I was sixteen the first time I heard my mother curse. She was worn and weary — stretched beyond her maternal limits. From delirious dreams, I sat up, mumbling that I felt sick. From her own crumpled position in a bedside chair, Mom scrambled for the emesis bowl too late, triggering her exasperated expletive. Who […]
In mid-September, the Wall Street Journal published “The Facebook Files,” a series of investigative reports that was partially based on internal documents leaked by a whistleblower. The overall impression left by the revelations is one of hypocrisy: a company saying in public how seriously they take their responsibility to protect their users from harm and police their […]
There is a growing gender gap in higher education. According to the latest figures from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center: as of spring 2021, women accounted for 59.5% of students attending colleges and universities nationwide. Among four-year private colleges, women now account for 61% of all students. Both figures represent new records. Douglas Shapiro, executive director of […]
Every day brings horror stories of racial discrimination and racial preferences. Told a couple of folks I was going to write about race. “Don’t go there,” said one. “Leave it alone,” said the other. ‘Nuff said. I couldn’t resist. America is obsessed with race. That is just how we live. Social justice warriors and woke […]
But not everything in the report adds up. France is reeling after yesterday’s release of a report on child sexual abuse. An estimated 216,000 victims suffered abuse between 1950 and 2020, according to the Independent Commission on Sexual Abuse in the Church (CIASE). “The church failed to see or hear, failed to pick up on the weak […]
On September 9, Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed HB 20, a law designed to keep social media companies with more than 50 million subscribers from blocking users whose viewpoints the company disapproves of. Scheduled to take effect in December, the law has already attracted controversy and threats of lawsuits to keep it from going into effect. Currently, if […]
The murder of 22-year-old American Gabby Petito, and disappearance of her fiance, 23-year-old Brian Laundrie, have sparked worldwide interest and speculation. Podcasts have been made covering the case, news outlets worldwide are giving daily updates — it would seem the public’s incessant consumption of true crime is feeding a market need for new material at an increasingly […]
The brilliant Nicholas Carr has proposed a Digital Communications Act. Nicholas Carr is a writer whose book The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains, published in 2010, gained considerable attention by pointing out how new technologies have affected our basic thought processes, and not always in a good way. In the fall 2021 […]
How has organised religion shaped the United States, and where does it stand today? Robert Putnam’s work on social capital and community — most recently displayed in his 2020 book, The Upswing — has often highlighted the crucial importance of organised religion. In 2012, in partnership with the Canadian political scientist and Notre Dame academic David Campbell, […]
Our politics is idolatrous; it claims too much both in scope and certainty. I’ve spent most of my adult life studying and teaching philosophy, having never lost the sense that the examined life was worth living, and that it is incumbent on humans to reflect on and weigh their actions and commitments. If, however, the […]
The rising rates of social media-induced depression and anxiety in young people nowadays are alarming. I suppose it’s natural for people, and parents especially, to express their unease about digital technology and its domination of our lives in the terms of public health — especially mental health. To say that smartphones have become ubiquitous since […]
The notion that biological relationships mean nothing must be rejected. Rebecca Roache, senior lecturer in philosophy at Royal Holloway, University of London writes, “The wish to be biologically related to one’s children, like the wish to associate only within one’s racial group, can have harmful effects.” Similarly, Dr Ezio Di Nucci of the University of Copenhagen writes, […]
Justifications of pornography are ingenious and endless but seldom novel. However, when OnlyFans, one of the world’s largest websites for user-generated porn, threatened to ban sexually explicit videos and images, a new argument emerged. Honest working folk will go hungry because they can’t upload images of themselves having sex for their viewers. “If you’re not […]
Lyman Stone is a pro-family scholar affiliated with the neo-conservative American Enterprise Institute. A prolific writer and Lutheran missionary, his work has lately graced the pages of America’s Gray Lady, the New York Times. In his recent missive to that paper, he advocates giving children the right to vote – all children, regardless of age. He argues that […]
The US Supreme Court has declined to hear a challenge to a Texas law which bans abortions after a foetal heartbeat is detected. This has effectively closed abortion clinics in Texas, as a heartbeat can be detected at about six weeks. Women who want abortions will have to travel to neighbouring states. For abortion supporters this is […]