Solidarity Forever

“You are who I love, you who stands at the courthouse with the sign that reads NO JUSTICE, NO PEACE” – Aracelis Girmay, “You Are Who I Love” Discomfort Liberalism assesses solidarity as an abstract concept rather than a strongly-held moral value. In this framework, unity is reduced to a comforting idea that focuses only … Read more

The Other Face of Privilege

By now, you’ve seen or heard the word “privilege” in myriad contexts: trumpeted from megaphones at city protests, stamped across aesthetically pleasing Instagram infographics, italicized and bolded in op-eds. In the context of recent race relations, the notion of “privilege” has been widely discussed and viewed as an exclusively White phenomenon that runs rampant in … Read more

Essentializing Essential Workers

Essentializing Essential Workers

As the coronavirus ravages communities around the world, essential workers continue risking their lives to perform the services that sustain our very lives. They clean our streets, keep us fed, and nurse us back to health. Praised by politicians, glorified by CEOs, and celebrated by celebrities and consumers alike, essential workers have been likened to heroes throughout the pandemic. Such recognition … Read more

TikTok: The Summation of 2020’s Duality and Chaos

TikTok perfectly encapsulates the zeitgeist of 2020. The video-sharing social network from Beijing-based ByteDance is the perfected form of previous social media trends: Vine’s snappiness, Instagram’s infinite scroll, and Reddit’s niche subsets. Now that quarantine has locked us away with phones as our constant companions, we suddenly have extra free hours that TikTok, like a … Read more

The Fate of Harvard’s International Students

The Fate of Harvard’s International Students

On Monday, July 6, Harvard announced that it will be transitioning to an online-only educational format for the Fall 2020 semester, and, despite Harvard’s pledge to opt for a medium density plan, promising to bring up to 40% of undergraduates back on campus, students will learn remotely whether or not they live in Cambridge. While … Read more

Ending Illegal Logging Means Corporate Accountability

Ending Illegal Logging Means Corporate Accountability

As we continue to investigate the linkages between the anti-corruption and climate change movements, it would be naive to not consider illegal logging. The world’s greatest forests suffer at the hands of some of the world’s largest economies, all hungry for resources without care for their origins. Beyond providing refuge for enormous amounts of biodiversity and serving as the … Read more

The Appropriation of Avatar

“Avatar the Last Airbender” is my favorite show of all time, and I’m not alone. Water, Earth, Fire, Air: The Fire Nation wants to conquer the rest, and only the Avatar, a 12-year-old boy named Aang, can master all four elements and save the world. The show is so popular that it topped Netflix charts … Read more

Bringing Down the World’s Largest Heist: Interview with Clare Rewcastle Brown

Clare Rewcastle Brown is an investigative journalist and founder of the Sarawak Report. She was a whistleblower in the 1Malaysia Development Berhad scandal, which saw billions of dollars siphoned from governments into private bank accounts and shell companies to fund extravagant parties, major Hollywood productions and forge relationships with some of the world’s most famous … Read more