The Guardian: Concrete jungle: why brutalist architecture is back in style

Thus was the stage set for the resurgence of brutalism. You can’t put a brutalist building in a gold lame party dress: raw concrete is raw concrete. It’s down-to-earth, honest, unpretentious, egalitarian, and creates buildings rooted in place: Boston City Hall, New York’s Whitney Museum (now the Met Breuer), the city of Brasília.

Unlike steel and glass, concrete has terroir: the reddish concrete of Boston, for instance, looks and feels very different from the fine-grained concrete of Japan. You take the local rock, bind it with cement and water, and there you have your concrete. Its very nature is local rather than blandly international.

When they’re treated with care and respect, brutalist buildings can become treasured by a city in a way that glass-and-steel towers very rarely are. In London, for instance, locals and tourists alike swarm to the concrete cultural buildings on the south bank of the Thames at Waterloo Bridge. These masterpieces – the Royal Festival Hall, the Hayward Gallery, Denys Lasdun’s National Theatre – are a beloved part of the capital, a destination even for people with no particular reason to go there. [...]

Great brutalist buildings, it turns out, have soul, in a way that antiseptic glass curtain walls never will. And they have undeniable power, too. Consider Peter Eisenman’s haunting holocaust memorial in Berlin: it would be unthinkable in anything but concrete. [...]

It’s easy to see, then, how brutalism is flourishing in the age of Occupy. But there’s another force driving the brutalist resurgence, which is maybe less austere and selfless: photography, in general, and Instagram, in particular. [...]

Say what you like about brutalist buildings, you have to admit they look gorgeous in photographs and in coffee-table books such as This Brutal World, recently published by Phaidon. Brutalism might still be a bit austere for many people’s taste. But when you live in something that good looking, you can’t help but feel a little bit of glamor by association.

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Quartz: What if the Danes’ secret to happiness is largely about bad weather?

Romanticizing Scandinavians’ way of life is becoming a popular pastime. Sweden has the best parental leave policy in the world. Finland’s education system magically mixes low pressure and high achievement. And the Danes, the happiest people in the world, have higgle. [...]

“Hygge practices are, broadly, things that we do that our ancestors would recognise; besides lighting fires, eating, drinking, eating cake and drinking things that are hot,” she writes. “Yet there is certainly a Danish specificity in the prominence of pyromania, and principles crop up repeatedly that are highly specific to the Scandinavian climate.”

Williams looks at a few books on the hygge list, including The Little Book of Hygge by Meik Wiking, which notes some of the downsides of hygge, namely that it is based on small groups which can be pretty exclusionary. That suggests that its comforting nature may have as much as anything to do with being in a tight-knit, familiar group of friends or family, and that the fire, hot cocoa, and artfully woven woollen blankets are more the trappings of hygge than the source of it. [...]

Perhaps, then, the craze for hygge is just a manifestation of the desire to be more connected. Westerners generally live in less cohesive communities than they did a few decades ago, and technology dominates their waking hours, which is both isolating and overwhelming.

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Salon: Yes, clowns are creepy: “The phantom clown theory” explains why we’re terrified of them

This isn’t the first time there has been a wave of clown sightings in the United States. After eerily similar events occurred in the Boston area in the 1980s, Loren Coleman, a cryptozoologist who studies the folklore behind mythical beasts such as Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster, came up with something called “The Phantom Clown Theory,” which attributes the proliferation of clown sightings to mass hysteria (usually sparked by incidents witnessed only by children).

It’s impossible to determine which of these incidents are hoaxes and which are bona fide tales of clowning around taken to the extreme. Nonetheless, the perpetrators seem to be capitalizing on our longstanding love-hate relationship with clowns, tapping into the primal dread that so many children (and more than a few adults) experience in their presence.

In fact, a 2008 study conducted in England revealed that very few children actually like clowns. It also concluded that the common practice of decorating children’s wards in hospitals with pictures of clowns may create the exact opposite of a nurturing environment. It’s no wonder so many people hate Ronald McDonald. [...]

Jesters and others persons of ridicule go back at least to ancient Egypt, and the English word “clown” first appeared sometime in the 1500s, when Shakespeare used the term to describe foolish characters in several of his plays. The now familiar circus clown – with its painted face, wig and oversized clothing – arose in the 19th century and has changed only slightly over the past 150 years. [...]

Unusual or strange physical characteristics such as bulging eyes, a peculiar smile or inordinately long fingers did not, in and of themselves, cause us to perceive someone as creepy. But the presence of weird physical traits can amplify any other creepy tendencies that the person might be exhibiting, such as persistently steering conversations toward peculiar sexual topics or failing to understand the policy about bringing reptiles into the office.

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Salon: Queer rights are human rights: Fighting for freedom is polarizing the world

In much of the world, gay rights, and recognition of sexual and gender diversity, appear to be progressing. In Europe, the United States, Latin America and Australasia, acceptance is growing of the idea that queer rights are human rights. Still, in large parts of the world, people face rape, murder and torture if they are perceived to be openly homosexual or transgendered. [...]

The global situation suggests increasing polarization, both between and within states. As the authors of a 2016 report on state-sponsored homophobia point out, some Latin American countries have been leaders in legal recognition of queer rights, yet “the region shows the highest levels of violence and murder against LGBTI population, and in the most of the cases [sic] impunity is the rule.”

Progress is always ambiguous: South Africa has constitutional recognition of the need to prevent discrimination based on sexuality, and has legalized same sex-marriage; Australia has neither. Yet the real-life experience of most queer South Africans is almost certainly more difficult than for most Australians. [...]

Governments and religious leaders both create and reflect public opinion, and there are few issues where different attitudes are as stark. Research suggests that more than 80 percent of the population of some western countries accept homosexuality, whereas the figure drops below 10 percent across much of Africa and the Middle East. [...]

In 2016, the U.N. Human Rights Council appointed an “independent expert” to find the causes of violence and discrimination against people due to their gender identity and sexual orientation, and discuss with governments how to protect those people. At its best, the United Nations can create what U.S. scholar Ronnie Lipschutz called “an incipient global welfare system,” able to provide global norms and rules, and to prevent local opposition to basic human rights principles. U.N. resolutions can be used by local activists in lobbying governments, and an increasing number of U.N. agencies, led by UNDP and UNESCO, are incorporating queer issues into their agendas.

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The Guardian: Do you live in a Trump bubble, or a Clinton bubble?

I can totally understand why the New York Times has departed from its usual practice. As it argued in an editorial, Trump is “the worst nominee put forward by a major party in modern American history”. He is a threat to civil peace at home and the country’s standing abroad. An Italian friend compares it to the reaction of the newspaper La Repubblica when faced with the resistible rise of Silvio Berlusconi.

Unfortunately this taking sides may reinforce a structural trend that is itself corrosive of US democracy. The most characteristic American argument for free speech and for what we still anachronistically call a free “press” – as explicitly mentioned in the first amendment – is that this is necessary for democratic self-government: only if citizens can hear all the relevant arguments and evidence, as ancient Athenians did when they gathered on the Pnyx at the foot of the Acropolis, will they be able to make an informed choice and therefore meaningfully be said to be governing themselves. First voice, then vote. So you have to hear the arguments and evidence from both sides.

But in this respect Monday’s television duel between the two candidates is the exception that proves the rule: a brief moment of shared experience in the public square. The rest of the time, American voters are off in their own echo chambers, hearing views that reinforce their own.

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Al Jazeera: Israel's strip searches at airports 'illegal'

The practices occur at Israel's international Ben Gurion airport, as well as at many foreign airports where Israeli security officials are entitled to carry out pre-flight checks on behalf of Israeli carriers.

In addition to being forced to undress for body searches, Arab passengers are often detained in secure rooms in the departure area before their flights and escorted on to planes by security staff in full view of other passengers. They may also have their hand luggage confiscated.

However, it is the first time it has been suggested that Israeli security staff are carrying out procedures that break Israeli law. Nadeem Shehadeh, an Adalah lawyer, told Al-Jazeera the organisation had written to Israel's attorney general, Avichai Mandelblit, and the Israel Airports Authority demanding that strip-searches and security escorts be stopped immediately. [...]

Shlomo Harnoy, a former senior officer with Israel's secret intelligence service, the Shin Bet, which oversees airport security checks, told the Jerusalem Post newspaper in July that Israel was "unique" in profiling passengers. Israel's supreme court refused last year to outlaw racial profiling, though it expressed discomfort with the policy and urged the Airports Authority to find technological solutions to lessen its impact.

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Alternet: A 50-Year Civil War That Killed Over 250,000 and Devastated Colombia Has Finally Reached a Peace Agreement

Tension sits heavy across sections of Colombia. Polls suggest that the majority of the population will vote to ratify the peace deal. Exhaustion is the mood. Colombians want the war to end. This was not a war with a frontline necessarily, although there were frontlines between the FARC areas and the government zones. This was a war across the country, with precious resources squandered in the battle and fear pervasive even far from the battlefield. [...]

Tension sits heavy across sections of Colombia. Polls suggest that the majority of the population will vote to ratify the peace deal. Exhaustion is the mood. Colombians want the war to end. This was not a war with a frontline necessarily, although there were frontlines between the FARC areas and the government zones. This was a war across the country, with precious resources squandered in the battle and fear pervasive even far from the battlefield. [...]

But there is no guarantee that the referendum on October 2nd will pass. Santos was the Defence Minister under former President Álvaro Uribe, who left office in 2010. Uribe is leading the charge against the deal. He is now a Senator, whose Democratic Centre party hopes for a defeat of the referendum. Uribe believes that the Colombian state should not negotiate with the FARC. Amnesty for fighters should be off the table, and indeed, the full force of the Colombian army – backed by the United States – should crush the FARC. Uribe shares a great deal with Sri Lanka’s Mahinda Rajapaksa, who prosecuted a war unto the death against the Tamil Tigers. Rajapaksa set aside the peace process in Sri Lanka that began in 2002. He then turned to his military to destroy the Tigers. The UN Report on the Sri Lanka’s government’s war showed that it was almost genocide. It makes for difficult reading. It is what Uribe hopes for Colombia.

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Advocate: Insightful Poll Reveals Who Opposes LGBT People on Two Big Issues

The survey is also enlightening because it explains what makes people want to deny service to same-sex couples getting married. It’s not an issue of civil rights. To them it’s a “moral” issue. Pew found that among the 35 percent of people who still say homosexual behavior is morally wrong, a whopping 76 percent said businesses should be able to refuse wedding services to same-sex couples.

The moral questions on these issues are more complicated if a person knows someone who is LGBT. Pew found that those who don’t know a gay person are more likely to be OK turning away same-sex couples. The difference was most sharp on the question of access to bathroom. “Knowing someone who is transgender is closely linked with views on the use of public restrooms,” Pew wrote in its analysis of findings. “Most people who personally know someone who is transgender say that transgender people should be allowed to use public restrooms that match their current gender identity (60%).” The problem is only three in 10 Americans said they knew a transgender person.

There was another way to predict whether a person would support refusing service: look at their political party registration. Republicans said businesses should be able to refuse service by a 71-26 margin. On access to restrooms for trans people, Republicans opposed it 67-30.

While Jews and Catholics and those unaffiliated with any religion were more likely to say businesses should be required to serve everyone (64 percent, 54 percent, and 65 percent, respectively), Protestants went in the other direction. Just 36 percent were opposed to discrimination. Then among Protestants, race played a factor, with black churchgoers evenly split on the question, while white churchgoers lined up strongly against serving everyone no matter their sexual orientation. Not surprisingly, white evangelical Protestants were most likely to support refusing service (77 percent).

That phenomenon largely held up on the issue of bathroom access, with one exception. Catholics are evenly split on that question, with 47 percent backing access and 50 percent opposed.

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The Guardian: Police with body cameras receive 93% fewer complaints – study

Police equipped with body-worn cameras receive 93% fewer complaints from the public, according to a new study that suggests the technology helps to cool down potentially volatile encounters.

Academics at Cambridge University, whose research looked at nearly 1.5m beat hours across more than 4,000 shifts by officers in the UK and California, claim their findings suggest the cameras herald a “profound sea change in modern policing”. [..]

Throughout the year-long experiment, researchers were said to have randomly assigned about half of the officers starting their shifts with cameras. All officers in the forces taking part worked with cameras at some point, the researchers said.

During the 12 months before the study, a total of 1,539 complaints were lodged against police in the areas examined, amounting to 1.2 complaints per officer. By the end, the number of complaints had fallen to 133 for the year across all sites – 0.08 per officer.

The researchers were surprised to find that there was no statistically significant difference between the number of complaints received by officers wearing cameras and those without, a result they said may be a result of “contagious accountability”.

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