Here’s your week in review, in haiku.
1.
Prebiously in
the West Wing. Currently on
Bob Mueller’s short list.
2.
Burkina Faso.
Konduga. Barcelona.
And yes, Charlottesville.
3.
A Pershing “missile”
misfires. Executives
break ranks. Guam exhales.
4.
I miss the days when
trending topics were soccer
players I don’t know
5.
Who are our allies?
Better angels with a touch
of badassery!
(— ^ with love for @jamesloduca)
Have a beautifully badass weekend, everyone.
On Point
| What eleven CEOs have learned about advocating for diversity |
| Stefanie K. Johnson, an associate professor of management and entrepreneurship at University of Colorado’s Leeds School of Business, interviewed eleven chief executives (Salesforce, Medtronic, YouTube and Kaiser Permanente are in the mix) to find out what was working and what wasn’t. All validated the business case for diversity, and all talked about the cultural benefits. Of her four findings, one jumped out at me: hold yourself and direct reports accountable for results. “Indeed, research has shown that setting and following through on diversity goals is the most effective method for increasing underrepresentation of women and minorities,” says Johnson. |
| HBR |
| One fifth of American workers find the workplace hostile or threatening |
| Here’s some really bad news. A new study of 3,066 U.S workers shows that nearly one in five workers say that their workplaces are threatening or hostile, which can include bullying and sexual harassment. The study was conducted by the Rand Corp., Harvard Medical School and the University of California, Los Angeles. It gets worse: Anyone with a customer facing job is taking the lion’s share of abuse. It's part of the reason for the massive discontent among the working class - there are jobs, but they're destroying people. The authors of the study also call the rates of abuse “disturbingly high.” |
| Bloomberg |
| Solange quits Twitter |
| Before you panic, she’ll still be on Instagram. But deleting her account was clearly an act of self-preservation. Click through for her thoughts – which included anguish that her now school-age son was learning that the world still tolerated race-themed hate. She also didn’t want to give her energy to the “racist ugly ass fuck bois who reek of citronella,” while she’s on tour, which is a pretty damning indictment of the kind of abuse black women take on the platform every day. |
| Vanity Fair |
The Woke Leader
| What do you do if you’re a white supremacist but your DNA test shows that you’re not actually white? |
| This is the dilemma that many white supremacists are facing in the age of genetic testing. Many online forums discuss testing or require proof of purity to participate, but not all tests come back the way people expect. Two UCLA scientists have spent years studying posts about genetic tests on Stormfront, the white nationalist forum. Turns out some white supremacists have increasingly nuanced ideas about race, genetics and the flaws of the genetic testing industry. “If we believe their politics comes from lack of sophistication because they’re unintelligent or uneducated,” says one of the researchers, “I think we’re liable to make a lot of mistakes in how we cope with them.” A fascinating read. |
| The Atlantic |
| On learning to be an ally |
| I’ve spent a bit of time at The Bitter Southerner, a thoughtful online journal dedicated to giving cultural shape to the “new South.” To do that well, it seems, means to wrestle with the old one, and the scars of Jim Crow. I found many wonderful examples of white writers struggling to articulate the cognitive dissonance of being both from and of a place as complex as the American South. I suggest you start with Greenville, South Carolina’s Brad Willis. A moment in a candy store and a text about Charlottesville triggered an epiphany. “For all the ways I’d convinced myself that I was too privileged to speak, for all the ways I’d convinced myself that I couldn’t write words that mattered to the most important of causes, for all the ways I’d decided my silence would let others be better heard, I’d gone too far. I’d disengaged.” |
| Bitter Southerner |
| Lupita Nyong’o doesn’t know how to make ugali, and it’s hilarious |
| The Academy Award winner drew ire from her fellow Kenyans when she admitted in an interview that she didn’t know how to make ugali, a Kenyan national staple made from maize flour. In this short video, she visits her parent’s farm in Kenya for a lesson. “It’s like an abdominal workout!” she declares as she stirs the floury glop over a cookstove. It’s also a dramatic departure from most “let’s go visit the folks of famous people” videos, if you get my drift. |
| YouTube |
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