Monthly Archives: February 2022

Letter of the week: The Brexit burden – The New Statesman

Posted: February 17, 2022 at 7:55 am

Andrew Marr, writing about possible successors to Boris Johnson (Is Boris Johnsons luck finally running out?, 4 February), says of Jeremy Hunt: [He] has done his best to make his peace with Brexit, arguing that if he knew then what he knows now, he would have voted to leave.

That seems an extreme form of peace-making, especially if you believe that not all our woes are due to the pandemic. The queues of lorries in Kent are seldom reported outside that county but they will inevitably lead to a hike in prices, exacerbating the cost-of-living crisis. Brexit has created a skills shortage and hence job vacancies. But that is offset by the economic damage and lost livelihoods among smaller enterprises strangled by Brexit-generated red tape. Opportunities to work and study in the EU and for performing artists to tour have been cut off. All that, and the risk to the hard-won peace in Northern Ireland.

I, for one, cannot respect any politician who panders to those who still claim that this monumental act of national self-harm was a good thing.Vera Lustig, Walton-on-Thames, Surrey

It is a great boon that Andrew Marr has joined the NS but can we do away with the florid language? One paragraph alone (Is Boris Johnsons luck finally running out?, 4 February) is full of adjectives: choked, misty, vivid and strange. Great political commentator Marr may be, but poet he is not.Dan Rovira, English teacher, via email

After 50 years working in psychiatry and community mental health, there is hardly a word I disagree with in Sophie McBains overview of psychiatric diagnosis (The end of mental illness, 11 February). I would only add that the fixation on the medical model is not simply the product of the diagnostic establishment. The law, the social security systems and the media are also now perpetuating this exhausted account. The diagnostic mission creep that McBains article depicts was driven not by medical overreach but by the US health insurance system, which demands a diagnosis before it will fund treatment.Robin Johnson, Falmouth, Cornwall

In the history of psychiatry the consensus on cause has often swung between biological and social. Descartes mind-body dualism had a tragic effect on Western medicine. The impact of physical illness on the mental state, and vice versa, is often not considered. In many other systems, such as Ayurveda, there is a recognised relationship between the mind and body. As Leon Eisenberg outlined nearly 50 years ago, disease concerns pathology while its impact on social functioning is what should be called illness. Patients are interested in illnesses; clinicians in diseases. There is anecdotal evidence that many patients can live with their symptoms as long as they have housing, employment and economic independence and are able to form relationships. Diagnoses are important for several reasons, but patients often do not fit into neat diagnostic categories.Dinesh Bhugra CBE, Emeritus Professor of mental health and cultural diversity, Kings College London

John Gray (A better kind of being?, 11 February) parades his preferences in his take on eugenics and 20th-century British intellectuals: While Christians were divided on eugenics, progressive thinkers were at one in supporting it. Not so. Lancelot Hogben, scientific humanist, NS contributor and one of the three foremost biologists of the interwar period, led the moral and technical excoriating of eugenics.Professor Callum G Brown, Doune, Stirlingshire

I was very taken with Stephen Bushs account of showing children around parliament (Bursting the Bubble, 4 February). In fact, I wonder if Mr Bush might consider extending his services to a different audience? As an OAP, I could easily cope with tales of gore and violence. I would promise to behave, and would enjoy the chocolate!Jane Eagland, via email

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This article appears in the 16 Feb 2022 issue of the New Statesman, The Edge of War

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Letter of the week: The Brexit burden - The New Statesman

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New Evidence Revives Old Questions About EO Wilson and Race The Wire Science – The Wire Science

Posted: at 7:55 am

Edward Osborne Wilson (1929-2021). Photo: Jim Harrison, CC BY 2.5

Did Edward O. Wilson Harvard professor, iconic biologist, champion of global biodiversity promote racist ideas? For years, some scientists have suggested the very question is rooted in smear campaigns and misreadings of Wilsons work. Other scholars have argued that racism and sexism are apparent in Wilsons writing on human evolution.

Since Wilsons death in late December 2021, at the age of 92, the question has been subject to renewed debate, after an opinion piece in Scientific American describing Wilsons dangerous ideas set off a backlash from some scientists.

Now, two separate pairs of researchers, drawing from Wilsons papers at the Library of Congress, have published details of correspondence in which Wilson privately supports a psychologist known for his racist work. It doesnt surprise me at all, said Joseph Graves, Jr., an evolutionary biologist at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University who has written extensively about scientific racism, and who reviewed some of the new archival work before it was published. Whats important about the new research, he added, was coming up with the smoking gun.

Not everyone agrees the new evidence is so definitive, but the revelations promise to prolong the reckoning over Wilsons legacy and to add to an ongoing discussion about how racism and sexism may have shaped entire fields of study.

Wilson may be best known for his widely praised research on ants, and for his push to protect biodiversity. But the scientists work on human evolution has been contested since 1975, when he published Sociobiology: The New Synthesis, a sweeping study of the evolution of social behaviour in animals.

The books final chapter, which aims to consider man in the free spirit of natural history, as though we were zoologists from another planet, touches on the evolutionary origins of language, territoriality, and other behaviours. In the chapter, Wilson wonders whether there could be marked genetic differences between socioeconomic classes. (He concludes theres little evidence thats the case.) And he speculates that some of the differences between human cultures could be rooted in genetic differences, calling for a discipline of anthropological genetics to explore the question further.

Wilson was touching on questions that remain deeply polarising: To what extent are certain features of human societies, like xenophobia, altruism or inequality, dictated by our genes? And can some of the complex variation among human groups, from IQ scores to incarceration rates, be explained by genetic differences, rather than by environmental and social forces?

Many racist projects from the eugenics movement to Nazism to present-day White nationalism have argued that racial differences have deep genetic roots. Such pseudoscientific ideas continue to fuel popular racist canards, such as the idea that Black people have genes predisposing them to violence.

Today, theres a broad consensus among experts in human evolution that that race is a social construct, not a biological category, and that it is extraordinarily difficult to link specific genes to complex human behaviours. And some researchers and advocates warn that, absent better data, explorations of those questions often just reproduce old stereotypes or offer thin cover for bigoted ideas.

After the publication of Sociobiology, Wilson was subject to fierce criticism, including from some of his Harvard colleagues, who argued he had gotten out ahead of the scientific evidence and that his conclusions about the way biology shapes human behavior veered into dangerous territory.

Wilson pushed back against those charges, arguing that his work had been misunderstood and, in some cases, distorted. (To keep the record straight, I am happy to point out that no justification for racism is to be found in the truly scientific study of the biological basis of social behaviour, he wrote in 1981, stressing his belief in a single human nature.) Despite the criticisms, Sociobiology was enormously influential: the book helped launch the field of evolutionary psychology, and it had a profound influence on the study of animal behaviour and biological anthropology.

Less than a week after Wilson died, Monica McLemore, a health researcher at the University of California, San Francisco, published the op-ed in Scientific American describing Wilsons work as problematic, and calling on scientists to reckon with his legacy. In response, the science blogger Razib Khan wrote an open letter challenging the way McLemores piece characterised Wilsons work, including baseless accusations of racism. Dozens of prominent scientists signed the letter.

The open letter pitted a group of mostly White scientists against a Black colleague who had raised concerns about racism. McLemore, who has received threats and hate mail since her piece was published, questioned the judgment of the researchers who signed it. That reputable scientists would be sloppy enough to sign a letter that would bring that kind of hate to my stance in this current moment to me the naivete is huge, she told Undark in a recent Zoom conversation. (Khan did not reply to requests for comment.)

Some of the letters initial signatories retracted their names after learning of Khans past connections with figures associated with white nationalism, including alt-right figurehead Richard Spencer and publisher Ron Unz.

Soon after, Wilsons own connections to the right-wing fringe upended the conversation again.

Also read: E.O. Wilsons Love of Ants, and All Things Living A Tribute

One pair of researchers who surfaced those connections, Howard University evolutionary biologist Stacy Farina and her husband, Matthew Gibbons, began reading sections of Sociobiology while stuck at home during the COVID-19 pandemic. They were taken aback by what they found.

I had read some chapters of Sociobiology as a grad student, said Farina. And theres a lot of really great science in there. Its a very interesting book. And I had no idea that the last chapter had any of that stuff in it. Part of her motivation for digging into Wilsons work, she continued, was a sense of gaps in her own training. I am frustrated with the lack of education about these issues in evolutionary biology.

Later, during a Library of Congress workshop for Howard faculty, Farina asked if the Library had archival material on Wilson. Sure enough, the institution holds his personal papers including boxes of documents related to the sociobiology wars. When she and Gibbons perused the collection, they were drawn to four folders labeled with the name of J. Philippe Rushton, a Canadian psychologist who, starting in the 1980s, published studies arguing that substantial genetic differences existed between racial groups.

Population differences exist in personality and sexual behaviour such that, in terms of restraint, Orientals > whites > blacks, begins one 1987 Rushton paper published in the Journal of Research in Personality. His work would eventually be dogged by accusations of statistical flaws and ethics violations, and key papers were retracted.

In 2002, Rushton took the helm of the Pioneer Fund, an organisation founded in the 1930s to promote eugenics, the idea that humanity can be improved by manipulating which people reproduce. He led the nonprofit until his death in 2012.

On weekends, Farina and Gibbons began returning to the Library of Congress. It was a nice little escape during the pandemic, said Gibbons, who works as a business development specialist for a public health organisation. Head out in the morning, go to an early session, grab some lunch, and sort of freak out over what the morning session revealed, race the clock and try to document as much as we could before they kicked us out at the end.

The letters, Farina said, demonstrate a warm relationship between Wilson and the psychologist. In the correspondence, which dates from the 1980s and 90s, Wilson expressed support for Rushtons work, and lamented a stifling culture that, he suggested, had prevented him from speaking more freely, referring in one note to a leftward revival of McCarthyism.

When Rushtons university seemed poised to sanction him for academic misconduct, Wilson sent letters in his defense. He also sent letters to drum up support for Rushton from colleagues at Harvard and at the conservative National Association of Scholars.

Unbeknownst to Farina and Gibbons, a pair of historians were also exploring the Wilson archive. In 2018, University of Illinois historian of science David Sepkoski began working with Wilsons papers while researching a book on biodiversity. Like Farina and Gibbons, he noticed and gravitated towards the Rushton folders.

Struck by what he was reading, Sepkoski began dropping scanned images of letters into a Dropbox folder he shares with Mark Borrello, a historian of biology at the University of Minnesota. Im sure I called you from the archives, and was like, Youre not gonna believe this, Sepkoski told Borrello during a recent Zoom conversation with Undark. The two began sketching out a book project on Wilson.

The correspondence, Sepkoski and Borrello now say, suggests that Wilson was carefully managing his public persona even as he quietly continued his dispute with his left-wing critics.

Providing comments on one Rushton paper which applied a famous Wilson theory, meant to examine reproductive differences between different species, to argue that Black and non-Black people pursue different reproductive strategies Wilson was effusive. This is a brilliant paper, he wrote, one of the most original and heuristic written on human biology in recent years.

Whether it can even be published in this or some other journal devoted to human sociobiology, Wilson wrote later in his comments, will be a test of our courage and fidelity to objectivity in science.

Earlier this month, spurred by the backlash against McLemore, Farina and Gibbons published their findings in Science for the People Magazine, a left-wing outlet linked to the activist group that prominently opposed Wilsons work in the 1970s.

Days later, Sepkoski and Borrello published their own essay in The New York Review of Books, with more details from the Wilson archives.

The reaction to the letters among the scientific community has been mixed. Some researchers suggested the revelations do not necessitate a substantial reevaluation of Wilsons legacy. Asked about the new letters, sociologist Ullica Segerstrale referred back to her influential 2000 book, Defenders of the Truth, which covers the dispute between Wilson and his antagonists.

In the book, Segerstrale challenges characterisations of Wilson as a racist thinker, and argues that his critics often failed to engage with the actual substance of his work. I stand by my general analysis in that book regarding the thinking and behaviour of both E.O. Wilson and Science for the People, she wrote in an email to Undark.

At the blog Why Evolution is True, biostatistician Gregory Mayer described Farina and Gibbons findings as small beer. Wilson, he wrote, appeared to be primarily defending Rushtons academic freedom, not endorsing his ideas. To do so does not imply an identity of views, Mayer wrote. In a phone interview, he suggested that historians should focus on more pressing historical topics, such as Wilsons role in the development of a key concept in ecology, rather than his correspondence with a discredited Canadian psychologist.

For other scientists, though, the letters felt significant. Writing for Small Pond Science, a science and teaching blog, biologist Terry McGlynn reflected on the letters impact. When navigating the whiter parts of the cultural landscape of biology, the general party line has often been that Ed was mostly right about sociobiology, but his ideas had been twisted by racists, and there wasnt anything he could do about that, he wrote.

But, he continued, its indubitable that the party line I have passively received over the decades simply does not comport with reality.

Also read: A Rift Over Carl Linnaeus Shows We Shouldnt Idolise Scientists

Not everyone found the content of the letters especially surprising. Indeed, close attention to Wilsons work and public statements, some scholars said, already provided ample evidence that he was sympathetic to ideas that most biologists now consider not just morally questionable, but scientifically unfounded.

In 2014, Wilson gave a warm blurb to then-New York Times science journalist Nicholas Wades book A Troublesome Inheritance. The book argues that Black people may be, on average, more impulsive and less hardworking than White or East Asian people, and that basic differences in human society why Haiti is poor, for example, and European countries wealthy are attributable to genetic differences among groups. In reviews, debates and public statements, experts in human evolution pilloried the book for misrepresenting the science.

A notable exception was Wilson, who, in his blurb, praised Wade for exemplifying the virtues of truth without fear and celebrating human genetic diversity.

Thats pretty much out in the open, said Princeton University biological anthropologist Agustn Fuentes, who describes A Troublesome Inheritance as awful, racist, horribly unscientific. What has changed, he said, is the scientific community itself. The field, he said, is really hitting a peak moment of reflection, of engagement with the complexities of racism and sexism, and how its structured some of the basic ideas.

Indeed, a recent paper in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution, authored by faculty, staff, and graduate students in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at UC-Santa Cruz, is titled Anti-racist interventions to transform ecology, evolution, and conservation biology departments. Recently, biologists have mobilised to change species names that honour Confederate officers and other figures with troubling histories.

Even just in the last two or three years, it feels like something has shifted, said Ambika Kamath, a behavioural and evolutionary ecologist at the University of Colorado-Boulder. Among other factors driving that change, she said, is that biologists from more diverse backgrounds are coming into the field.

Kamath is hopeful that the conversation around Wilson will spark broader introspection among her colleagues. The problem, she and some other researchers argue, goes far beyond Wilson. I dont really care that Wilson had racist ideas, because I know pretty much all of the people that I dealt with, when I was coming up through the science system, had racist ideas, said Graves, who in 1988 became the first Black American to receive a PhD in evolutionary biology. Wilson was just one of many.

For now, more work from the archives may continue to flesh out a fuller picture of Wilsons life and thought. Speaking last week, McLemore, the author of the Scientific American op-ed on Wilson, said she was still getting hate mail and threats. All I wanted to do, she said, was to have a more nuanced discussion about the work.

This article was first published by Undark.

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Kody Brown’s Family: Is There Any Love In Polygamy? – TV Shows Ace

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Sister Wives star Kody Brown may have multiple wives, but that definitely doesnt mean hes in love with all of them. But now, fans are actually curious whether or not hes genuinely in love with any of them.

These days, having plural wives seems to be more about the religion than love in the Brown household. On a Reddit thread, many Sister Wives fans started debating whether or not there could be romantic love in polygamist families.

The Reddit thread is titled, Do polygamists not marry for love? and brings up some very important points.

Kody said he never loved Meri, was not in love with Christine when they got married, and is not in love with Janelle & never really had a romantic relationship with her. Robyn is the only wife hes ever been in love with and he no longer advocates polygamy, the original poster says.

So do most polygamists just hire (marry) sister wives to perform specific duties within the family and thats all they are brought in for? Is a successful, functional polygamist family meant to be structured more like a business than an actual family where love isnt really in the equation?

Many of the comments seem to echo the OPs thoughts, but others brought up interesting points as well.

I think there is some history rewriting on Kodys part, especially about Meri, said someone else. Keep in mind that Meri was his first wife, so there likely was some level of romantic relationship there. Even if Kody says otherwise.

Agreed I am reading the book right now and he said that he was taken with Meri and couldnt get her off his mind, etc., someone else chimed in. It feels like once he met Robyn, he decided he never really had a good relationship with the other wives

Do you agree with their points? Let us know what you think in the comments.

We already know that Christine left the family. Will any of Kody Browns other wives follow suit?

We dont know much right now, but there are always circling rumors online. Meanwhile, Meri Brown is happily engaging in some much-needed self-care routines. She even sent herself flowers on Valentines Day.

At the end of the day, only Kody Brown knows if theres any real love in his polygamist family. Be sure to keep following us online for the latest Sister Wives news. Well keep you filled in as soon as we have more information on the family.

Nikole Behrens is a 2017 graduate of Ball State University where she finished with a degree in creative writing and a minor in Japanese. Today she is a professional writer for various companies and really enjoys contributing to TV Shows Ace.

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The Sects That Rejected Sex in 19th-Century America – Smithsonian

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The Shakers, who reached the peak of their popularity in America between 1820 and 1860, loathed the institutions of marriage and family for the sinful natural affections that accompanied them. Getty Images

Disconsolate after his beloveds marriage to another man in 1837, a young seminarian named John Humphrey Noyes declared in a bitter, anti-love poem to his ex:

I will not give you back your heart,

Ive wooed and fairly won it,

And sooner with my life Ill part,

You may depend upon it.

Not content with mere verse, Noyes would go on to turn his emotional anguish into a theological critique of the institution of monogamous marriage itself (or as he once called it, Egotism for Two). Condemning monogamy as simple and replacing it with a more heavenly, polyamorous version that he called complex marriage, in 1848 he founded a religious sect based on his teachings: the Oneida Community in upstate New York. There, people would be stripped as much as possible of their worldly I-spirit and have it replaced with the godlier we-spirit of genuine Christian fellowship. Only with this kind of radical reorientation, Noyes held, could believers experience community, family and marriage in the way that God had intended them.

For individuals feeling down about a lack of romantic fulfillment or a recent break-up this Valentines Day, Noyes story serves as a reminder that those unlucky in love are hardly alone eitheramong their contemporaries in 2022 or throughout human history. Three 19th-century American sectsthe Oneida Pantogamists, the Shaker celibates and the Mormon polygamistswaged wars against the so-called selfishness of monogamous marriage. All viewed romantic exclusivity as sinful, a hindrance to creating a more universal love for a community of fellow believers.

Monogamy, of course, won out. Experiments like Noyes commune now seem distant, strange and historically specific. Yet there is something familiar and universal in them.

We all search for meaning in the universe, and we all long for human intimacyto know our place in the bigger picture and to share that story with someone. These dual human drives are as old as the human species. Take the Book of Genesis, for example. Before God created Eve, Adam knew his cosmic significance and walked with his creator in Edenyet was still lonely and bummed out.

Noyes could relate. The next thing that a man wants after he has found the salvation of his soul, he wrote, is to find his Eve and his Paradise. When his first love renounced their shared faith and then announced her engagement to another man, his universe came crashing down around him.

So he picked up the pieces and created a new one, without that sinful institution that had caused him so much pain: monogamy. Rather than becoming some kind of perpetual, quasi-religious orgy, the Oneida Community was highly controlled. Prospective sexual partners had to arrange their liaisonsor fellowships as they called themthrough the ministrations of a third party, sleep separately after the fellowshipping had concluded, and strive not to have the same partner too often in order to prevent the relationship from becoming exclusive. As Noyes knew from experience, the desire for exclusivity is one of the most powerful emotions that romanticized and sexualized human love can engender. Such passion could only bring spiritual ruin.

The Shakers, who were founded in mid-18th century England and reached the peak of their popularity in America between 1820 and 1860, similarly loathed the institutions of marriage and family for the sinful natural affections that accompanied them. Shaker villages were to be believers new families, complete with spiritual mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers all living together in harmony, worshipping the Lord, working hard for their bread and waging a communal war against the flesh by abstaining from sex.

Over the Shakers, too, loves pain hovered. Mother Ann Lee, the groups founder, had tragic and traumatic experiences in childbirth, losing all four of her newbornsa fact to which later commentators point as the psychological source of her hatred of all sex.

The story of Steven Sutton, a new convert living in the Shaker village at Canterbury, New Hampshire, in the 1780s, illustrates just how painful this struggle against exclusive love could be. His wife was an amiable woman, and I loved her, he wrote. But after joining the community, now I must hate her The leaders said, She was my god. Separating the family proved to be too much for her, and when she was buried, Sutton continued, I was ordered to cover the earth over her coffin, to show that I had no natural affections; this I did, when at the same time, I felt as though I should pitch into the grave with her.

For Mormon polygamists, the message was largely the same, even if the remedy was assuredly not, with religious leaders especially targeting women in their crusade against selfishness. I am sure that, through the practice of this principle of plural marriage, Elder George Q. Cannon wrote, we shall have a purer community, a community more experienced, less selfish and with a higher knowledge of human nature than any other on the face of the earth.

The words of Helen Mar Kimball Whitney, plural widow of Joseph Smith and later apologist for Mormon polygamy, indicate that she had internalized this logic. Plural marriage will exalt the human family, she wrote in an 1882 letter, and in the place of selfishness, patience and charity will find place in [plural wives] hearts, driving therefrom all feelings of strife and discord.

As with the Shakers and Oneidans, selfishness was the real enemy of the Mormon polygamistsan impediment to personal godliness and communal unity that could only be slain (for the plural wives) through the sacrifice of their exclusive claim to their husbands. These sacrifices were often truly painful for the adherents of all three sects, which is why leaders needed mechanisms of control to enforce the communities practices whenever individual discipline wavered. Although faithful, the believers struggled profoundly to extirpate the special love they had for othersa love they were told was selfish and sinful.

Why did Mormons, Shakers, and Oneidans all target even the exclusive romantic love found in the time tested, biblically sanctioned and socially accepted institution of monogamous marriage?

For starters, perhaps that institution was not so biblically bulletproof as its defenders might have imagined. All three groups used the same verses from the Bible to attack it. The children of this world marry, and are given in marriage, Jesus proclaims in Luke 20:34-35, but those worthy to obtain the resurrection from the dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage. Both the Shakers and the Oneidans referred to this straightforward proof text often in defending their decision to abolish monogamy.

For polygamous Mormon Saints, who place the institution of marriage and the obligation of reproduction through sex at the center of their story of eternity, it was a little different. They believed that more wives would mean more children for the paterfamilias both on earth and in the afterlife. Mormons countered those selfish, complaining plural wives who wanted to be their husbands one and only with a heightened commitment to religious duty.

What also bound these three sects together was the time and place in which they rose, institutionalized and fell, relatively simultaneously. In the 1830s, the federal government was weak, the American frontier seemingly endless, and the opportunities for sectarian start-ups equally boundless. By the 1880s, however, the federal government was strong and getting stronger, the frontier was rapidly disappearing, and the majority of Americans were increasingly intolerant of sexual and marital arrangements they believed corroded the nations morality.

By 1881, the Oneida Community had dissolved, the Shakers were losing members at an alarming rate (and, obviously, failing to spawn new ones), and many Mormons were actively choosing monogamy over polygamy. The external environment that had once nurtured religious sexual experimentation had indeed turned from tolerable to toxic, and the internal desire of many sectarians to reject monogamy for something else had waned as well. Having originally condemned romantic exclusivity as sinful, over time more of them nevertheless wanted it.

We still grab at the romantic ring today, and it is understandable that we do, especially coming out of the shared solitary confinement we have all been through for the past two years. Adam wanted an Eve. John Humphrey Noyes wanted his lost beloved. My wife wants me to up my romantic game. If this Valentines Day you, too, are feeling particularly fired up by romantic disappointment, you can always take a page from Noyes, and write a poem about it. Noyes verse continues:

You say your heart is still your own,

But words will never prove it.

What God and you and I have done

Will stand; the world cant move it.

Or maybe try launching an entirely new religio-sexual community, complete with a cosmology, hierarchy, institutions and disciplinary apparatus. And buy my new book, Sex and Sects. It will show you how.

Stewart Davenport is an associate professor of American history at Pepperdine University, specializing in the period from 17501890. His second book, Sex and Sects: The Story of Mormon Polygamy, Shaker Celibacy, and Oneida Complex Marriage (UVA Press, 2022), is due out in March.

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I Have a Husband and a Girlfriend – This Is Why Ethical Nonmonogamy Works For Us – Yahoo Lifestyle

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Photo taken in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina

If you've perused Bumble or Tinder lately, you may have noticed "ENM" in some bios. ENM, or "ethical nonmonogamy," is the practice of having multiple relationships in which all parties are aware of what is going on - so no, it's not cheating. Though it's referred to as "polyamory" in some circles (having intimate relationships with more than one person at the same time) and often conflated with "polygamy" (being married to multiple partners), the term "poly" may seem tainted to some, conjuring up "Sister Wives" TV show drama and the disempowerment of women. My partners and I prefer to use the term "ethical nonmonogamy" since it truly embodies what we're about: mutual respect, intimacy, and exploring multiple partnerships.

I currently have a husband and a girlfriend. My husband and I first began exploring this lifestyle during our long-distance relationship before we were married. Frequently traveling 6,000 miles between our homes in Hawaii and Florida was not feasible, but we knew we wanted to be together for the long haul. Though we had a rich relationship through FaceTime and over the phone, we both craved in-person connection. I also identify as bisexual and found myself desiring a deeper woman connection. We decided to open our relationship - something neither of us had thought of as a possibility before.

In the beginning, we didn't ask about the dating or physical intimacy we were experiencing with others outside of our relationship. But after a few dates, we realized sharing what we were doing and how we were feeling actually helped dispel jealousy and brought us even closer. Sure, I felt heart pangs when he went on dates, and I sometimes felt guilty meeting a potential partner at the beginning, but as we worked together to create our own definition of a relationship, I watched us grow closer. I've never trusted anyone more. When I finally moved to join him in Florida a year and a half later, we expanded by opting to meet one another's partners during the beginning of their relationships. We found this built trust and understanding between us and made our partners feel more comfortable, too. No one had to worry about deceit or ill intentions; it was all up front. We didn't have to be friends necessarily, but a few of his previous partners are now my closest friends.

Story continues

My husband is considered my primary partner - we've chosen to cohabitate and marry, make financial decisions together, and raise a dog. (We've decided not to have children, though we have heard about successful ENM relationships who choose to coparent.) Our partners, while traditionally termed "secondaries," are anything but. They are a part of both of our lives. My past boyfriend was originally my husband's best friend, and these days we spend time with my current girlfriend both together and separately. We have a weekly trivia team, attend dinner parties, and go out together. We have shared friends and carved out a space in one another's circles, developing unique and separate friendships complete with strings of meme-filled text messages. We take care of one another. It's become a community.

Related: How to Take the Sexual Blueprint Quiz From Sex, Love & Goop, Because We Know You Want To

When some people first hear I'm in an open relationship, they are quick to quip, "I could never do that! I'd be too jealous"; "So you're not really in a 'real' relationship or committed"; or "You're just doing this so you can have sex with multiple people." I understand the ENM lifestyle is not for everyone, but having a husband and a girlfriend (and in the past, a boyfriend), has allowed me to continue to explore my fluid sexuality while developing deep, intimate relationships with my partners and expanding my capacity for love. It isn't just about sex. In fact, I've had partnerships void of physical intimacy. For me, it's about building deeper relationships and not limiting what they look like and how they grow.

It isn't just about sex. . . . For me, it's about building deeper relationships and not limiting what they look like and how they grow.

Through the years, our openness has looked different. We work together to set boundaries around what we're comfortable with, such as how much time we spend with another person or traveling with another partner. Some ENM relationships place boundaries around physical acts outside of the primary relationship. For us, making sure we both feel valued and full in our relationship is our first priority. Ensuring our external partners are also comfortable and have their needs met is important, too. We understand these boundaries can shift; they're always up for discussion as needed. There are times we've stepped back from our external partnerships to focus on growing our own relationship - especially as newlyweds - and there are times we've had to end an external relationship because it was no longer healthy to our shared connections.

Breakups still hurt, even when I know my primary partner is still there for me at home. I'm currently working through the heartbreak that comes with losing a boyfriend because he was someone I valued spending time with, grew very close to, and considered one of my best friends. Someone I loved. But as with any relationship, we have to know when to move on when one or both parties are hurting. Because of my openness throughout it all with my husband and my other partner, having their support and listening ears has helped me heal.

Being in an open relationship has allowed me to step fully into my sexuality, and it has brought me deeper connections with my husband and other partners. Even if you're not into the idea of ENM, the concepts of honesty and communication taught in these circles can be applied to any relationship. We're not seeking a warm body to fill a hole in a relationship. Instead, we are expanding our vast capacity to love each other and our external partners, continue learning and growing, and break the mold of what society claims a marriage "should" look like. We have a solid foundation of trust and clear channels of communication. We don't fear infidelity or replacement. With our mutual understanding, safe boundaries, and willingness to truly listen to the needs of others, I've never felt closer to my husband.

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I Have a Husband and a Girlfriend - This Is Why Ethical Nonmonogamy Works For Us - Yahoo Lifestyle

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Nick Cannon Calls Monogamy Unhealthy, About ‘Selfishness and Ownership’ – Newsweek

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Nick Cannon has shared his belief that monogamy is not "natural," adding that such relationships veer into the territory of "selfishness and ownership."

The TV personality, 41, has had seven children with four women over the years, sharing his first two with ex-wife Mariah Carey. It was also recently revealed that he's expecting his eighth child, with Bre Tiesi, bringing the total number of mothers to five.

Cannon, who welcomed four children over a span of 14 months, has now revealed that he feels more comfortable living a polyamorous lifethough he stressed that the women who have had his children believe in monogamy.

Making an appearance on The Language of Love podcast with Dr. Laura Berman on Wednesday, The Masked Singer presenter Cannon said that he only considers somebody to be "not single" if they are married.

"Married is not single," he said, per People. "When you allow the government and paperwork to come in and say, 'This is a bond, this is a covenant' ... you're not single."

He went on: "You can still make covenants without getting the government involved, where two people say, 'We choose to be monogamous because we value this so much, we don't want anyone to be a part of this energy we have,' and I don't feel like that's healthy.

"I don't think monogamy is healthy. I feel like that gets into the space of selfishness and ownership."

At the top of the interview, the San Diego-born star said that the women with whom he has had his children "don't want any parts of any polygamy," though he admitted that the "world knows" that he has sexual relationships with other women.

When asked during his interview if all of his children were planned, Cannon said: "I'm going to take full responsibility. Any woman that I know that I have unprotected sex with, there's the potential to have a child.

"So I feel like if I have unprotected sex with anyone I knowbecause one, I value everything about me so much, if I've gotten to that point where I say, 'I can take off this condom,' I'm gonna say, 'She could be the mother of my child.'"

The Wild 'N Out star stressed that he doesn't engage in unprotected sex with everyone, as he described himself as "the biggest germ freak in the world."

He said: "Every woman that I have a child with, there is definitely a conversation about, 'Wow, how amazing would this be?' I feel like every woman I have a child with are amazing mothers, and there was a thought process going into like, 'Man, she would be an amazing mother, she's desired children, I can't wait to see what type of mother she would be.'"

"So, in saying that, I would say that they're all planned," added the talk show host.

During the interview, he also singled out Carey, from whom he was divorced in 2014, saying: "Mariah and I co-parent very well. She and I are really great friends and she's kind of taught me so much. That's family."

He described his friendship with Carey as "a different setup" to the relationships he has with the other mothers of his children.

Cannon shares 10-year-old fraternal twins, Moroccan and Monroe, with Grammy-winning singer Carey; four-year-old son Golden and 14-month-old daughter Powerful Queen with Brittany Bell; and twin sons Zion Mixolydian and Zillion Heir, whom he welcomed with Abby De La Rosa in June 2021.

His youngest son, Zen, whom he shared with model Alyssa Scott, passed away at 5 months old in December 2021 after a brain cancer diagnosis.

In January, it was revealed that Cannon was expecting his eighth child, with Tiesi.

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Review: ‘Born of Lakes and Plains,’ by Anne F. Hyde – Minneapolis Star Tribune

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Like any chronicle of widespread migration across a continent, the history of the American West is a story about mixing cultures, languages and peoples. Beginning with the first French and English explorers, whenever whites encountered Native peoples, they fought, they traded goods, and inevitably they intermarried.

Anne F. Hyde's "Born of Lakes and Plains" seeks to bring this legacy of families sharing white and Native blood out of the shadows of our historical understanding. At certain times and places, intermarriage was a common practice. Native people simply extended this time-honored tool of diplomacy and trade between, say, Ojibwe and Menominee to whites.

Among Native peoples, marriage was often considered a temporary alliance, and polygamy accepted. Likewise, French fur traders seeking commercial contacts would claim a Native "country wife" on the frontier in addition to the femme back in Montreal. Their offspring faced uncertain futures, either as Natives or, less likely, as whites. Straddling cultures, they often served precarious roles as interpreters and go-betweens.

Hyde tries to corral her unwieldy narrative into the stories of five white men and their extended families ranging across North America from colonial times into the 20th century. (Intermarriage between white women and Native men was rare.)

William Bent, for example, married Mistanta, daughter of a Cheyenne clan leader, and built a successful trading post on the Arkansas River early in the 19th century. In keeping with Cheyenne custom, he also wed her two sisters and had children with all of them. One relative, George Bent, "began the [Civil War] as a white man but ended it as an Indian."

After serving in the Confederate Army, he joined with Black Kettle's Cheyenne band, who, despite surrendering, were massacred at Sand Creek in 1864. George survived only by hiding under a pile of bodies.

In the Northwest, fur entrepreneur Alexander McKay sired half-Chinook children by three wives. At the end of the 19th century, his grandson, William Cameron McKay, a physician, was barred from voting because he was considered 9/16ths Native and therefore not a citizen. Never mind that he had previously been elected to a local government position.

Henry Schoolcraft emerges as Hyde's villain. His wife Jane, half-Ojibwe, tried to adapt to white culture while keeping close ties to her Ojibwe roots. It was harder to remain close to Henry, who often went off on speaking tours, posing as an expert on Native peoples, while dismissing them as incapable of complex thought.

Unfortunately, as Hyde jumps from one large extended family to another, it's impossible to keep the names straight, let alone discern what makes any of them tick. In the effort to convey the wide variety of fates encountered by mixed-descent people, she has offered a huge, and hugely confusing, cast of characters. Family tree charts would have been a help.

By the age of reservations, mixed-descent people were forced to identify with one culture or the other. Both was not an option. Being called "mixed" was nothing but a slur.

Dan Cryer is the author of "Being Alive and Having to Die: The Spiritual Odyssey of Forrest Church."

Born of Lakes and Plains

By: Anne F. Hyde.

Publisher: W.W. Norton, 442 pages, $40.

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City of Waveland upgrading Gex Park on Coleman Avenue – WXXV News 25

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Waveland Mayor Mike Smiths plan to create a happy, healthier city got some help today.

The city added outdoor fitness equipment to Gex Park. A pull-up bar, chest press, and cardio walkers are some of the equipment installed so adults can get a workout while the kids play.

Mayor Smith hopes the addition of the equipment will also help grow the downtown area.

Coleman Avenue is the heart of the business district for the city and it lost many businesses after Hurricane Katrina.

Its still coming back and adding these amenities, Smith hopes will help businesses decide to build back. Were about to get our pier fixed again. Thats one of the main attractions for Coleman Avenue and Downtown Waveland. In the future, I dont want to see overgrowth, but growth to where it will sustain itself.

Next on the agenda, the city will be making the park ADA accessible by adding new playground equipment.

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White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Leadership Announced – HS Today – HSToday

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Today, President Joe Biden announced that Dr. Alondra Nelson will perform the duties of director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and Dr. Francis Collins will perform the duties of Science Advisor to the President and Co-Chair of the Presidents Council of Advisors on Science and Technology until permanent leadership is nominated and confirmed. These appointments will allow OSTP and the Presidents Science and Technology agenda to move seamlessly forward under proven leadership.

Nelson currently serves as OSTPs Deputy Director for Science and Society. Nelson has directed priority efforts to protect the integrity of science in the federal government, broaden participation in STEM fields, strengthen the U.S. research infrastructure, and ensure that all Americans have equitable access to the benefits of new and emerging technologies and scientific innovation. She has played a key role in overseeing the implementation of the Presidents early directives on Restoring Trust in Government Through Scientific Integrity and Evidence-Based Policymaking and on Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government.

Collins recently stepped down as the director of the National Institutes of Health, after serving as its Director for more than 12 years, under three Presidents. As the longest serving Presidentially-appointed director of NIH he oversaw the work of the largest supporter of biomedical research in the world, from basic to clinical research. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in November 2007. He will continue to run a research lab at NIH, which he has run since 1993.

In the selections of Dr. Alondra Nelson and Dr. Francis Collins, President Biden has doubled down on science. The selections are responsive to the dual importance of a strong OSTP that can drive science and technology solutions to our greatest challenges and the very specific attention the President wants to give to the creation of a new ARPA-H research and discovery agency, the building of support for a Cancer Moonshot 2.0, the search for a new head of NIH, and the broad advisory work of PCAST.

Dr. Alondra Nelson, Deputy Director of Science and Society of OSTP and Performing the Duties of Director of OSTPAlondra Nelson, Ph.D., serves as the inaugural Deputy Director for Science and Society in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. In this role, she brings social science expertise, including attention to issues of social inequality, explicitly into the work of Federal science and technology strategy and policy. Dr. Nelson is also Harold F. Linder Chair and Professor at the Institute for Advanced Study, an independent research center in Princeton, NJ. She was president of the Social Science Research Council, an international research nonprofit from 2017-2021. She was previously professor of sociology at Columbia University, where she also served as the inaugural Dean of Social Science. Dr. Nelsons research contributions are situated at the intersection of political and social citizenship, on the one hand, and emerging science and technology, on the other. Dr. Nelson connects these dimensions in a range of widely acclaimed publications, including, most recently, The Social Life of DNA. Dr. Nelson is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Academy of Political and Social Science, the American Philosophical Society, and the National Academy of Medicine.

Dr. Francis Collins, Acting Science Advisor to the President and Acting Co-Chair of the Presidents Council of Advisors on Science and Technology

Francis S. Collins, M.D., Ph.D., is the former director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). As the longest serving Presidentially-appointed director of NIH spanning 12 years and three presidencies he oversaw the work of the largest supporter of biomedical research in the world, from basic to clinical research. Dr. Collins is a physician-geneticist noted for his landmark discoveries of disease genes and his leadership of the international Human Genome Project, which culminated in April 2003 with the completion of a finished sequence of the human DNA instruction book. Dr. Collins research laboratory has discovered a number of important genes, including those responsible for cystic fibrosis, neurofibromatosis, Huntingtons disease, a familial endocrine cancer syndrome, and most recently, genes for type 2 diabetes, and the gene that causes Hutchinson-Gilford progeria syndrome, a rare condition that causes premature aging. Dr. Collins is an elected member of the Institute of Medicine and the National Academy of Sciences. Dr. Collins was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in November 2007, the National Medal of Science in 2009, and the Templeton Prize in 2020.

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The importance of modernized technology in court proceedings – Reuters

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Before entering the courtroom, counsel relies on a courts technology to electronically file and serve documents and obtain court records. Once inside the courtroom, counsel, judges, and court staff rely on the courts technology when attending and participating in proceedings, such as hearings, trials, conferences, and other events, that are increasingly held remotely. Counsel must also leverage the courts infrastructure such as document storage and transfer to use exhibits and other materials during a proceeding.

I recently moderated a bar association panel, comprised of state court judges, on how best to use existing technology in state court proceedings. There were several key considerations that the panel discussed that merit further exploration.

Does the court have compatible systems for electronic filing and case record management?

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Electronic filing, while convenient, creates an element of uncertainty until counsel can identify a filing as accepted on the court docket, an uncertainty complicated by the risk of a technical issue with a submission. Counsel must be able to promptly determine from the court docket whether the court processed an electronic submission, or if not, they must be able to refile if necessary. Any delay in making this determination creates a risk that counsel misses a filing deadline.

Judges must also be able to access directly all electronically filed documents. Absent this access, judges run the risk of overlooking a key document or exhibit filed by counsel.

As a result, courts must use a comprehensive system that combines the convenience of electronic filing with real-time access to the courts records. A court should use a single case management and electronic filing system; or, if that is unavailable, courts should integrate their existing electronic filing and court records systems. Otherwise, the risks of an error exist, and counsel may opt to file in paper format (unless mandatory) to minimize potential filing issues.

Can counsel digitally submit materials in any format?

Court electronic filing systems typically require that counsel use PDF format to electronically file materials and to limit file sizes. However, PDF format is not always available for digital evidence because of the size or format of the material involved. For example, electronic filing systems often do not accept photographs, emails, text messages, and audio or video recordings in original format.

Counsel must determine in advance the best way and timing for electronically submitting materials to ensure proper consideration by the court. This requires counsel to inquire whether they can file materials using a thumb drive, CD, shared cloud drive, or other means. Counsel must also determine whether the court has compatible software or applications to access materials using counsels preferred file format and, if appropriate, to copy and edit materials. In turn, courts should have the latest software and applications to review, access, and use electronic submissions.

Even when a document is electronically submitted, is it accessible as counsel intended?

Counsel must understand in advance what happens to documents and other materials after filing them with the court. For example, counsel should understand the courts capabilities for whether documents retain color features after electronic filing and if the court can print any or all copies in color. If counsel electronically file lengthy documents or multiple related documents, counsel should understand how the documents appear to the court (such as linking related documents and numbering pages).

Counsel often lacks the ability to preview documents, using a courts electronic filing system, and see how their submissions will appear to the judge and court staff. To minimize these issues, counsel may need to provide courtesy copies of filed materials where color is relevant and independently mark page numbers of exhibits and other associated materials to ensure that a filing is complete and reviewable as intended.

Do existing courthouse facilities limit counsels presentation in a courtroom proceeding?

Counsel should survey the courtroom in advance to determine the available equipment and technology features. This is particularly important before trial, where counsel often must use exhibits and other materials to convince a judge or jury. Even as courts adapt to use electronic methods, their physical facilities can lag. Courtrooms do not always have sufficient existing equipment or capabilities, such as ample or nearby electrical outlets, display monitors, computer cables, or wireless internet access. The construction or location of some courtrooms may interfere with a cell phone signal to contact others or access the internet.

As a result, counsel must understand whether and how to address any shortcomings and develop a backup plan. For example, counsel must bring necessary equipment, such as power strips, cables, or a mobile hotspot. Counsel should also account for using traditional ways to present evidence, such as a whiteboard or using oversized paper versions of exhibits, especially if internet access is unavailable or unreliable or the courtroom lacks monitors.

Can the court conduct a complex proceeding remotely?

Many courts adapted to the pandemic by using videoconferencing to conduct a fully or partially remote proceeding. While a court may use a videoconferencing platform, this requires reliance on the courts existing infrastructure, which can present challenges unless the court has upgraded that infrastructure.

Counsel must determine in advance whether the courts technology places them at a disadvantage with a complex remote proceeding, such as a trial. For example, the courts videoconferencing platform may need to accommodate multiple participants (such as parties and witnesses), display sophisticated exhibits (such as high-resolution documents, videos, or simulations), and provide or sync to a means for recording the proceeding. This also may require the court, as a host, to have enough bandwidth to hold the proceeding and place sufficient cameras and audio equipment inside the courtroom to avoid putting any remote participants at a disadvantage. Otherwise, counsel may need to have any complex proceeding held in person.

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Opinions expressed are those of the author. They do not reflect the views of Reuters News, which, under the Trust Principles, is committed to integrity, independence, and freedom from bias. Thomson Reuters Institute is owned by Thomson Reuters and operates independently of Reuters News.

Brandon Moss joined Practical Law from Murphy, Hesse, Toomey & Lehane, LLP, where he was a partner. His practice focused on civil litigation, appellate practice, employment law, and public law. He also served as a judicial law clerk with the Atomic Safety & Licensing Board Panel of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

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