Journalist – Historian – Speaker
I think a lot about the conversations I have with my kids, especially my hyper-verbal daughter, and the way they set up the next conversations. I over-intellectualize, thinking deeply about the lessons I want to impart to my children, and how I might take small steps down the road even at this early age. For …
Yesterday, Soraya Chemaly, one of the feminist writers I read regularly (Rule #3 – It’s about them), tweeted about a memo from a huge international law-firm to its female employees. It’s sexist in entirely predictable ways, demanding women de-gender and de-sexualize themselves so that they can be taken seriously. I genuinely believe that the author …
A friend sent me this link. It’s a story I haven’t heard before, but I just want to demonstrate that here, again, is the veneration of compliance by police. This is much like the Saylor case or the Antonio Martinez case in California where police explain the violence due to non-compliance and police demonstrate their inability …
Imagine you are walking down the street listening to music. Police see something about you that they don’t like. They are behind you though and call on you to stop. You can’t hear them. What happens next? I’ve written cases in which Deaf people experience just this – the police feel disrespected and they react. …
I began today’s writing with a new post on the Cult of Compliance, but I don’t want to skip the round-up, as there were some pieces I like here. Last Monday – I began the week with a post on academic, alternative career paths and gender, using an interesting clause calling for non-traditional candidates to …
Last week, a 13-year-old boy named Andy was walking home carrying a toy rifle. Police seem to have mistaken him for a grown man, called for him to drop the gun. As he turned towards the squad car (I think, based on reports), police fired on him. They hit him with seven bullets, according to …
I have been going to a bluegrass jam at the Oak Park Farmer’s Market for years, when I can (which is about once a month, and often not for more than an hour). We go as a family and Nico fixates on the music, because he truly loves music and dancing, especially live music involving …
Recently, among the various smart journalists that I follow, there has been a lot of debate about to what one should compare the current American far-right movements. During the shutdown, journalists talked a lot about the Civil War, for example. As a historian, I’m always interested to see how people invoke history to explain contemporary …
Pat Robertson says many inane, stupid, and/or offensive things. This is not news. I just want to point out the way that anti-disability language emerges out of a certain kind of religious discourse. There’s an idea that links disability to sin, that thinks of it as a punishment from God. It’s an old idea, though …
“Who is Jorge Mario Bergoglio?” The pope stares at me in silence. I ask him if this is a question that I am allowed to ask…. He nods that it is, and he tells me: “I do not know what might be the most fitting description…. I am a sinner. This is the most accurate …