June Thunderstorm, writing in The Baffler with the support of the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, digs into the race and class issues that underlie efforts to quell smoking. Is “public health” really the name of the game?
public health
Posted inEditor's Pick
Off Our Butts: How Smoking Bans Extinguish Solidarity
An impassioned essay on ways anti-smoking legislation is, and always has been, about social control — bans that target and dehumanize the poor in the name of public health.
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
The Power of Reddit as a Public Health Advocacy Tool
Writing for Backchannel, Andrew McMillen recently profiled a woman named Tracey Helton. Helton—a former heroin addict who now works as a public health advocate—has taken to Reddit to advocate harm reduction strategies among addicts and to distribute the overdose-reversing drug naloxone. Dubbed the “mother of r/opiates,” Helton’s program “illustrates the unexpected good that can emerge from darker corners of […]
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
Childhood Development and the Psychological Roots of Disgust
Disgust has deep psychological roots, emerging early in a child’s development. Infants and young toddlers don’t feel grossed out by anything—diapers, Rozin observes, are there in part to stop a baby “from eating her shit.” In the young mind, curiosity and exploration often overpower any competing instincts. But, at around four years old, there seems to be a profound shift.