The Roundup Top Ten for May 21, 2021

by HNN Staff

The Abortion Fight Has Never Been About Just Roe v. Wade

by Mary Ziegler

"The abortion debate has never been about just Roe—and it’s never been about letting a popular majority have a say. What’s new is that this argument now meets a receptive Supreme Court for the first time in more than a generation."

Dropout Professors

by Gretchen Soderlund

Sharing the stories of professors who, like her, dropped out of high school, one historian argues that we need open-admission and affordable public colleges and an education system that does more to keep students in.

In Israel, the Violent Legacy of 1948

by Benny Morris

"The chaos in the towns of Lydda, Ramle, Haifa, Umm al-Fahm and Acre is a dim echo of the civil war between Palestine’s Jewish and Arab communities that engulfed the country during the first months of the 1948 war."

How Billy Graham Weaponized White Evangelical Christian Power In America

by Anthea Butler

Although the Reverend Billy Graham projected an image of religious revival divorced from politics, he encouraged an evangelical sense of fear that has been manipulated by right-wing politicians for decades.

What Is Critical Race Theory And Why Did Oklahoma Just Ban It?

by Kathryn Schumaker

Attacks on "critical race theory" in Oklahoma's legislature are part of a political effort to prevent discussion of the state's racist past – the legislature made CRT a culture war issue as the centennial of the Tulsa Race Massacre approaches. Here's why we need more, not less, of the ideas behind CRT.

What Liberal Comparisons between Bush-Cheney and Trump Get Wrong

by Joseph Stieb

Liberal critics of Liz Cheney have suggested she's a hypocrite, blasting Trump's "Big Lie" while having championed the deceptions that led to the Iraq War. This is an imperfect comparison, which ignores the real lessons of Iraq – that fixing the fact-finding process to fit a policy is a common and continuing danger.

Campus Cancel Culture Freakouts Obscure the Power of University Boards

by Asheesh Kapur Siddique

The real power at American universities lies with their boards of directors, which are increasingly drawn from the ranks of corporate America and have shown themselves willing to enforce ideological restrictions on teaching and research.

To Navigate the Dangers of the Web, You Need Critical Thinking – But Also Critical Ignoring

by Sam Wineburg

"Learning to ignore information is not something taught in school. School teaches to read a text thoroughly and closely before rendering judgment. But on the web, where advertisers, lobbyists, conspiracy theorists and foreign governments conspire to hijack attention, critical ignoring is just as important as critical thinking."

The Century-Old Law That Inaugurated Biden’s Border Problems

by Reece Jones

This week marked the centennial of the Emergency Quota Act, which established racist quotas for immigration and continues to make immigration policy a political and humanitarian nightmare.

Black Germans and New Forms of Resistance

by Tiffany Florvil

Black activists and intellectuals in Germany have worked to promote knowledge of colonial and Black history as a counter to the entrenched tendency to hide and evade the subject.