Author: letstalklibrary4001

The Washington Post Takes the “Unusual Step” of Publishing Graphic Photos from Mass Shootings

A flat, grassy field lined with rows of simple grave markers that form a geometric pattern; the Washington Monument stands in the background.
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Image credit: Joe Flood

It’s not news to any of us that mass murders are alarmingly common here in the US. Most of us can rattle off place names—Sandy Hook, Uvalde, Parkland, Las Vegas, and numerous others. Many of us can name shooters, and sometimes we remember the names of the people whose lives were so senselessly ended. But those are names and words; what about images? For many good reasons, news organizations seldom publish photos or video of the grisly scenes. In November 2023, however, the Washington Post, a large-circulation daily newspaper, published mass shooting photos and interview snippets in a report titled “Terror on Repeat: A rare look at the devastation caused by AR-15 shootings.” The Post’s report was so unprecedented that Nieman Lab, a journalism watchdog and research organization affiliated with Harvard University, documented the process that the Post followed in a November 2023 report written by Nieman Lab’s deputy editor, Sarah Scire.

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How Hair Discrimination Affects Black Women at Work

Black and white photo of a young Black woman with an elaborate hairdo shown from the neck up; the background is solid green with purple dots.
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Image credit: HBR Staff/Suad Kamardeen/Unsplash

A person’s job may involve talking with clients, solving logistical problems, operating a drill press, analyzing data, supervising a team of interns, or any of a zillion other workplace tasks. What does their hairdo have to do with their job performance? Silly question? Think again. Janice Gassam Asare, writer and CEO of a diversity consulting firm, discusses the everyday reality of hair discrimination faced by Black women in the workplace, and she lays out some concrete steps for addressing the problem. Her May 2023 report appears in the Harvard Business Review.

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Why Are So Many Cakes Named After Fabric?

In the center of a white table is a 3-layer yellow cake on a rimmed plate, with thick white frosting spread with peaks. The top of the cake is ringed with pecan halves, and several ripe figs adorn the center. Two slices cut from the cake are on plates on the table, along with a few more plates, forks, and a cake server.
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Image credit: Photo by Joseph De Leo, Food Styling by Erika Joyce

Red velvet, black satin, lemon chiffon. We could be talking about fashion here, but we’re not. We’re talking about cake. It turns out (you likely have never noticed) that many classic cakes in the US take their names from fabrics. Curious, right? But once you read the analysis and explanation of food writer and chef Brandon Summers-Miller in this June 2022 Epicurious article, it will all start making sense (and make you hungry, as well).

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Warped Front Pages

Stacks of thick and glossy fashion magazines on a newstand. A copy of the New York Times is displayed on top of the magazine stacks.
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Image credit: Charles Guerin/Abaca/Sipa USA(Sipa via AP Images)

Do mainstream, large-circulation daily newspapers offer non-biased coverage of national news? Good question. Depending on whom you ask, responses will probably be Hard Yes, Hard No, and all points in between. To find a more concrete and precise answer to the question, a team of research analysts made a systematic study of the front pages of two major national newspapers, the New York Times and the Washington Post, during two specific periods leading up to national elections. David M. Rothschild is senior principal researcher at Microsoft Research; his four co-authors include academics and researchers. Their report was published by the Columbia Journalism Review, an online research and watchdog organization, in November 2023.

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This Full Page Ad Was Written Entirely in Chicken

A red chicken stands on a printed page as if reading it; the title on the page, in large letters, is “Bawk bawk ba-kawk bawk.”
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Do chickens talk? What a silly question! Of course they do; ask any child. So maybe we shouldn’t be surprised to learn that they can read as well. We have the evidence right here: a letter composed in chicken language, signed by the Founder and CEO of Upside Foods (a human), and addressed to all chickens. The letter appeared as a full-page ad in the New York Times in November 2022 (really!). Advertising journalist Tim Nudd gives a full report on it for Muse by Clio, an advertising industry periodical.

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LSU’s Angel Reese, Iowa’s Caitlin Clark, and the Double Standards of Race in Sports

LSU forward Angel Reese making the “you can’t see me” gesture in front of Iowa guard Caitlin Clark during an NCAA championship game in 2023.
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Image credit: MADDIE MEYER/GETTY IMAGES

A basketball player waves their own hand in front of their own face and gets called out for behavior that some reports and social media posts called “thuggish.” Wait. What? Did that really happen? Well, yes, it did. Here’s the context: an NCAA tournament championship game, two top teams, each with a top-notch star player. So far, nothing remarkable, right? Ah, but did we mention that it was a women’s game? And that the hand-waving player was a Black woman leading a mostly Black team from a school in the South, while the other star player was a White woman leading a mostly White team from the Midwest? Is it making sense yet? Award-winning sports journalist William Rhoden details the situation and adds his own argument in this April 2023 Andscape essay.

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Why Are All Action Heroes Named Jack, James, or John?

A collage of action heroes Capt. James T. Kirk, Johnny Utah, James Bond, John Wick, Jack Ryan, Jason Bourne, and John James Rambo.
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Image credit: Photo illustration by Natalie Matthews-Ramo/Slate. Photos by David Lee/Lionsgate, MGM, Amazon Prime Video, NBC, Universal, Twentieth Century Fox, and Yoni S. Hamenahem/Wikipedia.

“Bond. James Bond.” Such a recognizable movie quote even though it has no punchline, makes no clever point. Does it matter that his name is James and not, say, Clive (very English!) or Butch (very strong and also alliterative)? Such a silly question. But of course it matters; at least, his name follows a definite pattern of action hero names. Demetria Glace, data researcher and author, investigates a pattern she has observed in the names of action heroes in this March 2023 report in Slate.

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What Really Made Geoffrey Hinton into an AI Doomer

Geoffrey Hinton standing in a backyard.
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Image credit: CHLOE ELLINGSON/REDUX

Does the name Geoffrey Hinton mean anything to you? It might not; he never won an election, a Grammy, or a Super Bowl ring. But in the world of cybertechnology and artificial intelligence (AI), he’s more than a rock star, and he made a lot of headlines in May 2023 when he left his job at Google and began publicly expressing his alarm about recent developments in AI. Will Knight, who covers AI as a senior writer for Wired, spoke with Hinton and wrote this May 2023 report.

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