Is it November yet?
This week: news outlets couldn't decide how to cover a debate, Twitter would like you to stop telling people to die, and, finally, a good tweet about soap dispensers.
Hey there. Welcome to kites can't summarise. I'm cory zanoni.
Busy week, eh? Let's jam through it.
Debates and conflicts
The first US Presidential Debate of the 2020 campaign happened early in the week. It feels like it was months ago? And it was a big thing. People were mad for it.
They were mad about it as well. Both for what happened during the debate (which was infuriating) and after (which was excruciating). It was an hour plus of rants, insults, and incoherence and the media covered the whole thing with a healthy dose of "both sides did it". While accurate in the most banal sense of the word, covering the debate like that is unhelpful at best and willfully misleading at worst. But it does provide us with a good opportunity to talk about how we understand conflict.
Here’s the thing: news exists to help people understand what's happening. That calls for context. When it comes to conflict, we need to know more than just "Both people yelled at each other". If we don't get told who yelled first, who yelled louder, and what they yelled at each about, then, really, we don't know what happened at all. Two people yelling about their favourite snacks is very different than one person yelling threats and the other person yelling for them to stop.
The character of a conflict matters. That makes intuitive sense but that doesn't mean people always talk about conflict that way. The world is full of both-sidesism and it's often subtle, unspoken, assumed. It can help to see stark examples first. That's why I looked to domestic violence research to help me understand what was happening in the media (see below for more on this).
Twitter is still a mess (surprise!)
Speaking of conflict: Donald Trump has coronavirus and Twitter would like you to stop tweeting that you hope he dies.
Twitter has a had a rule about wishing death of people for a few months now (only a few months? Really?) and they chose now to reinforce it. If you say you want someone to die, your tweets may be removed and your account may be suspended.
They likely saw an increase in people (often jubilantly) saying they hope Trump kicks it. But let's not act like people haven't been dealing with this kind of thing for a long while. Women, people of colour, queer people, immigrants – the list goes on.
Nothing has happened to the people telling them to die. That's illuminating. In making this declaration now, Twitter has signaled who's worth protecting (Trump, the men – and it's usually men – telling people to die) and who's not worth protecting. They didn't mean to do that, and they issued a follow up acknowledging their failures, but they did it all the same.
Maybe leave social?
It's always fun when research says you're right about something. And, yeah, you're right that taking a break from social media is good for you.
Evolutionary biologist Rob Brooks dug into the evidence to convince his kids that social media isn't great for one's mental health. Who knows if it did the job for them but it worked on me.
Some good stuff
Well, that was an uplifting few paragraphs. How about some good stuff to lighten the mood? Here's what I've been digging lately.
Reading
I'm back into See what you made me do, Jess Hill's phenomenal book about domestic abuse. I'm only half-way through it but that's more than enough to tell you it's a vital read. The stories Hill tells will shatter your heart and, no matter who you are, it'll make you rethink both your behaviour and how you understand the world.
Related: New South Wales is looking to criminalise coercive control, which is one of the worst, if not the worst, forms of domestic abuse.
I've just started The force of nonviolence by Judith Butler, which I bought on impulse after reading Butler's interview with New Statesman. Butler goes into detail to define both violence and nonviolence, challenging both our understanding of society and the justifications people make for violence in a multitude of forms. Given how much violence is taken as a given in our world, that alone is worth exploring.
I'm 25% of the way through and, although is academic as all get out, it's thought provoking. And it's making me want to re-dedicate myself to vegetarianism (even though it's not at all about animals).
Watching
In a total change of pace, I've been watching people explode in The boys. After blowing through the season one in about a week (it's broadly fine?), I'm up to date with season two (better). They can't seem to keep more than a couple of characters interesting at once, and Frenchie – clearly the best character – hasn't had much to do, but the show is buoyed by some fantastic performances. And, yeah, anything that pokes at superhero cliches and American exceptionalism, racism, and capitalism is going to be compelling.
And sports! That aren't the NBA Finals (which, tbh, is almost boring at this point). All or nothing: Tottenham Hotspur is, as a recent convert to Spurs, a fun watch documenting a wild season for the Premier League club. It's a bit generically "emotive sports story" in its telling and, even though club manager José Mourinho is renowned for his tactical acumen, it leans on uplifting speeches rather than showing any deep football.
But, look, the players are talented and José is entertaining. And he swears brilliantly. I want him to follow me around saying "Fucking hell" all the time.
Playing
I'm obsessed with Rocket league – the perfect combination of rocket cars and football – and I'm going to spend a lot of time watching YouTube tutorials. The skill cap for this game is absurdly high and I feel like I'm still trying to learn what a car is.
That good tweet
Look, it's dumb. But it broke me.
Thanks for reading. I appreciate it. ❤️
cz