“Freedom from constraint is at the core of travel’s appeal; no wonder it’s always getting out of hand.”
2. An Alt-Right Makeover Shrouds the Swastikas
“Fewer pointed hoods, more khaki pants.”
3. Libraries Become Unexpected Sites of Hate Crimes
“There has been a spate of hate crimes targeting libraries, their books or patrons, the authorities say — offenses they had rarely seen before.”
4. ‘I’m Prejudiced,’ He Said. Then We Kept Talking.
“Garry makes me believe that even though a man endorsed by the Ku Klux Klan won the majority of white support, people can change. He told me he now notices his own stereotypes and is eager to replace them with something more generous and true about his fellow Americans.”
“Implicit bias is grounded in a basic human tendency to divide the social world into groups. In other words, what may appear as an example of tacit racism may actually be a manifestation of a broader propensity to think in terms of ‘us versus them’ — a prejudice that can apply, say, to fans of a different sports team. This doesn’t make the effects of implicit bias any less worrisome, but it does mean people should be less defensive about it.”
6. In Chicago, Bodies Pile Up at Intersection of ‘Depression and Rage’
“In places like this, cycles reinforce themselves: Poverty and joblessness breed an underground economy that leads to jail and makes it harder to get jobs. Struggling, emptying schools result in the closings of the very institutions that hold communities together. Segregation throws up obstacles to economic investment. And people and programs with good intentions come and go, thwarting hopes, reinforcing frustrations while never quite addressing the underlying problems, anyway. Into it all comes a lethal mix of readily available guns, a growing number of splintering gangs and groups, and a sense among some here that the punishment for carrying a weapon on these streets will never be larger than the risk of not carrying one.”
7. The American Dream, Quantified at Last
“For babies born in 1980 — today’s 36-year-olds — the index of the American dream has fallen to 50 percent: Only half of them make as much money as their parents did.”
8. It’s Our Land. Let’s Keep It That Way.
“Back in January, Mr. Trump told Field & Stream magazine that he opposed divesting such holdings because ‘I want to keep the lands great, and you don’t know what the state is going to do.’ That particular resolve, if it holds firm, deserves our approval and support. Public lands under federal management, including not just national monuments but also national forests, national parks, national wildlife refuges and other entities, deliver enormous value, of several sorts, to the communal and individual lives of Americans.”
“The latest round of headphones popularity may be an expression of our disaffected times, coming during a season when people holding different views on matters political and cultural struggle to open their mouths without triggering an argument.”
10. The ‘H-Bomb’ Fizzles: The Harvard Brand Takes a Hit
“The rose-garden perfume of privilege — as charged a word as can be found on campuses these days — emanating from anyone with a Harvard diploma receives more censure now than ever, whether that privilege came in the form of significant parental help in gaining admission or was acquired at the school and now opens endless doors.”
“Dating is an emotionally risky proposition for everyone, but it is particularly challenging for people with disabilities. People who rely on wheelchairs or who have another form of physical impairment often begin to date much later in life, and the rate of marriage is lower.”
12. Soak, Steam, Spritz: It’s All Self-Care
“What is the difference between self-care and simply pampering?”
13. Neither War Nor Peace: A New Look at the Aftermath of World War I
“Even stable societies buckled.”
“He works through his topics chapter by chapter — ‘The Revenge of Paper,’ ‘The Revenge of Film,’ ‘The Revenge of Retail’ — with scene-setting and friendly interviews with various innovators. One of his more substantial chapters looks at the cyber-utopian impulse that’s led public school districts to purchase laptops and related technology; these kids, he argues, mostly just need good teaching. And his ardor for analog models does not turn entirely on nostalgia: He argues that the older system created more jobs, and filled human needs — for a sensory, tactile experience, for example — that the new ones don’t.”
15. Looking to the Future of Our Humans-First World
“A dramatic high point comes when Biello recounts how a man living in the United States (him) fares as an Anthropocenic Homo sapiens, which is either really impressive or really distressing, depending on your scruples: ‘The average American uses 90 kilograms of stuff each day, day in and day out. We consume 25 percent of the world’s energy despite being 5 percent of the world’s population. We lust for the latest gadget, which hides away minerals wrested from beneath the Congo, among other places, deep in its innards.’”
16. Life in Obamacare’s Dead Zone
“The residents with the lowest incomes in those 19 states were now caught between two nonoptions: They made too much to qualify for Medicaid, or didn’t qualify at all, but they also made too little for publicly subsidized insurance on the exchanges, their income not high enough to trigger the refundable tax credits and cost-sharing that could make the possibility remotely affordable to someone making just a few dollars above the federal poverty level.”
Submitted For Your Perusal 