Howard Schultz, Gay Priests, and Ted Bundy

Past Present Episode 165

In this episode, Neil, Niki, and Natalia discuss Howard Schultz’ presidential bid, gay men in the priesthood, and the enduring fascination with serial killer Ted Bundy. Here are some links and references mentioned during this week’s show: Starbucks founder Howard Schultz has announced he is running for the presidency in 2020. Natalia referred ...
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Howard Schultz, Gay Priests, and Ted Bundy

Political Storytelling and the State of the Union

An examination of the role and limits of storytelling in American political life

With the government shutdown at an end, at least for the next few weeks, President Trump and Speaker Pelosi quickly agreed to hold the State of the Union on Tuesday, Feb. 5. Of course, some commentators have openly wondered how much the address still matters, especially in an age of constantly shifting news ...
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Political Storytelling and the State of the Union

Mitch McConnell and the “For the People Act of 2019”

Thoughts on power grabbing and democracy

This is the Democrat plan to restore democracy? A brand new week of paid vacation for every federal employee who’d like to hover around while you cast your ballot? A Washington-based, tax-subsidized clearinghouse for political campaign funding? A power grab. It’s smelling more and more like exactly what it is. Thus ...
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Mitch McConnell and the “For the People Act of 2019”

The Politics of Female Sexuality in ‘Lipstick Under My Burkha’

What a recent Bollywood film can tell us about risk, pleasure, desire and feminism.

In an advisory issued by the Information and Broadcasting ministry in December 2017, the Indian government banned the telecast of condom advertisements across all television channels until 10 pm on the contention that some of them were “indecent and can impact children.” The implicit idea behind the advisory is that anything involving ...
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The Politics of Female Sexuality in ‘Lipstick Under My Burkha’

Brexit, Dark Money and Big Data

An investigation into the financing of Brexit

An investigation by openDemocracy into the financing of the Brexit campaign in 2016 has raised far-reaching questions about connections between neoliberal elites, the tech industry and the private intelligence sector. Adam Ramsay, one of the journalists involved, summarizes a story vital to understanding how Britain has ended up where it ...
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Brexit, Dark Money and Big Data

Public Housing and Asthma

Another winter of discontent, or relief at last?

For the many thousands of New Yorkers who live with asthma -- including an estimated 174,000 children under the age of 12 -- the winter months can often be particularly painful and debilitating. Cold, dry air outdoors, and in poorly heated spaces indoors, constricts nasal passages and the body’s other ...
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Public Housing and Asthma

Can Gillette’s New Ad Turn Minds as Well as Heads?

Even as ‘virtue schooling’ widens the political divide, a new discussion space is up for grabs

When I started seeing headlines about the Gillette ad backlash, I assumed that the online reverberations came from feminists frustrated that the new advertisement was not “new” enough: too generic, too vague, too still-just-selling-razors. As it turned out, most of the online anger came from men who felt that the advertisement’s call ...
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Can Gillette’s New Ad Turn Minds as Well as Heads?

New York is the Place

How the city has defined The New School

The 1918 proposal to create a “new school” ended with a rousing declaration of the innovation of the idea, the significance of the moment, and, most of all, the importance of New York. The proposers believed that this city -- “the greatest social science laboratory in the world” -- would attract scholars ...
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New York is the Place

Reconsidering the History of Race through Peyote

How categories of belonging are made in Mexico

Loyalties begin with a sense of belonging, a sense of who is on the inside and who is on the outside. I suppose that historians almost invariably interrogate notions of loyalty as we imagine our historical subjects; how they experienced their connections and obligations, and how this in turned shaped ...
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Reconsidering the History of Race through Peyote

How Socrates Can Help Psychotherapists

When two minds meet like steel striking flint

As the field of psychotherapy focuses more on treatment manuals and the regimented nature of clinical research, the practice risks losing the subtle nuances that guide the interactive fluidity of therapy sessions. Can clinicians combat this loss by incorporating ideals from ancient philosophy into contemporary psychotherapy? In The Socratic Method of ...
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How Socrates Can Help Psychotherapists

Learning to See SPURA

Reflections on urban displacement, art, and community praxis

For forty years, as New York’s Lower East Side went from disinvested to gentrified, residents lived with a wound at the heart of the neighborhood, a wasteland of vacant lots known as the Seward Park Urban Renewal Area (SPURA). Most of the buildings on the fourteen-square-block area were condemned in ...
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Learning to See SPURA

Marching on Washington, the LA Teachers’ Strike, and Cities and Economic Inequality

Past Present Episode 164

In this episode, Niki, Natalia, and Neil discuss marching on Washington as a form of political protest, the Los Angeles teachers’ strike, and how American cities reflect economic inequality. Here are some links and references mentioned during this week’s show: Native American and pro-life activists both marched in Washington, D.C., last ...
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Marching on Washington, the LA Teachers’ Strike, and Cities and Economic Inequality