanation. Just the sound of the engine breathing heavily in the evening heat. Ayaan closed his laptop with irritation. He had been reviewing notes from his interview in Lahore — a multinational company, a glass building, a salary package that would finally make things “stable.” At least that’s what he kept telling himself. He checked the time. “Yaar, why here?” someone muttered behind him. Ayaan glanced out of the window. The faded board read: Mehran Junction. For a second, it meant nothing. Then everything.
By Shahid Zaman5 days ago in Humans
The Friction of Order
They promise that if you follow the rules, the outcome will follow too. Study, work, pay, vote, obey. In return: stability. Healthcare when you are sick. Education when you are young. Justice when you are wronged. Safety when you are afraid.
By Dagmar Goeschick5 days ago in Humans
Nomophobia: The 21st Century Fear Nobody Is Talking About
Picture this: you reach into your pocket and your phone is not there. In the space of a single second, a wave of unease washes over you — a flutter of panic, a surge of disorientation, a sudden and overwhelming need to locate the device immediately. Your mind races through possibilities. Did you leave it at home? On the table at the café? In the taxi? And beneath the practical concern lies something rawer, something harder to articulate — a feeling not merely of inconvenience, but of vulnerability. Of incompleteness. Of being, in some fundamental way, cut off from the world.
By noor ul amin6 days ago in Humans
The Voucher Program
Tennessee's Education Savings Account program was introduced to the legislature in 2023 with a specific image attached to it. A poor child in a failing school whose parents finally have the power to do something about it. That image did most of the political work. The bill passed. The program launched. And then the data started coming in, and the data described a different child entirely.
By Tim Carmichael7 days ago in Humans
Trickle Them Down, But Not Out. Top Story - February 2026.
The thing about smart people is that they should know better, but alas, intelligence is not the same as wisdom. Not only do the mistakes of experts too short on vision—when they are not corrected—have the potential to do great and far-reaching damage, but they also undermine public confidence in the very notion of expertise. This is particularly so when expertise is wielded in defence of the rich and powerful as a cudgel against those laid low. As an academic, this lack of faith in “so-called experts” is painful to see as it plays out in the spread of dis-/misinformation, conspiracy theories, and anti-intellectualism writ large. But it is also an understandable impulse given the catastrophic failure of an economic ideology pushed by certain economic experts. Supply-side economics has shaped a broken system for the last half-century and has arguably done more to undermine the fabric of the American Dream than any policy framework of the past century.
By Cory Wright-Maley7 days ago in Humans
From Resort To Nightmare
SOCIAL STANDARDS MAGAZINE February 19 2026 Andrew Strelley, international correspondent When Joshua Tadley’s friend, Matthew Besthorpe, came home from last vacation in a tropical climate, there was not exactly a happy welcome. He lay still in a box, no sign of life in his body. How did it happen?
By Moon Desert8 days ago in Humans
The Legible Child
A particular form of exhaustion arises from performing unseen tasks, distinct from the fatigue of overwork. It settles slowly, over months or years, until one day a teacher stands at a photocopier early in the morning, watching pages collate, and notices she no longer knows why she chose this profession. She gathers her papers, walks to her classroom, and begins another day of documentation.
By Tim Carmichael8 days ago in Humans
The Habit That Helped Me Stop Comparing Myself to Others
I didn’t realize how much comparison was stealing my happiness until one quiet night changed everything. For years, I had a habit that looked harmless. Every morning and every night, I scrolled. Social media. Success stories. Travel photos. Business wins. Engagement announcements. Fitness transformations.
By Dadullah Danish9 days ago in Humans
Power, Protection, and the Limits of Liberal Ideology
The Epstein saga didn’t happen in a vacuum. It happened inside a specific ideological architecture — one built on liberal principles of individual freedom, institutional trust, legal process, and market logic. Understanding how that architecture both enabled the abuse and is now struggling to reckon with it tells us something important about liberalism itself: its genuine achievements, and its profound blind spots.
By noor ul amin10 days ago in Humans
