Boxing Day, explained

Christmas has come and gone , but in some countries , the celebration is far from over .
Yes , gentle readers , December 26 is Boxing Day , which for Americans is the day we recover from our eggnog and gift-exchange hangovers but for other parts of the world is a holiday in its own right .
Boxing Day , which always falls on December 26 , is observed as an official public holiday in the UK and many European countries , as well as in former British colonies such as Canada , Australia , New Zealand , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has decided that , much like the metric system and extra U 's in certain words , we will not embrace this particular tradition .
When Boxing Day falls on a weekend , countries that observe it designate the subsequent Monday as a holiday .
Origin stories of the holiday are mixed : Some say the name comes from the British aristocracy 's habit of presenting their servants with gifts on the day after Christmas , once their own celebration was over and lowly employees could finally get some time off .
Another @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the tradition of making charitable donations during the Christmas season , wherein people would give boxes of food and other supplies to the less fortunate and churches would set out donation boxes to collect for the poor .
Still another theory centers on the 10th-century duke of Bohemia : As the story goes , the duke was out surveying his land the day after Christmas when he noticed a poor man trying to gather firewood in a blizzard .
Moved , the duke went to the man 's house with a box of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ — a deed so noble , it was immortalized in the Christmas carol `` Good King Wenceslas . ''
But Boxing Day is n't the only name for December 26 .
Some countries call it St. Stephen 's Day , in honor of a deacon who became the first Christian martyr when he was stoned to death in AD 36 .
In Ireland , it 's sometimes called Wren Day , which used to be marked by the heartwarming tradition of hunting down and murdering a small bird , tying it to a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ door singing the “ Wren Song.
” ( Thankfully , this is no longer a thing people do . )
South Africa renamed the holiday `` Goodwill Day '' in 1994 to `` sever ties to a colonial past , '' according to Cape Town Magazine .
And some countries , including Poland and the Netherlands , eschew the fuss and just call it `` Second Christmas Day . ''
Just like the countries that observe the holiday , the ways people celebrate Boxing Day are rich and varied , as this extremely @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Some people choose to mark the occasion with some copious drinking a la St. Patrick 's Day , another holiday that 's been somewhat co-opted by our baser instincts .
December 26 has also become , like Thanksgiving in America , an important day for sports .
As Vice explained in 2014 : And , yes , significant boxing matches have also taken place on Boxing Day .
However , one common denominator is that many countries have taken a holiday that ’ s said to have its roots in charitable giving and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ excess .
Indeed , Boxing Day is now a major shopping event in many countries that observe the holiday ; it 's kind of like Black Friday , except after Christmas instead of Thanksgiving .
( This fact seems especially bizarre once you note that Britain and Canada also recognize Black Friday , and on the same day as the US , despite celebrating Thanksgiving in a totally different month or not at all . )
The drill is more or less the same : Stores offer steep discounts , and people spend @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to 1 ) buy all the stuff they did n't receive in their Christmas haul , and 2 ) escape the family members responsible for such shoddy gift buying .
Still , the tide may be turning toward the earlier shopping day , at least in some places : A 2018 survey by the Retail Council of Canada found that 40 percent of Canadians were planning to take advantage of Black Friday sales , as opposed to just 25 percent for Boxing Day .
For more on the glories of Boxing Day commercialism @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from the British Columbia comedy troupe LoadingReadyRun , in which a man and a puppet discuss the `` true meaning of Boxing Day '' with help from a rather disturbing children 's book : Though not nearly at the same level as Christmas or even Thanksgiving , Boxing Day does get its pop cultural representation .
There 's a 2012 British film called Boxing Day that 's roughly based on a short story by Leo Tolstoy ; there 's also a very uplifting-sounding 2007 film by the same name , about an alcoholic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ trying to reunite his family .
The 10th season of M.A.S.H .
featured an episode called “ ’ Twas the Day After Christmas , ” which sees British soldiers giving the 4077th the idea of following `` Boxing Day tradition '' by having the officers and service members switch positions and responsibilities for the day .
There 's also this cheery little 2012 ditty by Blink-182 about a guy whose girlfriend dumps him the day after Christmas : Boxing Day sounds great , but I 'm American — can I still partake ?
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ to business as usual in the US .
If you do happen to have the day off , you 'll likely be able to find some post-Christmas deals , and drinking at home is technically doable on any day of the year ( as this year has made extra clear ) .
Alternatively , you could cook up your own Boxing Day feast .
The BBC has compiled a menu of vaguely disquieting recipes for Boxing Day brunch , including Christmas cake soufflés , cheesy sprout fondue , and `` ham and watercress @ @ @ @ @ @ @ several dishes involving mincemeat , which , in case you are n't familiar , is made of chopped fruit and spices and is used to repair buildings in war-torn countries .
Sausage rolls are another traditional Boxing Day dish in the UK , as a much-mocked 2015 New York Times article pointed out .
In a year that ’ s been hard for everyone , this December 26 could be a chance to get back to the roots of Boxing Day and helping those in need with a meaningful gift .
And if @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to celebrate the “ holiday ” the American way : by binge-watching something holiday-themed while scarfing down a plate of leftovers .

Christmas has come and gone, but in some countries, the celebration is far from over. Yes, gentle readers, December 26 is Boxing Day, which for Americans is the day we recover from our eggnog and gift-exchange hangovers but for other parts of the world is a holiday in its own right.
What is Boxing Day?
Boxing Day, which always falls on December 26, is observed as an official public holiday in the UK and many European countries, as well as in former British colonies such as Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa, among others. America has decided that, much like the metric system and extra U's in certain words, we will not embrace this particular tradition. When Boxing Day falls on a weekend, countries that observe it designate the subsequent Monday as a holiday.
Origin stories of the holiday are mixed: Some say the name comes from the British aristocracy's habit of presenting their servants with gifts on the day after Christmas, once their own celebration was over and lowly employees could finally get some time off. Another popular suggestion is that it arose from the tradition of making charitable donations during the Christmas season, wherein people would give boxes of food and other supplies to the less fortunate and churches would set out donation boxes to collect for the poor.
Still another theory centers on the 10th-century duke of Bohemia: As the story goes, the duke was out surveying his land the day after Christmas when he noticed a poor man trying to gather firewood in a blizzard. Moved, the duke went to the man's house with a box of food, wine, and other items — a deed so noble, it was immortalized in the Christmas carol "Good King Wenceslas."
But Boxing Day isn't the only name for December 26. Some countries call it St. Stephen's Day, in honor of a deacon who became the first Christian martyr when he was stoned to death in AD 36. In Ireland, it's sometimes called Wren Day, which used to be marked by the heartwarming tradition of hunting down and murdering a small bird, tying it to a pole, and then going door to door singing the “Wren Song.” (Thankfully, this is no longer a thing people do.) South Africa renamed the holiday "Goodwill Day" in 1994 to "sever ties to a colonial past," according to Cape Town Magazine. And some countries, including Poland and the Netherlands, eschew the fuss and just call it "Second Christmas Day."
How Boxing Day is celebrated
Just like the countries that observe the holiday, the ways people celebrate Boxing Day are rich and varied, as this extremely formal and scientific Facebook poll shows:
Some people choose to mark the occasion with some copious drinking a la St. Patrick's Day, another holiday that's been somewhat co-opted by our baser instincts.
December 26 has also become, like Thanksgiving in America, an important day for sports. As Vice explained in 2014:
Of the 92 fully professional teams in England's Football League, there are 46 live matches. Even in the Conference, England's fifth and sixth tiers, where many teams are semi-pro, every club is at it. In the Southern Hemisphere, things are just as festive and equally sporty. The Melbourne Cricket Ground, the fabled, 160-year-old temple to cricket, is full: Australia is taking on India in the annual Boxing Day Test. Similar matches, in addition to an uncountable number of other sporting events, are taking place in New Zealand and South Africa.
And, yes, significant boxing matches have also taken place on Boxing Day.
However, one common denominator is that many countries have taken a holiday that’s said to have its roots in charitable giving and transformed it into a smorgasbord of commercial excess. Indeed, Boxing Day is now a major shopping event in many countries that observe the holiday; it's kind of like Black Friday, except after Christmas instead of Thanksgiving. (This fact seems especially bizarre once you note that Britain and Canada also recognize Black Friday, and on the same day as the US, despite celebrating Thanksgiving in a totally different month or not at all.)
The drill is more or less the same: Stores offer steep discounts, and people spend hours waiting in line for the chance to 1) buy all the stuff they didn't receive in their Christmas haul, and 2) escape the family members responsible for such shoddy gift buying.
Still, the tide may be turning toward the earlier shopping day, at least in some places: A 2018 survey by the Retail Council of Canada found that 40 percent of Canadians were planning to take advantage of Black Friday sales, as opposed to just 25 percent for Boxing Day.
For more on the glories of Boxing Day commercialism, check out the following comedy sketch from the British Columbia comedy troupe LoadingReadyRun, in which a man and a puppet discuss the "true meaning of Boxing Day" with help from a rather disturbing children's book:
Boxing Day in pop culture
Though not nearly at the same level as Christmas or even Thanksgiving, Boxing Day does get its pop cultural representation. There's a 2012 British film called Boxing Day that's roughly based on a short story by Leo Tolstoy; there's also a very uplifting-sounding 2007 film by the same name, about an alcoholic father with a terrible secret who's trying to reunite his family.
The 10th season of M.A.S.H. featured an episode called “’Twas the Day After Christmas,” which sees British soldiers giving the 4077th the idea of following "Boxing Day tradition" by having the officers and service members switch positions and responsibilities for the day.
There's also this cheery little 2012 ditty by Blink-182 about a guy whose girlfriend dumps him the day after Christmas:
Boxing Day sounds great, but I'm American — can I still partake?
Most years, December 26 is back to business as usual in the US. If you do happen to have the day off, you'll likely be able to find some post-Christmas deals, and drinking at home is technically doable on any day of the year (as this year has made extra clear).
Alternatively, you could cook up your own Boxing Day feast. The BBC has compiled a menu of vaguely disquieting recipes for Boxing Day brunch, including Christmas cake soufflés, cheesy sprout fondue, and "ham and watercress salad with clementine dressing" — plus several dishes involving mincemeat, which, in case you aren't familiar, is made of chopped fruit and spices and is used to repair buildings in war-torn countries.
Sausage rolls are another traditional Boxing Day dish in the UK, as a much-mocked 2015 New York Times article pointed out.
@nytimes they'll be screaming for our lovable mop top Beatles next thing you know — (((Richard Lander))) (@richardlander) November 6, 2015
In a year that’s been hard for everyone, this December 26 could be a chance to get back to the roots of Boxing Day and helping those in need with a meaningful gift. And if nothing else, you could just opt to celebrate the “holiday” the American way: by binge-watching something holiday-themed while scarfing down a plate of leftovers.


vox--2020-12-21--Corporate America would like the vaccine now

Uber has spent years and millions of dollars making sure its workers aren ’ t classified as such and insisting it ’ s not responsible for those people ’ s health care .
Now the company is pushing for its “ earners ” — the word it uses to refer to its drivers and delivery people so as not to call them workers — to get priority access to the Covid-19 vaccine .
It ’ s hardly alone in lobbying public health officials and states to put its people near the top of the list .
Companies and industry groups @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at the federal and state level to make the case that when it comes to the limited-supply Covid-19 vaccine , their employees should get priority .
The meat industry , airlines , banks , retail , exterminators , restaurants , and zoos are among the myriad groups lobbying decision-makers .
So are specific companies such as Amazon , Lyft , DoorDash , and Perdue .
Unions are trying to get their members vaccines .
Even professional sports leagues , like the NHL , are making a play .
In early December , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ) , an arm of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention , recommended that health care personnel and long-term care residents should be first to receive the Covid-19 vaccine .
That “ phase 1a ” cohort represents about 17.6 million people , or 7 percent of the US adult population , and seems straightforward enough .
What comes next is more complicated .
There ’ s been a mad dash among a variety of stakeholders to try to secure the next spots and a lively debate about who should be prioritized .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ for 1b — the next phase — to be front-line essential workers and people over the age of 75 .
For 1c , it suggested people 65 or older , people with high-risk conditions , and essential workers not included in 1b .
Ultimately , it is up to states to decide what to do with federal recommendations and decipher which people , including workers , go where .
States could deviate from those guidelines — theoretically , a place like California could say entertainers should be higher up on the list , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Companies may have an easier time influencing decisions at the state and local level .
But in general , states take the guidelines seriously and could face enormous backlash if they ignore them .
“ I don ’ t blame businesses for trying to make their case , ” Georges Benjamin , executive director of the American Public Health Association , told Recode .
“ But the people that are listening to their rationale ought to use criteria that are going to save the most lives and return our economy.
” Prioritization is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ likely be months of discussions around how employers approach the Covid-19 vaccine .
Which workers within an organization will get the vaccine is going to be an important factor .
If a meatpacking company gets access to a vaccine supply , who ’ s going to ensure it ’ s the workers on the floor getting a dose and not the CEO ?
It ’ s a scenario already playing out in hospitals .
And what does it look like for companies to be taking such an activist role in their workers ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ get the vaccine ?
It ’ s one thing for your boss to recommend you take a vaccine ; it ’ s another for them to require it .
“ Pretty much everybody is on the same page with vulnerable people and front-line workers ” going first on the vaccine , said Matt McCambridge , founder and CEO of Eden Health , a personal health platform .
“ There ’ s a lot of gray area in terms of what happens next.
” The politics of Covid-19 is now the politics of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of vaccine lobbying efforts in the spring , when various interest groups and industry associations fought to get their business activities and workforces deemed “ essential ” so that they could stay up and running .
( It was a designation not all workers desired or appreciated . )
You might remember that in April , Florida Gov .
Ron DeSantis inexplicably declared the WWE essential in the Sunshine State .
So now that there are two emergency-approved vaccines in America , it makes sense that the rich and powerful are going to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for priority are companies that know getting their workers vaccinated would be a big deal for getting their operations back to full capacity .
Jonathan Slotkin , chief medical officer for Contigo Health , described the situation as a “ wrestling match ” where “ many interests want to make it clear that the people they represent have a lot of essential workers ” in an interview with the Washington Post .
The federal government estimates that there are about 87 million essential workers in the US , half of whom are over @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ethnic minorities are disproportionately represented in many industries deemed essential , and about a quarter of essential workers live in low-income families .
On Sunday , ACIP recommended that along with those over the age of 75 , some 30 million front-line essential workers should be part of phase 1b of vaccinations .
The group includes teachers , first responders , corrections workers , postal workers , public transit workers , grocery store workers , and people who work in food , agriculture , and manufacturing .
A second group of some 57 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in finance , telecommunications , and construction — will be part of group 1c .
“ We need science to drive policy and public health to drive politics ” Again , these are just federal guidelines .
States will be the ones to decide who gets priority .
So in a pandemic that ’ s been politicized from the get-go , the politics of vaccine distribution gets dicey quickly .
“ Where we ’ ve gone wrong with our Covid response is that we ’ ve had politics impact policy , practice , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Salmon , director of the Institute for Vaccine Safety at Johns Hopkins .
“ We need science to drive policy and public health to drive politics.
” Salmon cited an article written by former CDC Director Jeffrey Koplan and epidemiologist Melissa McPheeters in 2004 warning of the dangers of politics having too much influence over public health and science .
“ If that ’ s what this looks like , it ’ s going to be a disaster , it ’ s going to be really inequitable , and it ’ s going @ @ @ @ @ @ @ politics , ” he said .
“ This needs to come from science — we need to say who ’ s most at risk , what jobs are really essential , and that ’ s how the priority should be done.
” Not every group can lobby for themselves , or have someone do it on their behalf .
Homeless people , incarcerated people , and those living in group settings are among those at high risk of contracting Covid-19 .
If there ’ s too much politicization and corporate power in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people who are going to be left out .
Who should get priority is a hard question A litany of industries , companies , and unions are claiming the workers they represent should get an early spot in the line for vaccines .
And many of them have a solid case .
The meatpacking industry , which has seen waves of Covid-19 cases and deaths throughout the pandemic , lobbied the CDC for front-line meat and poultry workers to get early access and has gained support from Kansas Gov .
Laura Kelly in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has advocated for its tellers and other employees , who are in direct contact with the public , to be prioritized .
Groups representing air conditioning contractors , transit workers , and pest control workers submitted comments to the CDC arguing for their workers to get priority .
Figuring out what ’ s right to do here is not particularly easy .
Take , for example , Amazon .
It submitted a letter to the CDC asking that workers at its warehouses , data centers , and grocery stores get vaccinated “ at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that it employs 800,000 people , making it the second-largest employer in the US , behind Walmart .
Amazon workers have struggled during the pandemic , with tens of thousands sickened by the disease .
Who ’ s to say these workers haven ’ t more than earned a place in line ?
The same goes for companies like Walmart , Delta Airlines , Uber , Lyft , Cargill , and the list goes on and on .
Many companies and industries can make a solid case that they ’ re vital to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ going — the same case they made to be deemed essential — and that constitutes a place in line .
In an interview with Recode , Bryan Zumwalt , executive vice president of public affairs for the Consumer Brands Association , which represents companies such as Clorox , Coca-Cola , and General Mills , emphasized the importance of his members ’ role in supplying products people rely on every day during the pandemic .
“ We just want to make sure that our people are in that early 1b group … and that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ possible what the process is going to be , ” he said .
After ACIP ’ s recommendations were released , the group released a statement urging states to follow that guidance and get its 1.7 million essential workers the vaccine soon , arguing that they “ must be vaccinated to ensure shelves are stocked and Americans can continue to stay home and stay safe ” for the duration of the pandemic .
Some employers and groups are offering to help health officials and governments with the distribution of the vaccine .
Perdue @ @ @ @ @ @ @ governors of 15 states and the CDC asking to be part of 1b , has offered to assist with community outreach , including a multilingual campaign .
Uber is offering 10 million free rides to vaccination locations .
To be sure , it ’ s important to be clear about the motives here .
While a lot of these industries and companies do want to protect their workers , they are also well aware that doing so will come with a financial benefit .
That ’ s a big driver .
As the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Meat Institute , which is now lobbying for a vaccine for its workers , also drafted an executive order signed by President Donald Trump ordering meatpacking plants to stay open in the spring , even as their workers were getting sick and dying .
Uber and Lyft just spent tens of millions of dollars in California to make sure they don ’ t have to give their drivers typical employee benefits .
Amazon cut hazard pay for workers over the summer , though it did recently announce a one-time holiday bonus .
DoorDash @ @ @ @ @ @ @ state governors to prioritize delivery workers for the vaccine , noting that those people have worked throughout the pandemic and “ connect goods and services throughout our local communities and serve an essential role with restaurants and other small businesses.
” While its business has been booming this year , conditions for its delivery workers — the workers it ’ s now using to try to exert political pressure — have worsened .
“ You can ’ t blame Uber from a financial self-interest perspective , ” Salmon said .
“ But they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ driver gets , there ’ s somebody who ’ s not going to get one .
And who is going to give up that dose ?
” Companies that are now taking an interest in their workers ’ health and well being could be doing so all the time , not just when it ’ s financially expedient .
And a vaccine does not eliminate the need for other workplace protections .
Businesses shouldn ’ t let their guard down on the ways to prevent the virus from spreading , especially until broad @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ For every dose their driver gets , there ’ s somebody who ’ s not going to get one .
And who is going to give up that dose ?
” There is also a looming issue of who will get the vaccine in organizations once they get a certain amount of doses .
There was uproar at Stanford Medicine when hospital administrators and physicians who weren ’ t in contact with patients were given vaccine doses over those in direct contact with patients because of an algorithm the hospital was using @ @ @ @ @ @ @ very easy to imagine a case where a company gets a vaccine and hands it to the C-suite instead of people on the factory floor .
The NHL came under fire recently over a report that it was planning the private purchase of a vaccine for its upcoming season .
To a certain extent , it makes sense — professional sports is a high-dollar industry , and players are being asked to put their lives at risk amid a pandemic to keep people entertained .
When Recode contacted the league for comment , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that it would only look at that possibility “ in the context of the availability of excess capacity ” and not compete with health care workers , vulnerable populations , and symptomatic individuals for doses .
When Recode in a follow-up asked who the vaccines would be for — players ?
coaches ?
concession workers ?
— the NHL did not respond .
Private vaccine sales are possible , though inventory may be hard to come by because most doses are already spoken for by governments .
For a private organization such as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , it would need to buy excess supply from states on a secondary market or buy from another country .
In India , for example , the vaccine will be for sale on private markets .
The US government turned down a chance to secure more of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine over the summer , and the drugmaker could theoretically sell that excess production to a private entity , though it ’ s unclear how likely a scenario that is in the short term .
In the case of the NHL , for example @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Canada ’ s system to obtain vaccine doses .
Its health minister told reporters that the country doesn ’ t “ have any mechanisms to block corporations from purchasing on a private , contractual basis with corporations around the world.
” Pfizer told Canada ’ s CTV News in response that its contract is with the federal government .
The future of work has vaccines in it Getting access to the vaccine is part of the equation of how businesses will approach the issue , but it ’ s not all of it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of getting the workforce to take it , and companies are still in the early stages of figuring out how that will go .
Apart from the broader ( and misguided ) anti-vaccination movement in the US , many Americans are particularly concerned about getting the Covid-19 vaccines so early .
They ’ ve been given the go-ahead under the FDA ’ s emergency use authorization .
And while there ’ s been plenty of testing of them , the vaccines are still new , and people are nervous .
Dana , a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ last name is being withheld for privacy reasons ) , told Recode that while she is happy to be among the first in line to be vaccinated , even some of her colleagues have expressed some concerns .
“ We have a group of people who are like , ‘ I don ’ t know , I ’ m worried about this vaccine , ’ even though obviously there are not vaccine deniers among those people , ” she said .
“ I think that part of it is just the unknown quality @ @ @ @ @ @ @ largely accustomed to being required to have certain vaccinations for their jobs , but regular workers aren ’ t .
Sure , a lot of people are used to there being a flu vaccine campaign at work in the fall , but if you ignore it , it ’ s usually no big deal .
That ’ s not the case with Covid-19 .
Now one debate happening among industry leaders and businesses is how to talk to their workers about the Covid-19 vaccine and how far to go to get them to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at this issue now .
It ’ s one of the more difficult ones to grapple with , ” said Zumwalt , from the Consumer Brands Association .
“ The short answer is that , in general , employers can mandate vaccines ” On the less aggressive end , employers are working on programs to educate their workers about the vaccine , its benefits , and its safety , and to make workers aware of their efforts to get them vaccinated .
Uber sent a letter to its drivers and delivery people telling @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be near the front of the line for the vaccine ” and that it is focused on ensuring “ that if you choose to take the vaccine , you ’ re able to access it quickly and easily.
” Some employers may start to consider incentives , such as vacation time or gift cards , for workers to get vaccinated .
On the more aggressive end , there is the possibility of employers requiring workers to get a Covid-19 vaccine .
It ’ s likely within their legal capabilities , said Lindsay Ryan @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
“ The short answer is that , in general , employers can mandate vaccines , ” she told Recode .
Requiring vaccines isn ’ t a new phenomenon in some professions — it ’ s something that health care workers and teachers deal with .
And plenty of jobs come with certain parameters that rule people out .
Some employers have strict policies about hiring people with drunk driving convictions or who don ’ t pass drug tests , for example .
CNN recently reported that nearly three-quarters of CEOs polled at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they would be open to vaccine mandates .
“ I could see a lot of employers doing that , but it does presume that there ’ s a vaccine available .
You can ’ t tell your workforce you have to get vaccinated or you ’ re fired but you can ’ t get a vaccine , ” said Salmon , who opposes government-mandated vaccinations .
The situation isn ’ t straightforward .
On the one hand , Covid-19 is a more direct threat to workforces than the flu , and so the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ into account .
On the other hand , the vaccine being under emergency use authorization could make mandating it more unpalatable for employers .
Even if they can do it , they might not want to .
Employers have an obligation to maintain a safe and healthy workforce , including infection mitigation procedures , but mandating a vaccine comes with special obligations in terms of liability .
And some people are going to need waivers .
Benjamin , from the American Public Health Association , said that understanding not everyone will get the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ baked into public health planning .
“ At the end of the day , that ’ s why we push for herd immunity .
We realize there is a population of people who won ’ t be able to vaccinate early , and there ’ s a population of people who won ’ t be able to vaccinate at all , ” said Benjamin , who estimates about 75 percent of the population needs to be vaccinated to reach herd immunity .
Ryan said she doubts employers will go so far as to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ vaccinated , but they could use other measures , such as placing them on unpaid leave or having them work remotely .
In the case of companies like DoorDash and Uber that work with contractors , they can pretty much do whatever they want when it comes to asking people to get vaccines .
Just because employers , at the federal level , can mandate vaccines for workers “ doesn ’ t necessarily mean that they should , ” she said .
Wherever they fall on the list of priorities , phase 1b @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , businesses lobbying for the vaccine now have a lot of decisions ahead of them .
The ethics of the situation are far from clear .

Uber has spent years and millions of dollars making sure its workers aren’t classified as such and insisting it’s not responsible for those people’s health care. Now the company is pushing for its “earners” — the word it uses to refer to its drivers and delivery people so as not to call them workers — to get priority access to the Covid-19 vaccine.
It’s hardly alone in lobbying public health officials and states to put its people near the top of the list.
Companies and industry groups from across the economy are undertaking efforts at the federal and state level to make the case that when it comes to the limited-supply Covid-19 vaccine, their employees should get priority. The meat industry, airlines, banks, retail, exterminators, restaurants, and zoos are among the myriad groups lobbying decision-makers. So are specific companies such as Amazon, Lyft, DoorDash, and Perdue. Unions are trying to get their members vaccines. Even professional sports leagues, like the NHL, are making a play.
In early December, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), an arm of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, recommended that health care personnel and long-term care residents should be first to receive the Covid-19 vaccine. That “phase 1a” cohort represents about 17.6 million people, or 7 percent of the US adult population, and seems straightforward enough.
What comes next is more complicated. There’s been a mad dash among a variety of stakeholders to try to secure the next spots and a lively debate about who should be prioritized. On Sunday, ACIP issued its recommendation for 1b — the next phase — to be front-line essential workers and people over the age of 75. For 1c, it suggested people 65 or older, people with high-risk conditions, and essential workers not included in 1b.
Ultimately, it is up to states to decide what to do with federal recommendations and decipher which people, including workers, go where. States could deviate from those guidelines — theoretically, a place like California could say entertainers should be higher up on the list, or in New York, bankers. Companies may have an easier time influencing decisions at the state and local level. But in general, states take the guidelines seriously and could face enormous backlash if they ignore them.
“I don’t blame businesses for trying to make their case,” Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, told Recode. “But the people that are listening to their rationale ought to use criteria that are going to save the most lives and return our economy.”
Prioritization is just the first chapter in what will likely be months of discussions around how employers approach the Covid-19 vaccine. Which workers within an organization will get the vaccine is going to be an important factor. If a meatpacking company gets access to a vaccine supply, who’s going to ensure it’s the workers on the floor getting a dose and not the CEO? It’s a scenario already playing out in hospitals. And what does it look like for companies to be taking such an activist role in their workers’ health in trying to compel them to get the vaccine? It’s one thing for your boss to recommend you take a vaccine; it’s another for them to require it.
“Pretty much everybody is on the same page with vulnerable people and front-line workers” going first on the vaccine, said Matt McCambridge, founder and CEO of Eden Health, a personal health platform. “There’s a lot of gray area in terms of what happens next.”
The politics of Covid-19 is now the politics of the vaccine
The United States got a preview of vaccine lobbying efforts in the spring, when various interest groups and industry associations fought to get their business activities and workforces deemed “essential” so that they could stay up and running. (It was a designation not all workers desired or appreciated.) You might remember that in April, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis inexplicably declared the WWE essential in the Sunshine State.
So now that there are two emergency-approved vaccines in America, it makes sense that the rich and powerful are going to be jockeying for it. Also pushing for priority are companies that know getting their workers vaccinated would be a big deal for getting their operations back to full capacity. Jonathan Slotkin, chief medical officer for Contigo Health, described the situation as a “wrestling match” where “many interests want to make it clear that the people they represent have a lot of essential workers” in an interview with the Washington Post.
The federal government estimates that there are about 87 million essential workers in the US, half of whom are over the age of 40. Racial and ethnic minorities are disproportionately represented in many industries deemed essential, and about a quarter of essential workers live in low-income families.
On Sunday, ACIP recommended that along with those over the age of 75, some 30 million front-line essential workers should be part of phase 1b of vaccinations. The group includes teachers, first responders, corrections workers, postal workers, public transit workers, grocery store workers, and people who work in food, agriculture, and manufacturing. A second group of some 57 million other essential workers — including those in finance, telecommunications, and construction — will be part of group 1c.
“We need science to drive policy and public health to drive politics”
Again, these are just federal guidelines. States will be the ones to decide who gets priority. So in a pandemic that’s been politicized from the get-go, the politics of vaccine distribution gets dicey quickly.
“Where we’ve gone wrong with our Covid response is that we’ve had politics impact policy, practice, and then science,” said Daniel Salmon, director of the Institute for Vaccine Safety at Johns Hopkins. “We need science to drive policy and public health to drive politics.”
Salmon cited an article written by former CDC Director Jeffrey Koplan and epidemiologist Melissa McPheeters in 2004 warning of the dangers of politics having too much influence over public health and science. “If that’s what this looks like, it’s going to be a disaster, it’s going to be really inequitable, and it’s going to be who has more influence over politics,” he said. “This needs to come from science — we need to say who’s most at risk, what jobs are really essential, and that’s how the priority should be done.”
Not every group can lobby for themselves, or have someone do it on their behalf. Homeless people, incarcerated people, and those living in group settings are among those at high risk of contracting Covid-19. If there’s too much politicization and corporate power in the process, those are the types of people who are going to be left out.
Who should get priority is a hard question
A litany of industries, companies, and unions are claiming the workers they represent should get an early spot in the line for vaccines. And many of them have a solid case.
The meatpacking industry, which has seen waves of Covid-19 cases and deaths throughout the pandemic, lobbied the CDC for front-line meat and poultry workers to get early access and has gained support from Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly in its endeavors. The American Bankers Association has advocated for its tellers and other employees, who are in direct contact with the public, to be prioritized. Groups representing air conditioning contractors, transit workers, and pest control workers submitted comments to the CDC arguing for their workers to get priority.
Figuring out what’s right to do here is not particularly easy.
Take, for example, Amazon. It submitted a letter to the CDC asking that workers at its warehouses, data centers, and grocery stores get vaccinated “at the earliest possible time,” noting that it employs 800,000 people, making it the second-largest employer in the US, behind Walmart. Amazon workers have struggled during the pandemic, with tens of thousands sickened by the disease. Who’s to say these workers haven’t more than earned a place in line? The same goes for companies like Walmart, Delta Airlines, Uber, Lyft, Cargill, and the list goes on and on.
Many companies and industries can make a solid case that they’re vital to keeping the economy running and the country going — the same case they made to be deemed essential — and that constitutes a place in line.
In an interview with Recode, Bryan Zumwalt, executive vice president of public affairs for the Consumer Brands Association, which represents companies such as Clorox, Coca-Cola, and General Mills, emphasized the importance of his members’ role in supplying products people rely on every day during the pandemic. “We just want to make sure that our people are in that early 1b group … and that the states are being as clear as possible what the process is going to be,” he said.
After ACIP’s recommendations were released, the group released a statement urging states to follow that guidance and get its 1.7 million essential workers the vaccine soon, arguing that they “must be vaccinated to ensure shelves are stocked and Americans can continue to stay home and stay safe” for the duration of the pandemic.
Some employers and groups are offering to help health officials and governments with the distribution of the vaccine. Perdue, which has sent letters to the governors of 15 states and the CDC asking to be part of 1b, has offered to assist with community outreach, including a multilingual campaign. Uber is offering 10 million free rides to vaccination locations.
To be sure, it’s important to be clear about the motives here. While a lot of these industries and companies do want to protect their workers, they are also well aware that doing so will come with a financial benefit. That’s a big driver.
As the Intercept pointed out, the North American Meat Institute, which is now lobbying for a vaccine for its workers, also drafted an executive order signed by President Donald Trump ordering meatpacking plants to stay open in the spring, even as their workers were getting sick and dying. Uber and Lyft just spent tens of millions of dollars in California to make sure they don’t have to give their drivers typical employee benefits. Amazon cut hazard pay for workers over the summer, though it did recently announce a one-time holiday bonus.
DoorDash is petitioning the CDC and all 50 state governors to prioritize delivery workers for the vaccine, noting that those people have worked throughout the pandemic and “connect goods and services throughout our local communities and serve an essential role with restaurants and other small businesses.” While its business has been booming this year, conditions for its delivery workers — the workers it’s now using to try to exert political pressure — have worsened.
“You can’t blame Uber from a financial self-interest perspective,” Salmon said. “But they should consider that for every dose their driver gets, there’s somebody who’s not going to get one. And who is going to give up that dose?”
Companies that are now taking an interest in their workers’ health and well being could be doing so all the time, not just when it’s financially expedient. And a vaccine does not eliminate the need for other workplace protections. Businesses shouldn’t let their guard down on the ways to prevent the virus from spreading, especially until broad swaths of the population are vaccinated.
“For every dose their driver gets, there’s somebody who’s not going to get one. And who is going to give up that dose?”
There is also a looming issue of who will get the vaccine in organizations once they get a certain amount of doses. There was uproar at Stanford Medicine when hospital administrators and physicians who weren’t in contact with patients were given vaccine doses over those in direct contact with patients because of an algorithm the hospital was using to determine distribution. It’s very easy to imagine a case where a company gets a vaccine and hands it to the C-suite instead of people on the factory floor.
The NHL came under fire recently over a report that it was planning the private purchase of a vaccine for its upcoming season.
To a certain extent, it makes sense — professional sports is a high-dollar industry, and players are being asked to put their lives at risk amid a pandemic to keep people entertained. When Recode contacted the league for comment, an NHL spokesperson pointed to a clarification that it would only look at that possibility “in the context of the availability of excess capacity” and not compete with health care workers, vulnerable populations, and symptomatic individuals for doses. When Recode in a follow-up asked who the vaccines would be for — players? coaches? concession workers? — the NHL did not respond.
Private vaccine sales are possible, though inventory may be hard to come by because most doses are already spoken for by governments. For a private organization such as the NHL to get a Covid-19 vaccine, it would need to buy excess supply from states on a secondary market or buy from another country. In India, for example, the vaccine will be for sale on private markets. The US government turned down a chance to secure more of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine over the summer, and the drugmaker could theoretically sell that excess production to a private entity, though it’s unclear how likely a scenario that is in the short term.
In the case of the NHL, for example, the league would presumably go through Canada’s system to obtain vaccine doses. Its health minister told reporters that the country doesn’t “have any mechanisms to block corporations from purchasing on a private, contractual basis with corporations around the world.” Pfizer told Canada’s CTV News in response that its contract is with the federal government.
The future of work has vaccines in it
Getting access to the vaccine is part of the equation of how businesses will approach the issue, but it’s not all of it. There’s also the matter of getting the workforce to take it, and companies are still in the early stages of figuring out how that will go.
Apart from the broader (and misguided) anti-vaccination movement in the US, many Americans are particularly concerned about getting the Covid-19 vaccines so early. They’ve been given the go-ahead under the FDA’s emergency use authorization. And while there’s been plenty of testing of them, the vaccines are still new, and people are nervous.
Dana, a 55-year-old registered nurse in California (whose last name is being withheld for privacy reasons), told Recode that while she is happy to be among the first in line to be vaccinated, even some of her colleagues have expressed some concerns. “We have a group of people who are like, ‘I don’t know, I’m worried about this vaccine,’ even though obviously there are not vaccine deniers among those people,” she said. “I think that part of it is just the unknown quality of it.”
Health care workers are largely accustomed to being required to have certain vaccinations for their jobs, but regular workers aren’t. Sure, a lot of people are used to there being a flu vaccine campaign at work in the fall, but if you ignore it, it’s usually no big deal. That’s not the case with Covid-19.
Now one debate happening among industry leaders and businesses is how to talk to their workers about the Covid-19 vaccine and how far to go to get them to take it.
“People are looking at this issue now. It’s one of the more difficult ones to grapple with,” said Zumwalt, from the Consumer Brands Association.
“The short answer is that, in general, employers can mandate vaccines”
On the less aggressive end, employers are working on programs to educate their workers about the vaccine, its benefits, and its safety, and to make workers aware of their efforts to get them vaccinated. Uber sent a letter to its drivers and delivery people telling them the company believes they “should be near the front of the line for the vaccine” and that it is focused on ensuring “that if you choose to take the vaccine, you’re able to access it quickly and easily.” Some employers may start to consider incentives, such as vacation time or gift cards, for workers to get vaccinated.
On the more aggressive end, there is the possibility of employers requiring workers to get a Covid-19 vaccine. It’s likely within their legal capabilities, said Lindsay Ryan, an employment lawyer based in California. “The short answer is that, in general, employers can mandate vaccines,” she told Recode.
Requiring vaccines isn’t a new phenomenon in some professions — it’s something that health care workers and teachers deal with. And plenty of jobs come with certain parameters that rule people out. Some employers have strict policies about hiring people with drunk driving convictions or who don’t pass drug tests, for example. CNN recently reported that nearly three-quarters of CEOs polled at a virtual summit held by Yale signaled they would be open to vaccine mandates.
“I could see a lot of employers doing that, but it does presume that there’s a vaccine available. You can’t tell your workforce you have to get vaccinated or you’re fired but you can’t get a vaccine,” said Salmon, who opposes government-mandated vaccinations.
The situation isn’t straightforward. On the one hand, Covid-19 is a more direct threat to workforces than the flu, and so the analysis around requiring it will take that into account. On the other hand, the vaccine being under emergency use authorization could make mandating it more unpalatable for employers. Even if they can do it, they might not want to. Employers have an obligation to maintain a safe and healthy workforce, including infection mitigation procedures, but mandating a vaccine comes with special obligations in terms of liability. And some people are going to need waivers.
Benjamin, from the American Public Health Association, said that understanding not everyone will get the vaccine, whatever their situation, is baked into public health planning. “At the end of the day, that’s why we push for herd immunity. We realize there is a population of people who won’t be able to vaccinate early, and there’s a population of people who won’t be able to vaccinate at all,” said Benjamin, who estimates about 75 percent of the population needs to be vaccinated to reach herd immunity.
Ryan said she doubts employers will go so far as to fire employees who won’t get vaccinated, but they could use other measures, such as placing them on unpaid leave or having them work remotely. In the case of companies like DoorDash and Uber that work with contractors, they can pretty much do whatever they want when it comes to asking people to get vaccines. Just because employers, at the federal level, can mandate vaccines for workers “doesn’t necessarily mean that they should,” she said.
Wherever they fall on the list of priorities, phase 1b, 1c, whatever’s next, businesses lobbying for the vaccine now have a lot of decisions ahead of them. The ethics of the situation are far from clear.
Umair Irfan contributed reporting to this story.


vox--2020-12-22--What the 2020 debate over free speech missed

2020 was an especially rancorous year , and among the many things we fought about was the state of free speech in America .
There ’ s a rising contingent of heterodox thinkers — on the left and right — who argue that a culture of censoriousness has enveloped intellectual life and curtailed free speech .
Back in July , there was the infamous “ letter ” published in Harper ’ s Magazine defending free speech , signed by a wide range of writers and intellectuals .
Before that , there was a revolt at the New York Times after @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Sen. Tom Cotton ( R-AR ) calling for the deployment of American soldiers to protest hot spots around the country .
Columnist Bari Weiss quit the paper and posted a letter condemning what she called its increasingly “ illiberal environment.
” A few days after that , another prominent writer , Andrew Sullivan , launched The Weekly Dish to escape what he deemed were leftist orthodoxies in mainstream media .
More recently , Glenn Greenwald cut ties with the left-leaning outlet that he co-founded , The Intercept , claiming it has succumbed to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ censorship and ideological homogeneity plaguing the national press.
” And last month , Vox ’ s Matt Yglesias followed other writers ( like Greenwald and Sullivan ) in joining the independent digital platform Substack to , in his words , tell “ everyone what ’ s on my mind to an even greater extent than I do now.
” None of these cases are exactly alike , and the claims of censoriousness aren ’ t equally valid .
But they ’ re all part of a wave of “ cancel culture ” stories @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , if there is one , is that public discourse is being stifled .
As Greenwald lamented , “ how imperiled , across all societal sectors , this indispensable value of free discourse has become.
” Greenwald ’ s critique of cancel culture is right and wrong at the same time .
The boundaries of speech are being contested , on different fronts and for various reasons .
But that has always been the case .
What ’ s genuinely new about this moment is the number of voices in the discourse .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ unquestionably the freest and most open information space in human history .
So all of the challenges to speech are occurring alongside an explosion of ... speech .
Cancel culture , whatever you think of it , is a problem within free speech , not a problem of free speech .
This is a paradox that stretches all the way back to the invention of democracy and rhetoric in Ancient Greece .
The Greeks even created dueling conceptions of free speech — isegoria ( the right of everyone to participate in public debate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ speak without limits ) — to highlight the conflicts that emerge within open societies .
It ’ s worth noting that the Athenians could never manage these tensions and that ’ s partly why their democracy had the same familiar fights over ostracism and tribalism .
( Socrates was canceled by the mob ! )
Our discourse is as free as it ’ s ever been and as democratic as it ’ s ever been .
And that ’ s a challenge we ’ ve never truly navigated before — not on this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ experiencing now , viewed from 30,000 feet , is the latest example of a society wrestling with a contradiction at the heart of every democratic culture : It can ’ t function without an open communication environment , but that environment , because of its openness , is vulnerable to all sorts of internal pressures that can undermine the system from within .
Before the internet and social media , most people got their news from gatekeeping institutions like major newspapers and TV networks .
These institutions functioned like referees , calling out @ @ @ @ @ @ @ deciding what ’ s worth arguing about .
They had the ability to control the flow of information and set the terms of the conversation .
The style of discourse that dominated during the gatekeeping age was liberal in spirit but also tightly circumscribed because of the insularity of the participants ( mostly white , mostly upper and upper middle class ) .
The gatekeepers still exist , but they don ’ t have anything like the power they once had .
Whereas public discourse used to be a controlled , curated conversation @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s now a complete free-for-all .
The ecosystem looks very different .
Digital technologies — social media in particular — have unleashed more voices and platforms and essentially removed any barriers to entry in the public conversation .
And that means a broader range of voices and arguments and perspectives .
It also means more misinformation , more contestation , more tumult .
The complaints of writers like Yascha Mounk , who launched the online magazine Persuasion earlier this year to counter illiberal excesses , are justified but also misleading .
They ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ not only suppress speech but punish violations of emergent orthodoxies .
At the same time , it ’ s also true that we ’ re drowning in a free speech culture that has fostered the very tribalistic discourse people like Mounk want to transcend .
The issue here isn ’ t whether we have free speech or not .
It ’ s about what kind of free speech culture we want to preserve .
It ’ s the same fight the Greeks had .
Do we want isegoria or parrhesia ?
Does the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to say absolutely anything , regardless of the consequences ?
If I ’ m an absolutist about anything , it ’ s free speech , but even I would acknowledge there are boundaries .
I suspect most of the anti-cancel culture folks feel the same way .
But consensus will always be elusive and we ’ ll rarely agree about where to mark those boundaries .
As the public sphere opens up to more people , we should expect more collisions over the limits and meaning of tolerance .
We should also expect @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for exactly this reason .
Free speech , he argued , degenerated into sophistry because public discourse , if it ’ s truly open , is never reliably rational or free of coercion .
Plato ’ s response was to scrap democracy altogether .
If we reject that ( and most do ) , we still have to grapple with the fundamental problem .
Today there are more voices and platforms and almost no barriers to speech .
And that means more misinformation , more contestation , more tumult .
There isn ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Part of the issue is a media environment that foregrounds our worst impulses .
Social media , to take the obvious example , is basically engineered for bullying and groupthink .
Meanwhile , the competition for clicks and audiences is incredibly intense and all the incentives push in the direction of outrage and division .
But in a truly free society , everything is up for grabs .
The left , at this moment , is exerting a lot of cultural power and forcing mainstream media institutions to bend to new and shifting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ultimately , good for leftist political movements is a separate conversation .
What ’ s clear is that the digital media environment doesn ’ t privilege the same voices and attitudes that prevailed in the pre-digital world .
It ’ s too competitive and fragmented now .
That ’ s a major shift in how we think and communicate and it ’ s producing massive conflict .
Free speech has always devoured itself My main beef with anti-cancel crusaders is that they often don ’ t acknowledge that free speech only ensures a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t ensure that any particular style of discourse will prevail .
I keep returning to these Greek notions of isegoria and parrhesia because they underscore the tension between equality and liberty , between the right to speak and the license to offend .
You might say that isegoria created the political environment of democracy , while parrhesia actualized it .
Or to put that a little differently , the right to speak made democracy possible ; the ability to speak freely made it worthwhile .
But philosophers like Socrates and Plato quickly realized @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the door to all manners of subversion .
And as every first-year philosophy undergrad knows , the right to say anything in Athens led to joint rituals of ostracism and tribalism .
Indeed , Socrates was canceled by the same democratic forces that made his speech possible .
He refused ostracism and chose death , but his plight is a reminder that free speech has always devoured itself .
We can ’ t have a free society without all the hazards that freedom implies .
That ’ s the paradox .
The gatekeeping @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is but one of many modes of discourse competing for dominance in a wide-open ecosystem .
Thoughtful writers like The New Republic ’ s Osita Nwanevu and my Vox colleague Zack Beauchamp have argued that the “ woke ” debates we ’ re having now are , far from illiberal , happening squarely within the confines of liberalism — that some of the excesses of the left are efforts to force liberalism to realize its own ambitions .
I ’ m not convinced of that , but perhaps there ’ s some truth @ @ @ @ @ @ @ extend beyond the cancel culture debates .
The fight over speech , important as it is , seems small in comparison to a problem like misinformation about vaccines and elections and the collapse of trust in the institutions charged with informing the public .
And the epistemic crisis , as my colleague Dave Roberts dubbed it , springs from the same wide-open information space that produced the free speech drama .
It ’ s a manifestation of the same inescapable paradox .
What is true , and what ’ s always been true @ @ @ @ @ @ @ freedom — the freedom of expression — is occasionally a casualty of the very conditions that liberalism helps to establish in the first place .
A system built on free speech isn ’ t self-securing — it can and always has undermined the conditions of its own existence .
The freedom to speak has historically been limited to elites and people with power .
As more voices enter the public sphere , rhetorical boundaries will be pushed and erased .
The terms of the debates will shift .
The line between discomfort and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ unthinkable or unsayable will become commonplace , and what was previously acceptable will be challenged and sometimes suppressed , almost always in defense of the culture that makes freedom practically possible .
So whatever debates we ’ re having are because the gates to speech have been thrown wide open and the public conversation is less bounded .
What comes next is an open question .
But the road there will be disputed and shaped by more voices than ever before — and that ’ s what it means to live in a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .

2020 was an especially rancorous year, and among the many things we fought about was the state of free speech in America. There’s a rising contingent of heterodox thinkers — on the left and right — who argue that a culture of censoriousness has enveloped intellectual life and curtailed free speech.
Back in July, there was the infamous “letter” published in Harper’s Magazine defending free speech, signed by a wide range of writers and intellectuals. Before that, there was a revolt at the New York Times after the opinion section published a piece by Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) calling for the deployment of American soldiers to protest hot spots around the country. Columnist Bari Weiss quit the paper and posted a letter condemning what she called its increasingly “illiberal environment.” A few days after that, another prominent writer, Andrew Sullivan, launched The Weekly Dish to escape what he deemed were leftist orthodoxies in mainstream media.
More recently, Glenn Greenwald cut ties with the left-leaning outlet that he co-founded, The Intercept, claiming it has succumbed to “the same trends of repression, censorship and ideological homogeneity plaguing the national press.” And last month, Vox’s Matt Yglesias followed other writers (like Greenwald and Sullivan) in joining the independent digital platform Substack to, in his words, tell “everyone what’s on my mind to an even greater extent than I do now.”
None of these cases are exactly alike, and the claims of censoriousness aren’t equally valid. But they’re all part of a wave of “cancel culture” stories this year. And the common complaint, if there is one, is that public discourse is being stifled. As Greenwald lamented, “how imperiled, across all societal sectors, this indispensable value of free discourse has become.”
Greenwald’s critique of cancel culture is right and wrong at the same time. The boundaries of speech are being contested, on different fronts and for various reasons. But that has always been the case. What’s genuinely new about this moment is the number of voices in the discourse. We’re living in what is unquestionably the freest and most open information space in human history. So all of the challenges to speech are occurring alongside an explosion of ... speech.
Cancel culture, whatever you think of it, is a problem within free speech, not a problem of free speech. This is a paradox that stretches all the way back to the invention of democracy and rhetoric in Ancient Greece. The Greeks even created dueling conceptions of free speech — isegoria (the right of everyone to participate in public debate) and parrhesia (the right to speak without limits) — to highlight the conflicts that emerge within open societies. It’s worth noting that the Athenians could never manage these tensions and that’s partly why their democracy had the same familiar fights over ostracism and tribalism. (Socrates was canceled by the mob!)
Our discourse is as free as it’s ever been and as democratic as it’s ever been. And that’s a challenge we’ve never truly navigated before — not on this scale. The turbulence we’re experiencing now, viewed from 30,000 feet, is the latest example of a society wrestling with a contradiction at the heart of every democratic culture: It can’t function without an open communication environment, but that environment, because of its openness, is vulnerable to all sorts of internal pressures that can undermine the system from within.
We’re actually drowning in speech
Before the internet and social media, most people got their news from gatekeeping institutions like major newspapers and TV networks. These institutions functioned like referees, calling out lies, fact-checking claims, and generally deciding what’s worth arguing about. They had the ability to control the flow of information and set the terms of the conversation. The style of discourse that dominated during the gatekeeping age was liberal in spirit but also tightly circumscribed because of the insularity of the participants (mostly white, mostly upper and upper middle class).
The gatekeepers still exist, but they don’t have anything like the power they once had. Whereas public discourse used to be a controlled, curated conversation among the political class, it’s now a complete free-for-all.
The ecosystem looks very different. Digital technologies — social media in particular — have unleashed more voices and platforms and essentially removed any barriers to entry in the public conversation. And that means a broader range of voices and arguments and perspectives. It also means more misinformation, more contestation, more tumult.
The complaints of writers like Yascha Mounk, who launched the online magazine Persuasion earlier this year to counter illiberal excesses, are justified but also misleading. They’re justified because there are efforts to not only suppress speech but punish violations of emergent orthodoxies. At the same time, it’s also true that we’re drowning in a free speech culture that has fostered the very tribalistic discourse people like Mounk want to transcend.
The issue here isn’t whether we have free speech or not. It’s about what kind of free speech culture we want to preserve. It’s the same fight the Greeks had. Do we want isegoria or parrhesia? Does the right to free speech mean the right to say absolutely anything, regardless of the consequences? If I’m an absolutist about anything, it’s free speech, but even I would acknowledge there are boundaries. I suspect most of the anti-cancel culture folks feel the same way. But consensus will always be elusive and we’ll rarely agree about where to mark those boundaries.
As the public sphere opens up to more people, we should expect more collisions over the limits and meaning of tolerance. We should also expect a little anarchy. Plato hated democracy for exactly this reason. Free speech, he argued, degenerated into sophistry because public discourse, if it’s truly open, is never reliably rational or free of coercion. Plato’s response was to scrap democracy altogether. If we reject that (and most do), we still have to grapple with the fundamental problem.
Today there are more voices and platforms and almost no barriers to speech. And that means more misinformation, more contestation, more tumult.
There isn’t a satisfying solution at hand. Part of the issue is a media environment that foregrounds our worst impulses. Social media, to take the obvious example, is basically engineered for bullying and groupthink. Meanwhile, the competition for clicks and audiences is incredibly intense and all the incentives push in the direction of outrage and division.
But in a truly free society, everything is up for grabs. The left, at this moment, is exerting a lot of cultural power and forcing mainstream media institutions to bend to new and shifting ideological standards. Whether that is, ultimately, good for leftist political movements is a separate conversation. What’s clear is that the digital media environment doesn’t privilege the same voices and attitudes that prevailed in the pre-digital world. It’s too competitive and fragmented now. That’s a major shift in how we think and communicate and it’s producing massive conflict.
Free speech has always devoured itself
My main beef with anti-cancel crusaders is that they often don’t acknowledge that free speech only ensures a contest of persuasion. It doesn’t ensure that any particular style of discourse will prevail.
I keep returning to these Greek notions of isegoria and parrhesia because they underscore the tension between equality and liberty, between the right to speak and the license to offend. You might say that isegoria created the political environment of democracy, while parrhesia actualized it. Or to put that a little differently, the right to speak made democracy possible; the ability to speak freely made it worthwhile.
But philosophers like Socrates and Plato quickly realized that the right to say anything opened the door to all manners of subversion. And as every first-year philosophy undergrad knows, the right to say anything in Athens led to joint rituals of ostracism and tribalism. Indeed, Socrates was canceled by the same democratic forces that made his speech possible. He refused ostracism and chose death, but his plight is a reminder that free speech has always devoured itself.
We can’t have a free society without all the hazards that freedom implies. That’s the paradox. The gatekeeping age is over and that means liberalism is but one of many modes of discourse competing for dominance in a wide-open ecosystem. Thoughtful writers like The New Republic’s Osita Nwanevu and my Vox colleague Zack Beauchamp have argued that the “woke” debates we’re having now are, far from illiberal, happening squarely within the confines of liberalism — that some of the excesses of the left are efforts to force liberalism to realize its own ambitions. I’m not convinced of that, but perhaps there’s some truth in it.
The hazards of openness extend beyond the cancel culture debates. The fight over speech, important as it is, seems small in comparison to a problem like misinformation about vaccines and elections and the collapse of trust in the institutions charged with informing the public. And the epistemic crisis, as my colleague Dave Roberts dubbed it, springs from the same wide-open information space that produced the free speech drama. It’s a manifestation of the same inescapable paradox.
What is true, and what’s always been true, is that the essential liberal democratic freedom — the freedom of expression — is occasionally a casualty of the very conditions that liberalism helps to establish in the first place. A system built on free speech isn’t self-securing — it can and always has undermined the conditions of its own existence.
The freedom to speak has historically been limited to elites and people with power. As more voices enter the public sphere, rhetorical boundaries will be pushed and erased. The terms of the debates will shift. The line between discomfort and censorship will blur. What was previously unthinkable or unsayable will become commonplace, and what was previously acceptable will be challenged and sometimes suppressed, almost always in defense of the culture that makes freedom practically possible.
So whatever debates we’re having are because the gates to speech have been thrown wide open and the public conversation is less bounded. What comes next is an open question. But the road there will be disputed and shaped by more voices than ever before — and that’s what it means to live in a free society, for better or worse.


vox--2020-12-22--How virtual reality tricks your brain

How virtual reality tricks your brain

Virtual reality really had a moment back in 2016 .
The internet is still packed with people trying it for the first time , and it ’ s bizarre to watch .
People falling on the floor , reaching their hands into ceiling fans , kicking their feet as if they ’ re actually on a swing , and grasping at the floor for their lives even though they ’ re perfectly safe .
Let ’ s address the dinosaur in the virtual room : The graphics in VR aren ’ t exactly hyper-realistic .
Even the most realistic games @ @ @ @ @ @ @ There ’ s only so much processing power a computer can give before things start to lag .
Luckily for game designers , our brains aren ’ t all that great at differentiating between reality and virtual reality as long as some basic rules are followed .
Making a virtual experience feel real is a matter of picking and choosing specific visual cues ; the goal is to trick the brain in basic ways .
It doesn ’ t need to be realistic .
It simply needs to be believable .
Especially when @ @ @ @ @ @ @ virtual world , the pixels don ’ t need to be tiny or perfect for our brains to perceive the world as possible .
If we lift our feet and this virtual foot also lifts , the illusion only gets stronger .
Those virtual feet become our own .
Then the world is stretched out before us and objects within that world react in a very real way , even if the pixels aren ’ t perfect .
Researchers have harnessed a similar trick of the brain to get people to think a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out the video above to learn more .
You can find this video and all of Vox ’ s videos on YouTube .
And if you ’ re interested in supporting our video journalism , you can become a member of the Vox Video Lab on YouTube .

Virtual reality really had a moment back in 2016. The internet is still packed with people trying it for the first time, and it’s bizarre to watch. People falling on the floor, reaching their hands into ceiling fans, kicking their feet as if they’re actually on a swing, and grasping at the floor for their lives even though they’re perfectly safe.
Let’s address the dinosaur in the virtual room: The graphics in VR aren’t exactly hyper-realistic. Even the most realistic games in virtual reality have some pixelation. There’s only so much processing power a computer can give before things start to lag.
Luckily for game designers, our brains aren’t all that great at differentiating between reality and virtual reality as long as some basic rules are followed.
Making a virtual experience feel real is a matter of picking and choosing specific visual cues; the goal is to trick the brain in basic ways. It doesn’t need to be realistic. It simply needs to be believable. Especially when it comes to vision. In a virtual world, the pixels don’t need to be tiny or perfect for our brains to perceive the world as possible.
If we lift our feet and this virtual foot also lifts, the illusion only gets stronger. Those virtual feet become our own. Then the world is stretched out before us and objects within that world react in a very real way, even if the pixels aren’t perfect. Researchers have harnessed a similar trick of the brain to get people to think a rubber hand is their own.
Check out the video above to learn more.
You can find this video and all of Vox’s videos on YouTube. And if you’re interested in supporting our video journalism, you can become a member of the Vox Video Lab on YouTube.