Orwell's 1984 may provide us with a vocabulary for critiquing the Trump administration. "Double speak," "thought police": these and other turns of phrase explain the peculiar and insidious ways in which Trump is gaslighting America. (This is a phenomenon that Lauren Duca has explained, incisively, in Teen Vogue.) And while we need 1984's lexicon of authoritarianism, it's not... Continue Reading →
More Rage Against Gun Violence
This isn't going to be a long post. But I'm emerging from the shadowy frontiers of dissertation- and novel-writing to say this: there should be universal outrage over the mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, where gunman Omar Mateen murdered at least 50 people and injured another 50. News broadcasts from NBC, the... Continue Reading →
Emoter-in-Chief: Presidential Tears as Argument for Gun Control
I had intended to re-start the blog this year by writing about my 2015 in reading, complete with the pie charts and graphs you would expect from a former political science major. But let's be honest: Roxane Gay's list is far more interesting than what I would've written. So let's turn to something more current:... Continue Reading →
Caped Tigers and Red Cups, or Why Symbols Are Worth Getting Right
Recently, I've been following two stories about so-called "political correctness," or—as I prefer to think of it—(a.) basic human dignity and (b.) basic awareness of what our symbols say. I'm referring specifically to my alma mater Susquehanna University's recent decision to jettison its offensive mascot and the Internet's furor over Starbucks' holiday cups. In both... Continue Reading →
On Freedom and Patriotism
I've recently been binge watching Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, and yesterday—in one of those inexplicable accidents of perfect timing—I watched the episodes in which Oliver takes on predator drones and interviews Edward Snowden. The segment on Snowden, which also covered the dangers of renewing the PATRIOT Act, reveals in stark detail just how... Continue Reading →
Patrick Thomas Henry 