I have a new piece at Pacific Standard, my first column for them since signing on as a regular contributor. It’s called, “The New Blood Libel.” It’s not the piece I expected to be writing. I thought I’d write first about DeVos and disability education under Trump, or maybe healthcare and mortal risks to vulnerable…
Big case coming up next week about education for people with disabilities. “Special education” is mandated by the federal government but funded from the states and localities, and is often a place where school districts try to cut corners, provide the absolute legal minimum of services, and otherwise shirk their obligations. Here’s SCOTUSblog on the…
Dylan Roof, the murderer of 9 black people in South Carolina, rejected a psychiatric evaluation and mental health defense because psychology is a “Jewish invention.” It’s an important example of the way that hatreds intersect. Obviously, his hatreds manifested in acts of violence against black worshipers in church. He didn’t, say, attack a synagogue. But…
“On language and power” has been the tagline of How Did We Get Into This Mess? for years, so I’m always excited when other writers focus in on that specific issue. Here’s Summer Brennan, with her new twice-monthly column. I would like to invite readers to join me in doing this. Get a diary or journal…
I wrote two pieces for Los Angeles Review of Books this year, one on sexual ableism and the Anna Stubblefield case, the other on Michel Bérubé’s recent book on narrative deployments of developmental disability in literature. The latter was sheer joy to write. Bérubé’s was engaging to read, providing me (a non-literature specialist) with a welcome pathway…
I’m going to post a bit about some of my favorite pieces from 2016, starting with Al Jazeera America, which sadly shut down in April of this year. Last February, though, I became aware of an ad for The Arc – TX, which had anti-disability clauses written into the requirements. I blogged about it, called…
My university, Dominican University, has declared itself a sanctuary campus. We have a long history as a national leader in supporting the rights of undocumented students to access higher education, including regular fund-raising to make that possible. In 2014 I wrote: Over the last few years at my Roman Catholic university, we have begun to…
The RNC puts out messages on holidays. Here’s the text for Hanukkah: “As our Jewish friends and family around the country gather to light the first candle, we hope they will enjoy a special time of closeness and joy this Hanukkah season. These eight nights serve as a reminder of how the Maccabees never gave…
3) We know that Breitbart ran a story on the cancellation of A Christmas Carol, blaming the family, with a nativity picture in a church. pic.twitter.com/NsxrkSMO2Y — David M. Perry (@Lollardfish) December 23, 2016 A few days ago, would-be theocrat Todd Starnes, a Fox News Christianist pundit, published and performed an inflammatory segment about a school…
The New Yorker has a piece on formerly incarcerated people going to UC Berkeley. It’s long and interesting, with many good tidbits about life in prison, life in college, structural obstacles, but also genuine opportunities. But I want to quote a few bits on how awesome books are. This is Murillo. At first, he read the…