Rabbi Chaim Gruber delves into the psychological and sociological aspects of sports, video games, and mass shootings.
Arts & Cultural Critique
Analog Body in a Digital World: What Have You Got to Lose?
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Lisa Martinovic explores the frightening long-term neurological consequences of digital devices on our bodies.
2015
Net Neutrality and the Fight for Social Justice
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Net neutrality is not just for techies. The digital roots of the Black Lives Matter movement show why we must fight to keep the internet open to all.
Activism
The Community Radio Revolution
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With stations like KNSJ realizing the potential of grassroots radio and hundreds more stations set to go on the air very soon, many advocates see the 21st century as a new era for participatory media.
Articles
Before Mondoweiss: Jewish Anti-Nationalism in the Wake of the Holocaust
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Once upon a time, Hillel chapters across the country distributed an adamantly anti-Zionist newsletter that could well be described as the Mondoweiss of its day. Yet during the years in which the newsletter ran, Israel was gradually finding its place center-stage for Jews worldwide—a nightmare come true for the anti-Zionist camp.
Activism
Media Justice Is Social Justice: Why the Comcast-Time Warner Merger Matters
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Why does net neutrality matter? Because we’re treating a lifeline to the American economy and a lifeline for communities that need to organize as if it was just about profit, rather than as the essential human right that it is.
2014
The Crisis of Disability Is Violence: Ableism, Torture, and Murder
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Andre McCollins was eighteen years old in 2002 when he was a student at the Judge Rotenberg Center in Canton, Massachusetts. Like many of the students at the center, a residential institution for people with disabilities, Andre is autistic and has other mental disabilities. One day in October 2002, a staff member told McCollins to take off his jacket. He said no. That was direct defiance and disobedience to directions from staff.
Articles
Dream-Wizardry: A Collaboration Between Rodger Kamenetz and Michael Hafftka
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Jacob and Joseph begat Freud who begat Jung, who begat the poet Rodger Kamenetz and the visual artist Michael Hafftka. Their collaborative wizardry, published in the book To Die Next To You, is stunning. The poems and drawings (always paired) create vivid, waking dreams on psychological and spiritual subjects—dreams that are as resistant and open to interpretation as Pharaoh’s.
2014
Devil’s Advocate: Building the Religious Counterculture
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I have to admit: I enjoyed {title}Atlas Shrugged{/title}. Something about it resonated, even for me, on the far opposite end of the political and religious spectrum.
2013
Resisting Post-Oppression Narratives
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Class exploitation and racial discrimination has diminished in popularity as an explanation for our society’s continuing social inequalities. In its stead, a “post-oppression” ideology and rhetoric has developed, which leaves “distortions” (such as race-based disparities) to the market alone to resolve.
2013
A Visual Critique of Racism: African American Art from Southern California
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One of the most valuable functions of socially conscious art is its power to personalize and humanize what can easily become an abstraction. This power was evident again and again at BAILA con Duende, a recent Los Angeles exhibition featuring the works of seventy-four black artists.
Articles
Christmas Post-Mortem: Santa’s Attack on the American Family
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As I join many in my community in the annual post-feast January slim-down, it occurred to me that this is a fitting moment to reflect on how expansive market culture is damaging the health of our families.
2011
Subverting the Mass Media
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I almost always write for the people who don’t agree with me, and I would like to see more writer-activists reach out. For me, that practice began at the old Village Voice when my editor became increasingly conservative. In discussions with him I tried to understand his objections and fears. My story was then shaped to answer his concerns.
2011
Getting with the Program
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The old social movements were based on deep connections between activists who knew each other for a long time and thought long and hard about the issues before jumping into the fray. It took guts to confront authority and one’s opponents. We need to recapture some element of that discipline.
2010
Oscar Grant or Lebron James? The Systemic Devaluation of Black Life in America
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On the same day that millions of people watched Lebron James announce he was going to Miami, twelve jurors in Oscar Grant’s case decided that, unless he can put a ball through a hoop, a black man’s life is worth little in America. Two decisions — both resulting from five hundred years of white supremacy.