[OBSCURA] For #blackouttuesday

h/t to Twitter’s Jay Pitter for the original image, here.

[NEWS] Seven Christmas links: Bowie and Bing, horror, ghosts, holidays, xenophobia, Elf on the Shelf

• Dangerous Minds shares the story of the remarkable duet between Bing Crosby and David Bowie.
• Dangerous Minds looks at the 1980 horror film To All A Goodnight.
• Strange Company shares a strange story, of a ghostly choir reportedly heard in 1944, here.
• Caitlin Kelly at the Broadside Blog writes about why she and her husband each take Christmas seriously.
• Paul Campos at Lawyers, Guns and Money looks at the xenophobia behind the idea of a War on Christmas, going back to the anti-Semitism of Henry Ford.
• JSTOR Daily carries suggestions that the idea of the Grinch, from Dr. Seuss, has anti-Semitic origins.
• VICE makes the case for the creepiness of the Elf on the Shelf in the context of a surveillance society, here.

[URBAN NOTE] Seven Toronto links

• John Lorinc at Spacing considers the complication idea of a city charter for Toronto. Is it worth it? Does it ignore other governance issues?
• Tourism is booming in Toronto, transforming the economy of the metropolis. The Toronto Star reports.
• NOW Toronto notes how the Toronto District School Board is introducing educational courses intended to prepare students for careers in hospitality.
• Legal controversy surrounding the governance of Mount Pleasant Cemetery, and other like cemeteries in Toronto, is ongoing. The Toronto Star reports.
• In Milton, the owner of an illegal rooming house where one tenant died has been found financially liable. CBC reports.
• The Toronto Star tells the story of soldiers returning from the First World War who attacked Chinatown and its inhabitants, here.
• NOW Toronto points to an exhibition of photos created in solidarity with Hong Kong journalists.

[NEWS] Five NYR Daily links: Colombia, slavery, churches, journalism, Shakespeare&Co (@nyr_daily)

• The NYR Daily shares a report from Colombia, about the ways in which the filling of the Hidroituango Dam interacts with Colombia’s other social and political issues, here.
• Sean Wilentz makes the compelling argument at the NYR Daily that the young United States was a critical venue for antislavery movements, here.
• The NYR Daily tells the stories of two churches, one white and one black, as they merge, here.
• The NYR Daily shares the stories of a half-dozen pioneering, but overlooked, black woman journalists in the United States, here.
• Caitlin O’Keefe tells at the NYR Daily of how Paris bookstore Shakespeare and Company played a key role in the growth of feminism, here.

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

• Bad Astronomer notes a new study explaining how climate change makes hurricanes more destructive.
• Centauri Dreams shares a mosaic photo of the sky with Alpha Centauri highlighted.
• The Crux shares a paper explaining why the bubonic plague rarely becomes mass epidemics like the Black Death of the 14th century.
• D-Brief notes the new ESA satellite ARIEL, which will be capable of determining of exoplanet skies are clear or not.
• Gizmodo consults different experts on the subject of smart drugs. Do they work?
• JSTOR Daily explains why Native Americans are so prominent in firefighting in the US Southwest.
• Language Log looks at evidence for the diffusion of “horse master” between speakers of ancient Indo-European and Sinitic languages.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money notes the election of Chesa Boudin as San Francisco District Attorney.
• The LRB Blog considers the apparent pact between Farage and Johnson on Brexit.
• Marginal Revolution looks at a paper examining longer-run effects of the integration of the US military on racial lines in the Korean War.
• The NYR Daily looks at how Big Pharma in the US is trying to deal with the opioid epidemic.
• The Signal explains how the Library of Congress is expanding its collections of digital material.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel explains how future generations of telescopes will be able to directly measure the expansion of the universe.
• The Volokh Conspiracy explains why DACA, giving succor to Dreamers, is legal.
• Window on Eurasia notes that, after a century of tumult, the economy of Russia is back at the same relative ranking that it enjoyed a century ago.
• Arnold Zwicky reports on an old butch cookbook.

[BLOG] Some Friday links

• Bad Astronomy’s Phil Plait notes new research on where the sun is located within the Milky Way Galaxy.
• The Broadside Blog’s Caitlin Kelly considers the value of slow fashion.
• Centauri Dreams notes the different gas giants that our early methods have yet to pick up.
• Crooked Timber shares a lovely photo looking back at Venice from across its lagoon.
• D-Brief notes that upcoming space telescopes might find hundreds of rogue planets thanks to microlensing.
• io9 notes that Marvel will soon be producing Warhammer40K comics.
• The Island Review shares some poetry and photography by Ken Cockburn inspired by the Isle of Jura.
• JSTOR Daily notes that different humpback whale groups have different songs, different cultures.
• Language Hat tries to find the meaning of the odd Soviet Yiddish word “kolvirt”.
• Paul Campos at Lawyers, Guns and Money looks at the history of Elizabeth Warren as a law teacher.
• Map Room Blog shares information from Google Maps about its use of data.
• Marginal Revolution notes that in 2016, not a single child born in the United Kingdom was given the name Nigel.
• Peter Watts talks about AI and what else he is doing.
• The NYR Daily marked the centennial of a horrible massacre of African-Americans centered on the Arkansas community of Elaine.
• Emily Margolis at the Planetary Society Blog looks at how the Apollo moon missions helped galvanize tourism in Florida.
• Noel Maurer at The Power and the Money looks at the constitutional crisis in Peru.
• Drew Rowsome takes a look at A Streetcar Named Desire.
• Peter Rukavina looks at a spreadsheet revealing the distribution of PEI public servants.
• Spacing reviews a book imagining how small communities can rebuild themselves in neoliberalism.
• Towleroad shares the criticism of Christine and the Queens of the allegedly opportunistic use of queer culture by Taylor Swift.
• Understanding Society considers, sociologically, the way artifacts work.
• The Volokh Conspiracy argues that the 70th anniversary of the foundation of the People’s Republic of China should be a day of mourning, on account of the high human toll of the PRC.
• Window on Eurasia suggests the Russian generation of the 1970s was too small to create lasting change.
• Arnold Zwicky looks at how underwear ads can be quite sexualized.

[BLOG] Some Tuesday links

• Bad Astronomer notes the latest news on interstellar comet 2/Borisov.
• The Broadside Blog’s Caitlin Kelly emphasizes how every writer does need an editor.
• Centauri Dreams notes how the gas giant GJ 3512 b, half the mass of Jupiter orbiting a red dwarf star closely, is an oddly massive exoplanet.
• Gina Schouten at Crooked Timber looks at inter-generational clashes on parenting styles.
• D-Brief looks at the methods of agriculture that could conceivably sustain a populous human colony on Mars.
• Bruce Dorminey argues that we on Earth need something like Starfleet Academy, to help us advance into space.
• Colby King at the Everyday Sociology Blog looks at how the socio-spatial perspective helps us understand the development of cities.
• Russell Arben Fox at In Media Res listens to the Paul McCartney album Flaming Pie.
• io9 looks at Proxima, a contemporary spaceflight film starring Eva Green.
• JSTOR Daily looks at how the intense relationship between the US and Saudi Arabia began in, and reflected, the era of Jim Crow.
• Language Hat notes a report suggesting that multilingualism helps ward off dementia.
• Language Log takes issue with the names of the mascots of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money notes the emergence of a ninth woman complaining about being harassed by Al Franken.
• Marginal Revolution links to a new paper arguing that the Washington Consensus worked.
• The NYR Daily shares an Aubrey Nolan cartoon illustrating the evacuation of war children in the United Kingdom during the Second World War.
• At Out of Ambit, Diane Duane shares a nice collection of links for digital mapmakers.
• The Planetary Society Blog looks at how the European Space Agency supports the cause of planetary defense.
• Roads and Kingdoms interviews Kenyan writer Kevin Mwachiro at length.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel reports on how a mysterious fast radio burst helped illuminate an equally mysterious galactic halo.
• Strange Company reports on the mysterious and unsolved death in 1936 of Canadian student Thomas Moss in an Oxfordshire hayrick.
• Frank Jacobs at Strange Maps notes how Mount Etna is a surpassingly rare decipoint.
• Understanding Society considers the thought of Kojève, after Hegel, on freedom.
• Window on Eurasia looks at the falling numbers of Russians, and of state support for Russian language and culture, in independent Central Asia.
• Yorkshire Ranter Alex Harrowell looks at how individual consumer responses are much less effective than concerted collective action in triggering change.
• Arnold Zwicky reports on some transgender fashion models.

[BLOG] Some Sunday links

• Bad Astronomer Phil Plait notes how TESS detected a star being torn apart by a distant black hole.
• Centauri Dreams’ Paul Gilster looks at the past and future of the blog.
• Crooked Timber takes on the sensitive issue of private schools in the United Kingdom.
• The Crux considers the question of why women suffer from Alzheimer’s at a higher frequency than men.
• D-Brief notes a study suggesting that saving the oceans of the Earth could reduce the effects of global warming by 20%.
• Bruce Dorminey considers a paper suggesting that, if not for its volcanic resurfacing, Venus could have remained an Earth-like world to this day.
• The Dragon’s Tale notes that NASA will deploy a cubesat in the proposed orbit of the Lunar Gateway station to make sure it is a workable orbit.
• Andrew LePage at Drew Ex Machina looks at Soyuz T-10a, the first crewed mission to abort on the launch pad.
• Gizmodo reports on a paper arguing that we should intentionally contaminate Mars (and other bodies?) with our world’s microbes.
• io9 looks at how Warner Brothers is trying to control, belatedly, the discourse around the new Joker movie.
• JSTOR Daily looks at how, in industrializing London, women kidnapped children off the streets.
• Language Hat links to a page examining the Arabic and Islamic elements in Dune.
• Scott Lemieux at Lawyers, Guns and Money looks at a new documentary examining the life of Trump mentor Roy Cohn.
• The LRB Blog looks at how BBC protocols are preventing full discussion of public racism.
• The Map Room Blog looks at different efforts to reimagining the subway map of New York City.
• Marginal Revolution shares a paper claiming that increased pressure on immigrants to assimilate in Italy had positive results.
• The NYR Daily looks at the background to George Washington’s statements about the rightful place of Jews in the United States.
• Casey Dreier at the Planetary Society Blog looks at the political explanation of the massive increase in the planetary defense budget of NASA.
• Drew Rowsome takes a look at the Rocky Horror Show, with its celebration of sexuality (among other things).
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel considers why there are so many unexpected black holes in the universe.
• Frank Jacobs at Strange Maps examines why Google Street View is not present in Germany (and Austria).
• The Volokh Conspiracy reports on a ruling in a UK court that lying about a vasectomy negates a partner’s consent to sex.
• Window on Eurasia notes the controversy about some Buryat intellectuals about giving the different dialects of their language too much importance.

[BLOG] Some Saturday links

• Architectuul shares photos from a bike tour of Berlin.
• Bad Astronomer Phil Plait reports on new evidence that exocomets are raining on star Beta Pictoris.
• Larry Klaes at Centauri Dreams reviews the two late 1970s SF films Alien and Star Trek I, products of the same era.
• D-Brief reports on Hubble studies of the star clusters of the Large Magellanic Cloud.
• Bruce Dorminey shares Gemini telescope images of interstellar comet C/2019 Q4 (Borisov).
• The Dragon’s Tales shares video of Space X’s Starhopper test flight.
• Far Outliers notes the import of the 13th century Norman king of England calling himself Edward after an Anglo-Saxon king.
• Gizmodo notes that not only can rats learn to play hide and seek, they seem to enjoy it.
• io9 notes the fantastic high camp of Mister Sinister in the new Jonathan Hickman X-Men run, borrowing a note from Kieron Gillen’s portrayal of the character.
• Joe. My. God. notes that Guiliani’s soon-to-be ex-wife says he has descended from 911 hero to a liar.
• Language Log looks at the recent ridiculous suggestion that English, among other languages, descends from Chinese.
• The LRB Blog looks at the brief history of commemorating the V2 attacks on London.
• Scott Lemieux at Lawyers, Guns and Money looks at the practice in Saskatchewan of sterilizing First Nations women against their consent.
• Marginal Revolution suggests that farmers in Brazil might be getting a partly unfair treatment. (Partly.)
• The Planetary Society Blog explains why C/2019 Q4 (Borisov) matters.
• Window on Eurasia notes that, for the first time, immigrants from Turkmenistan in Belarus outnumber immigrants from Ukraine.

[BLOG] Some Thursday links

• The Buzz shares a TIFF reading list, here.
• Centauri Dreams notes the growing sensitivity of radial velocity techniques in finding weird exoplanet HR 5183 b, here.
• The Crux reports on circumgalactic gas and the death of galaxies.
• Dead Things notes the import of the discovery of the oldest known Australopithecine skull.
• Dangerous Minds reports on pioneering 1930s queer artist Hannah Gluckstein, also known as Gluck.
• Gizmodo notes that, for an unnamed reason, DARPA needs a large secure underground testing facility for tomorrow.
• JSTOR Daily looks at how Jim Crow laws affected Mexican immigrants in the early 20th century US.
• Language Hat looks at a new project to study Irish texts and language over centuries.
• Language Log shares some Chinglish signs from a top university in China.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money shares an interview with Jeffrey Melnick suggesting Charles Manson was substantially a convenient boogeyman.
• Marginal Revolution shares a paper suggesting marijuana legalization is linked to declining crime rates.
• Susan Neiman at the NYR Daily tells how she began her life as a white woman in Atlanta and is ending it as a Jewish woman in Berlin.
• The Planetary Society Blog looks at Hayabusa2 at Ryugu.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel celebrated the 230th anniversary of Enceladus, the Saturn moon that might harbour life.
• Window on Eurasia notes how global warming is harming the rivers of Siberia, causing many to run short.