Smash the Wellness Industry
Jessica Knoll calls out the wellness industry as a dangerous deceit. Masquerading as a way to increase energy or reduce inflammation, the industry’s success actually preys upon women’s self-hate by “preserving a vicious fallacy: Thin is healthy and healthy is thin.”
Meet the Money Whisperer to the Super-Rich N.B.A. Elite
“Who’s the guy Klay Thompson and other N.B.A. stars trust to manage their wealth? One who knows how to rebound with $8,000 stuffed into his underwear.”
The Making of a YouTube Radical
Caleb Cain was an aimless young man looking for some distraction on YouTube. He became radicalized by videos made by a community of far-right creators — many of which were put in front of him by YouTube’s recommendation algorithm.
‘They Were Conned’: How Reckless Loans Devastated a Generation of Taxi Drivers
A two-part investigation examining how taxi industry leaders artificially inflated the price of medallions, which allow taxi drivers the ability to own and operate a cab, and trapped low-income drivers in reckless loans while government officials looked the other way.
This Gen X Mess
A fun, ranging package about Generation X. It includes essays on Evan Dando, The Rules, John Singleton, Grunge music and fashion, CK One, among other 90s touchstones, plus a piece in which Caity Weaver rewinds 25 years to 1994 and spends a week only using what limited technologies existed then.
The Raisin Situation
“One man wanted to change the raisin industry for the better. He got more than he bargained for.”
She Draws Deeply Human Characters. They’re Just Animals.
“[A]t school, she pretended that she was a horse. This did not help integrate her into the mainstream of child society, but privately she expressed confidence in her choice.”
In San Francisco, Making a Living From Your Billionaire Neighbor’s Trash
Amid the mansions and new tech money, an entire economy has developed to gather discarded items and resell them for a few hundred dollars a week, if they’re lucky. “It’s a civic service as I see it,” said Nick Marzano, who publishes a magazine about San Francisco trash pickers. “Rather than this stuff going to landfill the items are being reused.”
For Larger Customer, Eating Out Is Still a Daunting Experience
If I have to contort myself to get into a booth or knock a vase of flowers off a too-close table with my ass, my wallet and I are heading elsewhere.
The Tragedy of Baltimore
Since Freddie Gray’s death, Baltimore — which once inspired The Wire but in recent years seemed to be experiencing an urban revival — has seen a sharp increase in violent crime amidst “a failure of order and governance the likes of which few American cities have seen in years.”