I recently read that “you are not free the day you walk out of prison; you are free the day you walk out of ignorance.” The statement resonates with me deeply. Yet, I know a lot of opposition exists against giving people who committed crimes an education at little to no cost. I was released […]
Month: November 2019
Realities of an Environmentalist
I do not think there is an accurate depiction of what an environmentalist goes through while being an environmentalist. Most people tend to view earth lovers as traditional peace-loving hippies, or activists that chain themselves to trees, but I have found a different truth. Most of them are actually hard-working people who spend much of […]
The Curious Case of Bethesda Softworks
When Bethesda announced Fallout 76, an always-online, microtransaction-fueled, shared-world shooter, I was dejected. I don’t think I could have dreamt up a worse addition to the venerated Fallout franchise. The feeling stuck with me for days, festering in the pit of my gut like a meal gone wrong. It took until a few weeks ago to […]
Email, Emails, and More Emails
Let’s talk about emails. Not those emails. Donald Trump’s emails. His campaign emails, to be precise. I’m not 100% sure how this happened, but about a year ago I started receiving emails from the Trump re-election campaign. If I had to guess, I’d say it happened when I filled out a survey regarding the […]
Off with Their Heads and Other Considerations: Part 2
In the television show, Once Upon a Time, the Pied Piper is really Peter Pan who is really Rumplestiltskin’s father who is really the crocodile whose ticking belly might be only ticking in Captain Hook’s mind, who may not be the villain he is made out to be. The story goes that Captain Hook wasn’t […]
Are You on Your Period? And Other Microaggressions
Can I be real with you for a second, reader? I’m exhausted. I’ve gone straight past tired and landed on a weariness that settles into your bones, under your eyes, makes a home in your heart. It’s been a long semester and each day feels like a never-ending marathon that I’ve not prepared for. I […]
Returning to a Waterfall in Mid-Cascade
Lagging with a quarter tank on the Taconic, I scroll back to an archive of music bereft of life—indie and alternative music confined to its inception. Still, nostalgia (even under false pretenses) thaws the distinctions between the seasons. A couple of songs in, an exiled piece crescendos. It recoils against my expectations, voiding the […]
Close Rikers
After years of protests to close Rikers Island Jail, New York City’s City Council finally decided to shut down the complex. While this decisions should have been met with praise, the decision was far from being a major feat. The decision has amassed significant criticism. If you have not been following the Close Rikers […]
Off With their Heads and Other Considerations: On R. Kelly
My mother said we ought to watch it together, Surviving R. Kelly. We’d talked about his case around my grandmother’s kitchen table, and we all agreed that it was disgusting, terrible, sad. We sang “Step in the Name of Love” in parody of ourselves, or at least the selves who had danced to it at […]
Detox the Digital at New York Public Library’s Picture Archive
“I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.” —Jorge Luis Borges, “La Biblioteca de Babel” I was born in the 1980s. I had a pager years before my first cell phone. In highschool I spent hours on the family computer, in chat rooms with friends and strangers, often while talking […]