Category / 2017 / Food / International / Social Justice
Articles from December 2017’s theme, “Food.”
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The Cuban Regime’s Historical Fear of Literary Dissent
“Within the revolution, everything; outside of it, nothing.” With these words pronounced in June of 1961, Fidel Castro dictated a course for Cuba’s intellectuals that would prove all too literal in the years to come. Writers who became disillusioned with the revolution and fell out of favor with the socialist regime, such as Heberto Padilla…
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Should the U.S. Balance Saudi Arabia Against Iran?
A humanitarian disaster in Yemen. Sanctions against Qatar. Consolidation of power in Riyadh. And yet another possible proxy conflict in Lebanon between Saudi Arabia and Iran. This is what you get when states—Saudi Arabia in particular—get blank checks from the United States of America. This is why the world’s last absolutist monarchy must be brought…
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The Fault In Our Cars
It won’t be long—a few years, maybe ten— before the algorithm begins killing us. As self-driving cars emerge on the market, eventually overtaking human-operated ones, there will inevitably be fatal car accidents in which computer code is responsible. Self-driving cars rely on deep neural networks to operate. This means that humans haven’t encoded every plausible…
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The Wrong Idea
This past September, when Betsy DeVos reversed Obama-era policy on campus sexual assault investigations, students took to the streets to protest. When DeVos rolled back protections for transgender students, the media covered the story until nothing was left unsaid. Last month, DeVos rescinded over seventy guidance documents protecting the rights of students with disabilities. Among…
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Why Trump Can Never be an Autocrat
On October 30, 2017, conservative writer and intellectual Norman Ornstein spoke at Washington University in St. Louis to promote a book he co-wrote, One Nation After Trump. He argued that the Trump presidency is leading the way toward autocracy (government by one person), kleptocracy (government by thieves), and kakistocracy (government by the worst). In fact,…
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South Korea’s Got Beef With America
It’s summer 2008. Tens of thousands of South Korean citizens pour into the streets of Seoul, holding demonstrations and organizing marches day and night. An overtaxed Seoul police force uses water cannons in sporadic clashes with protesters. President Lee Myungbak sees his approval ratings plummet to below 20% as his cabinet begins to tender resignation…
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Consuming a Balanced Plate of Information
Doctors, parents, and many others tell us from an early age to eat a balanced diet because our bodies need many different nutrients to function. Similarly, we need a balanced diet of information if we want to engage in healthy and informed discourse. This isn’t another article about the dangers of alternative facts; it’s about…
