Wednesday, 22 September 2021

What I've Been Reading, July and August 2021

Links

Above the Fold

Miscellaneous

Structural Violence

Black Lives Matter, Race, Racism

Coronavirus

Capitalism, Communism, Anarchy

The New Fascism, the Far-Right and Antifa

I hear a lot of well educated people saying that the people some of us are calling fascists don't meet all the criteria for being "real" fascists. Others have even accused us of calling anyone we disagree with a fascist. I predict that a few decades (maybe just a few years) from now those same people will be saying they wish they hadn't been quite so fussy with their definitions, and had acted sooner to oppose these "new fascists", even if they weren't identical to the fascists of the twentieth century.

Collapse

Responding to Collapse,

Climate Change, or rather, actually, Global Warming

Recipes and Cooking

  • The Secret to Making your Good Soup Glorious, by Malky McEwan, Medium
    "A top chef let me in on this trick and science agreed with him"
    This is essentially the same trick my wife taught me. Or if you end up frying the soup ingredients in a frying pan, be sure to deglaze the pan and put the resulting liquid into the soup. There is a lot of flavour there you don't want to miss out on.

Genetic Engineering

Before jumping to the erroneous conclusion that this section was paid for by Monsanto, stop for a moment and understand that organic agriculture/food is a multi-billion dollar per year industry that relies on fear to get people to buy its product. Millions of dollars are spent to convince you that non-organic food is dangerous. In fact both conventionally grown and organic foods are equally safe. Sadly neither method of agriculture is even remotely substainable.

  • Panic-free GMOs, A Grist Special Series by Nathanael Johnson
    "It’s easy to get information about genetically modified food. There are the dubious anti-GM horror stories that recirculate through social networks. On the other side, there’s the dismissive sighing, eye-rolling, and hand patting of pro-GM partisans. But if you just want a level-headed assessment of the evidence in plain English, that’s in pretty short supply. Fortunately, you’ve found the trove."
    A series of articles that does a pretty good job of presenting the facts about GMOs. I plan to include one article from this series here each month.
  • A 16th-century Dutchman can tell us everything we need to know about GMO patents, by Nathanael Johnson, Grist
    "Today's agribusiness patent holders have locked out innovation. The annals of maritime exploration offer a way out. Really! "

Practical Skills

Writing Skills

American Politics

  • Biden’s Invisible Ideology, by Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker
    "The President has deployed an exasperating but effective strategy to counter Trumpism."

Canadian Politics

Linguistics

Dancing on Graves

Debunking Resources

These are of such importance that I've decide to leave them here on an ongoing basis.

Science

Lacking an Owner's Manual

The human body/mind/spirit doesn't come with an owner's manual, and we continually struggle to figure out how best to operate them.

  • The Sexiest Things You Can Ever Do for Her, by Jessica Wildfire, Medium
    "Guaranteed to blow her mind, anytime."
  • The system of mathematics I wish I had known long ago, by Theodorrism, Medium
    "Go on. Learn. Do this for yourself."
  • Gender and Sexuality

    Poverty, Homeless People, Minimum Wage, UBI, Health Care, Affordable Housing

    Education

    Humour

    These are great times for political satire.

    Books

    Fiction

    Non-Fiction

    1 comment:

    Anonymous said...

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