The Weird Times
Inner Monologues and Desultory Reporting from Outer Spaces: Issue 212, June 3, 2024 (V5 #4)
but you could look all day &
not find a weasel in the desert—Maureen Owen
All water has a perfect memory, and is forever trying to get back to where it was.—Toni Morrison
All disease begins in the gut.–Hippocrates
Books, Music, Art, Culture
The elite ancient Greek fighting force made up entirely of gay couples: As Pride Month kicks off, the story of how the Sacred Band of Thebes defeated Sparta and changed history, Ainsley Hawthorn, Washington Post, 6/1/24: “The most fearsome military force of its day had been defeated by the Sacred Band of Thebes, a shock troop of 150 gay couples.”
Introducing the ‘Banned Book of the Week,’ Micah May, Digital Public Library of America, 5/28/24: “Banning books is a threat, not only to our collective knowledge, curiosity and intellectual growth as a society, but to the very concepts of free speech and democracy.”
Deep Reading Will Save Your Soul: Real learning has become impossible in universities. DIY programs offer a better way, William Deresiewicz, Persuasion, 5/29/24: “For life’s significant questions, like how one might choose to live, answers are to be found by moving along the gradient, not by ambling around the periphery.”
Coming of Age in the 21st Century: A Rite of Passage We Need, Tomas Pueyo, Uncharted Territories, 5/29/24: “If we want to bring back rites of passage, we need to start from 1st principles to understand our psychological needs and craft experiences that give them the importance they deserve.”
‘I’m bringing his music back to life’: the singer whose grandfather was silenced by the Holocaust: Roxanne de Bastion is honouring the memory of her brilliant Hungarian ancestor to keep his legacy alive, Roxanne de Bastion, The Guardian, 6/2/24: “I wanted to know more about the stories our piano had to tell. The opportunity presented itself to write a book about my grandfather and his instrument. It felt, as my ancestors would have called it, beshert (inevitable).” Book: The Piano Player of Budapest
Girls Will Be Girls: A Reading List on Consumerism in the Internet Age: Are the scores of girl personas on TikTok just a marketing campaign? Let’s do the (girl) math, Zoe Yu, Longreads, 5/28/24: “What is it about a girl online that invites Amazon storefronts, product placements, aspirational wish lists, and slang like “girl math” to make consumerism a frilly joke? Is retail therapy a distraction from something bigger?”
‘It’s a hallucinatory experience!’: musicians on the awesome creative power of motherhood: Much has been made of the struggles musicians face when they become mothers – but what about the inspiration? Bat for Lashes, Logic1000 and others discuss the radical energy unleashed by the ultimate collaboration, Nell Frizzell, The Guardian, 5/29/24: “If you can be brave enough to surrender entirely to the process, then it can flow.”
How Willa Cather Chronicled the Development of American Theater: on the Social and Cultural Impact of Film’s Triumph Over the Stage, James Shapiro, LitHub, 5/28/24: “Having witnessed these changes, and having been so marked by theater herself, she was sensitive to the cost of Hollywood’s triumph.”
“In the Middle of Fighting for Freedom We Found Ourselves Free,” June Jordan’s 1993 tribute to Audre Lorde, her sister-in-arms from the ’60s student protests and beyond, Introduced by Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Jewish Currents, 5/29/24: “…we knew the precious, unimaginably deep music and the precious unimaginably complicated mathematics that our forbidden Black bodies enveloped.”
‘I Still Would Have Had That Abortion:’ Well-meaning supporters of abortion tend to tell stories that focus on decisions rather than experiences. This is the rhetorical legacy of a reproductive rights movement that has for too long focused on “choice” rather than “rights,” Christine Henneberg, NY Review of Books, 6/20/24 issue
What QAnon supporters, butthole sunners and New Age spiritualists have in common, Christopher T. Conner, The Conversation, 5/28/24: “They long for alternative belief systems that confirm their existing beliefs and ignore contradicting evidence.”
How Writers Survived Fascism: The last years of the Weimar Republic are often thought to have witnessed an outpouring of politically engaged literature. But the history is more complicated. Writers more often avoided antagonizing a resurgent right to protect their lives and careers, Gustav Jonsson, Jacobin, 5/29/24
Basketball Hall of Famer Bill Walton dies at 71 after cancer battle: After winning championships at UCLA and in the NBA, Walton went on to become a memorable color commentator for NCAA and NBA games, Ben Golliver, Washington Post, 5/27/24
Eating Rocks: If the grid goes down, how am I supposed to know how many pebbles to eat? Sarah Kendzior, Newsletter, 5/29/24: “It is a grim place, the grid. Sometimes I feel like something beyond us knows this and throws cosmic miracles our way to keep us going. A ring of fire in a midday night; northern lights in southern Missouri. Or the raw miracle of crystals unearthed, shimmering in the sun for the first time, because you cared enough to dig until they were free.”
Log Off: Why Posting And Politics (Almost) Never Mix: 'There are positive possibilities for what the internet can look like if we get over the myth of social media’s indispensability,’ Katherine Cross, Aftermath, 5/29/24: “The end of the world is just a hypothesis.”
Ani DiFranco: An Interview, Amy Hughes, Culture Sonar, 5/27/24: “I need to just keep telling myself all you can be is you. All you can do is follow your heart. The rest is a mistake. But still, I stay up all night, fretting, in that process.”
all the passing of time
and the mysteries that abound
elude and confound you
all the stories you’ll never know,
—from “Boots of a Soldier,” Ani DiFranco
Politics, Economics, Technology
Respect the Equipment, Timothy Snyder, Thinking About, 6/2/24: “There is a magic in voting that we can take for granted. In each and every election someone is going to lose, and that someone is not going to hold office. Losing without blaming means that the country goes on. Our government continues. And society does not tear itself apart…Some people never learned the lessons they should have learned in kindergarten. Yet there are more of us, I think, who heed the signs. You can ‘respect the equipment’ by using it the right way. And the rule "lose without blaming" does not mean "lose." You can win while respecting the rules. And sometimes you must.”
A Fateful Time in Our Nation's History: We can feel grateful for democracy and free and fair trials, while feeling sad that a convicted felon and adjudicated rapist is on the ballot for president, Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Lucid, 6/2/24: [on the importance of] “the courts, which in a democracy have the power to convict demagogues if they have committed crimes and thus to act indirectly as guardians of public safety and ethics and national security as well. That is why this trial is so important at this fateful moment in our nation’s history.”
One in 10 Republicans less likely to vote for Trump after guilty verdict, Reuters/Ipsos poll finds, Jason Lange, Reuters, 5/31/24 [and] “Among independent registered voters, 25% said Trump's conviction made them less likely to support him in November, compared to 18% who said they were more likely and 56% who said the conviction would have no impact on their decision.”
After the verdict: American money and Donald Trump, Adam Tooze, Chartbook, 5/31/24: “For many businesses it is hard to argue that a Republican administration, whether headed by a convicted felon or not, will be better for profits, at least in the short-run. And profits is what they are devoted to delivering.”
The media and sullen nonvoters should listen to Ken Burns: The historian knows something about civil war — and moral responsibility in politics, Jennifer Rubin, Washington Post, 5/28/24: “There’s only us. There is no them. Whenever someone suggests to you, whomever it may be in your life, that there is a them, run away.”
‘No way out without bloodshed’: the right believe the US is under threat and are mobilizing: In ‘mirror world’, Trump is martyr and Biden is autocrat, as calls for violence erupt on internet after ex-president’s conviction, Rachel Leingang, The Guardian, 6/2/24: “On the right, in the alternate reality created by and for Trump and his supporters, the convictions are a sign of both doom and dogma – evidence that a corrupt faction runs the Joe Biden government, but that it can be driven out by the Trump faithful like themselves.”
Learning To Live In a World Where Trump Is Winning: It defies all sense. That’s no reason to ignore it, Quico Toro, Persuasion, 5/28/24: “Trump’s appeal is ineffable. Common sense rebels against it. Seeking to understand it does violence to our sense of reality.”
The Press: What Has Happened to the Lifeblood of our Democracy? How did America reach this point where about half our country thinks up is down, black is white, and Republicans are best trusted with our money and national security? Thom Hartmann, Hartmann Report, 5/28/24
We are down to two branches of government, Lucian K. Truscott IV, Newsletter, 5/29/24: “The only power we’ve got left is our vote, and they’re working hard to dilute and in many cases negate that power as well. Today we must face the question of how long will it be until they achieve their real objective, the one-branch government of a dictatorship, and what will we do to stop them.”
Eating Elephants, Jess Piper, View from Rural Missouri, 6/1/24: “…do you know how we win back our democracy and our rights? By following their lead, starting in the reddest states, and ripping away power from the GOP state by state.”
Ted Kennedy Warned Us About Samuel Alito. He Was Ignored: The Supreme Court justice’s flag controversy should come as no surprise to anyone who paid attention to his nomination hearings in 2006, David Masciotra, New Republic, 5/28/24: “…as an appellate judge, Alito failed to recuse himself in two cases involving companies with which he had financial interest, even after he pledged to do so.”
Leonard Leo Built the Conservative Court. Now He’s Funneling Dark Money into Law Schools: The megadonor’s plan for a $25 million research center at Cornell fell apart. So he took his money to Texas A&M, Shawn Musgrave, The Intercept, 5/29/24
The Real ‘Deep State:’ Lobbying firms have disguised their influence so well that it’s often barely visible even to savvy Washington insiders, Franklin Foer, The Atlantic, 5/29/24: “As lobbying has matured, it has grown ever more adept at turning government into a profit center for its clients.” (Gift Article)
Florida educators trained to teach students Christian nationalism, Judd Legum, Popular Information, 5/28/24: “the aim of the presentation is ‘to solidify this ideology that equates being American to being Christian.’”
Will Mexico Decide the U.S. Election? Top officials from the two countries are wrangling over immigration policy. What they resolve will have huge implications on both sides of the border, Stephania Taladrid, New Yorker, 6/1/24: “More than thirty-seven million people of Mexican descent live in the United States.”
When Peace is the Enemy: Reflections on the multiple tragedies of the Israel-Hamas War and the suffering of Palestinian civilians, Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Lucid, 5/28/24: “Warmongers, terrorists, fundamentalists and autocrats are all dedicated to chaos, repression, and hatred: these overlapping categories of people cause and benefit from spirals of violence. Rather than coexistence and solidarity…they encourage lawlessness and vengefulness that prolong conflict.”
Israel, Palestine, and the Sub-Rational: A liberal solution is still a possibility, Michael G. Holzman, Persuasion, 5/31/24: “The greatest tragedy of this entire conflict is that everyone knows the only rational outcome: Two groups of people who deeply distrust each other will need to be neighbors.”
Lost in the Middle East: Caught in the eye of a perfect storm | Non-Fiction | Sour Soup, Etgar Keret, Alphabet Soup, 5/28/24: “Watch Netanyahu’s lips carefully. He says a lot of things, but he has one objective: to ensure his own freedom at any cost.”
Better jump down a manhole
Light yourself a candle
Don’t wear sandals
Try to avoid the scandals
Don’t wanna be a bum
You better chew gum
The pump don’t work
’Cause the vandals took the handles
—from “Subterranean Homesick Blues,” Bob Dylan
Science, Environment
Intensity: Right Now, Everything's Turned to 11, Bill McKibben, The Crucial Years, 6/1/24: “At the exact same moment—the same string of months—that the planet is beginning to unravel, human beings are finally accelerating the only real response we have: the rapid rollout of sun, wind, and batteries.”
A Corporate Poisoner Two-Steps Out Of Its Toxic Liability: A Koch-owned company is exploiting bankruptcy law to avoid responsibility for their asbestos assets and rewrite judicial precedent, Katya Schwenk, The Lever, 5/28/24: “In 2017, Georgia-Pacific invented the so-called Texas two-step, a legal scheme to skirt liability for consumer harms like widespread asbestos exposures or the opioid crisis.”
‘How did we miss this for so long?’: The link between extreme heat and preterm birth: Heat waves are making pregnancy more dangerous and exacerbating existing maternal health disparities, Virginia Gewin, Grist, 5/30/24
Vermont set to become first state in the nation to ‘make big oil pay:’ Gov. Phil Scott allowed S.259, the “Climate Superfund Act” to go into effect without his signature, along with S.213, the “Flood Safety Act,” Emma Cotton, VT Digger, 5/30/24: [the law] “requires the world’s biggest oil companies to pay for damages that their products have caused in the state by way of climate change.”
The future holds many, many more EV batteries. And therein lies a solution to grid storage: A new study suggests vehicle-to-grid technology and reused old EV batteries could meet all of the EU’s need for battery storage—and then some, Sarah DeWeerdt, Anthropocene, 5/28/24
‘Yes, Lego car!’: why small electric cars could be about to break the grip of SUVs, Jasper Jolly, The Guardian, 6/1/24: “Most of the cars we see on the road today are completely overengineered for their daily use case.”
Are your internet habits killing the planet? The internet is quickly becoming a major contributor to climate change. Here's how to understand the problem—and what can be done to fix it, Arielle Samuelson, Heated, 5/29/24: “Individual behavior changes alone won’t solve the problem of a high-polluting internet. Ultimately, what’s needed is systemic change from tech companies and fossil fuel companies—and that change must be demanded by individuals.”
The ugly truth behind ChatGPT: AI is guzzling resources at planet-eating rates: Big tech is playing its part in reaching net zero targets, but its vast new datacentres are run at huge cost to the environment, Mariana Mazzucato, The Guardian, 5/30/24
Avocados are a ‘green gold’ export for Mexico, but growing them is harming forests and waters, Viridiana Hernández Fernández, The Conversation, 5/29/24: “…importing avocados from different areas of Mexico and the world to reduce the Hass market share may be the most effective environmental protection strategy.”
Restaurants Create a Mound of Plastic Waste. Some Are Working to Fix That: A small but growing number of restaurants are moving away from single-use plastic take-out containers, which usually end up in the trash because they can’t be recycled, Meg Wilcox, Civil Eats, 5/28/24
No One Really Understands Clouds: They’re one of the greatest climate mysteries left, Zoë Schlanger, The Atlantic, 5/28/24: “Clouds envelop two-thirds of the Earth in their moist embrace, and in every moment help determine our collective physical reality. Surely the quest to understand them is among the most salient scientific endeavors of our time.”
A Black farmer in South Carolina cultivates culture, history — and rice: Rollen Chalmers has been integral to the region’s rice revival, and now chefs and home cooks are becoming loyal customers, Caroline Hatchett, Washington Post, 5/30/24: “More than a sower of seeds, Chalmers works as a fixer, research grower, hydrologist, woodsman, field and fence builder, and ancestral knowledge keeper.” (gift article)
Family farmers make climate-friendly vodka and whiskey: The Silver Tree Beer and Spirits has committed to growing grain sustainably — and the family has launched an initiative to get others in the industry to do the same, YCC Team, Yale Climate Connections, 5/30/24
You're always wishing and wanting for something
When you get what you want, you don't want what you get,
And though I sit upon your knee, you'll grow tired of me,
'cause after you get what you want,
You don't want what you wanted at all.
—from “After You Get What You Want,”Irving Berlin
Health, Wellness
A plastic recipe for societal suicide: We must determine which uses of plastic remain essential; eliminate those that aren’t; and design new materials to replace still essential plastics, Pete Myers, Environmental Health News, 5/29/24
Strengthening microplastic regulation to protect our kidneys: Tiny plastic particles can travel to our kidneys and instigate oxidative stress and inflammation, Rohan Arora, Environmental Health News, 5/30/24: “More and more research is coming out showing how tiny plastic particles that we inadvertently consume on a regular basis damage our kidneys.”
Girls’ periods are starting sooner, more irregular than past generations: Researchers said higher body weight and the effects of environmental chemicals likely play a role in the trends, which are more pronounced across ethnic and racial groups, Tara Parker-Pope, Washington Post, 5/29/24
What Illness Can—and Cannot—Tell Us About Ourselves: on Cancer, the Body and the Philosophy of Mortality, Graham Caveney, LitHub, 5/30/24: “I yearn for revelations, have to settle for shadows. They are never quite enough.”
Smart Bandages That Heal Wounds Faster and Talk to Your Doctor Are on the Way: Researchers are working on bandages that allow remote monitoring and deliver treatment with zaps of light or electricity, Elizabeth Cohen, Wall Street Journal, 5/31/24 (gift article)
The miracle is not that this
is a lover’s poem, but that I
am the one writing it.
—from “Animal, Look” by Cleo Qian
Birds
Beauty, death and drama: Live bird cams are nature’s soap opera: Bird cam fans tune in for a close-up look at the triumphs and traumas of avian lives, Andrea Sachs, Washington Post, 5/30/24: “This adds an extra dose of compelling nature.”
Seed-stashing chickadees overturn ideas about location memory: Certain neurons encode memories of events that occurred in specific physical locations known as place fields. Chickadees show patterns of neuronal activity that are specific to locations of hidden food but independent of place fields, Margaret M. Donahue, Laura Lee Colgin, Nature, 5/23/24
‘More profitable than farming’: how Ecuador’s birding boom is benefiting wildlife: With hundreds of highly prized species, bird tourism is thriving in the country – and farmers are increasingly turning their land into nature reserves, Stephen Moss, The Guardian, 6/1/24
You also remain. The unlost birds come back
To crown the trees and do not wonder
How each branch bursts into again, how free fall
Is ever the stars. Come home changed
Or be changed; every harvest will be
Weighed against the still-to-be-done.
—from “The Longer Prayer,” Sophie Cabot Black
Book News and Reviews
Mauna Kea: A Novel of Hawai'i, by Tom Peek, published by All Night Books, has won the Nautilus Award for Small Press Fiction!
These are crisis times, for sure. So much of what is happening is on a macro scale that none of us individually can change. But what we can do everyday matters and will continue to make a difference. We do have the power to make change, just as we have the power to transform experience into art, to make magic with our hearts and inner beings.
So I will repeat, as I do every week, my Weird Times mantra: wherever you are, whoever you are with, whatever you are doing — thanks for who you are and what you do. Please continue to keep in touch. We can get through this. Send messages and news. Hearing from you makes this all worthwhile.
Above all, stay well; share love; work for good. We need each other, now more than ever.
Love from here—David