Pocahontas may seem like a strange vehicle for discussing our gay villains. But Disney gets inventive when they need to circumvent white people’s historical responsibility for genocidal atrocities — and queerness is a useful scapegoat.
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‘This Wasn’t His First Time’
A kidnapping deemed a hoax, the newbie detective who cracked the case, and the Harvard-trained lawyer whose mental unraveling set the whole story in motion.
The Artificial Intelligence of the Public Intellectual
Today’s public intellectuals have their own version of the American Dream, where one person, on their own, can achieve anything — including being the smartest person in the room.
I Must Be One of the Best, Because I’m Not One of the Worst
Iraq War veteran Phil Klay reckons with his own complicity.
Tales of War and Redemption
“The violence I have seen has left me feeling hollowed out, unable to gild all the agony with some beautiful meaning.”
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
This week, we’re sharing stories from Megan Twohey, Jodi Kantor, Susan Dominus, Jim Rutenberg, and Steve Eder; Eliana Dockterman, Stephanie Zarachek, and Haley Sweetland Edwards; John Woodrow Cox; Nadim Roberts; and Phil Klay.
One Man’s Poison
The only way to protect herself from her father was to erase him from her life, but she survived being his daughter by acting just like he did.
Tangled Up in Bob Stories: A Dylan Reading List
Few musicians have generated as much music and as much study as this Nobel Prize winning singer-songwriter. Dylanology will last hundreds of years.
We Still Don’t Know How to Navigate the Cultural Legacy of Eugenics
From abortion to immigration, a long-debunked scientific movement still casts long, confusing shadows over our most fraught debates.
Jersey Girl
Too Japanese for Americans and too American for the Japanese, one New Jersey native traces the influence of racism on her parents’ careers and her own life.

