Covid-19
Top coronavirus reporter Ed Yong is back with a gut-punch of a read: How the pandemic defeated America. (The Atlantic, ~36 min.)
Should you buy a face shield? (Slate, ~5 min.)
The mindfulness app Headspace has never been more popular. But does it have us all fooled? (STAT, ~8 min.)
An American surrogate had his baby. Then coronavirus hit. (Daily Beast, ~11 min.)
(Stephanie Gonot, New York Times)
The pandemic story that was only a matter of time is totally absorbing: How the fashion industry collapsed. (New York Times Magazine, ~34 min.)
In the age of coronavirus, those who CAN, teach. Take a tour of the new hustle economy. (OneZero, ~12 min.)
How to move your elephant during a pandemic. (New York Times, ~8 min.)
Race, policing & Black Lives Matter protests
Ibram X. Kendi, author of How to Be an Antiracist, asks the big question: Is this the beginning of the end of American racism? (The Atlantic, ~20 min.)
Student-athletes around the Pac-12 have teamed up to demand major economic, safety, and racial justice reforms from their respective schools. Some of them have everything to lose by speaking up. (The Undefeated, ~9 min.)
Meet Levar Stoney, the Black, millennial mayor who tore down white monuments in Richmond, Va., the former capital of the Confederacy. (Politico Magazine, ~18 min.)
(Hulu via Vulture)
A deep dive into the black people who appear on Seinfeld is the cultural commentary I didn’t know I needed this week. (Vulture, ~8 min.)
What drove two accomplished lawyers of color to light a police car on fire at a protest in the wake of George Floyd’s murder? (New York Magazine, ~23 min.)
Just when we thought Florida couldn’t be a hotter mess, Republican state legislators gutted the biggest voting rights victory in recent history. This is how they did it. (The Guardian, ~10 min.)
The legacy of Strange Fruit, one of America’s most powerful protest songs. (Rolling Stone, ~11 min.)
The best of the rest
The explosions in Beirut were devastating and traumatizing. But they were no accident. (New York Times Opinion, ~5 min.)
In 1984, Patty Prewitt’s husband was murdered. Then Patty was slut-shamed by prosecutors for cheating on him several years before he died; convicted of his murder on that “evidence” alone; and sentenced to life in prison. She’s still there. (Guernica Magazine, ~56 min.)
Bill McKibben, our smartest voice on the climate crisis, makes an important comparison: “The pandemic provides some useful sense of scale — some sense of how much we’re going to have to change to meet the climate challenge.” (New York Review of Books, ~14 min.)
(Bitter Southerner)
Beneath the popular folk song Swannanoa Tunnel lies a shocking cover-up of racism, violence, and greed. What a story. (Bitter Southerner, ~32 min.)
How California grandfather Jose Martinez got away with murder for more than 30 years: “If I didn’t do the job, somebody was going to do it.” (BuzzFeed News, ~21 min.)
With most other sports on pause the past few months, ESPN leaned hard into cornhole. Ace analyst Trey Ryder was ready for the spotlight. (The Ringer, ~8 min.)
Actress/producer/director Kerry Washington talks with five ACLU lawyers who are leading the biggest civil rights battles of our time. (Town & Country, ~14 min.)
In Hong Kong, a young activist named Grace won’t give up protesting, despite the increasingly violent government crackdowns over the past year: “Hong Kong is my home. I will fight until it dies.” (The Atavist, ~38 min.)
Actor James Cromwell reflects on Babe, 25 years after the unlikely hit movie enchanted us all. (Hollywood Reporter, ~13 min.)
If you read one thing this week
(Philip Cheung, The Washington Post)
On the 75th anniversary of Hiroshima, the incredible life story of Howard Kakita, an American who survived the bomb as a 7-year-old. (Washington Post, ~9 min.)
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Thanks for reading.
Kirsten