Tom Ancona

UChicago alum (twice!), New England native, Chicago educated, & Bowdoin Common Good supporter. RTs & likes are not endorsements

[Catholic Images That Go Hard @hardflics]

The “meet our friars” page for the Midwest Augustinians.

[Ben Leeds @benleeds_28]

This becomes less cool when you see the FanDuel ad on the wall - I’m ok with gambling having a place in sports but at the Field of Dreams game? The movie about players who bet on games and were suspended for life because it threatened to ruin baseball?

[Jonathan Liedl @JLLiedl]

For all his criticism of Pope Francis, Ross Douthat’s style of opinion writing at The New York Times often resembled a journalistic version of the late pope’s preferred model of evangelization: the art of accompaniment.

https://t.co/Ou28w6HX73

[Ben Schifman @BenSchifman]

US: we make if very difficult to build infrastructure here

UK: hold my fictional elf grave

[Freddy🇩🇪 @FreddyLA7]

So long, America🫡🇺🇸

49 days ago we landed in the USA to follow our country at the World Cup. We had no idea it would turn into the trip of a lifetime.

Thank you to everyone who followed along, and to all the people we met who made this journey even more special. We honestly don’t have the words to express how grateful we are for everything you did for us.

This trip exceeded every expectation we had. We came here with an open mind, wanting to experience as much of the country as possible. I still remember telling my friends on the flight to Atlanta that I hoped we’d get to meet a few locals on this trip. Now we’re flying home with friends all across the USA.

Before we came, we heard so many stereotypes and warnings about America. People told us about safety concerns, that they might check our social media at the border, and all kinds of other things. None of it matched our experience. This was probably the most welcoming country we’ve ever visited.

So if you have the chance to travel, do it. The world isn’t nearly as bad as the media often makes it seem. 99% of people are awesome!

I heard this quote somewhere during the World Cup, and I think it sums up our experience perfectly:

“If you want to hate the world, watch the news. If you want to love it, travel it.”

Thank you, America ❤️🇺🇸

[Robby Soave @robbysoave]

This is like appointing Cookie Monster head of the Don't Eat Cookies department

[George Yancey @profyancey]

Given all the talk about viewpoint diversity and that I have published in the area of academic bias, I think I want to offer an extended comment. First, as to what viewpoint diversity means. I, and others, have produced evidence of political and religious discrimination in academia. It is not as some would say, “Well, I just do not want to hire someone who is a sexist or racist. The evidence shows that merely knowing someone is a Republican or an Evangelical will convince a nontrivial percentage of individuals that he or she should be hired. That is textbook discrimination where a person’s social identity in and of itself is the source of discrimination.

Second, this discrimination is part of what limits the scope of what we can study. Allow me one simple example. Since 2016, there has been a ton of research on white conservatives and Christians. The vast majority of it is critical of those groups, likely as they were the key to Trump’s victory. You know who we have not studied with a critical eye? White progressives. Oh, but those people are not bigots, right? How do you know that without studying them? Indeed, one of the knocks against conservatives is about how fearful they are, and yet I have a paper under review showing that progressives are more fearful than conservatives. Stop with the foolish – do we need to include the perspective of Nazis? Very real research questions are being left on the table because different perspectives have been shut down.

Third, when people are only surrounded by people who think like them, there is a strong tendency to be overconfident in their assessments. I am not saying there are no arguments in academia. I am saying that the scope of the arguments is so narrow because of what is not allowed. In my example above, it becomes easy to blame just about all the social conflict on white conservatives/Christians, which is what most of the work on these topics does. By all means, we need assessment with those groups, and perhaps they are more responsible for our social conflict than white progressives. But if they are not, or if the responsibility is relatively equal, it will be hard to see that in modern academia because nearly everyone agrees that the responsibility is mostly on the conservatives. Unless you put your argument into the fire for critique, you will not know whether you have a sound argument or not.

Fourth and finally, some have talked about how academics have made themselves vulnerable by pissing off half the country, and thus the resources that drive our work are at stake. That is a valid reason to consider as we look at viewpoint diversity. I prefer the other reasons given above since those are more centered morally and can lead to better science. However, if the practical reasons of stopping the threat of the cutting off of funds is what works, then so be it. Nonetheless, at the very least, more viewpoint diversity will better allow us to talk to the half of the country that voted for Trump (for the record, I have never voted for him nor will I ever vote for him). Even if you disagree with people, we have to learn how to communicate with them beyond dehumanizing stereotypes.

Anyway, that is my 2cents, well maybe a nickel, on the subject.

[Tom Ancona @tancona1023]

Good thread here on some of the many problems in academia and how we can proactively tackle them.

[Jeffrey Sachs @JeffreyASachs]

Anti-con discrimination in academia is real. Part of it is a self-selection problem in the pipeline (ie "I have better things to do with my time than deal with a hostile grad program,") but part is also surely active discrimination in hiring, grad admissions, publication. 1/

[The Rest Is History @TheRestHistory]

Tom Holland meets a fan

[David Burge @iowahawkblog]

Young Hasan Piker contemplating how to harness working class populist rage for a socialist revolution

[Emily Zanotti 🦝 @emzanotti]

Important correction here: you excommunicate yourself. The Vatican just signs the paperwork.

[Scott Lincicome @scottlincicome]

My latest for @TheDispatch finds four wonky lessons buried in those delightful viral videos of foreign World Cup fans marveling at the awesome everyday things we Americans take for granted:

"The World Cup Is Putting American Abundance on Display" https://t.co/PuPAZblIwW

[Emily Zanotti 🦝 @emzanotti]

I mean, actually, those of us who have been preaching about this all along absolutely have authority here. Don't do it. You'll regret it. This is a path you can't come back from. We told the Republicans and now we're telling you. It's not worth it.

[Tom Ancona @tancona1023]

@SteveCollinsSJ Thank goodness the Red Sox suck and I don't have much interest in watching them this summer... Patriots games are going to be miserable though with all those ads.

[Josh Barro @jbarro]

Why did leftists decide that manifestly low conscientiousness is a mark of "authenticity"? They did it with Fetterman, it blew up in their face, and now they've done it again with Platner: falling in love with an obviously unreliable underemployed weirdo. https://t.co/cid5VoEtsW

[KC Johnson @kcjohnson9]

An odd defense of Platner: Collins opposed confirming Barrett, the 5th vote in the Dobbs majority, & wanted to hold the seat open for a Biden-nominated justice. (She also voted to confirm Kagan, Sotomayor, and Roberts, none of whom voted to overturn Roe.)
https://t.co/KIJ2y65BNf

[Bill Simmons @BillSimmons]

New @TheRewatchables — ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ with me, @SeanFennessey and special guest Steven Spielberg.

I mean….

Watch/listen on Spotify (or Netflix) ⬇️⬇️⬇️

https://t.co/A8I0Bc1Zc8

[Joel Mowbray @joelmowbray]

Graham Platner's Reddit posts blaming rape victims can HELP Dems "win back... the young men we've lost," his handler, @katz_morris, told @davidaxelrod.

Why? It shows Platner is "one of them" & a "real person."

Katz is a top Dem strategist.

This is what he thinks of young men.

[Charles C. W. Cooke @charlescwcooke]

This is a baffling tweet, because it says twice that Platner has “a history of bad decision-making,” and then confirms that that bad decision-making causes all sorts of other problems, and then concludes that this would not matter for . . . a member of the U.S. Senate.

[Roger Griswold @RogerWMTW]

Higher elevations may see snow! It's not unheard of, but also not very common in late May. Weekend campers and hikers should plan for much colder conditions in the mountains, especially on Saturday. #mewx #nhwx