Essays Archive - Page 85 of 131

In Search of Lost Time—And Misplaced Memories

June 24, 2020 • by Sergio Infante

You are in your twenties but have lived with petit mal epilepsy your entire life. Dr. Penfield has promised you a solution: he will peel back your scalp, open up your cranium, and probe your brain with electrodes for signs of injury. He believes that your epilepsy is due to ...

In Search of Lost Time—And Misplaced Memories

Democracy

Bernie’s Brooklyn

How growing up in a New Deal city shaped Bernie Sanders’s vision for America

June 24, 2020 • by Ted Hamm

One of the remarkable features of New York City in the middle three decades of the twentieth century was the plethora of political parties that wielded influence. There were the Democrats, still controlled by Tammany Hall in Manhattan along with similarly Irish-led machines in the Bronx and Brooklyn. The Republicans ...

Politics

Is Social Democracy Viable?

If it is, it will need better arguments, organization, and leadership, according to a U.K. Labour Party post-mortem

June 24, 2020 • by Simon Jones

The U.K. Labour party recently released a report that analyses their defeat in the 2019 election. The results should alarm anyone interested in the future of social democracy. The report concludes that the crushing failure of the 2019 Corbyn campaign had been years in the making. Shifting electoral demographics, organizational dysfunction, ...

Politics

Why Don’t We Call It Treason?

John Bolton confirms what Senate Republicans already knew

June 24, 2020 • by John Stoehr

I don’t like John Bolton any more than you do. He’s a crank. He’s a snob. He’s a warmonger. One thing you can’t question, though, is his loyalty. No matter how wrongheaded, how dangerous, how much he prefers airstrikes to diplomacy, you can’t doubt his dedication to the United States. ...

Interviews

Bernie Sanders’s Socialism Is New York Born and Bred

June 24, 2020 • by Charlotte Slivka and Ted Hamm

Charlotte Slivka [CS]: Bernie’s Brooklyn is so much more than what the title would suggest. This book shows a deep love for the city and how politics and life are so tightly intertwined in our dense and crazy city. Are you from New York? Ted Hamm [TH]: No, I grew up ...

Bernie Sanders’s Socialism Is New York Born and Bred

Activism

The Pride Wore White

Black trans women step out of the queer chorus

June 23, 2020 • by McKenzie Wark

I’d come for Brooklyn Liberation for Black Trans Lives. We were asked to wear white. I blended in easily with the human snow of the crowd, wrapped all around the museum. Coming up Washington Avenue, so many white-clad bodies streaming, milling, chatting, buying ice cream from the truck, clapping and cheering ...

Activism

Social Justice Is More Important Than Social Distance

Why a researcher who understands the health consequences of mass gatherings is in the streets fighting racism

June 19, 2020 • by Miranda Yaver

My first political memory was watching officers of the Los Angeles Police Department beating Rodney King on television. I did not fully comprehend what I was watching at 5 years old, though I sensed that it was unjust. Nearly three decades later, braving coronavirus and angry about police brutality against people ...

Social Justice Is More Important Than Social Distance

From the Editors

What Is John Roberts Up To?

Voting with liberals in two important civil rights cases, the Chief Justice seems to be invoking a version of the Garland rule: award no policy victories in the last year of a presidential term

June 19, 2020 • by Claire Potter

Three days ago, the first pre-election blow to Trumpism arrived. In a 6-3 decision, with Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch (a Donald Trump appointee) voting with the majority, the Court ruled that Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights act does make discrimination in the employment ...

Theory & Practice

Field Notes on “Sentencing the Present”

Diagnosing what is false without ceding what is beautiful

June 18, 2020 • by Jonathon Catlin and Benjamin P. Davis

This is a final reflection by the curators of the seminar series “Sentencing the Present,” which was republished in full last week as “An Archive of a Crisis.” Because readers have asked us about the process and production of “Sentencing the Present,” when Public Seminar asked us to write a “post-mortem” ...

Prisons and Police

Behind Bars in the Age of Coronavirus

A letter from prison

June 18, 2020 • by Phyllis Dietrichson

Is it wise or exploitative? My “soap shop” job is part of a difficult matrix of concepts. On the one hand, I am grateful to have the opportunity to work and contribute to the cause. On the other, I feel expendable and like a slave. But then again, I once ...

Activism

Why “Abolition of the Police” Is a Bad Idea

We need the police to enforce equal justice and protect ordinary citizens, not to go away

June 18, 2020 • by Jeffrey C. Isaac

Note: The author would like to thank Jim Miller for his editing, and Adam Kent-Isaac, Lisi Kent-Isaac, Debra Kent, Bob Orsi, Mala Htun, and Jeffrey Tulis for their comments. A much longer version of this piece can be read at the author’s blog. On June 15, 2020, citizens demonstrating against racism ...

Why “Abolition of the Police” Is a Bad Idea

Activism

When the Trump Circus Came to Town

The fallout from a 2019 visit to Greenville, North Carolina

June 18, 2020 • by Amanda Klein

Trump’s propaganda machine was running full tilt in the summer of 2019, in the weeks leading up to a rally Trump would hold in Greenville, North Carolina, the town where I live and work (teaching at Eastern Carolina University). The year before, the administration had abruptly implemented a brutal policy ...

Essays

In Search of Lost Time—And Misplaced Memories

Bernie’s Brooklyn

How growing up in a New Deal city shaped Bernie Sanders’s vision for America

Is Social Democracy Viable?

If it is, it will need better arguments, organization, and leadership, according to a U.K. Labour Party post-mortem

Why Don’t We Call It Treason?

John Bolton confirms what Senate Republicans already knew

Bernie Sanders’s Socialism Is New York Born and Bred

The Pride Wore White

Black trans women step out of the queer chorus

Social Justice Is More Important Than Social Distance

Why a researcher who understands the health consequences of mass gatherings is in the streets fighting racism

What Is John Roberts Up To?

Voting with liberals in two important civil rights cases, the Chief Justice seems to be invoking a version of the Garland rule: award no policy victories in the last year of a presidential term

Field Notes on “Sentencing the Present”

Diagnosing what is false without ceding what is beautiful

Behind Bars in the Age of Coronavirus

A letter from prison

Why “Abolition of the Police” Is a Bad Idea

We need the police to enforce equal justice and protect ordinary citizens, not to go away

When the Trump Circus Came to Town

The fallout from a 2019 visit to Greenville, North Carolina

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