I turned 30 last November and I'm just now realizing the all-consuming power that my menstrual cycle has on my body. Like most women I know, I've been constantly medicated via injections, implants and pills for more than 15 years, trying to find a birth control option that doesn't ravage me with cramps, cause ruptured cysts on my ovaries or thrust my mind into a vicious darkness at random and always-inconvenient moments.
Maybe I would have reckoned with my natural cycle by now, soothed it and learned how to live with it in peace, had I removed birth control from the equation for any significant stretch of time. I don't know. But I do know I've never wanted kids, and I really like having sex with dudes (and ladies, but they’re polite enough to not randomly impregnate their partners). Male contraception doesn't exist, ergo I've always been on birth control.
I've lived with the consequences of unproven, barely tested, hormone-ridden contraception methods my entire adult life, often signing up for consequences even my doctors didn’t anticipate. I've been hospitalized twice in the past two years with heart attack-like symptoms, only to have my period start between the EKGs and X-rays, explaining away my discomfort in one bloody rush. The gut-smack of realization -- Of course it’s my period, I’m such an idiot -- never fades.
The second time I went to the hospital, it was in Austin, Texas, during a work trip to cover SXSW in March 2019. After nearly 10 years of reporting at shows like E3 and CES, I don’t exactly look forward to most conventions, but SXSW is different. I enjoy the casual, creative vibe of the show, and this year, I had a lineup of fantastic interviews. I was eager to get going.
My period started because I had recently switched to the pill from Mirena, a high-hormone intrauterine device that for half a decade pushed my emotions to spike and plummet unpredictably, and possibly contributed to years of debilitating nausea.
I vividly recall the day I had the Mirena implanted; IUDs were still relatively new on the mainstream circuit and there weren’t many first-hand accounts of the process online. My gynecologist said I might experience some cramping that night. I felt a pinch around my ovaries as she inserted the device with its dangling strings, t-shaped polyethylene body and 52 mg of LNG, a steroid hormone that mimics progesterone. I drove home, cramping slightly but pleased I didn’t have to pop a pill every day to maintain my non-parent status.
By that night, I was curled into a ball on the bed, clutching my abdomen, riding waves of the worst pain I’d ever experienced. That remains true to this day. I questioned everything that night, but mostly, it exists in my memory as a blur of white-hot agony. I kept the Mirena, of course. Eventually, my periods became erratic, punctuated by agonizing bursting cysts on my ovaries every few months, aftershocks of that initial night. Still, I kept the Mirena.
Fast forward five years. I’d just had the Mirena removed and was in a month-long waiting period before my gynecologist would add Skyla, a smaller and lower-hormone IUD, to my anatomy. After living with Mirena for so long, I forgot to pack my temporary birth-control pills for the Austin trip.
On the third day of the show, my period arrived. Before I started bleeding, I had a fantastic day. I interviewed one of my literary idols, Neil Gaiman (and a bonus Jon Hamm), and had the rest of the afternoon to write; it was a dream situation for a convention like this. I walked to a coffee shop to work alongside some colleagues, opened my laptop, and was hit with an intense wave of nausea. My mind was gradually swathed in fog; my stomach roiled and acid hit the back or my throat. I couldn’t eat the soft pretzel I’d ordered. A colleague asked if I'd drank too much the previous night and I laughed it off, heart threatening to leap straight out of my throat.
I went back to my hotel room, exhausted, and tried to finish my story. What should have taken an hour took four, and even then my editor called the draft a fever dream. I puked three times while writing it.
Dizzy, short of breath, heart thundering in the pressurized cabin of my chest, I tried to eat dinner and sleep. I actually ate half of the burger I ordered. The night wore on, my colleagues went to a SXSW party, and once midnight rolled around, I tried to sleep. The tornado under my ribcage sent prickling tingles down my limbs, making my hands shake and sweat. Sleep eluded me.
The signs of a heart attack are different for women and men. Many “traditional” symptoms, such as sharp pain in the chest, don't always appear in women. I knew this, vaguely, and my own body was out of whack enough that I Googled "female heart attack symptoms." I matched them all with uncanny accuracy. The websites I visited recommended calling 911 -- but then, they always do.
Around 4:30AM, I called my boyfriend and then a 24-hour nurse line. I explained my symptoms and was advised to call an ambulance.
After another half hour spent trying to convince myself I could fall asleep if I just tried a little harder, I got a Lyft to St. David’s South Austin Medical Center (that was $13, compared with an estimated $1,000 for an ambulance). I puked again in the waiting room bathroom, light-headed and paranoid my left arm was going numb. My period started (idiot). Over the following four hours, the doctors ran a few tests, I took some anti-nausea medication, and that was that. I was young and relatively healthy -- it was probably just anxiety or indigestion, according to the hospital staff.
Even as I sat in the back seat of the Lyft on the way to the hospital, I knew the tests wouldn't return anything notable. They never did. Which, generally speaking, was a good thing. I wasn't having a heart attack -- great -- but I wasn't all right, either.
There were a range of possible causes for my symptoms in Austin, and the same culprit may also be responsible for the years of isolating stomach issues I've experienced. However, by the time I left the hospital, it was clear that these episodes of heart-attacky symptoms were tied to my menstrual cycle. I did some quick online research and found a number of results that might explain my situation, all of them related to my period.
This was new information. I knew about PMS and PMDD, the more extreme and debilitating version of PMS, but I'd never heard either word attached to heartburn or heart attacks specifically. I'd seen a gynecologist regularly for the past 15 years, but in the mess of other, more pressing consequences of female birth control, heartburn just never came up.
This is how it goes. I switch contraception methods and a fresh new hell is unleashed on my unsuspecting body, whether it's pain or emotional turmoil or fatigue or personality tweaks or changes in sex drive, and it takes me longer than it should to realize my symptoms line up perfectly with my new sterility regime. Shockingly, I'm not always thinking about birth control, though it's always, always in my life.
All of this is to say it's bullshit there is no widespread form of male contraception yet.
THE MALE BIRTH CONTROL CON | An informational interlude by Jessica Conditt
For men, the options are, essentially, condoms or vasectomies. Vasectomies are effective, but they’re also designed to be permanent. In an outpatient procedure, surgeons snip or block the vas defrens, which normally serve as the sperm highway in a man’s scrotum. Planned Parenthood describes the process as relatively pain-free, quick and nearly 100 percent effective after a three-month waiting period. However, vasectomies are for men who are done having kids, as they’re difficult (and sometimes impossible) to reverse.
There have been a few other attempts to fill the birth control gender gap: Vasalgel is a potentially reversible solution that acts like a vasectomy, but with an injected solution rather than actual surgery. This means the process is reversible, in theory. Vasalgel made headlines in 2017 when it was successfully tested on monkeys, but there hasn’t been much movement since.
There is one potential bright spot for the future of male birth control, and it comes in the form of a thin needle.
“Most of the research has focused on the combination of testosterone plus a progestin, another sex steroid hormone that is found in men and women,” University of Washington chief of medicine Dr. Bradley D. Anawalt told Endocrine News in 2016. “Previous studies of male hormonal contraceptives have shown that injectable formulations provide effective contraception that is far superior to the condom and compares favorably to most female contraceptive options.”
In October 2016, researchers reported the results of a study into a particular injection-based method of male birth control. The shots (200 MG of norethisterone enanthate and 1,000 MG of testosterone undecanoate, injected every eight weeks) were tested in 320 men and found to be 96 percent effective. However, the study was halted because the men involved reported particularly high rates of adverse side effects, most notably depression and other mood disorders, but also acne, muscle pain and increased libido. Even with these effects, more than 75 percent of participants said they were willing to continue using the shot.
The most recent advancement in male birth control comes from the National Institutes of Health, which announced in November plans to study a gel designed to prevent pregnancy. The gel, NES/T, is rubbed into a man’s back and shoulders and works via a progestin-based compound called segesterone acetate and testosterone. The NIH is recruiting participants and the study is set to be completed in September 2021.
And that’s about it, when it comes to the technological landscape for male birth control. Promises, tests and silence.
The point here isn't that female birth control sucks or that men are purposefully thwarting attempts to devise a male version. In fact, most men I know are eagerly awaiting the day they can pop a pill and not worry about making a baby.
I'm simply tired of treating my body like a hormone-bomb test site. I'm sick to death of the daily side effects of protecting myself -- and my male partners -- from pregnancy.
That doesn't mean I'll stop any time soon. The possibility of pregnancy is still scarier than the side effects of birth control, for me and for now. I just wish men had as many terrible, effective, agonizing, freeing and emotionally disruptive options as I do.
* * * * * *
I wrote the above words in March 2019, while waiting for my Lyft to arrive at St. David’s South Austin hospital and take me back to the hotel. I typed them deliriously into the Keep Notes app on my phone, caught a few hours of sleep and then got back to covering the show.
When I returned home, I told my gynecologist about the hospital visit, the pain, the convincing heart attack symptoms. She nodded sympathetically and slid a Skyla device into my uterus. One week later, she checked on it with an ultrasound, and found a 5cm cyst inside my left ovary. It was a dense, black hole on the monitor. Endometriosis.
“Wow, it’s big,” she commented. “I’m surprised you haven’t been in more pain.”
I had been. I’d told her about it. But she’s a gynecologist -- her entire job is dealing with women in pain. My complaints of nausea and vomiting, significant weight loss, spasms of agony in my gut and irregular heart rhythms were not cause for alarm in this space. They were simply the price of having ovaries.
I had surgery last week to remove the endometrial cyst and surrounding damage. The procedure was supposed to take about an hour, but mine took three. At one point, my gynecologist was concerned she’d have to remove my entire left ovary, but she managed to keep my organs in place. Regardless, surgery isn’t the last step in living with endometriosis. It’s just the start.
The birth control bouncing around my body for the past 15 years likely kept my endometriosis at bay. The brief gap in IUD placement simply allowed my doctor to finally see it. All along, what I thought was pain from rupturing cysts was actually this disorder sticking my uterus together and filling my ovary with pus the color and consistency of melted chocolate. The cyst was apparently pushing against my bladder; since having it removed I’ve realized how painful peeing used to be.
Like with so many other symptoms, I’d gotten used to it.
Your lifetime, specifically. Don’t think of it in terms of how long a single justice will serve, but rather, who you will be compelled to obey for the rest of your life; who will control the limits of your independence; who will pull the strings of your daily routine. Yes, daily. Decisions laid down by the Supreme Court directly affect every aspect of society, changing how the nation operates and what its citizens accept -- that’s why this vote is critical. That’s why people, specifically women, care so deeply about it.
Brett Kavanaugh has demonstrated his inability to be an impartial judge. He has been partisan, engaged in political conspiracy mongering and disrespected the democratic process. He has yelled at members of Congress, interrupted their questions and shown open hostility toward one side of the aisle exclusively. No one is asking Kavanaugh to be a robot devoid of human emotion or bias, but everyone is asking him to engage in rational debates with people of varying opinions. That is literally the job. The people of the United States demand any justice demonstrate the ability to approach complicated, emotional issues with wisdom, intelligence and grace gained through a lifetime of schooling and interpersonal relationships. A lifetime.
Imagine having a rational debate with the man who presented himself to the US Senate on September 27th.
Not only would confirming Brett Kavanaugh scream to women across the country that their lives don’t matter, but it would be a permanent stain on the Supreme Court. A stain that would only grow darker and more embedded with time.
The Supreme Court is a lifetime appointment. Your lifetime.
The world is a cave, dim on all sides and filled with holes sustaining unlikely life -- sores gushing bugs and bats and bile and blood. As if anything could be filled with holes. As if the world could squeeze inside a single cave.
My steps are slow, dragging, just past the edge of control. I haven’t eaten. My brain has a sore throat and it whines on a constant, stinging wavelength emanating from the base of my head and wrapping around my ears, coating my cranium in discomfort. I can barely stand, let alone walk. I can’t think, except for that one word seared across my subconsciousness.
Step.
ANTI-fa.
Crumble.
I grab the edge of the sink with both hands as chills wrack my bones, nearly forcing me to the ground. My back is hunched, my breathing labored, my mind spinning dust into fractured thoughts about death and this is how I die and fuck, I should have taken a shower when I still had the energy. The chills subside but my hands remain clenched on the porcelain. I don’t know what will happen if I let go, but it doesn’t feel like it’ll be good. My stomach roils. A bubbling cough rises in my throat. I swallow it down. I won’t puke today.
I haven’t been able to properly process thoughts in weeks. I haven’t been able to eat in months. Sleep is a game of chance and, this year, I have a losing record.
Two deep, calming breaths as my heart thunders against my sternum -- I feel it all the time now, pounding pounding pounding inside my bones -- and I peel my fingers from the sink. I stand up straight. Bathroom. Scale. Shower. I can do this.
God, it hurts.
Step.
Antifa.
At least I’m not the only person falling apart right now. The world is burning -- there are Nazis in the White House, riots in the streets, death on the news and I really, really wish Hunter S. Thompson were alive today. Shotgun to the face. But he’d be dead by now anyway. Nothing is sacred. Nothing survives.
Step.
An-TIFA.
I keep seeing this word but I haven’t heard it spoken aloud yet; I don’t watch the nightly news but I'm constantly devouring stories and tweets and updates online. It’s a new word, a fresh addition to our collective vocabularies. Antifa. Antifa. Antifa. It appears in my mind on repeat, circulating past the puss dripping from the wrinkles in my brain. It’s the only word that my head can sustain and I don’t even know how to say it.
Step.
Antifa.
It gets me where I’m going. In the bathroom, I strip off my sweatpants, oversized tank top and underwear. I weigh myself naked because I’ve never trusted the brands embellishing my body; because I've never owned a scale before now and I want this shit to be accurate; because maybe the doctors can figure out what’s wrong with me if I’m precise; because I don’t know what else to do.
Step step.
101.
I don’t know exactly how many pounds I’ve lost this summer -- the detritus of a life without a scale -- but it’s around 20. The high school version of myself nods in approval; I’ve fallen below my senior-year low. 101 pounds. Congratulations, skeleton. You did it. And you didn’t even have to swallow a cup full of fiber pellets every day to get there.
Besides, when you told the middle-aged man at the front desk of your building that you’ve been sick for a few months, he said, “Hey, at least you look good!” So, there’s that. Hashtag still got it.
Step step.
Antifa antifa.
I’m going to the rally next week. I probably won’t feel up to it, my body will scream at me to lay down and curl up and stay there until all of it, just all of it, goes away -- but I haven’t felt up to much of anything this summer and that hasn’t stopped me from going out, smiling, laughing, drinking and paying for it later. Usually, it’s worth the price. Sometimes, it’s not. The rally will definitely be worth it. I just need to make it there.
I turn on the shower.
At least I’ll finally hear that word out loud -- antifa. At least. Antifa.
Please prepare to encounter an earth-shattering paradox that might just rip apart the fabric of space, time and modern American politics. Ready? Deep breath. Here we go.
I’m a journalist and I’m not bitter about the election.
Personally and professionally, I’m not attempting to change the results of the US Presidential election, sneak Hillary Clinton into office or otherwise disrupt Donald Trump’s road to the White House. I respect the decision that emerged after a year of hateful campaigning and fearful voting, and honestly, I’m not even that surprised by the outcome.
Personally, I am affronted and ashamed to have Donald Trump represent my country, and I’m afraid of what strange new havok his idiocy and ego might inflict upon the world. But, to be fair, I am afraid of every president.
As with every new person we proudly march into the Oval Office, I wonder how many people this president will kill. I wonder how, why and when his decisions will result in death, how large the scope will be, and I hope he ruminates seriously on his role in the entire affair. Because sending people to die and orchestrating the untimely murder of citizens across the world is one of the infallible, unavoidable aspects of being President of the United States, especially in an era of drone warfare, connected missiles and rapidly advancing weapons technology. People are going to die because of Donald Trump’s decisions, just as people died under Barack Obama, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and nearly every other president in history. Just as they would have died under Hillary Clinton.
I wonder how killing people will make Donald Trump feel. I wonder if it will change him.
But I digress.
Donald Trump is the President of the United States. This is a fact. As a citizen and especially as a journalist, I honor this fact and I’m not in the business of trying to change it single-handedly.
Which brings us to Russia.
B A C K I N T H E U S S R
I would not be doing my job if I did not write about Russia’s well-documented cyber attacks on the US election process in 2016. Engadget would not be doing its job if we ignored the conclusions and evidence of multiple trusted intelligence agencies that Russia attacked the very foundation of US democracy right under our noses, while the world was watching.
Engadget is dedicated to discussing all of the ways technology influences our lives -- this includes its influence on the US political system. This includes hacking, especially on an international scale; especially from a country as power-hungry and dangerous as Russia.
Let’s be clear here: Russia is dangerous. Russia is the reason the war in Syria is so catastrophic that it has been called the worst humanitarian crisis since the Holocaust. Right now, Russia is helping bomb hospitals, civilians, children and entire cities in a nation already devastated by civil war. Russian president Vladimir Putin has shown willful disregard for international laws, not only by authorizing cyber attacks on the US, but also by invading his country’s neighbor, Crimea, and taking control of it by force. Putin’s actions have earned him a dedicated sub-heading on Wikipedia’s “List of journalists killed in Russia” page. Putin is dangerous. Russia is dangerous.
This isn’t a revelation. Frankly, the response to Russia’s intrusion into the US political system has been completely backward. Conservatives have decried Russia’s policies and actions for generations; Republicans rallied against the USSR so fiercely in the mid-1900s that they birthed McCarthyism and decades of anti-Communism crusades.
But somehow, today, the loudest defenders of Russia’s cyber attacks on the US election process are people who voted for Donald Trump, the Republican candidate. It’s baffling.
J O U R N A L I S M T O D A Y
I only know the political leanings of these commenters because a pattern has emerged on my published articles about Russia, cyber warfare and fake news: It seems that every time I mention these topics, I’m accused of being a liberal cuck who’s attempting to cast doubt on the legitimacy of Donald Trump’s victory. Even though these are straight news articles; even though they are clearly sourced, concisely written and contain no personal commentary.
Even then, in the comments I am suddenly transformed into the wider “mainstream media,” which I imagine as a beastly, bulbous worm oozing with kale-scented puss and covered in the plasma of a million aborted fetuses, quietly undulating in front of a computer playing Hillary Clinton’s campaign speeches on an endless loop. I am suddenly part of a larger effort to remove Donald Trump from office and implement endless term limits for Barack (or Michelle) Obama; I am a snowflake who can’t get over the election; I am the absolute worst.
And it’s not just me. Anyone who writes about Russia on Engadget -- and across the web -- gets similar treatment. So, let’s take a moment to clear the air: There is no left-leaning, media-wide conspiracy to brainwash the American public.
Journalism is just like any other industry -- it’s composed of individuals, some of whom are liberal, some of whom are conservative and some of whom don’t give a damn. Plenty of reporters voted for Donald Trump (and no, we’re not talking about the bloggers at Breitbart who were contractually obligated to vote for him, donate to his campaign and kiss his gold-flecked slippers once a week), and plenty voted for Hillary Clinton. Across the broad field of journalism (again, this does not include tabloid sites like Breitbart or InfoWars), there is no conspiracy to skew facts in any particular direction.
Of course, I can not and do not speak for every journalist. I take my job seriously; I have a degree in journalism and I delight in thinking critically about its role in society. Freedom of the press is protected by the First Amendment for a reason -- it is a vital aspect of our country’s checks and balances. It ensures people in power can’t act without consequence. It is necessary and I am proud to be a part of this particular machine.
Furthermore, I’m proud to report for an outlet with a laser-focus on technology and all of the ways it impacts our lives. As Moore’s Law plays out before our eyes, technology is becoming increasingly relevant to every person on the planet. I delight in introducing new audiences to the fascinating worlds of AI, gadgetry, cyber security, video games and, yes, state-sponsored hacking.
F A K E N E W S
I can hear the comments now: “No voting machines were hacked, no other systems involved in the elections were hacked. This is fake news at it's [sic] best.”
The thing is, comments like this (completely real) one have little basis in reality. I have never written an article claiming Russia hacked US voting machines, nor has any other journalist worth his or her salt. The easiest way to fact-check this claim is to read our stories.
I have also never written “fake news” (though I did get to the second round of interviews at The Onion like eight years ago). Fake news is not simply an article that you find upsetting or a report that makes someone you like -- or voted for -- look bad. There is a global fake-news industry churning away right now that is dedicated to writing incorrect and misleading stories about the US political system -- and we should be concerned about it.
When citizens can’t distinguish truth from a lie, we lose our power. It is impossible to make informed decisions in the voting booth, at town halls or on the streets without a consensus on the facts; we can’t change the system if we don’t first understand how it works. When fiction is treated as truth, there is no foundation for productive conversation and we lose the ability to reach a compromise. Democracy’s floor falls away beneath us.
It takes some work to write fake news, but it takes vastly more effort and expertise to spot trends, investigate, interview, verify and craft a true, in-depth report that stands up to public scrutiny. The process can take days, weeks, months or years. The process involves traveling to Baghdad, Manila, Delhi, Nice, Seoul and every other city across the globe; the process involves weeks away from family; the process gets people killed. And no, that’s not just in Russia.
This is what journalists do, every day, in pursuit of the truth. Journalists at CNN, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Mother Jones, NPR and Engadget follow complex processes and a strict code of ethics -- all of which are currently under a microscope as the Trump campaign wages a war of words against the press and its freedoms.
I do contend that 24-hour news networks in particular provided a disservice to the American public this election cycle. While plenty of hard-hitting, verified reporting about the candidates came out in 2016, they couldn’t hold the country’s attention while BREAKING stories about Trump’s sexual proclivities dominated the television screen. Plus, Donald Trump’s election was a shock to plenty of seasoned journalists who put too much stock in pollsters and prediction models in an unprecedented campaign season.
This scrutiny means journalists are working harder today than before Election Day. And just like 2017 promises to be a great year for punk rock, it’s also looking like fertile ground for robust, system-shaking journalism.
Which, again, is not fake news. A recent episode of Planet Money offers brilliant insight into the machinery behind fake news, and I encourage anyone who’s ever lodged that term at a journalist to listen in.
At its heart, fake news is the complete opposite of journalism; it is the antithesis of the work I do every day. It makes my job harder.
It’s a good thing I’ve always loved a challenge.
P R O M I S E S
So, here we are.
I will continue to write about Russian cyber attacks on the US political system. Engadget will continue to cover every instance of hacking, nuclear armament, technological advancement and military upgrades to come out of Russia, the US or any other country with global influence. Covering technology as it infiltrates systems across the world is not only fascinating and important work; it’s our only job.
As a human, I will make mistakes. As a journalist, I will rectify and clarify those mistakes as quickly as possible, with complete transparency and in the interest of cultivating an informed audience. This is what separates my work from the world of fake news -- my goal is to inform; the goal of fake news is to generate quick outrage and clicks.
I will continue to act professionally and write the truth as far as we can know it for the benefit of every single person who reads my articles.
She pauses, one hand tense on the armrest of an ornate purple couch, ready to propel her body out of the plush cushions, down the hall and back upstairs to her bedroom. She’s wearing a pair of thick cotton pajamas and a white silk bathrobe, her feet encased in sensible brown slippers. It’s 2:12 AM and the house is dead silent. The sitting room’s floor-to-ceiling shutters are closed, and the light is low and yellow.
Her eyes drill through the man on the opposite couch, daring him to say another word. He lets his hand fall.
“Look. You need to know what’s at stake. You have to deal with these consequences.” His voice lowers. “I can’t be the only person who knows what’s going to happen. You need to know. Hear me out.”
His face is hard but something sparks behind his eyes, a panicked, twitchy momentum that demands her attention. She settles back into the couch.
“Fine, James. Present your case and then get out of my house.”
She stares him down, one elbow on the armrest, hands clasped loosely in front of her. He takes a breath, adjusts his suit jacket and leans forward, his entire body screaming for her to listen, to take this seriously.
“OK,” he begins, voice deep but strained. “We’ve been studying the prediction models for months, but two weeks ago, something shifted. We don’t know what caused it, but we started seeing incredible results.”
She cuts in. “I understand the country has never elected a woman to the presidency but it’s not crazy to think I can win this, James. It’s certainly not ‘incredible.’”
“That’s not what I’m talking about. You're consistently winning our predictions for the election, and by a healthy margin. Those aren’t the models I’m talking about.” He pauses, ensuring he has her full attention. “We’ve been studying reaction models -- how civilians will respond to either of your victories. If he wins, it will certainly be a shock to a lot of people, but the blowback will take place online and in largely non-violent protests. There’s no threat of the country unraveling because of the election itself.”
“And if I win?” Her voice is nearly a whisper.
“Mayhem. Millions of citizens will hit the streets, armed with everything from handguns and knives to military-grade weapons. These people aren’t just ready to revolt, they’re excited about it. They’ll target government buildings and public spaces. They’ll shut down roads, waterways and airports. They will murder hundreds, if not thousands of civilians with guns, bombs, lynchings and poorly conceived acts of terror. They’ll hold the country hostage.”
He stops and a moment of heavy silence fills the room. And then, she starts laughing. He stares at her in disbelief.
“So what, James? His supporters have been talking about a revolution since day one and we’ve never taken them seriously. They talk a big game, but that’s just what people do. I can’t believe you’re even bringing this to me, especially at two in the morning at the end of my campaign.”
“Hillary, listen to me. Some time over the past two weeks, they stopped just talking about it. They started to mean it.” Her smile fades. “They have plans.”
“Then we can stop them.”
“We can’t. Not before they enact irreparable damage and kill hundreds of people. Hundreds, Hillary. There are too many cells to take out -- and those are just the ones we know about. We can’t stop them all.”
A beat.
“Show me the data.”
He leans back and grabs the thick red folder sitting next to him on the couch, passing it to her over the low coffee table. She holds it for a moment before flicking it open. She scans the first page, and then the next, and the next. For nearly ten minutes, the only sounds in the sitting room are the rustling of papers as she flips and reads, flips and reads, flips and reads.
He watches her intently, trying to gauge her reaction as she finds page five, where a diagram demonstrates the number of deaths expected in one particularly vicious campaign planned for North Carolina on election night. It breaks down the demographics of the people targeted: mostly black, mostly young, some just children caught in the crossfire. She pauses on page five for an extra minute but her face betrays nothing. She flips to page six. Another diagram, this one tracking planned lynchings, church bombings and KKK activity across Southern states. She flips to page seven. In Northern states, the models show a severe spike in violence against Muslims and refugees. Dozens of people are expected to be gunned down in Minnesota on election night alone. Houses will burn. Families will be ripped apart. She flips to page eight.
Eventually, she reaches the end and closes the folder. She places it on the coffee table and sits back, hand over her mouth, deep in thought.
“What are our options?” she finally asks.
“You know the options.”
“No, I don’t. You have shown me a series of disgusting and earth-shattering scenarios but you have not said how you plan to address them. What are our options?”
He shakes his head. “Hillary. You know the option.”
She opens her mouth as if to scream, but then her jaw snaps shut and all the air in her body seems to evaporate in an instant. She slumps back into the cushions, body deflated and eyes frantic.
“Fuck,” she says.
“I’m sorry,” he responds, quietly.
“No, you’re not.” She takes a deep breath and sits up a little straighter. “Let’s not pretend we’re friends, James. You don’t want me in the White House, but I know you don’t want him either.”
“I serve at the pleasure of the president, whomever he or she may be.”
“Ha,” she barks. “Sure you do. Sure.” Her gaze finds the floor and stops, unfocused and lost in her own head. “This is my last chance, James. There’s nothing else after this. If I lose, I’m done. I’ve been fighting in this system, against this system, for decades -- and I’m so close. Again. I’m so close again. But this is it.” She looks up with a fire burning dimly behind her eyes. “Why is this happening to me, James? Why not Barack or Bill or George? Haven’t I sacrificed enough? Haven’t I, James?”
“You have, Hillary.”
She nods. “I have.” Suddenly, she’s standing. “Do it, James. Do whatever you need to do. I’m done.”
He stands, too, following her as she pulls open the sitting-room door and begins walking down the hall. He stops at the front door. She continues, heading up the stairs without looking back.
“I’m sorry, Hillary.”
“Get out of my house, James.”
* * * * *
It’s Friday night. He sits in front of his computer monitor, cursor poised over the SEND button. He’s composed a letter to Congress, edited it, ruminated on it and edited it again. This is the first step and it’s the only option. He knows that. He clicks SEND.
Seven minutes later, his phone rings.
“Hello?”
“Hey, it’s Jason. What’s going on?”
He takes a deep breath.
“Hi, Jason. I’ll give it to you straight: The FBI has learned of the existence of emails that appear to be pertinent to the investigation...”
Hillary Clinton is not supposed to win the US presidential election in 2016.
It’s not only because she’s up against 227 years of staunch gender-based political tradition; it’s because her own party is working against her. I realize how hypocritical that sounds, considering that people in the Democratic party have literally worked in Clinton’s favor, lending credence to the belief that she’s a corrupt career politician -- but it’s true nonetheless. The Democrat brand is working against Clinton this election cycle.
Democrats have not won an election after a full Democratic cycle since 1948, after President Franklin D. Roosevelt successfully ran for a third term, died in office and was succeeded by his Vice President Harry Truman. Before then, it’s happened only once more, when Vice President Martin Van Buren succeeded Andrew Jackson in 1836. After eight years of President Barack Obama, in 2016 the system is working against Democrats.
Here’s how political analyst Charlie Cook explains it:
“One thing to keep in mind is the clear pattern that Americans have exhibited in situations where one party has held the White House for two terms. They tend to conclude that it is ‘time for a change,’ and they trade the in party for the out party. … We have had a party occupy the presidency for two consecutive terms six times in the post-World War II period. Only once has that party retained the White House for a third term.”
This all-American behavioral quirk explains, at least in part, the distinctly disparate major-party primaries in 2016. Dozens of potential candidates rushed the Republican side as analysts and campaign managers across the nation explained that the tides would most certainly turn; it was the year of the elephant; all aboard the Conservative cruise ship, next stop 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. This glut of Republican candidates also helps explain why Donald Trump -- a racist, sexist, violent and delusional businessman with little knowledge about the role and function of government -- was able to secure the nomination. The field was flooded and as the candidate with the most hot air to spare, he floated to the top.
Meanwhile, the Left got Bernie Sanders, a Democratic Socialist with slim prospects and nothing to lose, plus a handful of politicians and academics whose campaigns never quite caught fire -- and, of course, Hillary Clinton. Someone with a lot of experience and just as many cards stacked against her. Someone who had fought through this process once before and someone who, after a long career spent circling the Oval Office, may never get another shot at the presidency.
Clinton has spent her life in politics, a feat that comes with massive victories and disastrous downsides. While she has proven that she is capable of effectively governing, managing crises and preparing the world for a better future, she has also been in the spotlight for decades. All of her flaws, mistakes and political ploys are laid bare for the public to pick apart, and we have with relish.
Clinton is not supposed to win this election.
In order to win, she also has to make history. After more than 200 years of male-only leadership and a society that regularly devalues the contributions of women, Clinton is nearly the first female president of the United States. This does not “just happen.” On top of the standard political battlefield, throughout her entire career she has fought against blind, ingrained sexism and damaging stereotypes that are still held by the public, her opposition and even her peers.
Clinton is not supposed to win this election.
Donald Trump has said time and time again that “the system” is rigged against him, the Washington outsider. In a deeply ironic turn of events, after eight years of a Democratic president, the US political system is actually working against former US Senator, First Lady and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Clinton is not supposed to win this election.
Democrats, before you decide to skip voting this year because it feels like the presidency is in the bag, take a look at the polls’ shrinking margins and remember the historical context at play.
Remember: You’re not supposed to win this election.
I learned about the Orlando massacre just after the plane’s wheels touched down at Los Angeles International Airport on the morning of Sunday, July 12. I’d been up since 5:30, preparing and packing a few final items for E3, a huge, week-long work trip that I’d spent the past month frantically planning. That morning was my personal calm before the storm; I hadn’t even turned on music as I showered, let alone checked the latest headlines.
As we started taxiing toward the gate, I switched off my iPhone’s airplane mode and heard the requisite dings in my earbuds as a few text messages piled in. I gathered my carry-ons and glanced back down at my phone, ready to answer the messages, but a notification from NPR stopped me cold.
50 dead in mass shooting at Orlando gay club.
I don’t remember if that was the headline exactly, but it was similar. It was bone-chilling. The man seated next to me moved to stand up, and I shoved the phone back in my briefcase and shuffled into the narrow aisle along with the rest of the passengers.
I dragged my suitcase and extra bags through LAX and got in a taxi, shooting Telegram messages back and forth with my colleagues as we decided where to grab breakfast together. Taxi, hotel lobby, elevator, hotel room, elevator, breakfast, Uber, press conference -- all with that headline bouncing around the back of my brain.
Over the following six days, the only time I had to myself was around 1AM every night, just before I passed out, and then again for an hour when I woke up at 6 or 7. My days were filled with Uber trips, press conferences, filming videos, filing stories, playing video games and interviewing executives. My nights involved dinner with my colleagues and even more writing and planning. All with that headline, and 100 updated headlines, bouncing around the back of my brain.
I allowed myself to think about it in the mornings. I listened to NPR’s All Things Considered, broadcasting live from Orlando, as I showered and got ready for the day. For one hour every morning, I considered the ramifications of the massacre, I listened to the conversations around gun laws and terrorism, and I felt the searing pain of such a tragedy. In small doses, as I dried my hair, I cried for my fellow humans. As I applied my makeup, I mourned for my community.
And then I didn’t. I turned the grief off, grabbed my briefcase, got in the elevator and went to E3. I talked about fighting games and first-person shooters and new hardware. I played games where I gleefully murdered other characters on-screen, with the other players sitting right next to me. I played games where I was joyfully killed in return. I laughed. I had a good, exhausting time.
Time. I told myself I didn’t have time to think about Orlando. But that’s a lie -- all we have is time. Instead, I had the perfect excuse; maybe I didn’t want to think about 49 people dying on the floor of a night club because one man with hate and anger flowing through his veins decided they didn’t deserve to breathe any longer, so I allowed E3 to swallow those headlines. I allowed video games to cushion the base of my brain where those words and images wouldn’t stop bouncing around. Maybe I deafened that part of my brain on purpose. I had the perfect excuse.
E3 is madness barely contained in a convention center. Every minute of my day is planned out during E3 week (except for lunchtime -- that just never seems to happen), and every second that isn’t scheduled is spent furiously writing, trying to get up more stories about more video games before that other site gets up similar stories about those same video games. I couldn’t have done my job and spent more time thinking about Orlando if I’d wanted to. I think I wanted to. But, either way, I had the perfect excuse.
Now, I don’t. And I don’t want an excuse. I’m starting a week behind the news cycle, I’m sick with Nerd Flu, but I finally have a moment to think about Orlando and that club full of people who decided to go to a party on a Sunday night. I have time to think about the person who planned their murder. Perhaps he scheduled it just as meticulously as I planned E3. I have time to think about him, buying guns just weeks before with the intent to murder as many people in that club as possible. I have time to think about the way the media has handled this massacre; I have time to consider how disgusting it is that, with only a second’s consideration, his name weighs heavy on the tip of my tongue.
After a few days of sick, procrastinated consideration, I know a few things deep in my bones. I know that I do not want to know the shooter’s name. I do not want to know his face. We, as the media, need to stop naming the gunmen.
I also know that we, as a nation, need to act. We’ve needed to act for years now, decades even. For years, we’ve needed to stand up to the National Rifle Association, a group that fights for the rights of billionaire arms dealers and not the citizens of the United States. We need to strip the NRA of its power over our lawmakers. We need to wake up our elected politicians who raise their right hands and vow to fight for our safety against terrorism and socialism while their left hands finger the trigger of a Winchester. Those hands are soaked in blood.
I know that we need common sense gun laws. We do not have even basic safeguards in place; our laws are filled with loopholes that allow firearms to be sold like Doritos at gun shows. Our laws allow a person whose heart boils with blind hatred to walk into a store, purchase an assault rifle, a Glock 17 and multiple magazines, and then use those tools to carry out the most devastating massacre in modern US history. I know that we need to fix these laws. I know that these laws can be fixed and new ones can demonstrably reduce the number of gun deaths in this country. I know that the Centers for Disease Control need to be allowed to study, track and help develop solutions against gun violence in the United States. This is common sense. Right now, we, as a nation, lack common sense.
Murder is not horrendous because it it violent or gruesome. It is the epitome of inhumanity because it represents the ultimate removal of choice. Murder stares into a person’s eyes and denies their spark of life, their conscious thought. It denies their freedom of choice. Murder doesn’t ask; it takes. I know that we, as a nation, should not take from law-abiding citizens in the United States. The new laws that we so desperately need should not remove the freedom of choice from people who love and respect guns. Any new laws should engender that respect. I know that millions of people love guns, and I do not wish to remove a source of joy from anyone’s life. I do, however, know that we can ensure those same people can enjoy their guns for as long as they wish -- without the fear that their next trip to their favorite bar might be their last. That’s where common sense comes in. We, as a nation, can strike this balance.
I wrote the following for Engadget’s tribute to David Bowie on January 11, 2016.
Even though I grew up decades after the launch of "Space Oddity," Ziggy Stardust or even "Under Pressure," David Bowie influenced my young life in incredible, unforgettable ways. I can't hear his voice without soaring into a galaxy of memories: I'm in fifth grade and I hear the name, "David Bowie," for the first time. It's uttered in reverence by a friend who is infinitely ahead of her time (and continues to be today).
I'm in middle school and it's nighttime. I'm sitting in a car outside of an apartment complex with my dad, the volume cranked up as the tinny radio finishes playing "Space Oddity." Bowie croons, Ground control to Major Tom / Commencing countdown, engines on, and my young mind is blown. My dad's name is Tom. Somehow, this song is about him. It's a warm and heartbreaking moment, perhaps the first time I realize that, yes, even my dad is going to die one day. But it's not morbid; it's beautiful.
I'm a teenager, watching Jonathan Rhys Meyers make out with Ewan McGregor in Velvet Goldmine, a movie that parallels Bowie's life and romances to such a degree that he's threatened to sue the production company. I fall in love with the unabashed, unapologetic openness of the glittering, gaunt man that's modeled after Bowie. I fall in love with parts of myself that I'm just beginning to understand.
There are plenty of smaller memories scattered throughout my personal Bowie galaxy -- driving with friends and singing "Under Pressure" at the top of our lungs; dancing on my own to his later work with Trent Reznor; watching him play a convincing Nikola Tesla in The Prestige; devouring his new, gorgeous YouTube music videos. The best part is that I know this galaxy will never run out of stars. Though the man himself has left Earth, Bowie's art will continue to shape my life in small, welcomed ways.
That's the power of art -- it has an unencumbered ability to exist and influence human thought for centuries after its creators have faded to stardust. That's the power of David Bowie. Cheers.
She was born in 1933 and lived an incredible 82 years without ever taking a driver’s test, receiving her license or spending a significant amount of time behind the wheel of any vehicle. Eighty-two years.
Eleven children.
Twenty-six grandchildren.
Eight great-grandchildren.
One devoted, loving marriage.
For decades, my Grandpa Ken did all of the driving. He was a detective in Detroit and Phoenix, and he worked and drove Grandma, himself and his family until he no longer could. Having one driver in their marriage was never a point of contention. It simply was, and the world continued to turn.
You see, Grandma couldn’t drive in the same way humans can’t fly or breathe underwater -- an undisputed, accepted fact that doesn’t detract from anyone’s awesome humanity. She was a woman defined by what she did, rather than what she couldn’t be bothered to do. Even though she never learned to drive, my grandmother did everything.
She lovingly, happily raised 11 children, one of whom ended up being my mother. Early every morning, she prepared breakfast for the entire house and packed a handful of lunches. She baked birthday cakes from scratch and wrapped every present with bright, elegantly curled ribbon. For Christmas, she helped prepare a decadent, nine-course Polish meal. She passed important traditions of love, respect and family down to her children.
And then, when all of her kids had left the house, she did the same for her grandchildren.
As kids, a few cousins and I would visit Grandma and Grandpa in the afternoons, prepared to receive enormous hugs, glasses of milk and a plate of vanilla wafers. We never expected anger, judgement or shouting because they never provided these things. We always expected terrible (yet hilarious) jokes from Grandpa, puzzles with Grandma and a few rounds of Uno or Yahtzee. As we got older, the game changed to Pinochle (though the jokes remained the same). Grandpa never ran out of stories to tell and Grandma never failed to correct his minute mistakes.
”No, no. It was a Thursday, not a Tuesday, because Joan’s birthday was on a Friday that year,” Grandma would say, prompting an exaggerated eye-roll from Grandpa.
But she was always right. She knew her past like it was written in a beloved, detailed textbook and she had photographic recall. She did the crossword every day and she finished every clue before her mug of coffee got cold. She played Tetris and Dr. Mario like she designed them. She smelled like White Diamonds. She glowed.
Grandpa routinely called her a movie star and after more than 50 years of marriage, he still looked at her as if he couldn’t believe his eyes, his luck, his life. She would meet his gaze and offer a smile and smooch in return. When they met all those years ago, she was in pin curls and a babushka. He fell for her immediately. She let him. She was beauty and grace, no matter the state of her perm.
My grandparents were love, purified and rare. They were -- and are -- a driving force behind my lifelong belief in love; one reason I hold it in such impossibly high regard. Because of Grandma and Grandpa, I grew up surrounded by family. I grew up bathed in love.
Grandma couldn’t drive a car. But, every day, she drove Grandpa and her family mad -- with love, of course.
That terrible joke is for you, Grandma and Grandpa.
Dr. Chuck Dick wasn’t a real doctor. He acquired the nickname in college, one semester before receiving his bachelor’s in business, during a 1994 Halloween party hosted by his fraternity, Gamma Kappa Tau. He was frat president, and for years after his own graduation, he attended balls and formal flurries of status and networking, eventually giving speeches and honoring the remarkable marketable deeds of new members – first, for free and out of a sense of loyalty, and later, as he climbed the ranks of corporate public relations, for $40,000 an appearance. His attendance remained stable, at least for a few years.
But during that drunken Halloween extravaganza, when Chuck was still president of Gamma Kappa Tau, two longtime couples (in university time, that is) disbanded – broke up, split, de-friended – loudly and in front of two main groups of the party: behind the built-in hot tub in the back garden, and over the music blasting in the living room. Chuck was dressed as a doctor that year, in line with the party’s Sexy Soap Opera theme. When he heard about each break-up, three hours apart, he immediately found the relevant ex-girlfriend and used the weakness-detection skills he’d picked up in Psychology 202 to talk her down, get her alone and shove at least one hand up her dress and bra, respectively, before feigning remorse and returning her, horny and shameful, to her drunken and grateful boyfriend. The first one was an accident. The second one was an experiment.
After that night, his frat brothers and select classmates affectionately referred to him as Dr. Dick, and on his final day as frat president, he was presented with a plaque declaring him an official Love Doctor. They’d bought a doctorate online, and it was a sweet gesture, considering they’d had to enlist the reluctant help of two computer science majors to get the job done.
So, no – Dr. Dick wasn’t a real doctor. He definitely wasn’t a medical doctor, which was why he couldn’t be sure if his ribs were shattered, fractured or just bruised, or if the river of blood gushing from his nose was more cause for concern than the warm, throbbing gash on the back of his head.
Dr. Dick heaved on the dirt, his throat seizing up as viscous, black fluid poured from his mouth, coating his chin and soaking the collar of his pea-green button-down. He fell from his knees onto his left side in a heavy cloud of dirt and pre-spring pollen. His mouth opened and he gurgled into the dead grass, staining it pitch in the fading evening light. His body convulsed.
Uneven footsteps crunched steadily toward Dr. Dick from behind his prone body. A pair of teal stilettos rounded his head and stopped directly in his line of sight, pointed toes to his nose. The heels repositioned slightly and a body bent down, stopping in a comfortable crouch. Dr. Dick stared at the knees, covered in dark jeans, and the pair of sunglasses that dangled from one bony hand atop long, spidery legs.
“Pardon me, Sir,” a bubbly, raspy voice began. “I’d like a minute of your time, if you can spare it. Though at this point, I’m not sure that you can.” The legs twisted as the owner of the knees tried to meet Dr. Dick’s bulging eyes. Dr. Dick gurgled and heaved onto the dirt again, gasping out a wet, thick breath. His vision darkened and then returned.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” the stilettos continued. “See, I have a rather pressing problem at the moment. I’m in a jam. But, I think you can help. In fact, you’re the only person in the entire world who can help me with this, and that’s exactly my problem. Thing is, you’re dying. Painfully and unkindly, and, it seems, quickly. More importantly, you’re dying – hey, this is the important part. Pay attention.”
The hand with the sunglasses reached out and slapped Dr. Dick’s cheek, smearing tar further up his face. He wheezed and shook.
“You, Dr. Dick, you’re dying on my property. Do you see my problem? This is a huge ol’ lawsuit just waiting to happen. Paperwork for days. I mean, how does this look to your employer? You come here on a job, annoy the fuck out of an entire town, and then mysteriously disappear?”
The sunglasses rose and fell in an exaggerated pantomime of exasperation.
“Because that’s what we’re going to do to you, make you disappear. Poof. They may send detectives and cops with dogs out here to search, but they’ll never find your body because it will simply not exist anymore. We’re going to throw it in that pit – hey.”
The sunglasses slapped again, harder, startling Dr. Dick’s fading senses and forcing his mouth to eject another stream of black, bloody goo.
“We’ll toss your body into that pit, along with your car, and we’ll pave right over it. Maybe put a nice gazebo on top of everything. Somewhere for folks to sit and watch the sunset. And the cops will come and then they’ll leave, they’ll go home, they’ll have dinner, and they’ll forget all about you. They will close your case and move on, and they’ll never think about that nice, quiet town with the new gazebo ever again. You will not be remembered and you will not be mourned. I guarantee it.”
Dr. Dick felt the moment his heart stopped, body still twitching as it tried to expel the poison in his gut and lungs. His ears rang and blackness crept into his vision. The hand with the sunglasses held up a finger.
“One second, just one second.” The free hand pulled a folded stack of papers from a back pocket. “Before you die, would you sign these papers absolving me, the owner of the property you’re about to die on, of any legal consequence relating to your death? It would help out a ton, in case by some miracle someone decides to dig in this exact spot 50 or 100 years from now and discovers your dissolved, stripped remains in that pit under the gazebo. I want my family to be protected. Gotta think about the future, you know? Well, maybe you don’t.”
Dr. Dick blinked a final time. The last thing he saw before he died was a gold pen, dangling in front of his face.
Jon Stewart made me look like an ass at the airport
In 2010, I flew across the country to not see Jon Stewart.
I didn’t intend to not see Stewart, but I should have expected it. The trip was for the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear, a slightly humorous but deeply serious gathering of 215,000 people who believed earnestly in intelligent public debate and the merits of an informed republic, presented by Stewart and Stephen Colbert. Maybe I didn’t expect that many people to show up, or maybe I didn’t understand the mobilizing appeal of Stewart’s message, but by the time I stepped onto the Mall early on rally morning, I hit a wall thousands of people deep. I ended up on the edges of a crowd, with a view of someone’s hair and the stage a pinprick in the distance. People climbed trees and porta pottys around me, and I cursed myself for not thinking of the “sit on top of people while they poop” tactic first. I could hear Stewart, at least, and everyone was giddy and energized, and it still felt like something special.
I was a journalism student, in my junior year at ASU’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism in Phoenix, Arizona. The flight to DC was my first unattended by airport-savvy adults, and I ended up stalling the baggage-check line because I had packed full bottles of Victoria’s Secret Love Spell body spray and lotion in my carry-on luggage. I was a fool, and the security folks made sure the entire line behind me knew it.
Still, I made it to DC. I even wrote a news article and a pseudo-editorial about the rally for my newswriting class. They were strange pieces, as I attempted to adhere to journalistic standards that I didn’t yet understand enough to bend to my own voice as a writer, and my interview game was awkward at best. Plus, I wrote them after a full, cold day of standing and yelling and no food until dinner, where I scarfed down a burger and three beers in an hour flat.
I recall asking one police officer how the Rally to Restore Sanity compared with other events he’d worked on the National Mall. I don’t remember what he said.
I do remember Stewart’s closing monologue. It was about traffic – about the way drivers on even the busiest highway on-ramp work together to let each other get home. Stewart argued that during rush hour every weekday, one car merged from the left, and then the right, and then the left, without first questioning the political views of any driver. Everyone worked together, as fellow humans first, to get something done. It was cheesy and, I thought at the time, an odd and unsexy metaphor – but I still think about it every time I get on the highway. Unsexy, but perhaps lasting.
To be fair, I don’t think “unsexy, but perhaps lasting” is an accurate way to summarize Stewart’s years on The Daily Show. First, he’s an undisputable silver fox. Second, his coverage of politics and the media – and I do mean coverage in a journalistic sense as well as from an entertainment angle – helped shape a generation of journalists. He didn’t always do the news, but he always had a point. He presented it clearly. He displayed it in an accessible and intelligent way. He saw the systems for what they were – broken and bruised – and he called out the people responsible. He straddled two worlds with grace and professionalism, even while eating a blueberry pancake-wrapped sausage on a stick dipped in Baconnaise Lite.
As a comedy fan: Bless you, Jon Stewart.
As a journalist: Thank you.
In the hotel near Washington, DC, getting ready for the rally
The following is a sample of the interview-style segments dispersed throughout my novel, Master Ventriloquist (45,700 words, philosophical literary fiction in a near-future world).
NEW SCIENTIST
Feb. 26, 2069
Snapping the Strings of the Loab Theory
Interview by Joshua Klanbert
He’s the closest thing this age has seen to the next coming of Christ, a veritable dead mass of body and brain reanimated, brought back into full and flourishing life. In this sense, Scott Loab is also the closest thing we’ve seen to Frankenstein’s monster or the beginning of the decades-imminent zombie hordes. These all amount to the same thing, many would argue, while more would balk at such a grotesque heathen’s comparison. It is true regardless—Scott Loab, the first and only successful brain-transplant patient, is a modern-day miracle and medical curiosity.
Almost five years ago to date, Scott Loab, then a patient at St. Mary’s Cancer Treatment Center, partook in an extremely dangerous and untested surgery to remove his entire brain—seven-inch cerebral tumor and all—and replace it with another man’s healthy substitute (the identity of whom has yet to be released). The odds of such an operation resulting in a successful transplant and consequent fully functioning recipient were estimated at just below 7 billion to one, with many of the complications centered on the decay rate of a disconnected human brain. Once cut off from the rest of the central nervous system, including blood and oxygen flows, the human brain can remain unharmed for two minutes, from there incurring permanent damage to select lobes and system cores until the entire organ is rendered completely dead. Many experts’ best expectations stopped just short of vegetable status for Loab once he recovered, and that was only if he survived at all.
Today, five years later, Scott Loab sits across from me, shaking my hand firmly and waiting for the line of questioning to begin with a steel glare behind his very-much-alive eyes. Yet not only is he alive, he is brimming with the insights and charm of a well-educated man of 32, the only indication of his truly amazing procedure a thin, nearly invisible, scar running across his forehead and presumably into the blond hair covering his cranium. I begin there.
KLANBERT: Scott, you appear to have returned to a normal life, unburdened by any medical ills or malignant consequences from the surgery. Do you truly feel that you have made a full recovery into normalcy by now?
LOAB: That’s a loaded question. Obviously my life now is far from ordinary, even outside of the medical arena. I’m famous, whether I want it or not, and plenty of celebrity ghostwriters have already argued against the normalcy of fame. But in the medical sense, I feel completely recovered.
KLANBERT: Your doctors, Dr. Beland and Dr. Eiser, still perform frequent checks on your mental and physical states, I’m sure.
LOAB: Once a week, yeah. I guess that’s not entirely normal, but I think we’ve established the relativity of the word.
KLANBERT: Sure. But for the purpose of continuing the interview: Your life is as normal as anyone else who hasn’t had a brain transplant?
LOAB: If you really need to hear it like that, then sure.
KLANBERT: I’m just trying to clarify, Scott. No offense intended.
LOAB: That’s fine.
KLANBERT: Wonderful. Now, I’m sure you’ve studied intensely the details of your procedure and the risks you decided to take almost five years ago. Looking back, knowing what you know now and the dangers involved in such a procedure, do you think you still would have decided to attempt it?
LOAB: Ah, the “what if?” question. It seems pointless to ask. The fact that I’m here and conscious enough for you to ask it should be your answer. But since you seem to value direct responses: Of course I would have. I was dying. I had a brain tumor the size of a toddler in my skull; I had been through months of chemo, radiation and exploratory neurosurgeries, and everyone still told me I was doomed. Any fear I had of death at that point was instinctual, not logical. I wanted to die. If the surgery failed and I died on the slab, I won. If the surgery succeeded, I won. If it only worked halfway and I was left vegetative, I’d be easily entertained for a few weeks, and then I’d die—another win. It was a win-win-win situation for me.
KLANBERT: That sounds like it was a trying time for you, and I’m sure many people suffering from similar ailments can sympathize.
LOAB: Doubtful.
KLANBERT: That others sympathize?
LOAB: That others have similar ailments.
KLANBERT: Fair enough. Are you not glad that the surgery did in fact succeed? Was life not the better option in the end, or do you still feel that death would have been comparable?
LOAB: Like I said, my survival instinct is satisfied. Rationally, it still doesn’t make much difference to me. I’m alive now, but it seems pointless to have saved me. I’ll still die, just like everyone else. Only difference is, I am not as scared of it as most people seem to be. I’ve done it once already and it’s really not that bad.
KLANBERT: And what exactly was it like, death?
LOAB: You realize you’ve had five years to think of new questions, right?
KLANBERT: And you’ve had five years to answer this one .… Scott?
LOAB: Hmm. I assume my hindsight on death would be different had it come as a surprise, or had I been in the middle of something truly meaningful with my life. But I was diseased and in debt, nothing really worth sticking around for.
KLANBERT: But death itself. How would you describe the process, the sentiment behind dying?
LOAB: I wouldn’t.
KLANBERT: You wouldn’t?
LOAB: How would you explain the sentiment behind a fleck of dust in a river of concrete just before it hardens? The sense of unconsciousness as your body is flayed apart and your organs are rearranged and the doctors are doing who knows what to the remaining parts of your anatomy while you lie there and experience none of it? The emotion of a black hole? There is no process, no experience, no awareness. No description.
"We do keep replaying these images because they are just so dramatic."
CBSN anchor over looping footage of the final moments of the Sydney siege
Drama makes good television and, at times, it is part of important news. However, drama is not why the images are important to the news audience – drama is important to the marketing people and ratings analysts. Drama is juicy and plumps up those viewer numbers nicely. Drama is what makes The Real Housewives and Mad Men track so well. Drama is secondary to a journalist's job – sometimes relevant, but never the first priority.
Drama makes good television.
An email (the old new letter) I wrote to Alec C. Johnson this morning:
* * *
I love the conversation behind this piece: What if atheists were defined by their actions?
More than wanting to distance myself from a group of insensitive assholes who push atheism just as hard as Westboro nuts push theism, I don't like to apply a non-label to myself. Atheism is intrinsically a non-idea, a non-belief, an absence rather than a representation of fulfillment. It says nothing about what I do believe – in love, humanity, the beautiful mysteries of the mind, science, you – and it is a label borne of an inherently theistic society. It is a word of our times, and I do not believe it will last.
Now, to figure out a better word. I am not "against" theism, so the attempt to define a belief and behavior structure as "anti-something" is ill-fated. What do I stand for? Within the realm of belief and enlightenment, what do I hold dear?
Love, perhaps. Love is one of the truest and most consistent beliefs that I hold, even as I recognize that I don't know what it is, why it works or how I feel it. Even as I fear it's Soma created by those eager to make money on the backs of young, hormonal people and older ones who feel they'll die alone. It's said we all die alone anyway, but I've never understood this perspective. It is a thing that we each enact on our own, but that does not mean we are alone, as a state of being. I have been alone, even without myself, lost in that hollowness that consumes the top of my head and drips into my neck and chest – if I die that way, maybe it will be alone. But even then, you are now there, on the periphery, pulling me back.
Sidetracked.
And perhaps now I see why my dad said I speak about you as a savior. I might see you that way. I'm sorry for that pressure – but I hope you place it on me in return and in equal measure. I think you do. That is the balance.
But a religious idea formed around "love" is too nebulous for me – every person has a vastly different definition of the word. Besides, a belief system based on love recalls the commercialized flower power of the 60s (still a time when people stood for something, while also against other things, which I find as deeply moving as Hunter's high water mark).
Equally ridiculous is the idea of you as my religion. You are my support and light and darkness and muse, but you are these things because you are human. To make you a god undermines all that you are. Besides, turning men into gods is how wars start.
I don't know why I'm seeking a label today. I don't have much use for one, other than to more effectively communicate with people I've never met, and you know how much I don't care for that. A different story in the headlines today pissed me off, and I might be channeling that anger into this, a dissection of a part of myself, rather than a rant about a troll flashing in the pan. Torture reports and injustice abound; maybe this is my way of ignoring it all, for just a moment. Maybe I feel the drips starting to seep into my spine, and the novel is done, meaning this has nowhere else to go at the moment, aside from the holes within my half-formed ideas of The Next Story.
I do believe. I do love. I do so many things, all of them part of some larger code, an internal push to act a certain way for some tall reason. Morality and ethics, emotion and action. I don't know the right word for these things, within a belief structure, but it is something to ponder.
I love you and good morning.
Regarding Michael Brown’s death at the hands and gun of Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson:
I am privileged. I am privileged to feel anger and then have the ability to tamp it down, let it simmer, rationalize it. I am privileged to have peace of mind that allows me to take a step back and attempt to gain perspective, consider the context and absorb the information pouring in from all sides.
It is easy to believe what we want to be true. It is easy to view the world in black and white, good and evil, victim and authority. It is difficult to believe something that we sincerely, deeply don’t want to be true. It is arduous to conceive that we are, all of us, human and fallible, filled with good and bad and infinitely more shades of gray than fifty.
Murder is wrong. Killing is wrong. To an overwhelming majority of people in the world, death is the worst thing that a human could impose on another human. It is despicable, disgusting and unforgivable. “Justified murder” is an oxymoron. It does not compute, and it does not exist in this world of moral contrast – black and white, good and evil, victim and authority.
But there is always context. The world is never halved by good and evil. The world is filled with humans, who are by nature too complex to be so binary – we have impulses and responsibilities, good days and bad days, training and ignorance. We are imbued with social mores and raised in communities that impose subtle biases in our thoughts and actions – on top of the loud, obvious prejudices we freely recognize within ourselves.
I do not know if Wilson shot and killed Michael Brown in cold blood, or if Brown antagonized Wilson until he legitimately feared for his life and fired those fatal shots. Justified murder, the great oxymoron. No matter how many trials and juries pass judgment on the issue, I doubt I will ever be truly satisfied with the verdicts. One verdict assumes that Wilson shot and killed Brown for no other reason than he was black and nearby. This is a Horrendous Thing. The other verdict assumes that Wilson did not kill Brown in cold blood. This is a Good Thing – one fewer racist, trigger-happy police officer in the world is a Good Thing.
But it will never be Good because a man is dead.
One thing remains clear: I do not know what happened. At this point, I cannot know. Very few people can. Perhaps only – sadly – one.
This is the angle at which I approach the killing: I do not know. And without exhaustive, extensive research and air-tight dot-connecting, I will not know what happened. Until then, I will not know if this murder was justified according to US law or by my own moral standards, two extremely disparate things.
The first part of that equation is up to the prosecutors, defenders and judges handling the court cases. The second part is up to me. Only I know how far my moral code stretches, but I do always know that it is my own morality, and it is not applicable to anyone else. This moral code is mine; get your own. No, you have your own, and I will not impose mine into it. That is respect.
In their handling of the grand jury case, it is clear that some journalists do not respect their audiences. These reporters have decided – for themselves and for you – the boundaries of the moral code in this case. They have decided who is guilty and who is innocent, in those extreme terms, by similarly extreme standards. Black and white, good and evil, victim and authority.
This is fine in an opinion piece, in an editorial that clearly presents one person’s view, backed up by data and context. But this personal moral code is presented as fact by some journalists, embedded in news articles and on-air analyses. It screams at the audience, “This is wrong; this is right; this is what guilt looks like.”
This is not the media’s job.
Assigning guilt is sometimes a journalist’s job, when it is uncovering a conspiracy or discovering unjust practices in business, society or politics. When the facts of a killing do not add up and there is hard evidence that, somehow, its investigation was botched, a journalist can present that evidence, tell that story and ask those questions. But first the journalist must make sure that these questions need to be asked, that this narrative is valid and that the evidence supports it.
Evidence in the Michael Brown grand jury case was released this week. Thousands of pages and images, scrolls of text and testimony. Thousands.
If the evidence clearly and truly supports the idea that Wilson shot Brown in cold blood, these documents may show it. This is the evidence used to refuse his indictment, and if that refusal was wrong, this is where it can be outed. There is no reason to inject early conjecture into these documents, no reason other than ego and personal moral outrage to propose that Wilson or any of the witnesses were lying. Not without facts supporting these positions.
Journalists will believe certain things because journalists, too, are human. The idea of objective journalism is largely misunderstood. Objective journalism does not mean that the journalist is personally objective, that this person has stripped out all emotion and is now computer-like in his or her analysis. That simply isn’t possible, and I’m glad it’s not. Humanity is a Good Thing.
But it is possible to report objectively. It is possible to let the facts speak for themselves. It is possible to tell a story, fill it with empathy and data and context, and let it tell the truth, as far as anyone can know it.
That is what I’m searching for, alongside the opinion pieces and personal perspectives on this terrible situation. Either a man is dead for a lawful reason, or a man is dead for an awful reason. Still, a man is dead.
Most of humanity agrees that this is morally repugnant. We do not need to be told so. And journalists do not need to tell us that they think so as well, while couching this position as a piece of news. “BREAKING: Murder is wrong. More at 10.”
There are huge, clear issues with the systems involved in this case. Representation in police forces, racial tensions that plague our society decades after the Civil Rights Movement, special treatment afforded to people in positions of power, mistrust of our judicial processes. A history of treating black lives with less consideration than white lives. If anything beneficial stems from Michael Brown’s death, it is that these problems are now visible to wider society and we can start addressing them in real ways.
Right now, it is the courts’ job to review the facts and assign guilt. It is the media’s job to lay out these issues, relate them to the audience, and help create a society where positive change can more easily take place. Journalists are doing this job and many are doing it damn well – but it is at times hard to hear over the all-caps, off-the-cuff drama and disrespect streaming through news feeds.
Respect the facts, respect the audience. Respect humanity.
