A Sociological Eye

  Ah, nature. Everyone loves it!   Here on the left, we want to protect nature from human-caused climate change and pollution. The right counters, "Our scientists say there is no climate change!" Well, ok, but 99.5% of scientists agree that climate change due to our production of greenhouse gasses is indeed happening. Those are some really. . . unusual scientists you're citing.    The redhat right has its own claim about needing to protect nature. They cry that people on the left are violating the laws of the nature of sex! Nature dictates and the nation requires a sex binary of men and women who are eager to marry and produce children, they say. But instead, the left is full of gender transitions and queer people and crazy cat ladies, leaving the real men of America bereft of the loving, attractive wives they deserve!    Here's the thing. You can cause harm to natural beings and settings. You can kill off the vast herds of buffalo that once roamed the plai...

A Portrait of Zooey Zephyr Wow, rightwing social media bloviators are really going all in on the line that “America isn’t a Democracy! It is a Republic!” Have you seen this? I try to avoid Twitter as much as possible nowadays. Whole swaths of it used to be pretty dystopian, barely held in check by moderators. There were just some minimal rules—no hate speech, no misgendering trans people, no telling people exactly how you’d like to see them die horribly. Then Elon “I spent billions to be able to misgender my own children online!” Musk bought the place. According to him, banning hate speech is discriminating against Republicans. Evil leftists want to censor and cancel and muzzle people, but the noble right wing understands the incalculable value of there being no rules of civility! The right champions pure free speech! Tell that to Zooey Zephyr. (I collaborated with AI to make this portrait of her.) This week, Representative Zephyr was banned from the floor of the state legislature of ...