There is a shared set of beliefs about human nature that shapes the way we see the world — common assumptions about race, aggression, and sex that are seen as just part of being human.
While we might not always admit it in public, most people think that there is a specific set of biological differences between various kinds of people in the world, and that if you strip away society and laws, humans become beasts, with survival of the fittest and the bigger, badder, more aggressive taking control. And of course, nearly everyone knows that it is natural that men and women want, and need, different things from sex and personal relationships.
These beliefs are myths based on misinformation, partial truths, and a large dose of ignorance as to what we actually know about our species. Keep reading …
“PBS has become more and more dependent on viewers nothing like you.” —
The Colbert Report’s STEPHEN COLBERT, on reports that PBS killed a documentary critical of one of the gazillionaire Koch brothers — a major public broadcasting supporter.
Ugh.
(via inothernews)
Public funding is important for public broadcasting.
(via poynterinstitute)
(via poynterinstitute)
What Ever Happened to the Evangelical Left?
In 1973 the Washington Post predicted that the evangelical left could alter the structure of politics and religion in America. In the end, it failed to take shape electorally in the way that the Moral Majority did. So what happened?
I beg us all to end the duplicative journalistic practice of “matching”
Journalistic Netiquette, a conversation in progress.
“I think before his second term is over, we’re going to see a miracle before our eyes, I believe God is going to answer our prayers and we’ll be freed from the yoke of Obamacare” — Michele Bachmann decides God will repeal Obamacare. (via think-progress)
Why Is Tumblr Worth $1.1 Billion to Yahoo? -
This business model would grind to a halt if a form of opt-in, as the European Union is now considering, is required before data supplied to one outlet, say Tumblr, is shared with other prying eyes, be they of corporate or government entities. As it is, sites such as Tumblr and Instagram became popular because they appeared to bestow a measure of privacy by not offering advertising. An aggressive ad program of the kind Yahoo needs to recoup its investment could fatally alienate Tumblr’s core constituency.
But shredding privacy is the essence of Tumblr’s appeal to Yahoo, and even though it has said it will retain the social networking site’s founders in key positions, one way or another that very personal data will be mined and inevitably fall into what users will discover to be the wrong hands. That is truly scary, for private space is the necessary incubator of personal freedom.
(Source: azspot)
Whenever I feel fretful I watch Pretty in Pink. I feel fretful fairly often, and I’m not sure I could tell you why. It’s just a thing that happens, especially when I have to get ready to go out and be in front of other people. When I have to get dressed. I’m always able to get over it, eventually, but sometimes I need a little help. Andie Walsh helps me, with her elegance (half on purpose, half accidental), her inventive thrift-store style and orange hair. I’ll put on the movie—for what, the 200th, 300th time?—and watch its opening scene, which shows Molly Ringwald as Andie getting dressed piece by piece. My reaction to the shot of her zipping up the back of her silky, ivory-colored skirt is a nearly physical throb of recognition and longing: That could be me. I could wear that skirt, slinky and sweet. If only I could climb inside the movie and inhabit it, I could possess its main character’s sense of self. Keep reading …
Why chicken farmers find fault with Tamara Staples photographs, but city-folk love them. Read more.
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It’s easy to feel isolated against a force as powerful as gentrification, particularly in Manhattan, where the new average rent of $3,418 would require a 118-hour workweek for those earning minimum wage. But the activists behind the Movement for Justice in El Barrio were not about to feel isolated. So in 2004, a small number of Spanish-speaking tenants decided to organize and fight back against slumlords and the displacement wrought from gentrification in New York City’s East Harlem. Keep reading …