Aurelia Butler

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    Young Women Will Never Stop Talking About Sexism

    I was not going to write any more election post-mortems based on the current data. California is still counting votes, and it will take months for the whole picture of the electorate to come into focus.But that hasn’t stopped chatter from strategists and politicians about the ways Democrats should change their candidates and messaging. There has been heavy emphasis on appealing to young men specifically, with many advising that the left should go about manufacturing its own Joe Rogan. One articulation of this viewpoint comes from Richard Reeves, who writes in an op-ed in The Boston Globe that Democrats shouldn’t talk about sexism, and claims that the problem is that they haven’t focused enough on issues affecting boys and men. James Carville keeps repeating the charge that “preachy females” are the problem and Democratic messaging comes across as “too feminine.”It feels absurd to ask rank-and-file Democrats to stop talking about sexism when Donald Trump himself and several of his cabinet picks so far have credible accusations of sexual misconduct lodged against them, and when Trump’s campaign sunk to new lows in disparaging women.Democrats should absolutely be soul-searching and figuring out ways to win. But Reeves’s suggestions — “More investments in vocational training, for example in apprenticeships and technical high schools, would mostly help boys and men to secure better jobs” — were already an explicit part of Harris’s platform for economic opportunity, which she talked up on the campaign trail.Harris did not mention sexism as a reason for her loss in her concession speech. And the overwhelming consensus was that Biden’s low approval ratings, and his failure to bring an end to inflation sooner, were the major reasons that she did not win. But does that negate the sexism raining down on our young women, who are walking across campus hearing their classmates tell them: “Your body, my choice”?Trump’s totally cavalier attitude about violence against women — the ones he said he would protect whether we “like it or not” — is most glaringly evident in his nomination of Matt Gaetz as attorney general. More than 100 nonpartisan organizations that combat sex trafficking and gender-based violence signed on to an open letter to the heads of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee asking them to reject Gaetz because he has been investigated for sex trafficking himself and said: “The nomination of Mr. Gaetz sends a signal to the country and the world that sexual misconduct and exploitation and corrupt behavior will not only go unpunished, but will be rewarded.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    A Friend Lied About Her Dying Brother to Cancel Plans With Me. Help!

    A reader is struggling to forgive a fabricated excuse that involves a terminal cancer patient’s turn for the worse.My friend of many years, who is an alcoholic in denial, lies to cancel social commitments with me. I am trying to maintain our friendship because I care about her, but the excuse she gave me for her most recent cancellation is beyond the pale: She claimed that her brother, who was diagnosed with terminal cancer, had taken a turn for the worse, and that she just wanted “to stay home and cry.” When I checked the story with one of her siblings, though, it turned out his condition hadn’t worsened. I am really upset that she fabricated this excuse. I am close to her brother. Is this a deal breaker for our friendship?FRIENDI completely understand your distress. It feels terrible to be lied to by friends. And if your old friend had written to me, I would tell her as much. But she didn’t write — you did. So, I am going to give you some advice, and I hope you take it in the helpful spirit in which it is intended, because frankly, your letter struck me differently than you probably intended it to.Friends don’t malign each other gratuitously. Yet you introduce your friend as “an alcoholic in denial.” Respectfully, only mental health professionals, in consultation with their patients, are qualified to diagnose drinking problems. And as far as I can tell, her drinking is unrelated to your question. Still, it suggests that you are judgmental of your friend. Not my first choice in a dinner companion!The crux of your complaint, though, is that she lied to you about her sick brother’s condition. That was a lousy thing to do! But if your friend feels overwhelmed (about her brother or anything else) and asks to cancel a plan, that seems like a legitimate request to me. Now, you can certainly tell her you prefer truthful excuses. And she may have burned through your generosity by now. But sitting in judgment of your friend is the last thing either of you needs.Miguel PorlanMinivans or Museums? Let’s Get Married First.Our 27-year-old son got engaged recently and plans to marry next year. We are thrilled for the couple! They currently live in a small rental apartment in Manhattan. Our son tells us it’s very important for him to raise his future children in the suburbs, but his fiancée is equivocating: She was raised in the city and loves it there. As parents, should we press our son to resolve this issue before they marry or let it play out?We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump Chooses Linda McMahon, a Longtime Ally, for Education Secretary

    President-elect Donald J. Trump on Tuesday tapped Linda McMahon, a former professional wrestling executive who ran the Small Business Administration for much of his first term, to lead the Education Department, an agency he has routinely singled out for elimination in his upcoming term.A close friend of Mr. Trump’s and a longtime booster of his political career, Ms. McMahon had been among his early donors leading up to his electoral victory in 2016 and has been one of the leaders of his transition team, vetting other potential appointees and drafting potential executive orders since August.In Ms. McMahon, 76, Mr. Trump has elevated someone far outside the mold of traditional candidates for the role, an executive with no teaching background or professional experience steering education policy, other than an appointment in 2009 to the Connecticut State Board of Education, where she served for just over a year.But Ms. McMahon is likely to be assigned the fraught task of carrying out what is widely expected to be a thorough and determined dismantling of the department’s core functions. And she would assume the role at a time when school districts across the country are facing budget shortfalls, many students are not making up ground lost during the pandemic in reading and math, and many colleges and universities are shrinking and closing amid a larger loss of faith in the value of higher education.“We will send Education BACK TO THE STATES, and Linda will spearhead that effort,” Mr. Trump said in a statement announcing the decision on Tuesday.Ms. McMahon led the Small Business Administration during Mr. Trump’s first term and resigned in 2019 without a public fallout or rift with Mr. Trump, who praised her at her departure as “one of our all-time favorites” and a “superstar.” She stepped down from that role to help with Mr. Trump’s re-election campaign and became the chairwoman of the pro-Trump super PAC America First Action.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    NYT Crossword Answers for Nov. 20, 2024

    Robert S. Gard brings us a little sunshine.Jump to: Today’s Theme | Tricky CluesWEDNESDAY PUZZLE — You’ve come here to register a complaint, I presume, about the fact that there’s a rebus in your Wednesday crossword. You’re wondering what it’s doing there and why it refuses to leave.I can’t make the rebus go away, but it would be a shame to let its presence discourage you from tackling this utterly delightful crossword, constructed by Robert S. Gard. (And in case you’re wondering what the heck a rebus is, here’s a quick guide.) Even solvers just beginning to get their sea legs ought to give this grid a go — it’s a wonderful introduction to the kind of trickery one faces regularly in Thursday puzzles. Let’s size up the puzzle together, shall we?Today’s ThemeThe gambit begins at 17-Across, where the well-known [Coloring implement since 1903], CRAYOLA CRAYON, doesn’t quite fit in the squares allotted. Whenever you encounter an entry like this one — which meets the criteria of the clue exactly, but doesn’t fit where it’s supposed to — check the crossings to verify that more than one entry is affected. Rebus squares, as a rule, must work with both Across and Down entries. 17-Across crosses 2-Down, and the [Reef predator with extendable pharyngeal jaws], known as a MORAY EEL, doesn’t fit, either. That confirms it: rebus puzzle!A total of six squares require entering R-A-Y to make sense (though if you’re solving online and having trouble entering several letters, the game will also accept just R). These three letters, squeezed into one square, demonstrate the effect of a [Downsizer?] (64A): SHRINK RAY. Note that R-A-Y isn’t shrunken here; a rebus puzzle’s revealer generally lays out the gimmick without repeating it.Tricky Clues26A. [Blade runner?] has a clear indicator of deception: the question mark. This clue refers not to a film character but to a blade-bottomed vehicle that moves quickly: a SLED. Many makeshift sleds do not have blades, mind you. I have slid down snowy hills on plastic mats, skateboard decks and inflatable pool toys — whatever floats your butt.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    2024 Election Voter Turnout Map: See Where Trump Gained and Harris Lost

    Change in votes compared with 2020 It may seem like a clear story: Donald Trump won the election by winning the most votes. He improved on his totals, adding about 2.5 million more votes than four years ago. But just as consequential to the outcome were Kamala Harris’s losses: She earned about 7 million fewer […] More

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    DNA on Discarded Cigarette Helps Lead to Arrest in a 1981 Homicide

    A detective in Indiana helped crack a cold case more than 40 years after his father started working on the original investigation.The 1981 fatal beating of a steelworker in northwest Indiana remained unsolved for so long that the son of the original detective on the case started reinvestigating it in 2018 — and helped solve it.Blood from the crime scene and a discarded cigarette tossed out a vehicle window at a 2023 traffic stop in Illinois eventually led to the arrest of Gregory Thurson, 64, of Eugene, Ore., on Oct. 29 on a murder charge in the death of John Blaylock, Sr., 51, who was killed in his apartment in Griffith, Ind.That capped an investigation that began on Nov. 3, 1981. On Wednesday, Mr. Thurson, who was arrested in Oregon and extradited, is to appear in a Lake County, Ind., courtroom. His lawyer with the Lake County Public Defender’s Office could not be reached for comment on Tuesday.It is unclear what the motive for the killing was and what relationship there may have been between Mr. Blaylock and Mr. Thurson.“I can’t say enough about his hard work and how gratifying it is to me that he was able to come behind me some 43 years later and put this all together,” Retired Detective John Mowery Sr. of the Griffith Police Department said of his son, Detective John Mowery Jr. “When he sinks his teeth into something, he just he stays with it.”On Nov. 3, 1981, two worried steelworkers went to Mr. Blaylock’s building on a Tuesday afternoon, after he didn’t show up for his shifts on Monday or Tuesday morning. The Sunday newspaper was still outside his apartment door, which was locked, and they waited while two building employees used a master key to get inside.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Activist Kianoosh Sanjari’s Final Act Stuns Iran

    Repeatedly imprisoned in his country, Kianoosh Sanjari refused to be silenced by the government. But in the end, despairing of change, he silenced himself.The Iranian government first arrested him when he was a teenager protesting a crackdown on student activists. He remained undeterred.For two decades, the regime repeatedly threw him into jail and detained him in psychiatric institutions, but the more Iran tried to silence him, the more outspoken Kianoosh Sanjari became. A tall, lanky man known for his dark suits and striped ties, he recounted the horrors he had experienced in interviews and videos posted on his social media accounts.“The Islamic Republic ruined the days of my youth, as it did to millions of others,” Mr. Sanjari, a well-known journalist and human rights activist, once said. “Days that could have been filled with passion, happiness and sweetness were spent in prison, doing irreversible damage to my body and soul.”Last Wednesday, Mr. Sanjari plummeted from a commercial building in central Tehran, hours after declaring that he would take his own life as a final act of protest if the government did not release four political prisoners by the evening. He was 42.News of his death has shaken Iranians, with many saying it was the long years of government-inflicted trauma that ultimately led to his end. Many were especially rattled by the manner in which Mr. Sanjari’s death unfolded in public view, and in real time, as he posted a series of increasingly alarming messages on social media over the two days before it happened.Amid the outcry, Iranians have been wrestling with subjects seldom discussed openly in the country: the effects of long-term trauma on political prisoners; the invisible mental health suffering of activists who may not reach out for help; and whether their country has adequate measures in place for people who threaten suicide.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Los Angeles City Council Passes ‘Sanctuary’ Ordinance in Response to Trump

    The swift action, two weeks after Donald J. Trump’s presidential win, signaled a sense of urgency from city leaders.The Los Angeles City Council passed a so-called sanctuary ordinance on Tuesday that would prohibit city resources from being used to carry out federal immigration enforcement, the first deportation-related move by a major U.S. city since Donald J. Trump won the presidential election two weeks ago.Though Los Angeles had already declared itself a “city of sanctuary” during Mr. Trump’s first term, it had done so only through a resolution and an executive directive rather than by establishing a new city ordinance. The ordinance passed on Tuesday would enshrine protections in city law and give them more legal weight, officials said.The unanimous vote came a week after Mayor Karen Bass called for “swift action” to protect immigrants in Los Angeles, and it required the expediting of a draft ordinance that was introduced last year. The ordinance will now go to Ms. Bass for her signature and would take effect 10 days after she signs it.The leaders of the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation’s second largest school system, were also poised to enact their own immigrant protections later on Tuesday.The prompt actions by Los Angeles leaders signaled a sense of urgency to protect the city’s large immigrant population ahead of the inauguration of President-elect Trump, who has promised to pursue mass deportations of undocumented immigrants across the country.The ordinance would prohibit the use of city resources — including city workers and city property — to arrest or detain someone as part of a federal immigration enforcement effort. It would also bar city employees from asking about someone’s citizenship or immigration status. (The Los Angeles Police Department has had an order in place since 1979 that prohibits its officers from asking about immigration status or making arrests because of someone’s legal status.)We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More