Helen H. Moore's Blog, page 71

Why Ramadan is called Ramadan: 6 questions answered

AP Photo/Tatan Syuflana)

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

Editor’s note: Mohammad Hassan Khalil, associate professor of religious studies and director of the Muslim Studies Program at Michigan State University, answers six questions about the significance of the Muslim month of fasting.

Why is Ramadan called Ramadan?

Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic lunar calendar, and lasts either 29 or 30 days, depending on when the new crescent moon is (or should be) visible.

The Arabic term Ramadan connotes intense heat. It seems that in pre-Islamic Arabia, Ramadan was the name of a scorching hot summer month. In the Islamic calendar, however, the timing of Ramadan varies from year to year. This year Ramadan begins in mid-May; next year it will begin in early May. (An Islamic year is roughly 11 days shorter than a Gregorian year.)

What is the significance of Ramadan?

Ramadan is a period of fasting and spiritual growth, and is one of the five “pillars of Islam” (the others being the declaration of faith, daily prayer, alms-giving, and the pilgrimage to Mecca). Able-bodied Muslims are expected to abstain from eating, drinking and sexual relations from dawn to sunset each day of the month. Many practicing Muslims also perform additional prayers, especially at night, and attempt to recite the entire Qur’an (Koran). The prevailing belief among Muslims is that it was in the final 10 nights of Ramadan that the Qur’an was first revealed to the Prophet Muhammad.

What is the connection between soul and body that the observance of Ramadan seeks to explain?

The Qur’an states that fasting was prescribed for believers so that they may be conscious of God. By abstaining from things that people tend to take for granted (such as water), it is believed, one may be moved to reflect on the purpose of life and grow closer to the creator and sustainer of all existence. As such, engaging in wrongdoing effectively undermines the fast. Many Muslims also maintain that fasting allows them to get a feeling of poverty, and this may foster feelings of empathy.

Can Muslims skip fasting under certain conditions? If so, do they make up missed days?

All those who are physically limited (for example, because of an illness or old age) are exempt from the obligation to fast; the same is true for anyone who is traveling. Those who are able to do so are expected to make up the missed days at a later time. (One could potentially make up all of the missed days in the month immediately following Ramadan, the month of Shawwal.) Those unable to fast at all (if they are financially able) are expected to provide meals to the needy as an alternative course of action.

What is the significance of 29 or 30 days of fasting?

By fasting over an extended period of time, practicing Muslims aim to foster certain attitudes and values that they would be able to cultivate over the course of an entire year. Ramadan is often likened to a spiritual training camp.

Besides experiencing feelings of hunger and thirst, believers often have to deal with fatigue because of late-night prayers and predawn meals. This is especially true during the final 10 nights of the month. In addition to being the period in which the Qur’an was believed to have been first revealed, this is a time when divine rewards are believed to be multiplied. Many Muslims will offer additional prayers during this period.

Do Muslims celebrate the completion of Ramadan?

The end of Ramadan marks the beginning of one of two major Islamic holidays Eid al-Fitr, the “festival of the breaking of the fast.” On this day, many Muslims attend a religious service, visit relatives and friends, and exchange gifts.

This is an updated version of an article originally published on May 22, 2017

Mohammad Hassan Khalil, Associate Professor of Religious Studies and Director of the Muslim Studies Program, Michigan State University

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The next big discovery in astronomy? Scientists probably found it years ago — but they don’t know it

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This article was originally published on The Conversation.

Earlier this year, astronomers stumbled upon a fascinating finding: Thousands of black holes likely exist near the center of our galaxy.

The X-ray images that enabled this discovery weren’t from some state-of-the-art new telescope. Nor were they even recently taken – some of the data was collected nearly 20 years ago.

No, the researchers discovered the black holes by digging through old, long-archived data.

Discoveries like this will only become more common, as the era of “big data” changes how science is done. Astronomers are gathering an exponentially greater amount of data every day — so much that it will take years to uncover all the hidden signals buried in the archives.

The evolution of astronomy

Sixty years ago, the typical astronomer worked largely alone or in a small team. They likely had access to a respectably large ground-based optical telescope at their home institution.

Their observations were largely confined to optical wavelengths — more or less what the eye can see. That meant they missed signals from a host of astrophysical sources, which can emit non-visible radiation from very low-frequency radio all the way up to high-energy gamma rays. For the most part, if you wanted to do astronomy, you had to be an academic or eccentric rich person with access to a good telescope.

Old data was stored in the form of photographic plates or published catalogs. But accessing archives from other observatories could be difficult — and it was virtually impossible for amateur astronomers.

Today, there are observatories that cover the entire electromagnetic spectrum. No longer operated by single institutions, these state-of-the-art observatories are usually launched by space agencies and are often joint efforts involving many countries.

With the coming of the digital age, almost all data are publicly available shortly after they are obtained. This makes astronomy very democratic — anyone who wants to can reanalyze almost any data set that makes the news. (You too can look at the Chandra data that led to the discovery of thousands of black holes!)

These observatories generate a staggering amount of data. For example, the Hubble Space Telescope, operating since 1990, has made over 1.3 million observations and transmits around 20 GB of raw data every week, which is impressive for a telescope first designed in the 1970s. The Atacama Large Millimeter Array in Chile now anticipates adding 2 TB of data to its archives every day.

Data firehose

The archives of astronomical data are already impressively large. But things are about to explode.

Each generation of observatories are usually at least 10 times more sensitive than the previous, either because of improved technology or because the mission is simply larger. Depending on how long a new mission runs, it can detect hundreds of times more astronomical sources than previous missions at that wavelength.

For example, compare the early EGRET gamma ray observatory, which flew in the 1990s, to NASA’s flagship mission Fermi, which turns 10 this year. EGRET detected only about 190 gamma ray sources in the sky. Fermi has seen over 5,000.

The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope, an optical telescope currently under construction in Chile, will image the entire sky every few nights. It will be so sensitive that it will generate 10 million alerts per night on new or transient sources, leading to a catalog of over 15 petabytes after 10 years.

The Square Kilometre Array, when completed in 2020, will be the most sensitive telescope in the world, capable of detecting airport radar stations of alien civilizations up to 50 light-years away. In just one year of activity, it will generate more data than the entire internet.

These ambitious projects will test scientists’ ability to handle data. Images will need to be automatically processed — meaning that the data will need to be reduced down to a manageable size or transformed into a finished product. The new observatories are pushing the envelope of computational power, requiring facilities capable of processing hundreds of terabytes per day.

The resulting archives — all publicly searchable — will contain 1 million times more information that what can be stored on your typical 1 TB backup disk.

Unlocking new science

The data deluge will make astronomy become a more collaborative and open science than ever before. Thanks to internet archives, robust learning communities and new outreach initiatives, citizens can now participate in science. For example, with the computer program Einstein@Home, anyone can use their computer’s idle time to help search for gravitational waves from colliding black holes.

It’s an exciting time for scientists, too. Astronomers like myself often study physical phenomena on timescales so wildly beyond the typical human lifetime that watching them in real-time just isn’t going to happen. Events like a typical galaxy merger – which is exactly what it sounds like — can take hundreds of millions of years. All we can capture is a snapshot, like a single still frame from a video of a car accident.

However, there are some phenomena that occur on shorter timescales, taking just a few decades, years or even seconds. That’s how scientists discovered those thousands of black holes in the new study. It’s also how they recently realized that the X-ray emission from the center of a nearby dwarf galaxy has been fading since first detected in the 1990s. These new discoveries suggest that more will be found in archival data spanning decades.

In my own work, I use Hubble archives to make movies of “jets,” high-speed plasma ejected in beams from black holes. I used over 400 raw images spanning 13 years to make a movie of the jet in nearby galaxy M87. That movie showed, for the first time, the twisting motions of the plasma, suggesting that the jet has a helical structure.

This kind of work was only possible because other observers, for other purposes, just happened to capture images of the source I was interested in, back when I was in kindergarten. As astronomical images become larger, higher resolution and ever more sensitive, this kind of research will become the norm.

Eileen Meyer, Assistant Professor of Physics, University of Maryland, Baltimore County

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Somewhere on Earth, ozone-destroying supervillain is hard at work

NASA

Could it be that somewhere in this world, some diabolical supervillain is manufacturing a banned chemical and then releasing it into the atmosphere, part of a plot to eat away at Earth's ozone layer?

That is what some scientists and researchers are speculating — although without the comic book twist. Indeed, an unofficial investigation has been triggered to solve this international mystery that resembles the work of a "Captain Planet" antagonist.

Scientists raised concerns on Wednesday when a report, published in the journal Nature, showed that emissions of  CFC-11, a banned chemical that has been proven to be harmful to the Earth’s ozone layer, have increased 25 percent above average from 2002 to 2012. CFC is shorthand for chlorofluorocarbon; the chemical CFC-11 forms part of a group of pollutants that were banned under the 1987 Montreal Protocol, an international treaty created to protect the ozone layer.

“We’re raising a flag to the global community to say, ‘This is what’s going on, and it is taking us away from timely recovery of the ozone layer,’” NOAA scientist Stephen Montzka, the study’s lead author, said in an announcement. “Further work is needed to figure out exactly why emissions of CFC-11 are increasing, and if something can be done about it soon.

Scientists suspect that the unreported production might be coming from an unidentified source in East Asia.

"In the end, we concluded that it’s most likely that someone may be producing the CFC-11 that’s escaping to the atmosphere," he added. "We don't know why they might be doing that and if it is being made for some specific purpose, or inadvertently as a side product of some other chemical process."

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, CFC-11 is “is the second-most abundant ozone-depleting gas in the atmosphere.” The chemical can still be found in older refrigerators — built before the mid-1990s — as it was used in foam insulation and appliances.

“I’ve been making these measurements for more than 30 years, and this is the most surprising thing I’ve seen,” Montzka told the Washington Post. “I was astounded by it, really.”

Montzka said if the source can be identified, and controlled, damage will be minimal. If not, it could lead to delays in the recovery of ozone layer.

The ozone layer is the shield that absorbs most of the sun’s ultraviolet radiation, and can be found in the lower part of Earth’s stratosphere. The ozone layer was discovered in the early 20th century. In 1987, the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer was enacted, a global treaty and commitment to phasing out chemicals like chlorofluorocarbons that appeared to be depleting the ozone layer.

Ozone — chemically, O3 — is a weak triple bond of oxygen atoms that can be easily torn apart by certain man-made chemicals. In the upper atmosphere, it forms naturally as a result of cosmic rays severing the bonds of atmosphere oxygen, O2, whereas at lower elevations it is an oft-harmful pollutant. The ozone layer  serves an important role in deflecting ultraviolet rays and keeps the Earth cooler than it would be otherwise.

Ozone-depleting chemicals like chlorofluorocarbons are often measured according to their potential to split ozone molecules. In terms of that scale, known as "ozone depletion potential," only one compound has a higher rating than CFC-11.

It was not too long ago that the situation with Earth’s ozone layer appeared to be dire. However, in January 2018, measurements showed that efforts to reduce ozone-depleting chemicals were having a positive effect in the ozone layer’s recovery. Indeed, NASA’s Aura satellite measured about 20 percent less ozone depletion during the Antarctic winter than there was in 2005.

“We see very clearly that chlorine from CFCs is going down in the ozone hole, and that less ozone depletion is occurring because of it,” lead author Susan Strahan, an atmospheric scientist from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, said.

Scientists said the good news contributed to a better outlook for full recovery by mid-century.

“CFCs have lifetimes from 50 to 100 years, so they linger in the atmosphere for a very long time,” Anne Douglass, the study’s co-author, said. “As far as the ozone hole being gone, we’re looking at 2060 or 2080. And even then there might still be a small hole.”

But the latest news from this week could possibly slow that down that target. Overall, CFC-11 emissions in the atmosphere are still declining, but they are declining at a slower rate than they would be if there were no mysterious source producing the chemical.

 

 

 

 

Five strangers, one canceled flight: Our epic overnight carpool to Kansas

Courtesy of the author

Airports have a funny way of reflecting the face of humanity. If you want to get a sense of how we’re doing as a human race, go sit in an airport and observe interactions between spouses, patrons and employees, parents and children, and especially those between strangers.

Last year, I experienced an airport complication not unlike what I suppose I’ve come to expect anytime I’m at the mercy of airlines. When a connection is involved, it seems I have about a 50 percent chance of actually making it to my destination on the day of the flight plan.

After being elected to the national Journalism Education Association Board of Directors, I was headed to a board retreat and traveling from San Francisco to Manhattan . . . Kansas.

On May 18, I boarded American Airlines flight 2207 from SFO to Dallas (DFW), which took off and landed without complication. Then, I had just under an hour to make American Airlines flight 2787, the last of four daily flights that land at the two-gate Manhattan airport.

Thanks to a slow train ride and a tight connection, I had to book it to the gate. Muscles burning and short of breath, I was relieved upon arrival to see that my connection was delayed. At least I hadn’t missed it altogether.

I sat down to catch my breath and noticed a pizza and beer place right next to my gate. I was delayed, but at least I had pizza and beer.

I found a spot at the bar alongside a bunch of overweight, middle-aged men, ordered a personal cheese pizza and a wheat beer, then proceeded to have a lengthy conversation with a Republican from Anchorage, Alaska who co-owns a microbrewery. I patiently listened to his brilliant idea to tax the shit out of the immigrants so they won’t even want to come anymore, and he did not patiently listen in return. Thank God for the pizza and the beer! I got out of there quickly and decided to wait out the rest of my delay at the gate.

As time ticked on, the delay lengthened. One hour and 12 minutes. Two hours. Two and a half hours. Apparently, there were some bad storms — including the possibility of tornadoes — that the airline thought we’d better not attempt in our puddle-jumper plane.

When the storms cleared, the gate agent started calling us to board. I thought we might actually make it that night.

Long after everyone was seated and we were beginning to get antsy, the captain came on the loudspeaker and said they needed to remove 1,000 pounds of fuel to “maximize the payload and exercise extreme safety” and “we have other contingencies that include return to DFW.” It wasn’t looking good for us.

“I’m just hoping to make it to bed sometime before I turn into a pumpkin,” I joked via text to my husband Rod.

Finally, a fuel truck pulled up and removed the 1,000 extra pounds of fuel and I sent, “Just got the message ‘hopefully we will be able to push off soon.’ Love you!” to Rod. I always feel as if my last words to Rod need to be “love you.” I guess I’m thinking that any plane I get on might crash and I want my last words to be words of love and not bitching about the flight.

Our plane pushed off, and hope surged among the passengers. The captain came on the loudspeaker again and let us know we were fifth in line and would likely be able to take off in 10-15 minutes. This was a one-hour flight we were talking about, that we’d officially been sitting on for long over an hour, so this was welcome information.

Then he came back on again about 10 minutes later.

9:12 p.m. “Bad news: the captain and first officer are now over their hours, so we have to go back to the gate to get a new crew. FML. My butt is numb and we haven’t even taken off,” I joked to Rod.

While we waited behind planes that were actually going to take off and then taxied back to the gate, the rumblings among passengers intensified. Back at the gate, the captain and the co-captain got off and we waited. And prayed. After 15 minutes, the flight attendant got on the loudspeaker, apologized profusely, and asked us to deplane. Definitely not getting anywhere anytime soon.

“On the bright side, no one dragged me off the plane,” I joked, later thinking I may have preferred that to the on-again, off-again antics that I’d been dealing with for four hours.

Time for plan B

The mass of exhausted, rumpled passengers huddled in a blob in front of the ticketing desk, hoping for a miracle. The woman behind the counter gathered herself and took a good, deep breath before announcing that the flight was cancelled and American Airlines tagged this incident as “weather related,” so there would be no lodging and food compensation, and could we please form three lines for rebooking our flights.

That’s when things turned ugly. A tall, white man in a baby blue polo at the front of the line yelled expletives and pointed into this poor woman’s face as we all watched — some cheering him on and others like me praying that his teenage daughter would not grow up to be like her dad.

There were three gate agents and three lines. I was in the back of the middle line. As each traveler reached the front, they expressed extreme dissatisfaction — some more extreme than others — before moving on to the minutiae of rebooking. I soon found out the next available flight from Dallas to Manhattan was not until Saturday, two days away.

Rod sent me the American Airlines number and I begged the woman on the phone to find me any flight into anywhere in Kansas — Kansas City, Wichita, Salina — but it had to be tomorrow. After about 25 minutes of searching (and very little line movement), the woman said that, because of the bad storms in the area, any availability on other flights had been snagged by customers from earlier in the day and the earliest she could get me to Manhattan was Saturday afternoon. I thanked her for her time and hung up.

The wheels in my brain started formulating options:

Wait it out in Dallas for two days and get on a Saturday flight to Manhattan, only to turn around and go home to California the next day.

Find the next available flight to SFO and just go home, waving my white flag of defeat.

Check into a hotel to get some rest, then rent a car early in the morning and drive the 7 ½ hours to Manhattan.

Meanwhile, my fellow stranded passengers were displaying varying stages of grief. A distraught young lady mentioned that her sister’s wedding was on Saturday, she was the maid of honor, and the next flight out wouldn’t get her to the wedding in time. She joked that a group should rent a car and drive, but she wasn’t old enough herself to do so. Another woman said she was headed to her cousin’s graduation and would be down for car sharing.

A young man who looked no older than the high school students I teach said he was on emergency leave from the war in Afghanistan to attend his kid sister’s funeral, which was the next day.

I heard a record scratch. I lost my breath. Time stopped.

These people had places to be. I was old enough to rent a car and I could help.

We began hatching a plan. A mass of people started to gather at the back of the line, focusing on the hope of the drive instead of the hopelessness of getting a flight in a reasonable time frame.

Everybody wanted in the car. I felt like Oprah: You get a car! You get a car! You get a car! But I couldn’t give everybody a ride. We ended up organizing ourselves into two groups: one headed to Manhattan group and one to Wichita.

It was 10 p.m. “I’m going to rent a car and drive with a few other folks from the flight, okay?” I texted Rod (as if he had a choice).

“Do you trust these people?”

A shy Japanese man wearing a Trump T-shirt also needed to get to Manhattan. This was no time for politics, so I pulled out some rusty Japanese phrases from my time in Japan. “Hajimemashite,” I said. Nice to meet you.

I was nervous about driving for over seven hours through the night and then attending a board meeting the next day. I asked for people’s names, professions and home cities to text to Rod so he could track down my body parts if needed.

“I’m riding with Melanie (a preschool teacher from Panama City), Sydney (a swine fertility specialist from North Carolina), Dayton (on emergency leave from the army in Afghanistan for his 11-year-old sister’s funeral – car crash), and Taichi (from Japan and works for the U.S. Coast Guard maybe?)”

We stopped at a Starbucks, where I ordered a venti iced vanilla latte with an extra shot. Then we took a shuttle to the rental car area, where eventually National agreed to let us take a vehicle from the Dallas airport, drive it to Manhattan and leave it there. We left at 11:25 p.m.

The long ride

Five strangers get stranded in Dallas. They hatch a plan to drive to Manhattan. Watch next week’s episode to see the drama unfold. It felt like a combination of “Lost” and “Real World.”

We were seated as such: me in the driver seat, Melanie in the front passenger seat, Sydney (whom I called Shelby for most of the ride because she was too polite to correct me) behind Melanie, Dayton in the middle and Taichi behind me.

As I pulled the white Toyota 4Runner to the rental car check out, I said aloud, “This may be the weirdest thing I’ve ever done.”

Nervous tension filled the air. I could tell my passengers were aware of my anxiety and perhaps wondered if they had hitched their wagon to a death trap. Taichi was gripping the oh-shit bar in the back seat with an intensity I hadn’t seen before.

When we took off, I needed to be guided to the main freeway, but Melanie was in front and struggled to pay attention to the Waze app and instead gazed intently at the horizon. Luckily, Dayton had driven this same route on more than one occasion from Fort Riley in Manhattan to visit his mom in Texas. I was getting backseat directions in new territory in the pitch black. If it had been safe, I would’ve been clutching that oh-shit bar myself.

Eventually, we made our way to the main route, which involved a lot of driving straight. That meant a lot of time for conversation. This is the thing people ask me the most about when I relay this story: “What did you talk about?”

That was the best part.

Swine sperm and bomb squads

Sydney is a swine fertility specialist. She examines pig semen for a living and checks to see if at least 70 percent of the sperm in a specimen are viable. If not, it’s off to the slaughter mill. I asked her if her job seemed boring or repetitive and she said no, it was pretty fun and she got to work with great people. I thought her job sounded kind of gross, but she said it could be worse; there were people who had to collect the pig semen.

Sydney also told us how excited she was for her sister, who was marrying the best guy in the world. He was deaf, and Syd’s sister had learned sign language to communicate with him. She showed us engagement pictures that clearly captured the couple’s love for each other.

Sydney is one class shy of her animal science Bachelor’s Degree and will likely continue in the family business of swine management.

Sydney and I differed on two things: she loves bacon and hates Ford Motor Company. I hold the opposite opinion on both, but we bonded on our love for Adele.

Dayton still had two months of his nine-month tour left to serve in Afghanistan after his 10-day emergency leave. He spends 8-10 hours each day driving around and combing the streets for bombs. When they find one, his team marks it and calls in a bomb squad to detonate or remove it.

When I asked if he planned to go back for another tour, he said of course, as this was the only way to make money in the military.

Dayton spoke almost catatonically when he told us how his 21-year-old step-sister was driving his 11-year-old sister Kaitlyn in a car in Indianapolis when a cyclist crashed in front of them. His step-sister veered, lost control of the car, went into oncoming traffic and Kaitlyn was killed instantly.

We were nearing Oklahoma City when weather-watcher Sydney told us that we’d be hitting one of those big storms – maybe with a tornado.

As we drove into the storm and I found the windshield wipers couldn’t quite keep up with the torrent of water trying to drown our hope, I began to panic. I gripped the steering wheel as tight as I could. I leaned forward. I said aloud, “I don’t know what to do.”

“Keep going,” my passengers said.

In that time, I felt the weight of my passengers’ lives on my shoulders. I don’t know how airline pilots do it. In any case, it was precious Dayton’s life that I wanted to sustain above all.

Finding common ground

My privileged life of access to experiences and education seemed to offset the life that Melanie had lived. Melanie had a lot of sad stories.

She told us about her unstructured childhood, her work at a machine shop, her teenage pregnancy, how things got better when she left the baby’s dad, her work as a preschool teacher and then preschool manager, her renewed faith in the church and God, how she found the love of her life (who also worked at the machine shop) and had another child, yet this one had every challenge possible: she has autism, allergies, developed pica and ate everything in sight . . . as passengers we kept waiting for the story’s conclusion, for a happy ending, for things to get wrapped up with a bow. But none came.

She did show us beautiful pictures of her nine-year-old daughter Lilian and five-year-old Aubrey. They looked angelic and totally at peace.

Melanie’s stories about her family were just as sad, including that her brother once took a car with a stranger and wasn’t as lucky. As a lady driving a car full of strangers, it was hard to hear, especially when carrying the weight of Dayton’s Army stories and sister’s death.

But then we bonded on another level – many of us had a sibling or close loved one who was a failure – a danger to society even. Mostly, our stories revolved around the connection between mental illness and addiction, which broke my heart again that the same issues my immediate family has dealt with for over a decade and my extended family has been haunted by for generations are part of the American fabric.

Americans don’t take care of the mentally ill. They see mental illness as weakness. And the mentally ill are predisposed to alcohol and drug addiction. It’s no surprise that I, Melanie, Dayton and others have members of the family who are suffering. It feels wholly insurmountable. But we can do little things to make a big impact.

Into the home stretch

After a good hour of holding onto the oh-shit bar, Taichi had settled in and was the only one who was able to sleep in the car. When he woke, Taichi told us about his wife and 10-year-old son, his host family in Kansas that he started visiting when he was in 6th grade, and the trips he took to the U.S. every year.

We finally reached the Manhattan airport at 5:51 in the morning and returned the car. As we sat together like zombies who missed the apocalypse, I asked Taichi some questions. “Tell me about your family.”

He showed me a beautiful photo of his wife and son during cherry blossom season. I decided to push it and ask him directly about his Trump T-shirt and “Make America Great Again” hat.

“Do you like him?” I asked.

“Oh no! It’s a joke. My host family hates Donald Trump and I just wanted to see their faces when I show up wearing a T-shirt and hat,” he replied.

But I’m not so sure. After reviewing his Facebook page, he and his son both seem to wear a lot of Trump propaganda. I suppose I don’t really care, as long as he knows that not all Americans are selfish and rude. Some Americans will give up their night to drive you where you need to be.

So what do you do when faced with life’s inevitable problems: Do you swear at other folks who didn’t cause your problem or do you put on your big-person pants and find a solution?

You gather strangers, buy yourself a venti iced vanilla latte with an extra shot, stand in rental car lines until you find a company that will allow you to rent a vehicle large enough to fit five people and travel 7 ½ hours one-way from Dallas to Manhattan.

To deliver the soldier to his base. The maid of honor to her sister. The cousin to a graduation. The Japanese traveler to his host family.

Because humans are stronger when we work together.

The aftermath

The Army required Dayton to report in person to Fort Riley in Manhattan once he was stateside so they’d know he made it back safely. Before heading to the airport, we dropped him at the base, where his wife took a picture of all of us even before embracing her husband. She would help him check in and drive him the rest of the way to Indianapolis.

We didn’t all decide to become Facebook official friends until after we dropped off Dayton, and we didn’t know his last name. It was awful to have to search for stories on an 11-year-old who died in a car accident, looking for every spelling of Caitlyn/Caitlin/Kaitlyn/Kaitlin imaginable, to find him. But I did. And we all got to see pictures of Sydney in her purple lace and chiffon bridesmaid's dress at her sister's wedding.

I made it to the JEA Headquarters in Kansas for the Board of Directors retreat. My flight home to San Francisco? Don't ask.

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Steve Bannon tried to suppress black vote, Cambridge Analytica whistleblower says

Getty/Sylvain Lefevre

Christopher Wylie, Cambridge Analytica whistleblower and a former employee of the firm, told Congress Wednesday that the company ran voter suppression campaigns, which targeted black Americans and other liberal demographic groups. He said that those orders came from Steve Bannon, former chief executive of Donald Trump's presidential campaign, and later Chief Strategist in the Trump White House.

"Mr. Bannon sees cultural warfare as the means to create enduring change in American politics. It was for this reason Mr. Bannon engaged SCL (Cambridge Analytica's parent company), a foreign military contractor, to build an arsenal of informational weapons he could deploy on the American population," Wylie told CNN after the hearing, adding that "voter disengagement tactics" were used to "discourage or demobilize certain types of people from voting" — specifically, African-Americans.

Political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica was partly funded by right-wing billionaire Robert Mercer; Bannon was the firm's vice president until he joined the Donald Trump campaign, which then hired the firm to help win the 2016 election. In March, Wylie came forward and claimed that Cambridge Analytica improperly harvested personal information from some 50 million Facebook users to try to manipulate voters.

"We exploited Facebook to harvest millions of people’s profiles," Wylie told the Observer. "And built models to exploit what we knew about them and target their inner demons. That was the basis the entire company was built on."

The scandal provoked intense outrage across the technology and political landscapes and put a glaring spotlight on the privacy and surveillance practices and responsibilities of Facebook and other social media giants. Wylie's testimony to Congress marks the first time he's presented evidence on the wide-reaching and allegedly exploitative data breach since his public disclosure.

When Wylie spoke to the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday, Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.,) asked if one of Bannon's "goals was to suppress voting or discourage certain individuals in the U.S. from voting."

Wylie said, "That was my understanding, yes." He added that discussions about "voter disengagement" and the the targeting of African-Americans, prompted his departure from the firm, according to the Guardian, saying he saw documents referencing this operation.

In one example, "Facebook posts were targeted at some black voters reminding them of Hillary Clinton’s 1990s description of black youths as 'super predators', in the hope it would deter them from voting," the Guardian reported. "Wylie also explained why Cambridge Analytica was testing messages such as 'drain the swamp' and 'build the wall' in 2014, before the Trump campaign existed."

Wylie said, "The company learned that there were segments of the populace that were responsive to these messages that weren’t necessarily reflected in other polling."

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) were among lawmakers on the committee who have used Cambridge Analytica for past campaigns, CNN reported. In the hearing, they pointed to the Barack Obama campaign and its use of Facebook data.

"However, people who downloaded the Obama campaign app were aware they were using a political app," the Guardian said. "By contrast, the data obtained by Cambridge Analytica was obtained via a personality quiz application whose users had no idea their data would be used by a political campaign."

Still, Wylie stressed that this wasn't about partisanship. "Although Cambridge Analytica may have supported particular candidates in U.S. elections, I am not here to point fingers," his written testimony said. "The firm's political leanings are far less relevant than the broader vulnerabilities this scandal has exposed."

The embattled data firm closed down earlier this month, but filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy Thursday. It continues to deny any wrongdoing. The New York Times reported that Cambridge Analytica was under investigation by the FBI and department of Justice.

Trump administration’s abortion “gag rule” is a backdoor attack on birth control

AP/Evan Vucci/Getty/Salon

The headlines regarding the latest move from Donald Trump's administration heavily feature the word "abortion," but the most important thing to understand about this proposed new policy is that it's not about really about that. This move needs to be understood for what it is: A broad-based attack on the access that young and low-income women have to the full range of health care options that allow women to be sexually active while still avoiding unwanted pregnancy and disease — even death.

The new decision, which made big news on Friday but has not yet been formally announced, is being called a "gag rule" by pro-choice activists. The administration would yank Title X funding, meaning money from the federal program that provides financial support for contraception and sexually transmitted infection prevention, from any clinic that provides abortion, refers for abortion or even, it appears, mentions abortion.

Anti-choice activists are framing this as a "pro-life" move meant to discourage abortion. In reality, it's a direct assault on the ability of millions of women to get birth control, as well as gynecological exams, STI testing and treatment, and cancer screenings. Let's be clear about this: The funds in question do not go to abortion services and have not done so since the 1970s.

But it's true that clinics that provide these services rarely try to conceal the existence of abortion from patients. Not only would Planned Parenthood, which serves 41 percent of all Title X patients, be shut out of the program, it's likely that many other clinics would as well, since simply referring patients for abortion services or discussing the option is a standard part of gynecological care.

Because birth control is widely used and widely popular, anti-choice activists often downplay or conceal the anti-contraception sentiment that runs through their movement. Careful observation makes it clear, however, that the anti-abortion movement is rooted in a belief that sex should be for marriage only and ideally that marital sex should be about procreation over pleasure.

As Salon has previously reported, the Trump administration has been steadily pushing policies and messaging focused on the idea that sex is for procreation only -- at least for women. Both people Trump has appointed to run the Title X program are religious-right ideologues who have taken the public position that all people should wait for marriage until they have sex and also that government policy should be built on that premise. Title X grant programs have been rewritten to eliminate any mention of contraception, and Trump officials have argued that instead of sexual health care, women should be taught "refusal skills" -- i.e., sexual abstinence -- if they want to avoid pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases or HIV infection.

Trump's vice president, Mike Pence, has been a longtime opponent of people having sex outside of marriage or for pleasure. In 1999, he argued that women should not be allowed in the military because "many young men find many young women to be attractive sexually" (and vice versa). If young people are near each other in that context, Pence proposed, sex might happen, a proposition he felt was self-evidently awful.

In 2002, Pence castigated then-Secretary of State Colin Powell for suggesting that young people be taught condoms are an option, because abstinence is "the best choice for our young people," by which he clearly meant it ought to be the only choice. Pence went on to claim condoms are "a very, very poor protection against sexually transmitted diseases" (this is false) and were some sort of intolerably "modern, liberal" innovation.

That this move by the Trump administration is really a back-door method of cutting off contraception access is evidenced by what is happening in Texas. A few years ago, Texas started cutting off contraception funding to Planned Parenthood and other clinics that provide abortion. Anti-choice activists pooh-poohed fears that this was a cover to strip women of contraception access, claiming that other providers would step up. But the list of alternative providers offered by the state showed no such thing. One study found that 80 percent of the service providers in Dallas listed on a state website did not, in fact, offer low-cost contraception through the state programs.

Instead, Texas is redirecting millions of dollars that were supposed to go to contraception services to anti-choice organizations like the Heidi Group, which is run by a woman who believes contraception is "destructive to a woman’s reproductive system" and encourages "sex with multiple partners," a practice she has said is "almost like rape." Unsurprisingly, the group failed to direct women to doctors who would provide them with contraception. The state was forced to take the money back, but in the meantime, thousands of women who were supposed to receive services went without. Rather than cut the Heidi Group off, Texas reinstated its grant, which almost certainly means the outfit will spend years sitting on the funds rather than allowing them to flow to women who use them on contraception.

This move is being portrayed as about preventing abortion, but it's critical to understand that it is likely to accomplish the opposite. Title X funding prevents an estimated 1 million unintended pregnancies a year. About 40 percent of unintended pregnancies result in abortion, so it's reasonable to assume this move could drastically increase demand. In fact, abortion rates have been falling steadily since 1980 and have now reached their lowest level in decades. This is primarily because of increased contraception use, which is easily determined because there was no correlative rise in the birth rate. Anyone who sincerely wanted to reduce abortion rates would give Planned Parenthood more money, not less.

Both sex and contraception are wildly popular in the United States. More than 95 percent of Americans have premarital sex and more than 99 percent of women who are sexually active have used contraception. Roughly three out of five women of reproductive age are currently using contraception. With numbers like that, it's nearly impossible for abstinence-only ideologues like Pence and the religious conservatives behind Donald Trump to advocate directly for what they want -- an end to affordable, accessible contraception. So they come up with cover stories about abortion, an issue that makes many Americans uneasy, as a way to enact their real radical agenda.

Interview with Planned Parenthood's Cecile Richards
Longtime Planned Parenthood president visited SalonTV to talk about her new memoir, "Make Trouble."

Go ahead and enjoy the royal wedding: It’s not a fairy tale — but it is perfect

Getty/Chris Jackson

Yes, I know that monarchies are "outdated, feudal, aristocratic & anti-democratic." Yes, I understand that money spent on carriages could be spent on other things. And I am acutely aware that everything is on fire. Which is precisely why I'm going to need you to shut your damn mouth if you come to disparage the royal wedding. Shhhhhhhhhh. Did you know there will be Spice Girls? I said shhhhhhhhhhh.

I am predisposed to revel deeply in this sort of thing. I've been setting my alarms to watch English weddings since Diana Spencer donned eight thousand pounds of prom dress taffeta to tie the knot to Prince Charles back in 1981, and I have my own unfortunate, youthful Lady Di-haircut photos to prove it. I can regale you, even now, with a great many strong opinions about Fergie's 1986 Filene's Basement-style wedding gown and the way she flubbed Prince Andrew's name. I even showed up for Edward's 1999 wedding and nobody cared about that one. My only regret about my upcoming trip to London this fall is that I'll be too late for the fanfare around Princess Eugenie's wedding and what her squid hat sister will wear for it.

So if you want to know if I am here for all the hot takes on what color nail polish Meghan Markle will be wearing when Harry slips that band of gold on her finger, I one-thousand-percent am. Because more than with any other tiara-laden wagon hitching of the past few decades, I think a lot of us really need this one in particular.

From the very start, the relationship between the grandson of the queen and a divorced, biracial American actress sparked an unprecedented amount of curiosity and interest — both positive and ugly. For many, the official sanctioning of their love — along with their shared passion for activism — has been a symbol of the modernization of the monarchy. It has also brought out the worst from the notoriously vicious British tabloids and their mouth-breathing readers.

In 2016, the royal family took the unprecedented step of issuing a statement on the "media interest," noting "a smear on the front page of a national newspaper; the racial undertones of comment pieces; and the outright sexism and racism of social media trolls and web article comments" and reminding, "This is not a game — it is her life and his."

But the trolls couldn't stand in their way. A little over a year later, the palace announced an official engagement, followed shortly after by the least stuffy, most authentically romantic engagement pictures in the family's history. Did you see Meghan's flawless HEY GIRL wave and white coat? Did you see the official photo sesh, when the duo looked like the cover of a romance novel by Jane Villanueva? It's like we're living in "The Crown," only not depressing. But this marriage isn't just the pairing of two rich, good-looking people to make more aristocrats.

Harry and Meghan disrupt tradition
A look at the new, modern monarchy.

In addition to being rich and good-looking, Meghan and Harry also happen to appear to be two authentically in love, genuinely decent humans. Their charisma, like that of William and Kate and Barack and Michelle, is heightened by their apparently sincere delight in each other and pleasure in doing service in the world. As Jessica Wakeman points out, Markle has already earned "many achievements and considerable accomplishments before adding HRH to her name." 

Now, among their famous and newsworthy guests attending the wedding, the couple have also invited 1,200 members of the public — including charity workers, community leaders and survivors of last year's bombing in Manchester. The Palace explains that "Prince Harry and Ms Meghan Markle have said they want their wedding day to be shaped so as to allow members of the public to feel part of the celebrations too. This wedding, like all weddings, will be a moment of fun and joy that will reflect the characters and values of the bride and groom.”

"When Harry met Meghan it was clear from square one, bang. It was what the French call a coup de foudre," explains Leslie Carroll, author of "American Princess: The Love Story of Meghan Markle and Prince Harry."

"But while there was combustible chemistry," Carroll notes, "they connected on humanitarian issues, and they talked into the night on what was important to them."

The princes and in-law Kate, for example, have taken up the cause of mental health awareness with their Heads Together initiative. According to Carroll, both Harry and Meghan had mothers who were kind and compassionate and raised them, from the time they were grade school age, taking them to homeless shelters and soup kitchens and to developing nations. "[They were] showing them that there are people who have less than you do, whether you grow up in the San Fernando Valley or whether you grow up in Kensington Palace." You know what's beautiful? The active, consistent practice of love and kindness. An example of the joy of active service.

"What they care about is what the world cares about," says Carroll. "Their youth and energy and vitality and genuine compassion is something that the next generation or two will really care about in the commonwealth. They don't care about the ermine and the tiaras. They care about the royals who are going to roll up their sleeves and get involved. . . . The monarchy has been the glue that has held Great Britain together as a a people for the last one thousand plus years."

So now that the big day is upon us, my alarm is once again set for an ungodly hour to endure breathless punditry on how quickly a woman can get pregnant — even if my own daughters are determined to sleep in — and I am grateful for it. Because you know what I am definitely not alone in being starved for? Media coverage of things that don't make me desperately scared and sad and angry.

Of course, others take a different view. Letter writers to The Independent complain that "Someone from the privileged classes is getting married so let’s all smile as we watch people wandering in front of the cameras at Nottingham Cottage for their two seconds of fame." Social media doesn't lack for people remarking on the "stupid" wedding when there is so much else "happening in the world." I'm going to let you in on a little secret — you can care about more than one thing. You can be calling your elected officials every day AND also like pretty dresses. If weddings aren't your thing, that's cool, but that doesn't make you a smarter or better person than someone who likes seeing, every few years, somebody get to ride off in a carriage.

I watch Meghan and Harry for the same reason I was addicted to the Winter Olympics, for the same reason I live for the Oscars — because there's no shame in giving attention to things that aren't horrific. Our indefatigable news cycle has long meant that we can consume our tragedy and outrage pellets with clockwork regularity. But the past two years have been been that particular deluge on speed. Do you ever have days where you get to 6 p.m. and so much has happened, you can't even remember what in the world was freaking you out just that morning? I do! Do you send your children off to school and pray they won't be murdered? I did, on Friday, hours before a school shooting in Texas.

In the darkest moments of history, we need light and joy and hope. A steady diet of nothing but distress is unsustainable, and if there is a story out there that includes somebody holding an award or a baby or the beloved hand of a new spouse, sign me up. We all know that fairy tales aren't real. Nobody's asking for happily ever after. But happy, right now for a little bit, is a gift. And that would be supremely wasteful to ignore.

UN human rights chief lambastes Israel for Gaza protest killings

Getty/Thomas Coex

Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein, the UN human rights chief, has denounced Israel's deadly response to recent protests in the Gaza Strip, calling Israel’s use of force “wholly disproportionate.”

Zeid supports calls for an international investigation into Israel’s response.

His statements were made during a special session of the UN Human Rights Council on Friday. 

"There is little evidence of any attempt to minimize casualties on Monday," Zeid said.

Protestors at the Israel-Gaza border flew burning kites into Israel, used sling-shots and wielded Molotov cocktails. An estimated 60 Palestinians were killed on Monday, and over 2,000 injured — the same day President Donald Trump officially announced that he would move America's embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. This week was also the seventh consecutive week of border protests, according to BBC; the protests have been named the Great March of Return.

Israeli forces said they responded to "riot dispersal means” on Monday.

“The troops used riot dispersal means to distance the terrorists from the fence, & the terrorists fired at the soldiers,” Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced on Twitter. “The soldiers responded with targeted fire, thwarting a significant shooting attack.”

Zeid added that the border protests, and the devices protestors used, did not warrant the violent response that followed from Israel.

"These actions alone do not appear to constitute the imminent threat to life or deadly injury which could justify the use of lethal force," Zeid said.

Monday marked the deadliest day in Gaza since 2014.  Zeid said the response was “wholly disproportionate.”

"They are, in essence, caged in a toxic slum from birth to death," he said of the Gazans on Friday, adding the occupation must come to an end.

Israel defended its forces, and denounced Zeid’s statement. Indeed, UN ambassador Aviva Raz Shechter called his comments "politically motivated.”

"The loss of life could have been avoided had Hamas refrained from sending terrorists to attack Israel under the cover of the riots, while exploiting its own civilian population as human shields,” Shechter said.

U.S. chargé d’affaires Theodore Allegra said the Humans Rights Council was ignoring Hamas, whom Israel and the United States believe is to blame.

“The one-sided action proposed by the council today only further shows that the Human Rights Council is indeed a broken body,” he said, suggesting there is an anti-Israel attitude in the Council.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defended the use of Israeli forces in a statement on Twitter earlier this week.

"The Hamas terrorist organization declares it intends to destroy Israel and sends thousands to breach the border fence in order to achieve this goal," Netanyahu said. "We will continue to act with determination to protect our sovereignty and citizens."

The White House supported Netanyahu's defense. On Monday, deputy press secretary Raj Shah said that Hamas was responsible for the deaths.

“We believe that Hamas is responsible for these tragic deaths, that their rather cynical exploitation of the situation is what’s leading to these deaths, and we want them to stop,” Shah said.

“Deadpool 2″ director David Leitch on his hero’s humanity: “We go for personal stakes”

20th Century Fox

"Deadpool," the irreverent superhero flick starring Ryan Reynolds in the title role, was a surprise blockbuster hit in 2016, becoming the highest-grossing R-rated movie of all time. "Deadpool 2," opens to similar hopes this weekend. We welcomed "Deadpool 2" director David Leitch to the Salon Talks studio earlier this week, where he broke down Deadpool's audience appeal and how he maintained a balance of comic and emotional moments in this highly-anticipated sequel.

You were brought in to replace the director from the first movie, Tim Miller. What did the team working on this, especially Ryan Reynolds, feel that you were going to bring to this film?

I'm not sure.

So he hasn't told you?

No. He's, like, they just threw a dart at a board of directors, and I got lucky. No, I think that there's obviously a certain sensibility in the films that I do that have the action, the grounded action was interesting to them. I was also developing a property with them, at the time and so we had a rapport when this became available. So there was a lot of common ground, and I think there was a sensibility.

When I was offered the job, taking on a sequel is — of something so beloved, as the first "Deadpool" is — a really, sort of a daunting task. The expectation is so high, that I really had to have a gut check and decide if it's something that I wanted to do. After having conversations with Ryan, and the writers, and the producers, I started to see where they wanted to take it. I really understood there was a way to make this my own, but stay true to the original. You know, have a core emotional story, have some irreverent comedy, but still make it my own, and I think we did that. I think it's additive to the film.

Watch the full interview with David Leitch
A Salon Talks conversation with the director of "Deadpool 2"

You got your work start as a stunt double and a stunt coordinator, but you've directed movies, like "Atomic Blonde" and some of "John Wick." What do you think that your background in stunts brings to your work as a director?

There's a sensibility to the action, a respect for the action, and a respect for the choreography. In the way that I photograph it— not to cut it up too much, but to really see it.

I would say, also, just being in the trenches in a film set for 20 years before stepping into the director's chair, it just gives you a real working knowledge of the logistics of making a movie. It's just an invaluable experience that a lot of directors don't get to have. You come out of film school and you're in the director's chair as a filmmaker [instead].

That's one point of view. I mean I came [up as] sort of a journeyman, stuntman, stunt coordinator, second unit director. I've mentored under great people. I've seen where they succeeded, and where they failed, and lessons learned. It's so invaluable that I had the experience, to be here now, with all the knowledge of 20 years of film behind me.

Speaking of the tone of the movie, just like in the first movie, there's this really, narrow tightrope. It's even narrower in this film, because it's both sentimental and goofy as hell. How did you manage to walk that line? Because it was both more than the first movie.

It is. I mean, it's heightened. My comedic sensibilities, like I can go goofy, and I could go camp. So, we can lean into those, the physical elements of the comedy. I can go hardcore Buster Keaton [or] Jackie Chan and so that totally is a bit broader than the first film.

There's two categories. [One is] the emotional arc of the movie, and Deadpool's existential crisis and what his real, emotional mission is, and what the heart of that is.

Then the subversive comedy: There's these scenes that come up and you're like, "It's a really emotional scene." And it’s like, "Are we going too melodramatic?" Where you always have the comedy to pull out the rug.

So, we would go into these scenes, and we'd always shoot a comedic out. You didn't always use the comedic out, and vice versa.

You might have a comedy scene, and you're really like, we need to learn something about the character's arc here. We need to make sure that we've seeded enough of the story in this moment, or even emotional context. Or even the joke, just for the sake of the joke, may not work. So it was a balancing act all the way to the end, I would say. Even at editorial, you're fine-tuning it.

I saw recently some critics complaining about "Avengers: Infinity War" for doing that, which is, they would have these emotional moments, [followed by] a comedic out.

Like you said, you don't do that for every emotional moment in this movie, but how do you feel about using comedy to kind of be the punctuation of an emotional scene?

It is part of the balancing act. If the movie's sort of a Jenga puzzle, it could be one time you subverted the wrong emotional moment [and] you could send the whole arc of the movie, or the character, down. So, you have to pick the ones that you want to subvert, I think. It has to be thoughtful to the story you're trying to tell.

[In the] "Deadpool" universe, you have a little bit more license, because there's an expectation for that, too. I think outside of "The Avengers" you may not have had as much expectation that you're going to subvert every moment. I think our audiences are, like, "Ooh, it's coming. It's coming. It's coming. It's coming." Right? Which is also fun to play with. Like, "It's coming. Oh, it didn't go." And then it's, like, Bam! you hit them. So, there's an expectation in "Deadpool" that you don't have in "The Avengers" for that type of comedy.

Yeah, the meta stuff. So, speaking of the difference between this and other movies, I've noticed, in watching a lot of superhero movies, that they can try reasons to have the characters act outside a mask as much as possible. You do some of that in this movie. So the audience can see Ryan Reynold's face, even though he's wearing a ton of makeup.

A horrible three-hour prosthetic makeup job that he has to go through every day. Part of modulating that on this film was just the logistics of, like, "We have to shoot this in 75 days. We might want to do more with the makeup, but I don't know if . . . I can't get him to set until nine o'clock, ten o'clock because . . ."

You might adjust a scene, and be like, "He can be in a mask for this one," or whatever, but no.

I think it's important to see the characters as human beings. I think that's what people are loving about where these comic book movies are going. They're not just caricatures now. They are actually fully-developed humans with relatable issues, and problems, and especially Deadpool. I mean, we never go for global stakes, really. At least so far they haven't. And that wasn't the plan on this. We go for personal stakes.

And so I think it just makes him more relatable, as a character. So when we he puts on the mask even though he's an irreverent jerk, you still care about him. You know?

He's one of the few characters in the superhero universe that is actually a middle-aged person. What does that add to the character, do you think?

Again, it's this humanity that Ryan can bring to all his performances.

He brings an empathy and humanity to him, not only in the dramatic performances but in the comedic presentation of Deadpool the character. There's a self-deprecating vibe to Deadpool and he's willing to laugh at himself. Anyone who's reached middle-age, like myself, you need that. You need it.

Speaking of the action part of this, not to spoil too much, but you got so much more mileage in this film than the first one out of the fact that Deadpool can't die. You put his body through the ringer. Tell me about the process of coming up with all these crazy ways to put the fact that you can just mutilate him into action?

You look at your character's powers and then you look at problems to solve. You put them in the blender of choreography and you're like, "OK, Deadpool's powers are healing. All right. He needs to get from A to B. Here are the people that he's fighting." Then you let the choreography team go off, but you give him the parameters of like, "He can heal." That's the the power I want them to focus on. Because I did feel that [previously] at times it was under-used, and it was the most interesting power that he has.

So we really went all out, and I had them create libraries of ideas. We could start to use them, and when we got to the set piece, and choreography, within the idea that he can break his arm in a weird position, or break a leg, and still keep going, it just makes for an interesting choreography session, right, and design of action. Outside of the classic kick/punch, kick/punch. We've all seen that. So, when you have these unique powers, you want to take advantage of them.

I don't want to spoil too much, but I just was super impressed by the way that you were able to make the action sequences tell the story in a way that a lot of action films don't do. So, the first "Deadpool" movie is the highest-grossing R-rated film of all time. So you guys went in with an R-rating this time, which leads to, again, all that crazy, fun violence. Do you think that this is a new era for R-rated movies? Do you think that there's more room for them in the market?

I don't know. That's a good question. We'll see. I hope there is.

I mean, you want art to serve all different people and all different demographics. You don't want art to be restricted to a box and if there's a story that you want to tell on the PG space, great, but there are a lot of stories that need the R-rating so they can reach a more adult audience and a different sensibility.

I hope that they'll still want to make them. Who knows? I think "Logan" had success after "Deadpool," as a very different film. It did show that a comic book movie could be rated R and still do great business. So I think that's encouraging to, at least, the comic book world.

Julian Dennison, who plays the kid, Russell, in the movie —

Yeah, he's great.

Again, not spoiling anything, but he's just so great. He's from New Zealand. So, tell me about he ended up in your film.

Ryan suggested him when we were working the script, and I read the character. I had already seen "Hunt for the Wilderpeople" but he was like, "What about Julian Dennison? What about Julian Dennison?" And the light bulb went off in my head.

I think he was already, kind of, in a sense they were writing to that idea.

Julian was in town. Ryan, him, and myself had a meeting and it was pretty instant, at that point. I mean, their chemistry was great. Julian is funny, and a really sophisticated actor for 15. And there wasn't really any other choice at that point. It's a role that's made for him.

Will there be a "Deadpool 3," do you think?

I hope so. I mean, I don't know. I've heard there was a sound bite in the press that Ryan said there's not going to be a "Deadpool 3." I don't know if it was taken out of context or not. I hope there is. I hope that they continue to make Deadpool movies. Because it is one of these refreshing universes that you can do irreverent comedy [in]. You can do sophisticated stories. And you can be truly creative in the Deadpool universe, where others, sometimes, you're just wrangled into a corporate machine. I think this has its really special voice and a place in cinema. So I'm really grateful to have been involved in it.

Federal watchdog launches investigation of age bias at IBM

AP/Mark Lennihan

This article originally appeared on ProPublica.

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has launched a nationwide probe of age bias at IBM in the wake of a ProPublica investigation showing the company has flouted or outflanked laws intended to protect older workers from discrimination.

More than five years after IBM stopped providing legally required disclosures to older workers being laid off, the EEOC’s New York district office has begun consolidating individuals’ complaints from across the country and asking the company to explain practices recounted in the ProPublica story, according to ex-employees who’ve spoken with investigators and people familiar with the agency’s actions.

“Whenever you see the EEOC pulling cases and sending them to investigations, you know they’re taking things seriously,” said the agency’s former general counsel, David Lopez. “I suspect IBM’s treatment of its later-career workers and older applicants is going to get a thorough vetting.”

EEOC officials refused to comment on the agency’s investigation, but a dozen ex-IBM employees from California, Colorado, Texas, New Jersey and elsewhere allowed ProPublica to view the status screens for their cases on the agency’s website. The screens show the cases being transferred to EEOC’s New York district office shortly after the March 22 publication of ProPublica’s original story, and then being shifted to the office’s investigations division, in most instances, between April 5 and April 10.

The agency’s acting chair, Victoria Lipnic, a Republican, has made age discrimination a priority. The EEOC’s New York office won a settlement last year from Kentucky-based national restaurant chain Texas Roadhouse in the largest age-related case as measured by number of workers covered to go to trial in more than three decades.

IBM did not respond to questions about the EEOC investigation. In response to detailed questions for our earlier story, the company issued a brief statement, saying in part, “We are proud of our company and its employees’ ability to reinvent themselves era after era while always complying with the law.”

Just prior to publication of the story, IBM issued a video recounting its long history of support for equal employment and diversity. In it, CEO Virginia “Ginni” Rometty said, “Every generation of IBMers has asked ‘How can we in our own time expand our understanding of inclusion?’”

ProPublica reported in March that the tech giant, which has an annual revenue of about $80 billion, has ousted an estimated 20,000 U.S. employees ages 40 and over since 2014, about 60 percent of its American job cuts during those years. In some instances, it earmarked money saved by the departures to hire young replacements in order to, in the words of one internal company document, “correct seniority mix.”

ProPublica reported that IBM regularly denied older workers information the law says they’re entitled to in order to decide whether they’ve been victims of age bias, and used point systems and other methods to pick older workers for removal, even when the company rated them high performers.

In some cases, IBM treated job cuts as voluntary retirements, even over employees’ objections. This reduced the number of departures counted as layoffs, which can trigger public reporting requirements in high enough numbers, and prevented employees from seeking jobless benefits for which voluntary retirees can’t file.

In addition to the complaints covered in the EEOC probe, a number of current and former employees say they have recently filed new complaints with the agency about age bias and are contemplating legal action against the company.

Edvin Rusis of Laguna Niguel, a suburb south of Los Angeles, said IBM has told him he’ll be laid off June 27 from his job of 15 years as a technical specialist. Rusis refused to sign a severance agreement and hired a class-action lawyer. They have filed an EEOC complaint claiming Rusis was one of “thousands” discriminated against by IBM.

If the agency issues a right-to-sue letter indicating Rusis has exhausted administrative remedies for his claim, they can take IBM to court.

“I don’t see a clear reason for why they’re laying me off,” the 59-year-old Rusis said in an interview. “I can only assume it’s age, and I don’t want to go silently.”

Coretta Roddey of suburban Atlanta, 49, an African-American Army veteran and former IBM employee, said she’s applied more than 50 times to return to the company, but has been turned down or received no response. She’s hired a lawyer and filed an age discrimination complaint with EEOC.

“It’s frustrating,” she said of the multiple rejections. “It makes you feel you don’t have the qualifications (for the job) when you really do.”

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