The Atlantic: Why 1984 Isn't Banned in China

Censors have banned books simply for containing a positive or even neutral portrayal of the Dalai Lama. The government disallows the publication of any work by Liu Xiaobo, the determined critic of the Communist Party who in 2017 became the first Nobel Peace Prize winner since Nazi times to die in prison. Again, for a time last year Chinese citizens could not type “nineteen,” “eighty,” and “four” in sequence—but they could, and still can, buy a copy of 1984, the most famous novel on authoritarianism ever written. Prefer Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World? They can buy that text, too, just as easily, although its title also joined the taboo list last winter.

Here’s the rub: Monitors pay closer attention to material that might be consumed by the average person than to cultural products seen as highbrow and intended for educated groups. (An internet forum versus an old novel.) As a result, Chinese writers are watched more closely than foreign ones. (Liu Xiaobo versus Orwell.) Another rule of thumb is that more leeway is given to imaginative works about authoritarianism than ones that specifically engage with its manifestations in post-1949 China. (1984 versus a book on the Dalai Lama.) [...]

These patterns may suggest that censors take a rather dim view of their audiences’ abilities—that they believe Chinese citizens are unable to draw a connection between the political situation Orwell described and the nature of their government (unless prompted to do so by a rabble-rouser on the internet). More likely, they’re motivated by elitism, or classism. Analogously, in the United States the MPAA slaps movies with an R rating if they depict nudity, but there’s no warning system for museums that display nude sculptures. The assumption is not that Chinese people can’t figure out the meaning of 1984, but that the small number of people who will bother to read it won’t pose much of a threat.[...]

The “somewhat” is key: it is rare for the government to ban an author’s oeuvre in its entirety. Publishers have some leeway to make decisions on a case by case basis, and a publisher in Shanghai may come to a different conclusion than a publisher in Sichuan. These disparities are a result of individual judgement calls and the specific relationships between publishers and their local censorship authorities.

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Vox: New York’s Orthodox Jewish community is battling measles outbreaks. Vaccine deniers are to blame.

What’s notable here is that the cases are mostly occurring among unvaccinated or under-vaccinated Orthodox Jews, particularly children. When asked why people are opting out of vaccines, the city health department said anti-vaccine propagandists are distributing misinformation in the community.

The fearmongerers include the Brooklyn group called PEACH — or Parents Teaching and Advocating for Children’s Health — which spreads misinformation about vaccine safety, citing rabbis as authorities, through a hotline and magazines. Brooklyn Orthodox Rabbi William Handler has also been proclaiming the well-debunked link between the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism. Parents who “placate the gods of vaccination” are engaging in “child sacrifice,” he told Vox. [...]

He also explained that some Orthodox Jews in Brooklyn go to school together, worship together, and live and travel together. This means a few unvaccinated people living in close proximity can be dangerous. But it also means making inroads with public health messages requires extra effort. “We see government invest in public health awareness a lot,” Rapaport said. “But it never trickles down to Yiddish speakers or people who don’t own TV sets.”

The story in New York is familiar: Other tight-knit communities — like the Somali-American community in Minnesota and the Amish in Ohio — have recently fallen victim to measles outbreaks as a result of vaccine refusal. This latest outbreak is a reminder of how vulnerable more insular groups can be to anti-vaxxers, and the unique challenges for public health advocates in countering their messages in these communities. [...]

“From a religious point of view, people have to vaccinate,” Rabbi David Niederman, executive director and president of the United Jewish Organizations of Williamsburg, told me. Instead, people have a duty to protect their families and the most vulnerable in their communities. “Anything that causes harm — you have to do whatever you can to [avoid] that.”

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UnHerd: How British politics is failing

Consider first the two columns, in black type, showing the responses of all voters. Both leaders have strongly negative ratings on all counts. That is unusual enough. But when we look at the blue figures, showing how Conservative voters view Theresa May, and the red figures, showing how Labour voters view Jeremy Corbyn, the scale of the drama becomes clear. The positive scores for May range from 57% of Conservative supporters who say she is strong, down to 40% who back her on Brexit. Her average score among Tory voters is 45%. Labour voters give Corbyn positive scores ranging from 64 to 38%; his average is 50%. Among all voters, the averages are, of course, even worse: May 26%, Corbyn 28%. 

To put these figures in context, a successful leader would expect average scores of around 80% among their party’s own voters and 40% among the general public. For both leaders to fall so far short of these figures should set off alarm bells in both parties. 

Here, though, is the paradox. Precisely because both leaders have terrible ratings, the scale of the problem is less obvious than it would be if only one was doing badly. In that case (as when Foot led Labour and towards the end of Thatcher’s premiership), their party would have support well below 30% in the polls and facing a landslide defeat. Instead, nothing much seems to have changed since the 2017 election. An average of recent polls shows the two parties still close together, and with almost as many supporters as 18 months ago. The high commands in both parties, though plainly struggling over Brexit, see no wider reason to panic. [...]

Which brings us to the possible long-term consequences of current public attitudes. In any country with a different electoral system, the chances are that support for both Labour and the Conservatives would have crashed by now. Across Europe, countries with more proportional voting systems have seen the traditional big parties slump in recent years – even with leaders less widely derided than Britain’s.  

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Atlas Obscura: Why Cider Means Something Completely Different in America and Europe

In the American state of New Hampshire, the state beverage of apple cider is like unfiltered apple juice. Usually, mulled spices are added, turning it into a spiced, piping hot drink. But in the famed cider-growing region of Britain’s West Country, cider is a fermented, alcoholic beverage. Look further across Europe and you’ll find that America’s version of apple cider is the outlier—cidre in France and sidra in Spain are both akin to British hard cider, rather than the American mulled beverage. So, how did Americans end up with such a unique form of apple cider? [...]

Cyder was the most commonly produced drink in colonial America—the beverage of choice for most Americans at a time when imbibing water was questionable. Not only was it easy to obtain and affordable to produce, but the fermentation process guaranteed it would be free from disease-causing pathogens, writes Amy Stewart in The Drunken Botanist. Even as Puritans denounced distilled spirits, cider and other low-alcohol products remained in good repute. [...]

But soon, the opportunities of the Industrial Revolution beckoned to millions of immigrants—and a lot of them didn’t want to drink cider. Over 33 million people entered the United States between 1820 and 1920, revolutionizing many American industries. German immigrants became the leaders in brewing and malting, popularizing beer. Coupled with affordable grains grown from the Midwest, beer began to replace cider. By 1900, cider consumption had dropped to a total of 55 million gallons for a country that now had over 76 million people. (While cider was on the decline, beer-making gradually grew more difficult too. World War I diverted grain and altered factory production across the country, and beer producers faced boycotts due to anti-German sentiments.)

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Failed Architecture: Le Corbusier’s Vision for Fascist Addis Ababa (9 October 2014)

This little known sketch for the town in the Italian colonial empire in Africa, made in 1936, therefore not only presents radically new ideas on colonial urbanism, but also serves as a testing ground for the critical relationship between ‘theory and practice’. The sketch can also be used to think about several questions: how were ideas about urbanism and political, social and economic agenda’s translated into the final building plan? How were radical utopian ideas on the city of the future were translated into concrete form? How did architects mediate between a ‘virgin territory’ and an irrevocable reality?  

The idea of Ethiopia as a tabula rasa—a blank slate—was omnipresent in the writings of architects and urban planners occupied with the designs of the colonial capital between 1936 and 1939, who considered the country devoid of any structures of architectural significance. Contrary to the fascination of Libyan whitewashed courtyard house – their simplicity, colours and volumes perfectly in tune with modern taste – the round houses of the Ethiopians were regarded by Italian architects as irrational and unhygienic.  [...]

Although Italian Addis Ababa gradually changed from a futuristic utopia into a tedious town in the hands of the Italians, this story on Le Corbusier’s involvement urges us to rethink the idea of (Italian) colonial planning as an isolated phenomenon. Clearly, the debate on the plans for Addis Ababa was closely intertwined with the general European debate on architecture in the 1930’s. As Le Corbusier’s ideas on functional zoning, rigid lines, and three-dimensional urbanism were often too radical and futuristic to be realized on the European mainland, the colony was the ultimate laboratory to realize these concepts. Le Corbusier’s sketch challenges us to rethink received interpretations of modernist planning practices: it demonstrates how progressive design could serve to build a destructive colonial empire. 

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Foreign Policy: Welcome to the People’s Democratic Republic of America

American journalists and media institutions seem critically unprepared to cope with the bad faith and corruption coming out of their own government. Repeatedly played by Trump, network executives appear capable of rationalizing any decision. If he came out to announce a coup, they would probably go ahead and broadcast it on the basis of its newsworthiness. It’s a sharp contrast with the skill of American correspondents dealing with hostile administrations abroad. [...]

This isn’t entirely new thinking. Within days of Trump’s win in November 2016, Masha Gessen, who had reported from Russia, published her widely read piece on surviving autocracy, writing that “the national press is likely to be among the first institutional victims” and warning reporters they would likely face the possibility of losing access if they pushed officials too hard. [...]

I saw some of this DRA thinking with MSNBC’s decision late last year. The channel had decided not to air a White House press conference. That move attracted a ton of attention, but it shouldn’t have. U.S. cable broadcasters’ habit of pro forma distributing White House briefings should stop. Propaganda from the administration should be given no more credibility or time than American media gives to Nicolás Maduro’s daily rants or Xi Jinping’s patriarchal videos. This doesn’t mean instinctively dismissing them but instead evaluating the government as they would any other country’s rather than instinctively following its every demand. [...]

In China, it became kind of a thing for outgoing correspondents to produce their juiciest stories in the final months of their stay, on their way out and when officials had the least leverage to punish them (such as by threatening to revoke their press credentials). Not giving a single solitary fuck can produce some great reporting. When it became clear my own stay in China had an expiration date—officials had indicated they would expel me—I went to town my final month, investigating extralegal detention centers by barging right into facilities and interviewing a rights attorney against the direct wishes of state security.

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Foreign Policy: The Belarusian President Won’t Go Down Without a Fight

But there’s a new wrinkle in the spat this time: Belarus could provide a way for Russian President Vladimir Putin to prolong his political career. Putin, who won re-election last year, is slated to leave office in 2024 under constitutionally mandated term limits. But a 20-year-old treaty with Belarus could provide a way for him to take leadership of both countries, potentially offering a way to keep ruling while technically complying with the Russian Constitution. [...]

While president, Medvedev signed a law extending presidential terms from four to six years. That means that Putin, who regained the presidency in 2012, could stretch two terms until 2024. The question of what happens then is the single-minded focus of Russian political elites.

Russian leaders are suddenly paying more attention to a 1999 treaty of union with Belarus, which was intended to create a confederation in which the countries would remain sovereign but would share a legislature and a currency—and, crucially, a head of state. [...]

Lukashenko, whose nearly 25-year rule earned him the moniker of “Europe’s last dictator,” has sought to squash talk of a full union. “If someone wants to break [Belarus] into regions and force us to become a subject of Russia, that will never happen,” he told a group of Russian reporters in December.

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