Author: Rose Woodhouse
Confederate Flags and Washington’s Football Team
So. Washington, D.C. has this football team. And it has a name. Some people want to change this team name, as it is flagrantly racist. I must say, seems rather reasonable to me. We...
What’s in a Maiden Name?
A Facebook friend, and fellow female professor, recently made a status update that mentioned that her students call her “Mrs. X.” She is unmarried and has a doctorate. She signs her emails with “Dr....
Sugar and the Real Reason for Cruz’s Opposition
Ted Cruz is worried about sugar addiction. Or rather, that Obamacare is like sugar addiction. He uses the metaphor over and over. Why? His point is this: once Obamacare is passed, Americans will get...
9 Things Your Local Philosopher Won’t Tell You
1. We totally know why there’s something rather than nothing. Our lips are sealed. Have fun guessing! 2. Plato’s forms of Truth, Beauty, and Goodness were recently found in a filing cabinet in the...
Doping, Blade Running, and Wheelchair Basketball
Andrew Sullivan criticizes Jeremy Rozansky’s condemnation of steroid use by claiming that steroid use is perhaps less morally arbitrary than genetic inheritance of athletic ability. I agree with Sullivan that there is no question...
My Three Sons
Forgive me for not having an upshot with this post. It’s just a jumble of thoughts about the relationship that my sons have with each other, a topic I wrote about briefly once before....
Fictional Gun Violence and Mass Gun Killings
Note: This post is part of our League Symposium on Guns In America. You can read the introductory post for the Symposium here. To see a list of all posts in the Symposium so far,...
What I Wish My Students Knew
There was a really wonderful and moving article in the New York Times the other day about how for poor students, getting to college is only the beginning of the battle. They often fail...
Is It Morally Wrong to Donate to Your Alma Mater?
Note: This post is part of our League Symposium on Charity. Here is the introductory post for the Symposium. Here is a list of all posts so far. New York City Police Officer DePrimo (pictured) was...
The Specific Problem of Hipster Irony
In the New York Times’s ongoing philosophy column, The Stone, Christy Wampole informs us “How to Live Without Irony.” Actually, the more accurate headline would be “Why We Should Live Without Hipster Irony.” Her plea is mostly convincing,...
When You Can’t Score an Autism Diagnosis
This is part of a series I’m writing on being the parent of a child with severe multiple disabilities at Blinded Trials. A couple of months ago, a mother of a child with the...
An Emerging Staten Island Narrative
Staten Island is getting upset. Staten Island is a borough that has an uneasy relationship with the rest of New York City’s boroughs under the best of circumstances. It has felt treated like a...
Let’s Not Demand an Apology from Ann Coulter
Although I like my “job” (grad student and lecturer in philosophy) enormously, it has its downsides. Ann Coulter’s “job” has many advantages over mine: she makes a lot more money, people likely treat her...
More on Being a Woman in a Male-dominated Field
I was never quite sure about what might be the cause of the extreme disparity of males to females in philosophy. Women make up 21% of professional philosophers. This is nowhere near their representation...
Nassau County is Not an Obama Love-fest
I have heard it suggested, in our own backyard and countless times on Twitter, that Obama had a homefield advantage because the debate was in New York. Thus, he got softball questions. Please set conspiracy theories...
What’s the Matter with New York?
Two months ago, which is, like, 49 months in blog-months, Kevin Drum suggested there was a very good essay to be written called “Why People Hate Liberals.” This is not that essay. But it reminded me...
Is It Okay to Ogle Hotties, Male and Female?
In the comments on my post on the hollowness of Seventeen magazine’s promise to avoid Photoshopping, beloved readers Tod and Will brought up some related points. Tod asks: How do we collectively, and also women specifically, square the...
Nars and the Real Girls
Seventeen magazine recently patted itself on the back for responding to a petition drive led by an enterprising teenage girl, Julia Bluhm. The magazine now will present only non-Photoshopped girls in its editorial spreads and covers. This...
Political and moral rights
This is adapted from something I posted the other day over at Blinded Trials. I know there are many Friends of Rights who read the front page, and not Blinded Trials, and I’d love...
