Men’s studies actually exists, but not for the reason you think. I was confused at first when I saw that a college actually had a men’s studies department. The idea of “men’s studies” is usually a trope used to bash the existence of “women’s studies” and is (usually) not a serious proposal. Yet, such a department exists at Stony Brook University, and has for a few years. Except (surprise!), it’s actually feminists studying men. Here’s Bruce Bawer, a Stony Brook alumni, checking in at his old school: “The Men’s Center, in short, is not about understanding men’s psychological and emotional development and their personal and professional lives; it is about encouraging young men to feel guilty about being born male, to check their own natural male impulses and interests, to emulate (as best they can) the manners and mores of women, and to subordinate themselves, in all ways and all circumstances, to their female friends, relatives, and colleagues.” I feel guilty already!
Digital armchair warriors. At Vice, there’s an interesting item about the alt-right and antifa waging digital war against each other. While racists and communists might be battling in the streets, there’s a lot going on in the ones and zeros, Jacob Siegel writes: “We seem to be entering a new phase of bottom-up cyberwar. [Military theorist John] Robb originally described open-source insurgency as “a large collection of small… superempowered groups [working] together to take on much larger foes (usually hierarchies).” What’s going on these days looks even messier than that. Instead of smaller sub-state groups forming strategic alliances to fight the government or private power brokers, affinity groups organized around ideology and ethnic identity are battling one another.” It’s not just memes anymore. It’s actually quite scary how people are rallying large internet mobs in an attempt to identify people in photos, often misidentifying them and causing harm to innocents. Perhaps, sadly, this is the new normal.
Get to ze choppa! Matt Fuller of the Huffington Post has a neat video of a helicopter doing a late night landing at the U.S. Capitol. It was a training exercise, police informed Fuller. Most likely, it was a continuity-in-government exercise, as members of congressional leadership get whisked away to a secret bunker in times of an attack or disaster. If, like me, you are into this sort of thing, then you must read Garrett Graff’s fantastic book: Raven Rock: The Story of the U.S. Government’s Secret Plan to Save Itself—While the Rest of us Die. And, you should definitely listen to this episode of Eric Felten’s Confab podcast where Graff joins as a guest.
You ever see a helicopter land at the Capitol?
Police tell me they're doing training exercises. pic.twitter.com/AfrHSFeJ5f— Matt Fuller (@MEPFuller) August 31, 2017
You can’t spell important without import! At the AEI blog, econ wonk Mark Perry shares a wonderful anecdote about the importance of free trade. A German grocer removed all of its imported products in a PR stunt. The result? Pretty empty shelves.
Just the context. Complex context. Over at the Washington Post, their fact-checking department examined a quote from President Trump during his speech on tax reform. “In 1935, the basic 1040 form that most people file had two simple pages of instruction. Today, that basic form has 100 pages of instructions, and it’s pretty complex stuff.” WaPo‘s fact checkers say that while Trump is correct, that “this claim needs historical context.” Funny, then, that the Post’s fact checkers need to explain the context of a simple claim that things are more complex than they used to be. Complex context.
What it’s like as an ice cream man. Recently, while tailgating outside of a soccer game I purchased a pre-made snow cone from an ice cream truck driver slowly snaking his way through the lot of D.C. United fans. (Spoiler: They removed the gum ball that used to be at the bottom.) Later that night, I read in a recent issue of the Washington Post Sunday Magazine a feature on Washington’s ice cream men. Most hail from West Africa, and the profit margins in this not-very-competitive-market are really quite low. The drivers are often robbed, given that it’s a cash-only business. One was even shot! Going independent is a costly enterprise, as with high rents in Washington, not everyone can afford to keep a truck’s freezers running 24/7. And the regional supplier? He’s cornered the market with “the Fort Knox of refrigerators: a 35-foot-tall ice cream freezer that covers as much area as two basketball courts and is constantly kept at minus-20 degrees.” Not at lot of people are willing to build a giant freezer for such a low-margin business, it seems.
Not only is the supply market messed up, the demand market is, too. Kids these days and their computers and video games means they don’t spend much time outside. And in D.C., who can blame their parents? In Maryland, you’re liable to be arrested if you dare let your children walk alone.
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