In a blatant attempt to whitewash slavery and broader history, Florida’s latest curriculum claims that slavery taught some Black people valuable skills that they could use for their personal benefit. This, along with other misleading claims, is meant to excuse the historical crimes of white America. This story has been…

Centrists like to frame themselves as the rational ones: While everyone else squabbles and succumbs to radicalism, they work for unity through compromise. They situate themselves at the center of an illusory left vs. right binary as if they alone can solve the issues confronting us. …

Edgy comedians often assert that edgy comedy has inherent value. That edginess is automatically groundbreaking and people who don’t like edgy humor just don’t like to be challenged. This logic is nonsense. There might be no better example of this than Bill Maher. Take this recent piece by Adrian Hennigan…

Even as audiences enjoy Dune, it is being criticized for a range of elements including its muted colors, slow pacing, and overt portentousness. All fair criticisms to be sure except a number of these opinions go on to imply that Dune shouldn’t have been made because it’s taking science fiction…

There’s an inordinate amount of talk about how to convince people to get vaccines and wear masks — and a lot of it misses a crucial point. Let’s start with a story: I work at a welcome desk for a gym and one day a pizza delivery guy came in…

In the wake of George Floyd’s murder and the subsequent Black Lives Matter protests, crime shows are increasingly under the microscope. Areas of criticism include how cop shows endorse and/or normalize police brutality and misconduct, the limited diversity in writers’ rooms and the stories they tell, and the myth of…

It is hard to argue that taking personal responsibility for your life is not a good thing. However, in America this has warped into an argument against most social programs. You’ll see the idea pop up often in arguments against the Covid-19 stimulus bill passed by Democrats where claims are…

What is cancel culture? What drives cancel culture? Is cancel culture a problem? These questions swirl around endlessly on the internet and media discourse like some bottomless whirlpool. (I’ve weighed in too.) …

No book can appeal universally to all audiences. No work of art can. Yet, to the detriment of stories, universal perfection is still regarded as an ideal. Universal perfection is the idea that it is possible to create an objectively masterful story that somehow enthralls each and every person that…