“Culturally rich. No kitsch.” Apparently Cincy tourism board has a new slogan and… I kind of like it. “Full of trend” definitely needs work, though

Goodness, I really hate the syncophantism of ChatGPT. Are there people who actually like this? I asked for headline suggestions for a feature I've got going up soon and here's what it responded afterward:

Guess who has two thumbs, an insatiable thirst for disappointment, and just won a FOIA appeal for DEA data

I was going to join the local garage-sale group on Facebook and this was the first post I saw and... nope. no thank you. hell no.

TikTok 🇺🇸... "Combating the prospect of Chinese propaganda by giving the the U.S. government partial control of the app? That's logic only a propagandist could love…" - @enbrown.bsky.social on the joke that is nAtiOnAL sEcuRity tHReAt, #TikTok... 😑 reason.com/2025/09/17/t...

Hard to think of a more on-the-nose encapsulation of how far the online speech wars have swung in the year of our lord 2025 than major U.S. corporations racing to fire people whose tweets offended Milo Yiannopoulos

Sorry, folks. The only comedy that's fully legal now is specials called TRIGGERED: THE UNWOKE, UNCENSORED TOUR with a thumbnail of a guy with a piece of duct tape over his mouth. Everything else will be placed under review for content by the FCC.

Roughly 60% of prostitution charges are the result of a sex worker becoming the victim of a crime. These violations typically START with people the government has demonized (sex workers, drug users, migrants), but NEVER EVER stop with us.

I sort of guessed the answer when I asked which Kirk legacy would be honored — debating your opponent, or using state power to shut down the left. But it happened very quickly. www.semafor.com/article/09/1...

Not really an overstatement to say that the test of a free society is whether or not comedians can make fun of the country's leader on TV without repurcussions.

Kimmel didn’t even really say anything negative about Kirk. He noted the cynical and almost giddy exploitation of the killing by right-wing propagandists, absolutely accurately, and in gentler terms than I would have used.

Will a US-specific version of TikTok mean US creators are cut off from the rest of the world? Today's newsletter looks at the TikTok deal + prostitution decrim legislation in NY, a new poll on New Yorkers & legalizing sex work, and a new study on "body counts" reason.com/2025/09/17/t...

George Retes was denied access to an attorney, wasn’t allowed to make a phone call, was not presented to a judge, and was put in an isolation cell before being released with no charges.

People are blaming social media for Charlie Kirk's murder. History shows us that's wrong.

Truly insane post from The Federalist, which includes the recommendation that the government pressure tech companies to limit access to BlueSky because of the reaction to Kirk's death thefederalist.com/2025/09/15/w...

👇 @mmasnick.bsky.social is talking about social media; applies more broadly... 'you can’t “win back” a platform that’s owned and controlled by someone who actively opposes everything you stand for. You can’t “win back” something you have no ability to control at all' www.techdirt.com/2025/09/15/s...

Crazy thought but… men may have committed violence before social media existed. So I’ve heard, at least reason.com/2025/09/15/s...

The Paper; the Office, the British office, and Dexter; all take place in the same universe Look it up.

Lol, this was my feed just now...

I saw a study about pirate porn and I couldn't resist

"Leftist" censors now claiming hypersexualized media is a "civil rights violation" FOR THE CONSUMER, as it is interrupts their development of a "natural" sexuality. Of course, this is the same claim advanced by religious groups, which blame porn for kinks, gender identity, queerness.

some personal news: in a few weeks, I, along with my Rolling Stone comrade and editor @andrewperez.bsky.social, will be up and running at the expanding political reporting team at @mehdirhasan.bsky.social’s outlet @zeteo.com www.semafor.com/article/09/0...

Fuck who ever you want.. boys girls whatevs, just use protection. Thanks for coming to my sex Ed class with no gender ideology

As more places around the world—including U.S. states—pass laws requiring age checks around the internet, we're continuing to see a slew of unintended (but entirely predictable) consequences. reason.com/2025/09/03/m...

The Trump administration is threatening to withhold sex ed $ from states that won't strike "gender ideology" from their curriculums reason.com/2025/09/03/s...

...better mental health outcomes. This dovetails with long-known findings (I studied 'em in adolescent psych in the mid-'80s) demonstrating that overly permissive parents (cell phone at 8) and authoritarian parents (no phone until 18) were equally bad for their kids' development.

Any competent psychologist (who wasn't trying to push a predetermined authoritarian agenda) would recognize that results like the one you describe means that what is ACTUALLY going on is that there is something about the PARENTS who choose the moderate path that results in...

If you’re a parent in North America, when would you give your child their first smartphone if you were basing your decision just on this study about cellphone initiation and mental health?

A few years ago one of our fellows told me she thinks the world would be better off without the Internet. I told her I was old enough to live through both and explained toll calls, paper maps, questions you never learn the answer to, wondering if anyone else in the world is gay...

I see this all the time. A big part of our anti tech moment is Gen Z and younger millennials convinced that eternally fraught things—dating, finding purpose, navigating one’s 20s, sex, socializing, motivation—are only hard for them BECAUSE OF the internet

I think many OG Internet users underestimate how many digital natives blame the Internet for, well, everything. A student's feedback from the first week of my Internet Law course: "I have honestly never thought of the Internet as a good thing before!" 📉

Adult site ManyVids appears to be instituting a 21+ age-verification level for certain categories of content and calling it "Adult Industry 2.0" and "evolution." No clarity on what versions of sexuality count as "21+" or which creators would be relegated there. No clue why this is being pushed.

'Laws like this pass because lots of people casually think "Well, who would want minors to see such horrid stuff?" and move on. But if you stop to ponder how this requirement would work in practice, a lot of problems emerge.'- @enbrown.bsky.social on Mississippi, Bluesky➕ reason.com/2025/08/25/b...

we're finally saying Merry Cracker Barrel again

I can’t believe this is real

Never believe government fear-mongering ABOUT ANYTHING. Not tech. Not sex, drugs, music, crime, immigrants... Trump EO, Aug 2020 trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential... Trump on TikTok today, via @apnews.com apnews.com/article/trum.... cc @enbrown.bsky.social @maggiemcneill.bsky.social #TikTok

Good push back on this narrative here as @enbrown.bsky.social discusses FT 'torturing the data' and more: 'seems like a really convoluted way to present the data...' Plus some mostly crappy news in the Sex & Tech updates, but a win on stupid book bans in Florida. 🐿️

Is Conscientiousness Cratering? It Depends on How You Twist the Data reason.com/2025/08/18/i... An alarming chart purportedly showing young ppl's conscientiousness level in "freefall" masks a pretty small drop — from a score of 35.5 out of 45 points a decade ago to 33.26 in more recent data

ICE just posted this video taking down the sign in Mount Pleasant on Twitter.

Louisiana's AG is suing Roblox for failure to age-verify, mirroring the same attacks we've seen in conservative states over adult sites. It was never going to stop with porn. Literally anything a kid can access will require state-mandated identity and surveillance.

The numbers out of the UK on age-verification are devastatingly bad. A quarter of Britons are already using a VPN. And 22% have downloaded or considered a VPN since the OSA went into effect. 60% say it will increase government censorship. More than half say its making children less safe.

Quote of the Week: “When hotel owners face huge lawsuits and fines for failing to profile people, you're going to end up with a lot of innocent people being harassed.” - @enbrown.bsky.social reason.com/2025/08/11/h...

This just does not seem like the right way to go about convincing people on embryonic screening that

ICE used your taxpayer dollars to trick out a bunch of trucks in new livery, all painted black with "ICE" and a logo printed in gold on the side (and Trump's name in gold on the back window), then shoot a rap video in DC to post on social media. I am not making this up.

"There's no evidence. There's no charges being filed. There's no convictions," says Aquilina Soriano Versoza. "And then they're just having their visas revoked." reason.com/2025/08/13/c... "We really think that this is [about] trying to reach these 3,000-a-day quotas" for deportations

Another story today, the day after CJ reported about this: globalnation.inquirer.net/288078/filip...

I spoke with a South American woman who is one of more than 100 former cruise crew members who've been deported based on allegations of child pornography. She said she was arrested, never shown the evidence against her, then marched through the Detroit airport in shackles reason.com/2025/08/13/c...

Latest: CBP has been targeting cruise ship crews for deportation and revoking their work visas based on allegations of viewing or posting child pornography. But detainees aren't shown the evidence against them or given any due process before they're summarily deported reason.com/2025/08/13/c...

President Trump and his allies have berated local officials in Washington, D.C., for not managing the capital better, vowing a crackdown on crime. Yet it is the federal government that has often made it harder for those officials to manage the capital. nyti.ms/45RtLLq

So much to be annoyed with in this, including, ‘Also caught in the sweep are a teen-rated romantic comedy game, some 2SLGBTQ+-themed games by award-winning developer Robert Yang, and a 1920s alternate-history art book that has no sexual content.’