Daily Archives: May 20, 2021

On Wednesday, the House voted to create a commission to look into the Jan. 6 insurrection.

Thirty-five Republicans joined Democrats to pass it, but they did so over the objections of the House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, who opposed the bill. The Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, joined him in opposition.

The Republican leadership in Congress seems to be engaged in a coordinated effort to reduce and minimize the attack on the U.S. Capitol, or even erase it all together.

One reason used to oppose the commission is that it would be redundant of work already being done by the Justice Department and Congress itself.

But another, used by McCarthy, was specifically to muddy the water by widening the inquiry to include investigations into anti-fascists and Black Lives Matter. It was a clear attempt to establish an equivalency, to reduce the historic nature of the insurrection while simultaneously elevating issues with other groups.

They want to flatten all of this into a single mass of things that happened during the pandemic, none better or worse than the other, things happening on the ideological left as well as the right.

But, these things are not equal at all. They know this. But, this is how propaganda is born and history is buried. It is shockingly easy to do and has been often done.

We are just weeks away from the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa Massacre, when in 1921, white citizens of that city aided by the National Guard, it should be noted destroyed the Greenwood section of that city, a prosperous, self-sufficient community known as Black Wall Street, killing as many at 300 people and leaving 8,000 others homeless.

One of the most remarkable things about that massacre was the concerted effort by the city to erase it from history, and just how effective that campaign was.

Now, to be sure, that massacre happened before the time of television, the internet, social media and cellphones. But, there were images, not to mention the scores of families who lost loved ones. There were graves.

As The New York Times has reported:

After the massacre, officials set about erasing it from the citys historical record. Victims were buried in unmarked graves. Police records vanished. The inflammatory Tulsa Tribune articles were cut out before the newspapers were transferred to microfilm.

The Times continued, City officials cleansed the history books so thoroughly that when Nancy Feldman, a lawyer from Illinois, started teaching her students at the University of Tulsa about the massacre in the late 1940s, they didnt believe her.

We sometimes underestimate human impulses and human nature when we simply assume that the memory of a thing, a horrible thing, will last forever.

Often the perpetrators of the offense desperately want to let the stigma fade, and the victim hesitates to pass on the pain of it to children and family. Everyone awaits the healing power of time, like the jagged rock thrown into the river that eventually becomes smooth stone.

That happened in Tulsa. The first full history of the massacre was not written until 1982 when Scott Ellsworth wrote Death in a Promised Land, and a commission to fully study what happened in Tulsa wasnt established until 1997. Its report was issued in 2001.

We have a tendency to drift away from the fullness of history even when the truth isnt actively suppressed. Think about things like how horrible Christopher Columbus actually was, or the massacres of native people and all the broken treaties that helped grow the geography of this country, or how many of the pioneers of gay rights were trans people and drag queens.

We are horrible transmitters of the truth. We are also horrible receptors. It is like the game you played as a child when something was whispered from child to child, and what the last child hears bears no resemblance to what the first child said.

Even when we record things, in writing, or by photography or even video, something gets lost in the transfer: the severity, the solemnity, the impact.

This is why memorials and monuments are important in society, to aid collective memory and reflection. This is also why monuments are often used as tools of propaganda, because they have helped create false narratives that alter collective memory. Many Confederate monuments were erected precisely for this purpose.

So, when I see Republicans trying to alter our perception of the insurrection, I do not take that lightly. There is nothing silly or trivial about it. Memory is malleable. This tactic may now fail on 50 and work on five, but years from now it may be the inverse ratio.

We absorb the stories we are told, too often without circumspection, imbuing them with the authority of the tell. So, when authorities tell a lie or diminish something, many people will accept it as told.

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Opinion | History Can Be Erased. It Often Has Been. - The New York Times

Good morning.

The California landscape has been shaped by intentional fires for millenniums. What European settlers in the 19th century took as a natural habitat was the result of what fire experts say was the deliberate burning of millions of acres of forests and chaparral every year by Native tribes.

Now, after four years of particularly destructive fires, there is broad consensus among experts and government officials that California should embrace Indigenous traditions and the notion that good fire is crucial to preventing the destructive power of megafires.

But a prescribed burn last week in Modoc County, in the far northeastern corner of the state, underlines the difficulties of using fire as a forest management tool.

Youre talking about dozens of people and thousands of hours of planning, said Ken Sandusky, the public affairs officer for the Modoc National Forest. You have objectors time, and litigation time. You could get into the tens of thousands of hours to get to the point where you are running chain saws and putting fire on the ground.

Before contact with Europeans, California tribes not only had thousands of years of burning tradition to guide them, but they also were free of the lawyers, paperwork, environmental impact assessments, and thicket of national and state regulations that forest managers face today.

Sandusky said the burn in Modoc last week, which covered 29 acres in the national forest, was possible only because of a decade of preparation that has allowed for several hundred acres to be burned a year. The controlled burn was done to protect the most vulnerable trees and clear out the fuels that create a more volatile fire.

Prescribed burning across the state has been curtailed this year by the dry conditions that make fires more dangerous to manage and control. Fire experts pointed to the Palisades Fire in western Los Angeles in recent days as a measure of the drought-stricken California landscape.

We used to burn into June fairly often when I first got to the Modoc, said Mandi Shoaf, a fuels specialist in the Modoc National Forest who has worked in the area for more than a decade. Now we are lucky to get a window late April, early May before fire season really kicks off.

Prescribed burns are often preceded by the mechanical removal of trees and brush. The wood is sold as boards or chips, helping to recover the cost of the operation. In Modoc, forest management helps preserve older Ponderosa pines, some of which are older than 200 years. The burning also promotes new growth, which serves as food for local elk and other wildlife.

Don Hankins, a fire expert who is working with California tribes to revive Indigenous burning practices, said caution and preparation were key to successful burns. The Cerro Grande Fire, a prescribed burn in New Mexico two decades ago that raged out of control and destroyed more than 200 homes, was a scarring experience for fire experts.

But Hankins and other experts argue that liability questions and bureaucracy have made prescribed burning too cumbersome in California.

We overcomplicate things, he said.

Compiled by Jonathan Wolfe

Riverside County disagrees with the states mask rules and wants to lift restrictions in most settings sooner than the rest of the state, The Press-Enterprise reports.

A new poll found that two out of three Californians support allowing some businesses to verify the vaccination status of customers, The Sacramento Bee reports.

Citizen, a neighborhood crime and safety app, falsely accused a man of starting a Los Angeles wildfire and set off a manhunt for the wrong person.

When it comes to drought preparedness in the state, CalMatters found a mixed bag: Wells are still being over pumped, but urban residents have been better about not wasting water.

In some areas of the state, drought conditions are so bad that farmers are choosing not to plant crops this season, Bloomberg reports.

The rapper T.I. and his wife, Tameka Harris, are under investigation by the L.A.P.D. after multiple women accused the couple of drugging and sexually assaulting them.

As the planet warms, ecologists in the National Park Service are adjusting their core mission of absolute conservation and are instead deciding what to safeguard and what to let slip away.

The Guardian examined the deadly toll of Californias ghost guns, homemade weapons that are untraceable and coveted in many vulnerable communities.

A state regulator is reviewing whether Tesla violated regulations by falsely promising that its car-driving technology was full self-driving, Reuters reports.

The Mercury News looked at the most popular baby names in the state. At the top of the list: Olivia for girls and Noah for boys.

California Today goes live at 6:30 a.m. Pacific time weekdays. Tell us what you want to see: CAtoday@nytimes.com. Were you forwarded this email? Sign up for California Today here and read every edition online here.

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The Meaning and History of a Controlled Burn - The New York Times

June 2015: LeBron and Steph meet in the Finals for the first time, but with Kevin Love out for the series and Kyrie Irving injuring his knee in Game 1, some hinted that Stephs first championship needed an asterisk.

ESPN Reporter Brian Windhorst: The Cavs had bristled watching the Warriors celebrate, feeling there was an unfairness they couldnt do anything about. [Return of the King: LeBron James, the Cleveland Cavaliers, and the Greatest Comeback in NBA History]

James: We ran out of talent. There was a lot of talent sitting in suits. Ive been watching basketball for a long time, Im a historian of the game. I dont know any other team thats gotten to the Finals without two All-Stars. [USA Today]

Windhorst: Jamess implication was that theyd faced extreme, in his mind historic, obstacles. The Warriors had been fully healthy throughout the season and the playoffs. Not only had they played the injury-riddled Cavs, but some of their other opponents had had significant injuries as well. [Return of the King]

Curry: I apologize for us being healthy. I apologize for us playing who was in front of us. I apologize for all the accolades we received as a team and individually. Im very, truly sorry, and well rectify that situation this year. [ESPN]

December 2015: LeBron had just signed a lifetime contract with Nike, but Stephs signature shoe was boomingMorgan Stanley projected that it would surpass LeBrons shoe sales for the year, although it ultimately came up short.

Reporter, talking to LeBron postgame: Under Armour just released a commercial

James: Who?

Reporter: Under Armour.

James: Who is that? I dont know what youre talking about.

January 2016: Steph and the Warriors return to Cleveland for the first time since celebrating their championship. Cheers!

Curry: "Obviously, walking in the locker room, it'll be good memories. Hopefully, it still smells a little bit like champagne."

NBA Reporter Chris Haynes: Sources are telling Cleveland.com that members of the Cavaliers have taken exception to the quote and viewed it as disrespectful.

When LeBron James finished up his media address after shootaround this morning, he walked away asking reporters why no one asked him about Curry's comments. He said he had an answer for it. [Cleveland.com]

Curry:

May 2016: Steph becomes the first unanimous winner of the MVP award in 2015-16 (LeBron fell one vote shy of the same achievement in 2013). Its Stephs second MVP in a row, and the second straight year LeBron finishes in third. LeBron, not for the last time, muses on the criteria for selection; Steph muses on criticism from Hall of Famers that he looks up to.

See more here:

The History of LeBron James and Stephen Currys Rivalrous Friendship - GQ

Aletha Maybank:

There's just a tremendous still lack of diversity, of having Black physicians and Latinx physicians, as well as Native American physicians, who have been completely excluded still from the medical profession.

We're the ones, as AMA, who commissioned Abraham Flexner. We valued this model of significant scientific rigor and really evaluated schools across the country in the early 1900s and said, if you didn't have that, if you didn't have those types of resources, we didn't think you were a good enough school to stay open, basically.

And so that impacted, as you can imagine, many Black med schools that aren't going to be resourced. And so five were recommended to shut down. And, in addition, the part that really I think really speaks to the impact at that time, AMA was also excluding Black physicians.

And so, back then, in order to get licensed to hospitals, you actually had to be a member of theMD-IN medical society within your local community, which was an AMA, or American Medical Association, affiliate. So, if you couldn't gain membership to an AMA medical affiliate, you couldn't gain a license to work at the local hospital.

So, now you have Black physicians who also can't find hospitals to work at, which impacts in our communities. We have to take a look at that entirety of the history and its impacts.

Original post:

Examining the AMA's racist history and its overdue reckoning - PBS NewsHour

Local historians and Northern Michigan University alumni Barry James ('92) and Troy Henderson ('99) will give a virtual presentation on Upper Peninsula history for the next Northern Now event for NMU alumni and friends. Their free presentation begins at 7 p.m. EST Wednesday, May 26.

James and Henderson will discuss early U.P. history, highlighting Fayette Historic State Park on Big Bay de Noc, the Michigan Iron Industry Museum in Negauneeand Fort Wilkins Historic Park in Copper Harbor. Their talk will be followed by alive Q&A session facilitated by Susy Ziegler, head of the Earth, Environmental and Geographical Sciences Department and associate dean of the College of Arts andSciences.

Advance registration is required to obtain a link to the live stream. It can be completed directly here or from a link at nmu.edu/alumniassociation/.

Northern Now is a monthly, digital event series for alumni and friends hosted by the Northern Michigan University Alumni Association on the second Wednesday of each month. It provides a behind-the-scenes look at NMU students, departments, athleticsand more on campus with exclusive tours, interviewsand interactive events.

Media contact: Kylie Bunting at kbunting@nmu.edu or227-2529.

See the original post here:

'Northern Now' Focuses on UP History | Northern Today - Northern Today

The United States has vetoed dozens of United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions critical of Israel, including at least 53 since 1972, according to UN data.

With the latest escalation of violence between Israel and the Palestinians now in its tenth day, the US has stuck to that playbook. On Monday, Washington blocked a joint statement calling for an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas the USs third such veto reportedly within a week.

The USs unequivocal support of Israel has seen it thwart resolutions condemning violence against protesters, illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank built since 1967 and even calls for an investigation into the 1990 killing of seven Palestinian workers by a former Israeli soldier.

Critics say Washingtons blanket support of Israel encourages a disproportionate use of force against Palestinians, including Israels current bombardment of the besieged Gaza Strip, which has killed at least 219 Palestinians, including 63 children.

Here is a list of some of the major vetoes cast by the US over the years:

Palestinians in Gaza began protesting at the Israeli border fence in March 2018, calling for the right of return to ancestral homes from which their families were expelled in 1948 during what Palestinians call the Nakbah, or the creation of the state of Israel. The UN estimates 750,000 Palestinians were expelled that year.

Palestinians faced sniper fire from Israeli forces during the year-long protests, which killed at least 266 people and injured roughly 30,000 more, according to Gazas health ministry.

A Palestinian protester hurls stones at Israeli troops during a protest at the Gaza Strips border with Israel during weekly Palestinian demonstrations along the Gaza Strips frontier with Israel on September 28, 2018 [File: Khalil Hamra/AP Photo]On June 1, 2018, the UNSC drafted a resolution (PDF) expressing grave concern at the escalation of violence and tensions since the protests began and deep alarm at the loss of civilian lives and the high number of casualties among Palestinian civilians, particularly in the Gaza Strip, including casualties among children, caused by the Israeli forces.

The US vetoed the resolution (PDF), with then-US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley saying it presented a grossly one-sided view of what has taken place in Gaza in recent weeks.

Haley blamed Hamas for the violence.

East Jerusalem is meant to be the capital of a future Palestinian state, as outlined in international agreements. But the area has been occupied by Israel since 1967, when Israeli forces defeated forces from Jordan which controlled East Jerusalem and the West Bank at the time Egypt, Syria and allied Palestinians, to occupy all of historic Palestine.

The status of occupied East Jerusalem was meant to be determined through peace negotiations. International law, including UNSC resolutions, state that East Jerusalem is not to be considered Israeli territory.

Palestinians evacuate a wounded man during clashes with Israeli security forces in front of the Dome of the Rock at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalems Old City on May 10, 2021 [File: Mahmoud Illean/AP Photo]But former President Donald Trump recognised Jerusalem as Israels capital in December 2017.

A draft resolution (PDF) from December 18, 2017, wrote that any decisions and actions which purport to have altered, the character, status or demographic composition of the Holy City of Jerusalem have no legal effect, are null and void and must be rescinded in compliance with relevant resolutions of the Security Council.

In vetoing the resolution, Haley said (PDF) the US had the courage and honesty to recognize a fundamental reality. Jerusalem has been the political, cultural and spiritual homeland of the Jewish people for thousands of years.

The Second Intifada, or Palestinian uprising, ignited on September 28, 2000, when then-Israeli opposition leader Ariel Sharon, accompanied by heavily armed forces, entered the al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem.

The provocative act sparked long-simmering frustrations over the failed promises of the Oslo Accords to end Israels occupation of Palestinian lands.

The Oslo Accords were signed by then-Palestinian Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1993.

But the occupation continued into 2000, with Israeli settlements increasing and Palestinian sovereignty nowhere in sight.

In December 2001, a slew of suicide bombings led Israel to retaliate by destroying much of Arafats Ramallah headquarters, essentially forcing him into house arrest. The Second Intifada, a period of intensified Israeli-Palestinian tension, began in late September 2000 [File: Abbas Momani/AFP via Getty Images]In contrast to the First Intifada in the late 1980s and early 1990s that was largely peaceful, the Second Intifada was very violent, with Palestinian armed groups attacking Israeli forces and a sharp increase in suicide attacks against Israeli civilian centres.

The death toll stood at over 3,000 Palestinians and close to 1,000 Israelis, along with 45 foreigners, according to a BBC tally.

A draft UNSC resolution (PDF) from December 2001 expressed grave concern at the continuation of the tragic and violent events that have taken place since September 2000, condemned attacks against civilians and called for peace talks to resume.

When vetoing the resolution, then-US Ambassador to the UN John Negroponte said the draft resolution before us fails to address the dynamic at work in the region. Instead, its purpose is to isolate politically one of the parties.

The US has vetoed at least four UNSC resolutions condemning Israels settlements on Palestinian land, which are considered illegal under international law.

There are between 600,000 and 750,000 Israeli settlers in at least 250 settlements (130 official, 120 unofficial) in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.

These settlements have exploded under the rule of hawkish Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who began his current term in 2005. They have long been considered a major roadblock to achieving a Palestinian state.

US vetoes of resolutions condemning Israels settlements date back to at least 1983. The most recent was in 2011 (PDF), when a draft resolution aimed to reaffirm all Israeli settlement activities in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, are illegal and constitute a major obstacle to the achievement of peace on the basis of the two-State solution.

Then-US Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice said Washington agreed that settlement activity is illegal, but we think it unwise for this Council to attempt to resolve the core issues that divide Israelis and Palestinians. Therefore, regrettably, we have opposed this draft resolution.

Rice served under former President Barack Obama, who caused diplomatic controversyin 2016, months before he left office to be succeeded by Trump, when he instructed the US to abstain from vetoing a similar UNSC resolution against settlement activity.

US President Joe Biden, who served as Obamas vice president, is known for his support of Israel. But he is facing pressure from progressive Democrats and others to take a greater role in supporting Palestinian rights.

Biden publicly voiced support for a ceasefire on Monday, a demand posed in a letter signed by 25 Democratic lawmakers. But he has also stuck with Washingtons long-established policy of failing to acknowledge the deeply asymmetric nature of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by expressing his unwavering support for Israel and its right to defend itself.

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A history of the US blocking UN resolutions against Israel - Al Jazeera English

Detroit Tigers starting pitcher Spencer Turnbull didnt feel great in the bullpen before Tuesday nights game in Seattle.

No, thats being too kind. It was some of the worst stuff Ive ever had, he said.

But Turnbull didnt panic, didnt even worry. If there was a theme of the best start of his career, it was that the Tigers 28-year-old right-hander, in the 50th big-league start of his career, pitched without overthinking, without hesitation and without fear.

The whole night I was like, Im not going to be afraid to make any pitches, Turnbull said after the celebration had abated. Im not going to second-guess or doubt or have any fear about anything.

The result was an evening of historical proportions.

Turnbull threw just the eighth no-hitter in the Tigers 120-year history and the first in 37 years by someone not named Justin Verlander. He allowed just two walks in the Tigers 5-0 win over the Seattle Mariners.

I dont really know how to think of it from a historical perspective, Turnbull said. But for myself, obviously, its the greatest achievement of my life so far. Or at least my baseball career. Its by far the best night of my life. Its one of those landmark stamps on my career up to this point. Im just happy to be here and happy to be a part of it and happy to have my name written on something that can never be taken away.

When it was over, he had a long embrace with catcher Eric Haase, with whom he had shared the three-hour battle, and was mobbed by teammates. He hugged each of them, giving extra emphasis to Jeimer Candelario, who made a brilliant defensive play in the seventh to extend the no-hitter.

Turnbull said he didnt focus too much on the looming feat in the ninth inning, when he felt that pressure was inevitable and it would be pointless to ignore it.

Once I got to that point, I was like, All right, Im going to be nervous. This is just crazy. But Im going to go out there and keep doing the same thing, Turnbull said.

The fact that he had already walked one batter in the fourth inning and thus no longer had a perfect game may have actually eased the pressure somewhat, Turnbull said. It also meant that he didnt get flustered when he led off the ninth inning by walking Jose Marmolejos.

Two outs later, he was facing Mitch Haniger, who had twice hit him hard on a night when Turnbull was getting almost exclusively soft contact.

But it only took three pitches to strike him out. Fastball, slider, fastball.

I made probably the best three pitches I made all night, Turnbull said. I not only wanted to make my nastiest pitches, but I wanted to execute them as perfectly as possible.

Then the celebration was on. Turnbulls girlfriend was in Seattle and could share in the accomplishment.

That was really special. Im really, really thankful that she was here. Just a dream come true on probably the best day of my life, Turnbull said.

There was also a small group of fans behind the dugout who had good-naturedly razzed Turnbull in the first inning, predicting a no-hitter.

Afterwards, Turnbull shouted, You guys called it!

Read more:

Best night of my life: How Tigers Spencer Turnbull made history in Seattle - MLive.com

As concerns have grown about violent crime, she released a policing and public safety plan that includes hiring a civilian police commissioner and creating a new commission to decide whether to fire officers accused of misconduct. She was early in urging Mr. de Blasio to fire his police commissioner, Dermot F. Shea, after his aggressive response to last years protests.

Yet she has also distanced herself from the defund slogan, saying the term means different things to different people. In contrast, Ms. Morales has embraced the movement and pledged to slash the $6 billion police budget in half a stance that has endeared her to left-leaning voters, less so to more moderate ones.

At the same time, some business and civic leaders fear that Ms. Wiley is too liberal; in a poll of business leaders, Ms. Wiley was near last place with just 3 percent. They also question whether Ms. Wiley has enough experience as a manager to run a sprawling bureaucracy with a $98 billion budget.

Maya is terrific, but business is looking for a manager, not an advocate, said Kathryn Wylde, the leader of a prominent business group.

At the moment, Ms. Wiley is simply looking to connect to as many voters as she can, in person and on social media, where she posts campaign diaries recorded at home.

She lives in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn, with her partner, Harlan Mandel, in an elegant house built in the Prairie School architectural style made famous by Frank Lloyd Wright. They have two daughters, Naja, 20, and Kai, 17. Ms. Wiley is Christian and Mr. Mandel is Jewish, and they belong to Kolot Chayeinu, a reform congregation in Park Slope.

The last woman who came close to being mayor, Christine Quinn, a former City Council speaker, said she regretted that she tried to soften her hard-charging personality during her campaign. Her advice for Ms. Wiley was to be herself.

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Maya Wiley Has 50 Ideas and One Goal: To Make History as Mayor - The New York Times

Margaret Atwood has always been waiting for the other shoe to drop. Born in Ottawa in 1939, Atwood has been consumed with the specter of a sudden totalitarian takeover, like the one she imagined in her 1985 novel The Handmaids Tale, since she was a girl. She watched with trepidation, then, if not necessarily surprise, as Donald Trump was swept into power in 2016. When the TV adaptation of her book debuted on Hulu in the early months of his administration, it was heralded as an allegory for our times. But Atwood sees herself less as an oracle than a student of history including her own. The fourth season of the series, now streaming on Hulu, follows June as she attempts to escape to Canada, as Atwoods own ancestors did: Protestants driven out of France, and United Empire Loyalists who fled north after the American Revolution. They were all kicked out of somewhere for being on the wrong side of something, Atwood says.

The author recently spoke with Rolling Stone about the inspiration for The Handmaids Tale and its companion text, The Testaments, written during Trumps tenure, her fears for the future, and the one plot point she vetoed from the Hulu series.

Ive been fascinated by the added cultural resonance The Handmaids Tale took on during the Trump administration. The TV show premiered only a few weeks after his inauguration in 2017No kidding! What a coincidence. What a series of adventures led up to that coincidence happening. I noticed from looking at my notes that I started actually thinking about [the book] in 1981. What had just happened? Ronald Reagan had been elected, and the religious right was on the rise in those years, the early Eighties. The Seventies was a fermentous time, with second-wave feminism making a lot of gains but not the adoption of the Equal Rights Amendment, which got nixed, basically, by Phyllis Schlafly, who got a lovely little cafe named after her in The Testaments. And then there was a backlash. There are always backlashes. In the Eighties, that is when people started saying things like Women belong in the home. And I started thinking, Well, if they do, how are you going to get them back in there?In the Fifties they were stuffed back in with some pretty amazing propaganda.

Youre talking about after World War II, when women had gone to work in factories and other places.Dial back even more. In the Thirties, during the Depression, it was considered bad manners and not permissible, once you got married, for you to have a job if you were a woman. You were supposed to give up that job so that some man could support his family. Then it was the Forties and Step up, gals, roll up your sleeves. We need you to work at a factory, have a victory garden, do all of those things. Women were doing all kinds of things they never would have in the Thirties: driving trucks, earning salaries. A very big social stir-up, fermentation, and an equally big unsettling of previously received sexual mores. How can I put this? A lot of partying while the bombs were falling!

Along comes the Fifties: Back into the bungalow! You can have a bungalow now, and you dont have to have a servant, because youve got a Hoover and a washer-dryer. That gave rise to another backlash in the form of Betty Friedan: educated women who felt stuck in the box. Then we got the birth control pill about the mid-Sixties, and then, not coincidentally, the miniskirt and, not coincidentally, the so-called sexual revolution. A lot of thinking went on around that: Should women behave like men? How did men behave? Should you have wide-open freedom, or would that turn into a different form of oppression? In the Fifties you were supposed to say no, and in Seventies, you were supposed to say yes, and if you didnt, then you were a prude. Sex, drugs, and rock & roll, that was the undercurrent of the Seventies. A huge amount of feminist writing took place some of it pretty extreme, some of it historical. Then arrived the Eighties and Ronald Reagan: This has gone too far. Lets roll it back. And The Handmaids Tale came out of that.

My ever-present question, since I was born in 39, is: If there were to be a totalitarianism in the United States, what would it look like? What would be the slogan? What would be the excuse? Because they all come in with: Were going to make things so much better, but first, we have to get rid of those people.

Knowing your fascination with the looming shadow of totalitarianism in the U.S., how did you watch the rise of Donald Trump?With trepidation! Weve seen this before. Its right out of the playbook. The big propaganda lies, the replacement of people in pivotal positions in the judiciary because every totalitarian regime controls the judiciary. The attempt to subvert the Constitution, the attempted coup. These are motifs that have occurred many times throughout history. The attempt to seize control of communications media. They couldnt actually do that, but they could try to erase belief in the media as a trustworthy source of information, and replace that with other sources that were telling you there are blood-drinking Democrats in the cellar of a pizza parlor that didnt have a cellar.

It was either Hitler or Goebbels who said if you tell the big lie often enough, people will believe it. Make the lie big, and make it often. We saw that. And its not a question of left or right so-called left regimes have done the same thing. Its a question of totalitarianism or not totalitarianism.

One of the hallmarks of a totalitarian regime is intolerance for peaceful protest. Youve said that if you can protest and not get shot, youre not living under a totalitarian regime.Yes, absolutely.

Now there are these laws that have been passed, in Florida and elsewhere, basically legalizing the act of running protesters over with your car.What? What? What? When did that happen?

In Florida, the governor recently signed a new law protecting drivers from civil and criminal liability if they hit a protester with their car.So theyre legalizing murder? Thats the name for it: murder. You might as well just go out with the Night of the Long Knives and knock on peoples doors and shoot them. Its extrajudicial murder, and there is no other name for it.

Im curious how you view our current moment. Earlier we were going all the way back to the 1930s, talking about the cyclical nature of some of these things throughout history. Where do you think we are right now, post-Trump? What are your thoughts or fears for the future?Were in a very unsettled moment. Since there is no the future, not graven in stone, there are a number of potential futures, and how people react to these things now is going to determine what kind of the future we have in, say, two, three, four, or five years. It has never been any different. Were in a moment, much like the Thirties, in which things [are] pretty polarized. And we have just seen anotherThirties-era thing happen, which is this huge better not use that word, huge, so many words have been trashed the enormous infrastructure plan that the Biden government has just proposed, a lot like FDRs.

Is this a moment of crisis for America? Yes, it is. How should America respond? It should respond with positivity and some realism. People in the United States have taken for granted for so long that theyre top dog, that they can afford these battles and in intramural wars that theyve been having, but maybe they cant afford them. Maybe to indulge yourself that way is going to be to slip from world power. And when you slip from power I give you the Battle of Waterloo as an example when you turn around and start to run, you will be ruthlessly pursued, because other people want your power.

What has it been like for you to see the handmaids costume, from this story you wrote in the Eighties, take on so much resonance in the last four years?The reason it has is because its very visual and we live in a visual age. People with cell phones, well, weve seen the power of those, but also just television, taking pictures, putting them up on social media, et cetera. You can convey a message without having to say anything.

You can also get into a state legislature [with the costume]. They cant bar you, as things are now but maybe youll get run over by a car on the way there but, as it is, youre not creating a disturbance, because youre not saying anything, and youre not immodestly dressed, lord knows. So thats one of the reasons. The other reason, of course, is the television show. It made the narrative available to a lot of people who would not have necessarily seen or understood it before.

Is it ever surreal for you just how ubiquitous of a symbol its become?Everything is surreal to me. Take your choice! Its all pretty surreal when you come to think of it. But against what normal are we measuring this? That is the problem. What is normal? Looking again back to history, once we get to a period of recorded history, there are a great many unsettling events, and very few periods in which there were no unsettling events.

You started writing The Testaments as Trump was on the rise.Thats right.

Did you have, at the time, almost a sense of dj vu to this period in the Eighties when you were writing The Handmaids Tale?During the two Obama elections we had some of the Republicans saying these kinds of things quite amazing things, like, theres real rape and not-real rape. What was it?

If its a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.The body has ways of shutting things down. Yeah, it was a very peculiar understanding of the female anatomy and physiology. They said things like you have to carry a dead baby until it got birthed naturally because thats what cows did. Do you remember that? There were a lot of comments like that, which I think had something to do with them losing the election to Obama. So I was taking note of those. They were gaining adherents, believe it or not, and thats why a pussy-grabbing presidential candidate didnt turn the election. There was already that happening during the Obama years not so much under George W. Bush, who now seems like some kind of paragon of old-world gentility. I mean, he made some disastrous foreign policy decisions, but he was not on a crusade to smoosh women into the ground partly because he had a pretty smart and literate wife. So, yeah, Id been thinking about it not just when Trump was on the ascendant, but before he even appeared as a presidential candidate. But in those two elections, although the clouds loomed on the horizon, what with the women are like cows, et cetera, it didnt happen. But people were already using Handmaids Tale imagery in those elections, and then came out in full blossoming form during the Womens March, and then internationally after the television show was launched.

June (Elisabeth Moss) and Janine (Madeline Brewer) in Milk Episode 404 of the Handmaids Tale

Hulu

What has your involvement with the show been like, and what has it been like for you to see it develop over each successive season?Im called a consultant that means I dont have any actual power. I get to read the scripts, and voice opinions, and I talk with Bruce Miller, the showrunner. And he was happy to have The Testaments in hand, because it gave him some ideas about where things could go next. But as we all have said [both myself and] people in the writing room who are actually writing the show nothing goes in that doesnt have a precedent in real life, either in history or now, elsewhere or here. All of that has been respected. They are exploring the possibilities of what might happen next in such situations. And I was interested to read the other day, which I didnt know, and I should have known, that Audrey Hepburn was a resistance fighter in World War II. She was a teenager, and they used teenagers a lot as messengers, because they were less likely to be suspected. She was helping rescue downed British airmen. It was very, very risky, of course. So theres a lot of precedent for girls and women doing these kinds of things. It is not out of line for women in The Handmaids Tale to be working underground in this way. There would always come a moment when theyve felt that their cover was about to be blown, or when people would try and get them out. No spoilers, but there would be these issues and it has been that way with Canada and the United States before. Canada was the destination of the Underground Railroad. Canada was the destination of, I think, 250,000 draft dodgers during the Vietnam period. Canada was a destination during the American Civil War for people who wanted to sit it out they went to Montreal, apparently.

Miller has said that you will occasionally put the kibosh on some of the ideas from the writers room. Whats something youve nixed?I did say you cant kill on Aunt Lydia. That time they pushed her over a banister and stuck a knife into her, I said, You cannot do not kill Aunt Lydia! No! Ann Dowd is so brilliant as Aunt Lydia. Brilliant.

You wrote in The New York Times in the first season about one of the scenes I think it was the slut-shaming of Janine. You said it was horribly upsetting to watch. One of the criticisms of the show, especially in recent seasons, is that it can be so hard to watch what these women are going through.History is hard to watch. The present moment is hard to watch, which is why a lot of people dont watch it. What is happening to the Uighurs in China all of these things are hard to watch, but if you have a personality that includes empathy, which most people do, unless theyre psychopaths This is painful. Ouch. This hurts. Yes, its true, it is hard to watch.

The show was, for a lot of people, an almost cathartic escape at the very beginning of the Trump administration. You might think that thats the time when people would want to turn away from something that feels so resonant with their reality.Theres another way of looking at it, which is: It hasnt happened yet. And no matter how bad you are feeling about what has happened, at least its not there.

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Weve Seen This Before: Margaret Atwood on The Handmaids Tale and How History Repeats Itself - Rolling Stone

By Staff | on May 20, 2021

It was just 70 years ago today, May 20, 1951, when the latest Communist offensive was defeated and brought to a halt on the eastern half of the front line in Korea. Remember the 750,000 Chinese Soldiers that walked all the way from Eastern China to fight in Korea, well they had now been used up, sacrificed in an all-out attempt to break through the UN Forces and conquer South Korea and win the War. The UN Soldiers were shocked at the fanaticism of the Chinese and North Korean Soldiers, which seemed almost suicidal. Communist casualties were heavy, over 70,000 in April and another 90,000 for May, so heavy that the battlefield was covered with their dead. Once again UN Soldiers couldnt advance without stepping on the dead or pieces of the dead enemy soldiers. It looked like the UN now had a chance to win the Korean War.

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This Day In History, May 20th, 2021 - "Fields of Dead" - Signals AZ