The free speech dilemma

Speech is a hot-button issue these days, with inflammatory rhetoric being spouted everywhere and those who are called out on it claiming to be victims of censorship and ‘cancel culture’. The radio program On The Media had a very thoughtful discussion on the controversial issue of free speech. Host Brooke Gladstone spoke with Andrew Marantz about the heated response he got to a 2019 New York Times op-ed Free Speech is Killing Us that he had written that had argued against free speech absolutism, saying that noxious speech can metastasize into physical violence. He cited many instances where hate speech had resulted in deaths.

Having spent the past few years embedding as a reporter with the trolls and bigots and propagandists who are experts at converting fanatical memes into national policy, I no longer have any doubt that the brutality that germinates on the internet can leap into the world of flesh and blood.

The question is where this leaves us. Noxious speech is causing tangible harm. Yet this fact implies a question so uncomfortable that many of us go to great lengths to avoid asking it. Namely, what should we — the government, private companies or individual citizens — be doing about it?

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What makes people explode with rage over trivialities?

I have written before about the increasing number of incidents on planes where passengers have become unruly and even attacked flight attendants, who have now started taking self–defense classes. About 4,000 people have been banned from flying just within the past year because of their bad behavior, sometimes mask-related.

But I was surprised at the level of aggression shown by one woman who had unbuckled her seat belt and let down her tray while the plane was still taxiing to the gate, and was so infuriated by being told to rectify those measures that she jumped up and punched the flight attendant, so hard that she knocked out two teeth and bloodied her face so that it later required four stitches. Why would you get so angry over such a trivial matter?
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My Scientific American article on Kelvin and Darwin

In lieu of a post, I will refer you to an article of mine that was just published in Scientific American magazine titled When Lord Kelvin Nearly Killed Darwin’s Theory. It deals with an an interesting historical period in the second half of the 19th century that pitted two scientific giants against each other in which the age of the Earth was the key factor in determining the final outcome.

Enjoy! And let me know in the comments what you think.

Showdown at the Tenacious Unicorn Ranch

In an effort to get away from the trans haters and their constant persecution, a group of trans people went out to a remote part of Colorado to start the Tenacious Unicorn Ranch, to grow alpacas and other animals and to provide a safe haven for other trans and non-binary folk. They hope that theirs will be the first of many across the country. But when word got out to the local townspeople about who had moved there, some of them tried to force them away.

Samantha Bee’s show had a report on what went down.

To my mind, alpacas look like a creation of the Star Wars special effects team.

Portrait of a careerist

Samantha Power, who was the US ambassador to the United Nations during the Obama administrations and is currently the head of the Agency for International Development, is a good example of how someone starts out wanting to do good and then ambition takes over and corrupts all the ideals, leaving a residue of cynicism and hypocrisy, something that happened to Macbeth as well. (Incidentally the Agency for International Development has been accused of often acting as a front for the CIA.)

Jon Schwarz writes that her recent statement about Sudan joining the International Criminal Court demonstrates her cynicism.


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Sliced bread was not that great for three months

Slicing bread yourself is not only tedious, it also results in uneven slices. The bread slicing machine, first marketed in 1928, was an incredibly useful invention and took the country by storm so that in just five years, about 80% of bread was sold pre-sliced. The phrase “the greatest thing since sliced bread” has become a cliche, so much so that one wonders whether a similar saying existed before it and, if so, what the equivalent product of comparison was.

But during World War II, the overzealous person in charge of war time food supplies actually banned sliced bread for reasons that had dubious merit.

In 1943, Claude R. Wickard, the head of the War Foods Administration as well as the Secretary of Agriculture, got the bright idea to ban pre-sliced bread in America, which he did on January 18, 1943.  The specific reasons behind this aren’t entirely clear, though it was about conservation of resources, particularly generally thought to have been about conserving wax paper, wheat, and steel.

None of these reasons held up. The US had a two-year stockpile of wheat, there was no shortage of wax paper, and it was not clear that much steel would be saved. The outcry against the ban was so great that he reversed his policy after just three months.

How could big investors have been this gullible?

I have been fascinated by the case of the company Theranos, whose founder Elizabeth Homes is going on trial for fraud.

The trial, delayed earlier this year by Holmes’s pregnancy, is scheduled to begin on Tuesday and last several months.

Jurors will hear allegations that Holmes raised more than $700m from investors on claims Theranos invented a revolutionary machine that could conduct hundreds of laboratory tests from a single finger-prick of blood, but was actually using other companies’ technology for the tests. The company folded in 2018.
…

Holmes dropped out of Stanford University at 19 and became a star in a startup space dominated by men. She founded Theranos in 2003, with the goal of revolutionizing blood testing. The company’s rise and fall became a cautionary tale about the Silicon Valley hype machine.

Theranos received glowing media coverage and raised more than $700m from investors on
claims it had invented a machine that could conduct hundreds of laboratory tests from a single prick.

The tests were rolled out in Walgreens stores and Theranos reached a $9bn valuation before it became clear that many of the claims about the supposedly revolutionary blood test were bogus.

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Mikis Theodorakis (1925-2021)

The Greek composer and left wing political activist who fought against his country’s military dictatorship has died at the age of 96.

The renowned Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis, who scored the 1964 classic film Zorba the Greek and was an icon of resistance to the former military junta, has died in Athens, aged 96.

A prolific talent and political maverick, Theodorakis was revered in his home country for his inspirational music and defiance during the junta that ruled from 1967 to 1974.

After the news of his death on Thursday, the Greek flag was flown at half mast at the Acropolis while parliament observed a minute’s silence.

But Theodorakis was perhaps best-known around the world for his film title scores, which also included Z in 1969 and Serpico in 1973. His work ranged from operas to choral music and popular songs, providing a soundtrack to the life of his country.

This is the memorable ending from the film Zorba the Greek where an uptight Englishman played by Alan Bates asks freewheeling Zorba, played by Anthony Quinn, to teach him the traditional sirtaki dance. (Quinn was actually a Mexican-American, one of the earliest Latinos to gain prominence in American films, and was active in civil rights and social movements.)

When allusions fail

I recently posted about how cartoons depend so much on shared knowledge for their humor. But the increasingly fragmented nature of our information sources means that we can no longer take anything for granted. I recall a colleague of mine who had been teaching English for a long time saying that he could no longer depend upon his students having a shared background anymore that he could build upon. One positive reason for this lack of commonality is that the student bodies are now more diverse and the different backgrounds can add richness to the classroom experience.
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