In the News

Here is some stuff in the news today...

[Content Note: Class warfare] This is what class warfare actually looks like: "A new Stateline analysis shows that in all 50 states, the percentage of 'middle-class' households—those making between 67 percent and 200 percent of the state's median income—shrunk between 2000 and 2013. The change occurred even as the median income in most states declined, when adjusted for inflation. In most states, the growing percentage of households paying 30 percent (the federal standard for housing affordability) or more of their income on housing illustrates that it is increasingly difficult for many American families to make ends meet."

[CN: Death by hanging; racism; eliminationism] Um. "FBI Supervisory Special Agent Jason Pack said the FBI and Mississippi Bureau of Investigation are on the scene where a man's body was found hanging from a tree by a bed sheet in the woods near Old Rodney Road. It is unclear if the death is a homicide or a suicide, as Coroner J.W. Mallett would not release any details, stating the death is under investigation." I know they have to say that, but the man is believed to be 54-year-old Otis Byrd, a black man who has been missing since March 2. This has all the hallmarks of a lynching.

[CN: Police brutality] Leaving aside the debate about whether body cameras worn by police officers would actually have a meaningful effect on reducing police brutality: "Lawmakers in nearly a third of the states have introduced bills to restrict public access to recordings from police officer-worn body cameras." Of course they have. Which states have introduced legislation and what that legislation looks like is detailed at the link.

[CN: Disablism; racism; carcerality] Abreham Zemedagegehu is a deaf man who is able to communicate only with sign language, and after he was arrested last year, he reports being denied an interpreter during the entire six weeks he was held. Further: "He was administered a tuberculosis shot without his consent, often went hungry because he couldn't hear alerts for mealtime, and was unable to call friends or an attorney because of inadequate technology in the jail." He was "placed in a cell alone and missed many meals because he couldn't hear the alerts for mealtime and no one explained that he had to push a button to open his cell door quickly after the alerts sounded." I feel like there's there's no way, NO WAY, that in a place where every move is scrutinized for excuses for further punishment that no one noticed he wasn't eating. And by that I don't mean that I think Zemedagegehu is lying; I mean I think that the people responsible for his well-being knew but didn't care that he wasn't.

[CN: Racism; White Supremacy; slurs; violence] Tracy Clayton has written a powerful essay on being "one of few black students at a small college in Kentucky in the early 2000s. Every day I was reminded just how unwelcome I was there."

[CN: War on agency] Andrea Grimes on how increasing restrictions on abortion are "Changing the Way People Think About Self-Induced Abortions."

[CN: Christian Supremacy; homophobia] John Wright with more on the garbage "religious freedom" legislation expected to pass in Indiana next week.

[CN: Anti-choice terrorism; war on agency] A year after Susan Cahill's All Families Healthcare clinic was destroyed, the clinic still has not reopened "and its proprietor, Susan Cahill, has been out of work for a year. Patients were shifted to new health care providers, and the Flathead Valley lost its only clinic willing to perform abortions. ...For Cahill, her future is in limbo: Unable as of yet to find a space in the valley willing to rent to her, she says she can't continue her practice as a physician's assistant, even though she has decided to stop performing abortions. 'I promised my family I wasn't going to be a martyr; I've had enough. Which doesn't make me feel particularly happy,' Cahill said."

[CN: Abuse of homeless people; religion] I would say this is unbelievable, but, of course, it isn't: "St Mary's cathedral, home of the Catholic archbishop of San Francisco, has been scrambling to explain itself after local media revealed that it had installed water sprinklers above its doorways that were dousing homeless people seeking shelter in the alcoves there. Officials of the archdiocese hastily began the process of dismantling the sprinklers after the local CBS franchise, KCBS Radio, revealed that homeless people and their belongings were routinely being soaked by the automated system. The anti-homeless technique has been deployed outside commercial properties in several major cities, including San Francisco, but its use by an institution devoted to the tradition of the good Samaritan has proved more contentious." More contentious. Fucking hell. My friend sent this to me with the note: "tax. the. church." Yeah. It's long past time to revisit the church's tax exempt status.

Wow: "18 Amazing Images from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope." Stunning.

Johanna Basford's adult coloring book, Secret Garden, "inspired by Scotland's Brodick Castle Gardens, where her grandfather was the head gardener," has sold over a million copies. And I can see why. Extraordinary.

Say hello to my little NOPE! "Universal is moving forward with its Scarface remake." I cannot get on board with this unless the new filmmakers promise to make the new one as PERVASIVELY PINK as the original.

And finally! March is Dolphin Awareness Month, so here are some fun facts about dolphins to celebrate one of the coolest animals in the seas!