A follow up to my series on fame. One of the reasons I’m interested in fame and why I think it’s a microcosm that demonstrates the way our socio-political institutions (including the media) work in late capitalism to keep us firmly away from…

I have mixed feelings every June. And at every pride parade I’ve ever attended. Because I don’t fit neatly into one of the first four letters. I can fit myself approximately into pre-existing microlabels — the ones that many people roll their eyes at — but even those distinctions, those…

What they don’t tell you when you learn about the Plague or the 1918 influenza pandemic is how unfathomably annoying everyone will be. Set aside the politicization for a moment. There are people out here, nearly two years in, whining about wearing masks and restaurants closing and wanting to go…

If there’s one idea that’s been running through my head all year, it’s this: we can’t go back. Over the last two years, I’ve seen many people in many contexts talk about “going back to normal” or refer to a “post-pandemic” state. As if we’re not still in the middle…

I hate politics. Let me start there. I hate political debates. I hate talking to people about politics. I hate politicians. However, I’m fascinated by political theory. I have taught political philosophy to college students — everything from basic intro classes to a course specifically on just war theory, but…

We’re selective (and usually wrong) in what we think of as ‘good’ and ‘bad’ when it comes to food. — Many years ago, my uncle told me that New Jersey was the artificial flavor capital of the world, and I have thought about this way too much ever since. Indeed, there are dozens of companies that manufacture artificial flavors located in New Jersey. Givaudan, a Swiss company, is the world’s…

I’m trying to be okay with being in my own body. It’s a work in progress, made more difficult by the steady march of age. Usually when I think about my body, I feel resentful. My body mostly feels like this thing I’m forced to lug around with me. It…

Find yourself. Know yourself. Work on yourself. What do these things even mean? I confess that one of the things that drew me to philosophy in the first place was the idea of the self. Sometimes I talk about the “classical liberal self” as the basic unit of U.S. society…

“I will die of suppressed rage at the folly of my fellow men.” — Gustave Flaubert Living through a global pandemic has had an unexpected effect of making me even more misanthropic than I was before. It’s not a remarkable insight that we have to live in a world with…