Subscriber Writing, April 2024

Well I once again made a hash of things! I swear to you I attempted to copy and paste a formatted entry into the Google Form I sent out and it appeared to work. But apparently I was mistaken, as many of you let me know that you couldn’t do that. I’m thankful to you all for adapting on the fly and just getting the information to me. I will have to figure out how to get formatting working, or automatic outputs from different fields into a set format, before next time. (I’ll probably pay some college kid or something.) Surprisingly, even though I had to do the formatting by hand, this was still faster than clicking through a hundred emails, with less chance of missing someone, so I know I’m on the right track. In any event, here are this month’s entries! Please click around and see what you like; people work hard on this stuff and there’s always gems in here. In the likely event that I missed an entry or two, email and let me know next time the call goes out (June 12th) and I’ll move your entry to the front. If you’re not a subscriber and would like to be included next time, hit this button:

Congrats to Erica Etelson on her Nation column!

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Benjamin J. Smith, Terlingua Ghost Town: Poems

Love, horror, and Leonard Cohen in South Texas

Jayne Swift, Queers, Our Fight is Against Anti-Sex Work Laws pt.II

The second part of (what will be) a three-part essay examining how anti-drag bans are based on anti-sex work laws and why queers should care about anti-sex work policies.

T.J. ELLIOTT, 13 Ways Of Looking At Self Producing

A series on how to self-produce theater aimed at artists of all persuasions

Liam Smith, Book Review: The Two-Parent Privilege.

An economist looks at the surge of single parent families.

Erica Etelson, The Only Thing Worse Than Taking Rural Voters for Granted

In our debut “Rethinking Rural” column for The Nation, we implore Democrats to pay attention to rural voters. Contrary to myth, they're not all MAGA diehards.

Meghan Bell, Bad Journalism: The Problems with Abigail Shrier's Bad Therapy

Critical review of "Bad Therapy" looking at problems with citations and poor science, taking issue with the premise that the current youth mental health crisis is mostly iatrogenic (i.e. caused by therapists and therapy culture). Sorry if I did the form wrong I wasn't sure how to bold or link, this is my first time submitting, thank you for reading.

Triangulation, Artistic Authenticity in the Age of Artificial Intelligence

Where does the intuition that AI-generated art lacks authenticity come from?

T Scott, Gutenberg in the Whirlwind

In which I attempt to explain why I’m not too worried about my granddaughter’s use of her phone, while pushing back a bit (gently, I hope) against Freddie’s argument that we’re in a period of technological stagnation.

David Azrael, Things I Like And Don't Like

I write a daily blog about whatever is on my mind. "Likes" have included: people robbing banks, hanging out and doing nothing, adding maple syrup to coffee; while "Don't Likes" have included: People who immediately get up when the plane lands, calcified auteurism, and holding hands.

Gabriel Kahane, Soul of the Machine

An appraisal of Suno, the “ChatGPT for music.”

George Menz, Simple and Complex Misogyny

On men who hate women.

Nigel Bowen, Autism is So Hot Right Now

The author discusses the complexity of diagnosing and living with autism, emphasizing its impact on individuals and families while questioning the romanticization of the condition and the potential drawbacks of heightened awareness and accommodation

Hal Johnson, Weird Books

Brief profiles of five weird books you may want to read (if you like weird books).

David Roberts, A Much Needed Adjustment To My Factory Settings On Marriage And Children

Opening my mind to the idea that getting married and having children are not universal conditions precedent for a meaningful life

Amod Sandhya Lele, Stoicism for boys, mindfulness for girls?

Do Stoicism and mindfulness offer differently gendered versions of the same advice?

Peter James, Quitting Comedy - Relief Or Regret?

Why I quit pursuing a career in stand-up comedy after fifteen years, and how I feel about it today.

Paul Bali, bips & bobs

some kinda failed PUA journal by wayward monk

Joe Mayall, My Shirt Calls for Peace & Freedom in Palestine. So Why Are People Trying to Fight Me At the Gym?

A bizarre confrontation shows the delusions of Zionism.

Kody Cava, Yes, Language Is Important, But Changing Words Does Not Change Material Conditions

An examination of why nonprofit liberals love changing terminology and policing language, and what we can do to get back to a more sane conception of politics.

The Memory Hole, When You Live a Double Life

A senior official writes a memoir in 1971 just before his death that contains secrets that the government to this day is still trying to keep from the public. This is a partial account of what the memoir contains.

First Toil, then the Grave, The “radical fringe” which is neither

Ireland's most recent referendum failed to pass by a landslide. What does this mean for modern European political alignments?

Tony, The Martyrdom of St. Alison

A short story about a young boy who has visions and his delinquent older sister, as well as a meditation on coming of age, Catholicism, and Czech-American identity.

Thomas Reilly, The case against 'mental health'

Why we need to speak less about mental health and more about mental illness

Argo, The Layman's Guide to Electricity Part 2B

A short primer to the different kinds of energy we use to make electricity, and why we use each.

Jimmy Nicholls, Men are likelier to be killed. We don’t mind

Preventing women and girls being killed is a worthy goal. But it’s not as worthy as preventing men and boys being killed.

Stuart Buck, Hot Dogs, Cancer Cells, Replication, and AI

This article points to how difficult it is to replicate everything from a cancer biology experiment to even just making a hot dog, and offers suggestions for how we should think about scientific replication and the usefulness of AI in science.

The Expiration Date, Self-Immolation

On Aaron Bushnell and others who light themselves on fire

R.B. Griggs, The Case for (Im)material Progress

A time-traveling thought experiment

Joseph Burgo, Ph.D. Living in an 'As If' World

Gender ideologues pretend to care about the truth, but their position boils down to 'because we say so.'

Thaddeus Haas, This Won't Be Fun for Anybody...

What's a boy to do when he's asked to stand for a Land Acknowledgement statement, but he knows they aren't worth the paper they're printed on? The answer: assume he's the problem and keep his mouth shut...of course not.

Luke T. Harrington, Every book I read in 2023, ranked (definitively)

I wrote a three-sentence review of every book I read last year, in case anyone is looking for a new book to read (or avoid)

Kiran Prasad, Devin: The First AI Software Engineer

Given recent developments in AI, what does the future hold for software engineers? Find out :)

Christopher J Feola, Books and movies suck, so why not TikTok?

Science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon’s Law is 90 percent of everything is crap. But I'm putting the Game of Thrones debacle and insanely long unedited novels down to Feola’s Law: All trends are flogged into the ground until they provoke a backlash.

Praj Kulkarni, We Need Less Education

My self-published book explains why college classes are often overly abstract, why so many people never use the knowledge they learned in college, and why both workers and employers continue to rely on higher education credentials despite their flaws.

Mari the Happy Wanderer, The Problem with Potlatch: I Propose a Pact

Some inspiration for spending less time toiling alone in the kitchen, and more time conversing together in the living room, plus a wonderful recipe for lemon tart.

Gamourtian, Before Thunder Leaves The Body

Three spells of the rhythm of fear, the declaration of three ignoble truths and their totality — how do you keep thunder inside the body?

Adam Whybray, Nazi Self-Perceived Victimhood in 'The Zone of Interest'

A short reflection having read Sam Kriss's remarkable 'Against the brave'

Graham Cunningham, Teach Your Children Well

How much has political correctness damaged parents' confidence in schools? And in the age of the internet, is compulsory classroom schooling still the only way?

Mike Andrews, The C Word

How language fails us when we talk about 'climate change'

Justin DaMetz, No Right to Forgive: Deconstruction, Protest Atheism, and the Crucified God

The first essay in a Holy Week series contemplating the reality of human suffering, and the often insufficient response of American Christianity

Luke Allen, Coastal Elites Agree! Rednecks are the Source of All of America's Problems

I got your "White Rural Rage" right here.

Costanza Polastri, “Trying is for the untalented” and other lies

A former “gifted kid” reflects on her self-sabotaging habits, her fear of failure and decoupling self-worth from the label of “smart”

Gregory Pettys, Hiraeth: Post Activism in the Anthropocene

A deep dive into parenting in uncertain times, cross cultural eco-village life, unschooling, grief and praise

Sarah, What’s On Your Mind, Sarah?

My Catholic upbringing and my phone addiction: Two beasts enter, neither will leave. An examination of conscience, an act of contrition, and a review of Patricia Lockwood’s No One Is Talking About This.

Adam Rosen, The Push to Get 'Ha Ha You're Old' Jokes Out of Birthday Cards

Feature on the movement to make birthday cards more age-affirming

Garrett Kamps, What's Wrong with Me

Lauren Oyler occasions a discussion of my mental/physical health

Iain Carlos, Chicago Archdiocese bungled child sexual abuse investigation, priest says

An investigative piece detailing how, during an Archdiocese investigation of child sexual abuse allegations leveled against Fr. Daniel McCarthy, the accused priest was never directly questioned about the specifics of the accusations leveled against him; furthermore, the Archdiocese knew about an abuse accusation against McCarthy for around a year before it removed him from from his parish or told the public.

April Streich, Drunk and Disorderly

A reunion story about two bitter exes who changed quite a bit in their years apart

Doctrix Periwinkle, Friends like these

Reflections on being friends with coworkers or robots

José Vieira, A Brief History of Every King of Portugal: The Second Dynasty (House of Avis)

A brief introduction to every king in Portugal's second dynasty

Jon Busch, Rumors of My Death

A short post-Easter reflection on Jesus Christ’s stubborn refusal to be buried 150+ years after Marx and Nietzsche

Anthony Flaccavento, Is it Culture or Economics? Why Rural Communities Have Moved to the Right

Explores the everyday connections between work and culture to help explain the rural-urban divide

Nicky Shapiro, Facing the Master

Gabriel García Márquez and the Moon

Chris Jesu Lee, Phone-Based Childulthood

Online culture creates middle-aged youths and childish geezers

A.J. Fezza, Italian Kitsch

An examination of Italian-themed kitsch and its use in The Sopranos, McMansions, and the Olive Garden

Eva Sylwester, Forever's Gonna Start Tonight: Coming Down From the Total Solar Eclipse

An astrological look at “Total Eclipse of the Heart” by Bonnie Tyler — and the mass hysteria surrounding the April 8 Solar Eclipse

William Rickards, LinkedIn to Hypernormalisation

Job search hell, LinkedIn vanity, and lazy girl jobs

Devanshu Singh and Daniel Deudney, Bounding Power: The ASI Control Problem, Republican Constitutionalism, and Public Safety

This essay is responding to all of the existential and utopian philosophies of AI that are taking over Silicon Valley and directing billions of dollars towards lobbying, nonprofits, and regulatory activity. These debates are really perspectives on whether or not centralized power is morally good for people and how it should be restrained. It makes this case through a philosophical case study of an artificial superintelligence.

Mark Newheiser, Love Letter Strategy: An analysis of the card game

A strategic analysis of the popular card game Love Letter, based on testing different AI strategies.

Sam Kahn, What Was A Millennial?

Cultural essay on a confused generation

Mazin Saleem, The Evil Dream

Ursula Le Guin's nightmares, James Cameron's debt, and how decolonising is always self-flagellation too

Quinn Davis, Engram

A short story on bandwidth.

Socratic Psychiatrist, Letter to a Medical Student

On Choosing to Become a Psychiatrist — To A Subscriber

*Mr. Present Punk*, Life as a Surplus Elite in the 2020s

An assessment of where elite overproduction stands in the 2020s, and what it means for political instability in the United States

Katie Duane, Equations for a Falling Body

This is an essay that narrates a day spent skydiving alongside questions about fear, loss, and how to create a life with meaning

Benji Mahaffey, Love Thy Neighbor

Difficult encounters with neighbors lead the author to reconsider the moral teachings of his childhood and confront the taboos that drive destructive conflict

Burke Bindbeutel, Zoraya ter Beek’s last cup of coffee

A discussion of legal euthanasia in the Netherlands

Tapirclip, WhytManga's art scorched my retinas harder than the eclipse

Analyzing the compositional shortcomings of WhytManga/Odunze Oguguo's “Apple Black” comic illustrations. But eventually I admit that I don’t like his art because I’m jealous of his success.

Brian Howard, The Miracle of the Universe

If something can be fully explained by reference to the natural world, can it still be considered miraculous? Reflections on the eclipse.