A kind reader sent me information on a revealing psychological study at Emory University reported in the 22 June 2005 issue of the professional journal Biological Psychiatry. Subjects were asked to make simple determinations (e.g., which line is longer, which shape is the same?). Without social pressure, the answers would have been obvious. But the …
One unintended side-benefit of the recent orgy of censorship by the Federal Communications Commission has been the giggle of hearing all-grown-up journalists and lawyers pontificating on the news about “the S-word” and “the F-word.” When a coward like myself has to cover her eyes often during prime time to avoid close-ups of gunshot wounds and …
Consider the tale of DP World, Dubai’s state-owned company trying to spend almost $7 billion to buy a company that operates port terminals around the world, a few of which are in the U.S.A. This morning’s New York Times tells us that President Bush was shocked—I say, shocked— at the breadth and intensity of objections …
Our text for today is the parable of the parboiled frog. You know it: when a frog is dropped into boiling water, it immediately saves itself by jumping out. But when a frog is dropped into a lukewarm bath and the bath is gradually heated to boiling, the poor thing is lulled to death. Is …
Two of my readers have given me a lot to think about. They wrote comments on my February 12th blog, “The Fashion in Outrage,” about controversies over art. It contrasted Americans’ huge response to recent domestic literary scandals with our inertia with respect to political ones. From Israel: The fact that “tout le monde” is …
My friend was fulminating about the Bushies: “So their lies are piling up, a huge pile of deceit, and what can we do about it? We just have to sit it out till the next election? Why aren’t people up in arms?” (Maureen Dowd’s Saturday Times column has a good compilation of recent lies, if …
It’s funny how certain things stick in your mind. Before Powerpuff Girls stickers, bath mats, T-shirts, wristwatches, PJs, Gameboys, backpacks, books…—before the vast economic potential of product tie-ins were more than a gleam in Hollywood’s eye—Saturday morning kids’ TV was an unvarying stream of cartoon shorts first shown in the interstices of the Saturday matinee …
Yesterday’s New York Times carried an interesting column about citizenship tests. The most anxious nations—Britain, Germany, Canada and of course, the USA—have been revising their tests to raise the threshold for citizenship, making sure that prospective citizens get with the program before they are admitted to the club. The new tests are a fascinating Rorschach …
In my last essay, I quoted a line of Paul Goodman’s from forty years ago: “So we drift into fascism. But people do not recognize it as such, because it is the fascism of the majority.” I have been thinking about it ever since, with growing alarm. In one way, it seems insane to call …
Monday is my birthday. (And I’m honored to share it this year with Dr. Martin Luther King, may he rest in peace and may we live to see his dreams come true.) For me, a birthday is an occasion for relentless self-examination, which is how I seem to mark all milestones. I must be making …