Trump’s Inconvenient Racial Truth

“Regardless of how you feel about Trump, on this one thing he is right: The Democratic Party has taken black Americans for granted. “

Published: Nov 1, 2016
Length: 10 minutes (2,594 words)

Why Pop Culture Just Can’t Deal With Black Male Sexuality

Wesley Morris takes on American culture’s deep, all-abiding fear of the black penis and “America’s dubious assumptions about the sexual prowess of black men.”

Published: Oct 27, 2016
Length: 24 minutes (6,244 words)

Miri Regev’s Culture War

A profile of Miri Regev, Israel’s brash, right-leaning minister of culture and sports. Regev is on a mission to uproot the country’s left-leaning, mostly Ashkenazi culturati to make more room for artists who share her Mizrahi (middle eastern Jewish) roots.

Published: Oct 20, 2016
Length: 23 minutes (5,848 words)

The Wall Is a Fantasy

Separating fact from fiction in the plan to build an impenetrable barrier along the Mexican-American border.

Published: Oct 14, 2016
Length: 9 minutes (2,436 words)

The Professor Wore a Hijab in Solidarity — Then Lost Her Job

A graduate of evangelical Wheaton College herself, journalist Ruth Graham writes about the ousting of its first tenure-track black professor, Larycia Hawkins, after she wore a hijab during Advent in solidarity with Muslim students.

Published: Oct 13, 2016
Length: 25 minutes (6,256 words)

How U.S. Torture Left a Legacy of Damaged Minds

So much for assurances that harsh interrogation techniques used by the United States at Guantanamo Bay and in secret CIA prisons around the world wouldn’t cause lasting harm. New York Times reporters interviewed over 100 former detainees for this article on the never-ending psychological torment many of them live with years later.

Published: Oct 9, 2016
Length: 24 minutes (6,085 words)

Generation Adderall

Casey Schwartz spent years using Adderall, the stimulant and A.D.H.D. drug, to get through college, grad school, and the start of a career. Then she tried to stop.

Published: Oct 12, 2016
Length: 19 minutes (4,984 words)

Big Food Strikes Back

Michael Pollan chronicles the Obamas’ promising early attempts to reform America’s industrial agricultural complex, the ways Big Foods’ lobbying muscle and money impeded progress, and America’s food movement needs to build a powerful presence in Washington.

Published: Oct 5, 2016
Length: 23 minutes (5,796 words)

The Quest to Make a True Blue M&M

As consumer preferences change, the food industry is scrambling to replace artificial dyes used in their food with natural pigments, which is much harder to do than one might think.

Published: Oct 5, 2016
Length: 18 minutes (4,707 words)

How Donald Trump Set Off a Civil War Within the Right-Wing Media

The Republican nominee has divided conservative media commentators, hosts, and personalities, who either see Trump as the right candidate to shake up a corrupt establishment, or a “frightening” and “train wreck” of a choice.

Published: Sep 29, 2016
Length: 25 minutes (6,327 words)