vox--2020-08-21--How politicians showed off their books at the Democratic National Convention

Quarantine has brought one single , simple joy into our lives , and it is this : Snooping on celebs and their taste in books .
Now as never before , we have the chance to see inside the homes of not just our friends and families and coworkers , but of famous people .
Now as never before , we have the chance to judge them by the details lurking in the background of every media appearance : the house plants , the throw pillows , and , most importantly , the books .
For famous politicians especially , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ signifier of intelligence and erudition , and what books they choose to showcase for snoops like me to suss out is a huge signal about how they want the public to think of them .
At the 2020 Democratic National Convention , most official speakers appeared before DNC-provided backdrops , often featuring their state flags or other patriotic memorabilia .
So what has come to be called the credibility bookcase was not much on display during the big dramatic addresses .
( Notable exceptions among the keynote speakers were Michelle Obama and Hillary @ @ @ @ @ @ @ rooms .
While they did have books in the background of their videos , the contents were too blurry for your humble correspondent to identify the titles . )
But the convention also featured a few informal pre-shot montages , and those videos showcased bookshelves galore — and plenty of opportunities for analysis .
Let ’ s dive in .
Former Georgia Representative , lawyer , and romance novelist Stacey Abrams spoke at the convention on Tuesday night , and she represented with not only a bookshelf but also a charming sunflower arrangement @ @ @ @ @ @ @ but we do offer bonus points for nice flower arrangements . )
Notably , she had Ron Chernow ’ s biography of Ulysses S. Grant hovering just above her ear in what was the second Chernow cameo of the week .
( The first came on Monday , and we ’ ll get to it below . )
Her shelf was also studded with telltale orange-and-white Penguin Classics spines , indicating a fair amount of fiction .
No romance novels were immediately visible , but Abrams has already proven her bona fides in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ professional author , so her credibility bookcase has true , authentic credibility : It can ’ t be purely for show because Abrams manifestly works with books .
This is a harmonious and well-balanced bookshelf , indicating both gravitas and an ability to enjoy oneself .
Let ’ s move along to some of the candidates from primary season , who appeared before their various bookshelves to endorse Joe Biden over the course of the week .
They offer a prime chance to see how a group of erstwhile presidential hopefuls are presenting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ election .
Sen. Klobuchar helpfully stood flush with her bookshelves , so we can really get in there and go to town .
Her shelf features the classic politician go-to choices of political biographies and memoirs , including Ron Chernow ’ s George Washington , Jimmy Carter ’ s A Call to Action , and a biography of Eleanor Roosevelt .
Notably , her collection also includes the Margaret Thatcher biography The Iron Lady and Hope in the Struggle , a memoir by the activist Josie Johnson .
The Johnson memoir seems to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Thatcher biography would then counter out , but perhaps Klobuchar wants to suggest an identification with any woman in politics , political affiliation aside .
Notably , this is the kind of blurring of feminist ideas , in which any powerful woman can become a feminist role model now matter how many dubious things she does , of which Klobuchar ’ s supporters were often accused during the primary .
Klobuchar is also gesturing at an artsy side here , with books on Picasso and Van Gogh just behind her shoulder , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s short stories lurking prominently .
Plus , she has a copy of On Film-Making : An Introduction to the Craft of the Director .
Perhaps this is a reminder that Klobuchar has been active in trying to legislate arts relief bills during the pandemic , arguing that the American arts are one of the US ’ s most valuable exports .
The top left corner , which is studded with the orange-and-white spines of Penguin Classics , seems to be Klobuchar ’ s fiction section .
Most of the titles are too @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ m 80 percent certain I see an Agatha Christie , most likely Postern of Fate .
A classic and unimpeachable mom choice , and part of the Midwestern mom vibe that helped build the Klobuchar base .
And what is that there on the right just above Klobuchar ’ s shoulder ?
It appears to be a shiny copy of 50 States , 5,000 Ideas , a travel book that will guide the reader across the United States .
Amy Klobuchar : Like all of us , she just wants to get @ @ @ @ @ @ @ trip .
Beto O ’ Rourke is the coolest dad in the PTA O ’ Rourke ’ s framing gives us the full benefit of his voluminous book collection , plus the vinyl and — arguably even more old-school — CDs .
He ’ s going for breadth over depth here so we can see just how many well-worn books and records he keeps around and intuit that O ’ Rourke is a well-rounded and cosmopolitan Renaissance man who is genuinely devoted to the arts .
But a few titles are visible , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Ken Burns ’ s baseball book , and they both serve to cement O ’ Rourke ’ s position as the coolest dad ever to break out the acoustic guitar at their child ’ s sleepover .
The books on the chest of drawers behind Sen. Booker are too far away for their spines to be legible , but check out the two books on the table peeking coyly over his shoulder .
That is some deliberate placement if we snoops have ever snooped it !
The bottom book is the seminal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , which Booker has discussed before .
He told the New York Times in 2016 that he gave copies of it to his entire staff , and then he teamed up with Sen. Tom Harkin to buy copies for everyone in the Senate .
This is Booker reinforcing the message he repeated in his Biden endorsement : that he is committed to fighting against systemic racism and that he will hold Biden accountable to his commitment to do the same .
The red book on top of The New Jim Crow was a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an entertaining couple of hours speculating that it might be the beloved neurodivergent-child-solves-the-mystery-of-life novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time , or perhaps the recent addiction memoir Jesus Goes to Hollywood ( Senator , what message are you trying to send ?
?
? )
.
But I ’ m nearly certain the actual answer is much less fun : Cory Booker ’ s second choice after The New Jim Crow is almost surely The Road to Character by noted Booker supporter David Brooks .
And for the record @ @ @ @ @ @ @ may have found the next step forward for the credibility bookcase : It ’ s not just a place to show off one ’ s smarts , but also a place to scratch the back of a prominent supporter .
If so , perhaps we can expect to start seeing The Art of the Deal show up on the credibility bookshelves of GOP speakers across the country as the Republican National Convention kicks off .
But that ’ s an issue for next week .
Will you become our 20,000th supporter ?
When @ @ @ @ @ @ @ spring and we started asking readers for financial contributions , we weren ’ t sure how it would go .
Today , we ’ re humbled to say that nearly 20,000 people have chipped in .
The reason is both lovely and surprising : Readers told us that they contribute both because they value explanation and because they value that other people can access it , too .
We have always believed that explanatory journalism is vital for a functioning democracy .
That ’ s never been more important than today , during @ @ @ @ @ @ @ protests , a recession , and a presidential election .
But our distinctive explanatory journalism is expensive , and advertising alone won ’ t let us keep creating it at the quality and volume this moment requires .
Your financial contribution will not constitute a donation , but it will help keep Vox free for all .
Contribute today from as little as $ 3 .

Quarantine has brought one single, simple joy into our lives, and it is this: Snooping on celebs and their taste in books.
Now as never before, we have the chance to see inside the homes of not just our friends and families and coworkers, but of famous people. Now as never before, we have the chance to judge them by the details lurking in the background of every media appearance: the house plants, the throw pillows, and, most importantly, the books. For famous politicians especially, the background bookcase has become a fundamental signifier of intelligence and erudition, and what books they choose to showcase for snoops like me to suss out is a huge signal about how they want the public to think of them.
At the 2020 Democratic National Convention, most official speakers appeared before DNC-provided backdrops, often featuring their state flags or other patriotic memorabilia. So what has come to be called the credibility bookcase was not much on display during the big dramatic addresses. (Notable exceptions among the keynote speakers were Michelle Obama and Hillary Clinton, who spoke from their living rooms. While they did have books in the background of their videos, the contents were too blurry for your humble correspondent to identify the titles.)
But the convention also featured a few informal pre-shot montages, and those videos showcased bookshelves galore — and plenty of opportunities for analysis. Let’s dive in.
Stacey Abrams gets points for sunflowers
Former Georgia Representative, lawyer, and romance novelist Stacey Abrams spoke at the convention on Tuesday night, and she represented with not only a bookshelf but also a charming sunflower arrangement. (We are no Room Rater but we do offer bonus points for nice flower arrangements.) Notably, she had Ron Chernow’s biography of Ulysses S. Grant hovering just above her ear in what was the second Chernow cameo of the week. (The first came on Monday, and we’ll get to it below.) Her shelf was also studded with telltale orange-and-white Penguin Classics spines, indicating a fair amount of fiction. No romance novels were immediately visible, but Abrams has already proven her bona fides in that category. She’s a professional author, so her credibility bookcase has true, authentic credibility: It can’t be purely for show because Abrams manifestly works with books. This is a harmonious and well-balanced bookshelf, indicating both gravitas and an ability to enjoy oneself.
Let’s move along to some of the candidates from primary season, who appeared before their various bookshelves to endorse Joe Biden over the course of the week. They offer a prime chance to see how a group of erstwhile presidential hopefuls are presenting themselves as they pivot to the general election.
Amy Klobuchar loves a biography
Sen. Klobuchar helpfully stood flush with her bookshelves, so we can really get in there and go to town. Her shelf features the classic politician go-to choices of political biographies and memoirs, including Ron Chernow’s George Washington, Jimmy Carter’s A Call to Action, and a biography of Eleanor Roosevelt. Notably, her collection also includes the Margaret Thatcher biography The Iron Lady and Hope in the Struggle, a memoir by the activist Josie Johnson. The Johnson memoir seems to suggest a flirtation with progressivism that the Thatcher biography would then counter out, but perhaps Klobuchar wants to suggest an identification with any woman in politics, political affiliation aside. Notably, this is the kind of blurring of feminist ideas, in which any powerful woman can become a feminist role model now matter how many dubious things she does, of which Klobuchar’s supporters were often accused during the primary.
Klobuchar is also gesturing at an artsy side here, with books on Picasso and Van Gogh just behind her shoulder, and Shakespeare and an anthology of Fitzgerald’s short stories lurking prominently. Plus, she has a copy of On Film-Making: An Introduction to the Craft of the Director. Perhaps this is a reminder that Klobuchar has been active in trying to legislate arts relief bills during the pandemic, arguing that the American arts are one of the US’s most valuable exports.
The top left corner, which is studded with the orange-and-white spines of Penguin Classics, seems to be Klobuchar’s fiction section. Most of the titles are too blurry to make out, but I’m 80 percent certain I see an Agatha Christie, most likely Postern of Fate. A classic and unimpeachable mom choice, and part of the Midwestern mom vibe that helped build the Klobuchar base.
And what is that there on the right just above Klobuchar’s shoulder? It appears to be a shiny copy of 50 States, 5,000 Ideas, a travel book that will guide the reader across the United States. Amy Klobuchar: Like all of us, she just wants to get out of quarantine and go on a trip.
Beto O’Rourke is the coolest dad in the PTA
O’Rourke’s framing gives us the full benefit of his voluminous book collection, plus the vinyl and — arguably even more old-school — CDs. He’s going for breadth over depth here so we can see just how many well-worn books and records he keeps around and intuit that O’Rourke is a well-rounded and cosmopolitan Renaissance man who is genuinely devoted to the arts. But a few titles are visible, most notably a book on Bob Dylan and Ken Burns’s baseball book, and they both serve to cement O’Rourke’s position as the coolest dad ever to break out the acoustic guitar at their child’s sleepover.
Cory Booker is being slick
The books on the chest of drawers behind Sen. Booker are too far away for their spines to be legible, but check out the two books on the table peeking coyly over his shoulder. That is some deliberate placement if we snoops have ever snooped it!
The bottom book is the seminal mass incarceration analysis The New Jim Crow, which Booker has discussed before. He told the New York Times in 2016 that he gave copies of it to his entire staff, and then he teamed up with Sen. Tom Harkin to buy copies for everyone in the Senate. This is Booker reinforcing the message he repeated in his Biden endorsement: that he is committed to fighting against systemic racism and that he will hold Biden accountable to his commitment to do the same.
The red book on top of The New Jim Crow was a little harder to ID. I spent an entertaining couple of hours speculating that it might be the beloved neurodivergent-child-solves-the-mystery-of-life novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time, or perhaps the recent addiction memoir Jesus Goes to Hollywood (Senator, what message are you trying to send???). But I’m nearly certain the actual answer is much less fun: Cory Booker’s second choice after The New Jim Crow is almost surely The Road to Character by noted Booker supporter David Brooks. And for the record, Brooks thinks so too.
I think Booker had Road to Character over his shoulder. I call on delegates to go rogue and switch the nominee! pic.twitter.com/kibfHba2KN — David Brooks (@nytdavidbrooks) August 18, 2020
Booker may have found the next step forward for the credibility bookcase: It’s not just a place to show off one’s smarts, but also a place to scratch the back of a prominent supporter. If so, perhaps we can expect to start seeing The Art of the Deal show up on the credibility bookshelves of GOP speakers across the country as the Republican National Convention kicks off. But that’s an issue for next week.
Will you become our 20,000th supporter? When the economy took a downturn in the spring and we started asking readers for financial contributions, we weren’t sure how it would go. Today, we’re humbled to say that nearly 20,000 people have chipped in. The reason is both lovely and surprising: Readers told us that they contribute both because they value explanation and because they value that other people can access it, too. We have always believed that explanatory journalism is vital for a functioning democracy. That’s never been more important than today, during a public health crisis, racial justice protests, a recession, and a presidential election. But our distinctive explanatory journalism is expensive, and advertising alone won’t let us keep creating it at the quality and volume this moment requires. Your financial contribution will not constitute a donation, but it will help keep Vox free for all. Contribute today from as little as $3.


vox--2020-08-21--The 2020 DNC was an eerie look at a country in crisis — and great TV

For months now , the 2020 presidential election hasn ’ t felt entirely real to me .
The obvious reason is that the global outbreak of Covid-19 scrambled everything about the campaign to such a degree that it felt ever so slightly like an event happening in some other country entirely .
“ While this pandemic is going on , we ’ re going to also have an election ?
” I would catch myself thinking .
“ Really ?
?
” But if I ’ m being honest , I was feeling this way back before the coronavirus came @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Iowa caucuses in early February , when there were huge problems with vote reporting , to the degree that essentially none of the candidates could claim momentum from them ?
Those , too , felt like an event happening in some other reality .
Covid-19 contributed greatly to the distance I felt from this election , but it wasn ’ t the sole reason for it .
So it sort of made sense that the 2020 Democratic National Convention would be the first virtual convention , staged not in one central location but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ spread across the nation in a fine smear , like jam on toast .
Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were together , and a few important Democratic officials were in Milwaukee ( where the convention was originally slated to be held ) .
Barack Obama traveled to Philadelphia to deliver his speech .
But most of the events were broadcast from party members ’ hometowns and living rooms , to the degree that I found myself a little fascinated with trying to examine the pattern on the Clintons ’ couch .
( I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ couch with that pattern , so it ’ s good that the Clintons are grandparents . )
The whole endeavor had the intimacy of television , which even at its worst brings people right into your living room and invites them to plop down there , blended with the strangely distancing quality of videoconferencing software , which so often lags slightly behind reality .
For me , that weird blend of intimacy and lag contributed to a sense , all throughout the convention , that it wasn ’ t quite real .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a dry run for the real event .
By the time Biden delivered his concluding speech officially accepting the party ’ s nomination for president , the whole hootenanny seemed , in rather surreal fashion , as if it were taking place inside a video game cutscene .
Biden ’ s speech was the best I ’ ve ever seen him give , but the eerie vacuum he delivered it in made it seem like something selected from a menu of dialogue options .
Yet this fictional quality was also one of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which honestly might be my favorite political convention I ’ ve ever seen .
It didn ’ t change my feelings about Biden , or Harris , or even Obama .
But it did leave me feeling like I had watched some entertaining television .
The 2020 DNC featured bland politics , but it was frequently fun to watch Perhaps the most surprising shot of the entire convention came late in Harris ’ s vice presidential nomination acceptance speech Wednesday night .
Harris presented her remarks to a nearly empty convention center , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , normally , applause would drown her out .
But without any devoted Democrats in attendance , her whole speech filtered out into an unforgiving room .
And then the camera pulled into a wide shot , looking at the stage from an angle .
Seated throughout the empty space , observing proper social distancing , were a handful of reporters scattered about the echoing room .
It was as striking a visual reminder of the highly strange circumstances of this convention as I could think of , and it spoke to just @ @ @ @ @ @ @ seem , because it reminded you there was no way her speech could avoid awkwardness .
Biden ’ s speech , delivered under similar circumstances , in a nearly empty convention center , played much better on television , and it speaks to a strength of this DNC : Its organizers and participants were willing to think on their feet .
Biden didn ’ t pause for applause that wouldn ’ t come , and yet he parceled out his address in such a way that you could have emotional reactions at home @ @ @ @ @ @ @ kept a tight focus on Biden , compared to occasionally taking a wider view of Harris , as if trying to reestablish the former ’ s intimacy with the audience , while centering Harris as a relative newcomer on the global stage , stepping out into an unprecedented crisis .
Their speeches were also shorter than the typical convention speech .
It was in keeping with the entirety of the event .
Only Harris , Biden , and the two Obamas spoke for longer than 15 minutes , and even Bill Clinton , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ got only five minutes of screen time .
( Rising party star Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez got even less , in her speech seconding the nomination of Bernie Sanders . )
It was an acknowledgment of a key difference of a virtual convention — without audience reactions to surf , a speaker like Clinton needed to stay sharp and to the point .
But I ’ m not sure that was a problem , either .
Did we really need hour-long speeches ?
Barack and Michelle Obama are among the most effective political communicators of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ made efficient use of 20 minutes .
Without a crowd present , their remarks were boiled down to their most effective and emotional points .
They were tailored for TV , in other words .
The convention also took chances in the way it staged speeches .
Jill Biden ’ s speech opened as a walk-and-talk shot by what appeared to be a TV news camera .
Barack Obama delivered his speech from the American Revolution Museum in Philadelphia , which lent the speech a gravitas a convention stage couldn ’ t hope @ @ @ @ @ @ @ John Kasich beamed in from a literal crossroads , and still other speechmakers ( notably Long Beach , California , Mayor Robert Garcia ) appeared from business places sitting quiet amid nationwide shutdowns .
And when in doubt , the convention aimed for the intimacy of reminding viewers that all of these party faithful had places to go home to .
Getting to see Hillary Clinton or Michelle Obama appear from their homes created a vague sense that everybody “ attending ” the convention and everybody watching at home were in the same @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Wilmington , Delaware , to “ greet ” Biden after his big speech were in their cars , a major political event reimagined as a drive-through graduation ceremony .
All of these choices combined to give the whole event a brisker pace .
Each night ’ s programming ran for a little over two hours , and I never felt like any person or topic got short shrift or overstayed their welcome .
It was just more entertaining to watch , while also accomplishing the core task of getting the Democratic Party faithful @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s chances at winning the presidency .
But what made the DNC most successful was the meta-narrative baked into it .
The 2020 DNC wasn ’ t about averting catastrophe .
It was about alleviating it .
The biggest plan Biden outlined in his acceptance speech on Thursday had nothing to do with income inequality or systemic racism or climate change .
He touched on all of those problems , but the one topic where he outlined a concrete approach was when he discussed what could be done about the coronavirus ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s plan — lots of testing , lots of masks , lots of social distancing — isn ’ t any different from those of any of the countries that have controlled the spread of the disease .
And yet just hearing it explained so clearly by an authority figure felt weirdly revolutionary , because , well , that authority has been in short supply of late .
( I don ’ t know if you ’ ve noticed . )
“ We ’ re going to do more testing to stop the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t feel like the breath of fresh policy air that it does , but the very existence of the virtual convention underlined how necessary it is .
All media is produced under certain constrictions and circumstances , and sometimes , it can make something artful of those constrictions and circumstances .
This convention wasn ’ t art , but its value as television lay in how it was careful to rarely let the subtext ( 170,000 people have died ) overwhelm the text ( and let ’ s elect Joe Biden ! )
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ text could have defeated the convention , but its light touch ensured that nothing got too bogged down , even in the endless strings of montages that took up the first hour of most evenings ’ programming .
At all times , the event relied on the power of images to convey a country that feels as if it ’ s careening downhill with nobody to stomp on the brakes — and to suggest , implicitly , that Joe Biden knows exactly how to stomp on the brakes .
I may not have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ excited about Joe Biden and Kamala Harris , but I did leave it feeling like there ’ s no reason any other political convention should go back to how they used to be .
The DNC maybe wasn ’ t the rousing celebration of the party it would have been in other years , but it was pretty darn good television , which understood the horrors of the time required not something inspiring but something quiet , thoughtful , cautionary , and hopeful .
We might be careening downhill , the message went @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
We just have to elect someone who knows how they ’ re supposed to work .
In the spring , we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone , and last week , we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors .
Well , you helped us blow past that .
Today , we are extending that goal to 25,000 .
Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes .
Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers , your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world .
Contribute today from as little as $ 3 .

For months now, the 2020 presidential election hasn’t felt entirely real to me.
The obvious reason is that the global outbreak of Covid-19 scrambled everything about the campaign to such a degree that it felt ever so slightly like an event happening in some other country entirely. “While this pandemic is going on, we’re going to also have an election?” I would catch myself thinking. “Really??”
But if I’m being honest, I was feeling this way back before the coronavirus came to dominate headlines. Remember the disastrous Iowa caucuses in early February, when there were huge problems with vote reporting, to the degree that essentially none of the candidates could claim momentum from them? Those, too, felt like an event happening in some other reality. Covid-19 contributed greatly to the distance I felt from this election, but it wasn’t the sole reason for it.
So it sort of made sense that the 2020 Democratic National Convention would be the first virtual convention, staged not in one central location but all over the country, a party spread across the nation in a fine smear, like jam on toast. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were together, and a few important Democratic officials were in Milwaukee (where the convention was originally slated to be held). Barack Obama traveled to Philadelphia to deliver his speech.
But most of the events were broadcast from party members’ hometowns and living rooms, to the degree that I found myself a little fascinated with trying to examine the pattern on the Clintons’ couch. (I maintain that only grandparents would own a couch with that pattern, so it’s good that the Clintons are grandparents.) The whole endeavor had the intimacy of television, which even at its worst brings people right into your living room and invites them to plop down there, blended with the strangely distancing quality of videoconferencing software, which so often lags slightly behind reality.
For me, that weird blend of intimacy and lag contributed to a sense, all throughout the convention, that it wasn’t quite real. The virtual DNC felt either fictional or like a dry run for the real event. By the time Biden delivered his concluding speech officially accepting the party’s nomination for president, the whole hootenanny seemed, in rather surreal fashion, as if it were taking place inside a video game cutscene. Biden’s speech was the best I’ve ever seen him give, but the eerie vacuum he delivered it in made it seem like something selected from a menu of dialogue options.
Yet this fictional quality was also one of the primary strengths of the 2020 convention, which honestly might be my favorite political convention I’ve ever seen. It didn’t change my feelings about Biden, or Harris, or even Obama. But it did leave me feeling like I had watched some entertaining television.
The 2020 DNC featured bland politics, but it was frequently fun to watch
Perhaps the most surprising shot of the entire convention came late in Harris’s vice presidential nomination acceptance speech Wednesday night. Harris presented her remarks to a nearly empty convention center, and she kept pausing during moments where, normally, applause would drown her out. But without any devoted Democrats in attendance, her whole speech filtered out into an unforgiving room.
And then the camera pulled into a wide shot, looking at the stage from an angle. Seated throughout the empty space, observing proper social distancing, were a handful of reporters scattered about the echoing room. It was as striking a visual reminder of the highly strange circumstances of this convention as I could think of, and it spoke to just how awkward Harris’s speech could seem, because it reminded you there was no way her speech could avoid awkwardness.
Biden’s speech, delivered under similar circumstances, in a nearly empty convention center, played much better on television, and it speaks to a strength of this DNC: Its organizers and participants were willing to think on their feet. Biden didn’t pause for applause that wouldn’t come, and yet he parceled out his address in such a way that you could have emotional reactions at home should you want to. The camerawork kept a tight focus on Biden, compared to occasionally taking a wider view of Harris, as if trying to reestablish the former’s intimacy with the audience, while centering Harris as a relative newcomer on the global stage, stepping out into an unprecedented crisis.
Their speeches were also shorter than the typical convention speech. It was in keeping with the entirety of the event. Only Harris, Biden, and the two Obamas spoke for longer than 15 minutes, and even Bill Clinton, who has frequently delivered convention stemwinders, got only five minutes of screen time. (Rising party star Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez got even less, in her speech seconding the nomination of Bernie Sanders.) It was an acknowledgment of a key difference of a virtual convention — without audience reactions to surf, a speaker like Clinton needed to stay sharp and to the point.
But I’m not sure that was a problem, either. Did we really need hour-long speeches? Barack and Michelle Obama are among the most effective political communicators of the TV era, and even they made efficient use of 20 minutes. Without a crowd present, their remarks were boiled down to their most effective and emotional points. They were tailored for TV, in other words.
The convention also took chances in the way it staged speeches. Jill Biden’s speech opened as a walk-and-talk shot by what appeared to be a TV news camera. Barack Obama delivered his speech from the American Revolution Museum in Philadelphia, which lent the speech a gravitas a convention stage couldn’t hope to approach. Former Ohio Gov. John Kasich beamed in from a literal crossroads, and still other speechmakers (notably Long Beach, California, Mayor Robert Garcia) appeared from business places sitting quiet amid nationwide shutdowns.
And when in doubt, the convention aimed for the intimacy of reminding viewers that all of these party faithful had places to go home to. Getting to see Hillary Clinton or Michelle Obama appear from their homes created a vague sense that everybody “attending” the convention and everybody watching at home were in the same boat. Even the convention-goers gathered in Wilmington, Delaware, to “greet” Biden after his big speech were in their cars, a major political event reimagined as a drive-through graduation ceremony.
All of these choices combined to give the whole event a brisker pace. Each night’s programming ran for a little over two hours, and I never felt like any person or topic got short shrift or overstayed their welcome. It was just more entertaining to watch, while also accomplishing the core task of getting the Democratic Party faithful at least vaguely excited about Biden’s chances at winning the presidency.
But what made the DNC most successful was the meta-narrative baked into it.
The 2020 DNC wasn’t about averting catastrophe. It was about alleviating it.
The biggest plan Biden outlined in his acceptance speech on Thursday had nothing to do with income inequality or systemic racism or climate change. He touched on all of those problems, but the one topic where he outlined a concrete approach was when he discussed what could be done about the coronavirus’s unchecked spread in the US.
Biden’s plan — lots of testing, lots of masks, lots of social distancing — isn’t any different from those of any of the countries that have controlled the spread of the disease. And yet just hearing it explained so clearly by an authority figure felt weirdly revolutionary, because, well, that authority has been in short supply of late. (I don’t know if you’ve noticed.)
“We’re going to do more testing to stop the spread of Covid-19” probably shouldn’t feel like the breath of fresh policy air that it does, but the very existence of the virtual convention underlined how necessary it is. All media is produced under certain constrictions and circumstances, and sometimes, it can make something artful of those constrictions and circumstances. This convention wasn’t art, but its value as television lay in how it was careful to rarely let the subtext (170,000 people have died) overwhelm the text (and let’s elect Joe Biden!).
That careful balance of subtext and text could have defeated the convention, but its light touch ensured that nothing got too bogged down, even in the endless strings of montages that took up the first hour of most evenings’ programming. At all times, the event relied on the power of images to convey a country that feels as if it’s careening downhill with nobody to stomp on the brakes — and to suggest, implicitly, that Joe Biden knows exactly how to stomp on the brakes.
I may not have left the 2020 DNC feeling any more excited about Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, but I did leave it feeling like there’s no reason any other political convention should go back to how they used to be. The DNC maybe wasn’t the rousing celebration of the party it would have been in other years, but it was pretty darn good television, which understood the horrors of the time required not something inspiring but something quiet, thoughtful, cautionary, and hopeful. We might be careening downhill, the message went, but the brakes are still functional. We just have to elect someone who knows how they’re supposed to work.
New goal: 25,000
In the spring, we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone, and last week, we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors. Well, you helped us blow past that. Today, we are extending that goal to 25,000. Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what is, quite possibly, the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes. Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers, your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world. Contribute today from as little as $3.


vox--2020-08-21--The legacy of Toni Morrison looms large in The Vanishing Half

The Vox Book Club is linking to Bookshop.org to support local and independent booksellers .
When I opened up Brit Bennett ’ s The Vanishing Half for the first time , I couldn ’ t stop thinking about Toni Morrison .
Specifically , I couldn ’ t stop thinking about the opening of Beloved ( “ 124 was spiteful .
Full of a baby ’ s venom.
” ) , and how even though it will be hundreds of pages before the ghost of Beloved shows up , everything in that opening paragraph tells the reader that the book takes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tale world .
The Vanishing Half doesn ’ t have any full-fledged supernatural elements .
But like Beloved , it takes place in a world that is not quite straightforwardly real : a world in which every character is the most whatever they are that the world has ever seen ; a world in which fates are intertangled in ways that can not be fought ; a world in which the narrator ’ s voice is elevated rather than conversational , and has the cadence of a storyteller sitting by a fire .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ waiting customers the story of the Vignes twins — complete with pauses at the dramatic points , as Lou is “ a bit of a showman ” — and that sense of being verbally told a story continues all the way through the novel .
The Vanishing Half takes place within the world of folklore , of oral tradition .
As part of the Vox Book Club ’ s month-long discussion of The Vanishing Half , I wanted to find out more about how this narrative technique works .
So I called up @ @ @ @ @ @ @ American literature at Ohio Wesleyan University , and I asked her to tell me all about the place of the oral tradition within the Black literary canon .
Together , we talked through the way oral traditions work as call and response stories , what that means for us as readers , and how Toni Morrison changed the way America reads .
Our full conversation , lightly edited for length and clarity , is below .
So , when I read The Vanishing Half , I think , “ This is not a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a realist novel.
” It ’ s a book where everyone is defined by their epithets — the two beautiful sisters , the darkest girl , the lightest girl — and their narrative trajectories are intertwined in ways that feel fated .
It reads in many ways like a fairy tale or a folk story .
And there ’ s a similar effect in Bennett ’ s first book The Mothers , which is narrated by a Greek chorus of church ladies .
What can you tell me about how African American novels @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with oral traditions ?
Let me start with a good landmark for most readers : Toni Morrison .
In the mid- ’ 80s , she wrote an essay titled “ Rootedness : The Ancestor as Foundation ” that laid out why and how the oral tradition is important to her and to any number of other Black writers .
She says in that essay that her goal is “ to have at my disposal only the letters of the alphabet and some punctuation .
I have to provide the places and spaces so @ @ @ @ @ @ @ notion of the reader as not just participant , which is in itself progressive , but the more revolutionary concept of the reader as a co-creator of the text , is a principle that is borrowed from the oral tradition .
And it becomes an informing philosophy for many African American writers .
If you think about it in terms of the larger expanse of the novel as a genre , the traditional positioning of the reader has been as an observer , right ?
The writer buries or hides certain meanings in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the reader is to find those meanings and then say , “ I ’ ve done a good job !
I ’ ve found all of the buried treasures !
” That ’ s not the viewpoint they [ Morrison and others writing in her tradition ] bring to the work of literary artistry .
They see it as the reader is a co-creator of the text , much in the tradition of call and response .
It ’ s an essential dynamic of the oral tradition that the listener will eventually become @ @ @ @ @ @ @ What you have in call and response is a structure , a performance dynamic , that anticipates and requires that the listener provide a response that may expand , challenge , revise , clarify , transform , whatever , the previous utterance .
And they themselves eventually become the new caller .
If you take that principle and apply it to literature , then you have this vision of the reader as the future caller , the co-creator of the meanings possible from the text .
The finished novel is itself just a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
It is a work waiting to be completed by the reader ’ s engagement .
You have a number of literary techniques that can be used to make that participation possible within the work .
But that ’ s what Morrison says in this mid- ’ 80s essay : that her goal is to take this sensibility , this opportunity that attends the oral tradition , and to make it available in literature .
One of the more prominent authors to work with this tradition recently was Marlon James , who wrote @ @ @ @ @ @ @ very committed to the idea that pulling from an oral tradition is part of a rejection of the idea of a coherent , stable reality .
He said something like , “ The African folktale is not your refuge from skepticism.
” Is that sense of multiple realities and instability traditionally part of how this technique is understood ?
Multiple possibilities , I would say .
And once you say possibilities you imply freedoms , but also responsibilities .
To be in a community means to have the responsibility of expanding the growth @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Which requires creative commitment , creative competencies .
And those competencies have to be instilled .
They have to be taught , they have to be developed , and you have to make room to practice those competencies .
The notion is that artistic expressions in their variety — not just the novel but also the poetry , the sermon , the dance , and so forth — must have this as a primary commitment : authorizing the creative competency of all participants .
Not just the main performer .
A lot of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it onto school syllabi , and I ’ m thinking of books by Richard Wright especially here , exists in a space more of social realism .
What does the conversation between these two literary projects look like ?
Once you talk about Richard Wright , you bring us back to a moment before what I see as the healing of a bifurcation in the artistic tradition .
For some obvious reasons , oral traditions were not given the kinds of respect , the kinds of valuation by the mainstream literary establishment [ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ So you see a break in the tradition between the writers who were very comfortable , were very confident of the value of those aesthetics — people like Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes — and people who on the other hand had a much different orientation .
Richard Wright was the most renowned , the most credentialed , the most authoritative of those writers .
That bifurcation has now healed itself with the career and the achievements of Toni Morrison .
As a matter of fact , I think that American readers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have accepted as wholeheartedly , the kind of narrative choices that you see in Bennett ’ s work without Morrison ’ s career .
Is there anything else that you think is really essential to this tradition that you think people should know about ?
I think Bennett is doing something really interesting in the way in which she builds her discursive authority .
I hesitate to use some of the terms we scholars use , because I know everyday readers of literature don ’ t want to be bothered about it , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ here !
What she uses is what I would call an ideal narrative audience .
That becomes important for Black writers in particular , because of the history of discursive authority attaching itself most frequently to writers who are white and male .
So Black women writers end up in an impoverished position in that economy and having to use different techniques to accrue authority .
One of those techniques is the positioning within the text of an ideal narrative audience : an audience that accepts the writer ’ s intellectual judgment , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the writer ’ s credibility .
It ’ s interesting , the idea of the writer creating or positioning this ideal narrative audience at the same that they ’ re asking the audience to help co-create the text .
It ’ s like each participant is creating the next .
It might seem at first contradictory , but really it ’ s not .
What the ideal narrative audience does is , it clears ideological space .
It relocates both the reader and writer beyond the racialized positionings assigned by society .
Because @ @ @ @ @ @ @ woman ’ s voice carries very little authority .
But in the experience of Black women , there are spaces where a Black woman ’ s authority is paramount .
So for the artist to bring those spaces within the text , is for the artist to clear a space and then map out a space for their own performance .
And then they relocate the reader within that space .
I love the idea that Bennett is relocating us , taking us out of the world and into the one she ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to co-create her book with her .
And so now I am turning things over to you , book clubbers .
If The Vanishing Half is a novel of call and response , then you are the ones responding .
You ’ re the vanished half !
How do you feel about the idea of a collaborative reading of this book ?
How did you respond to the fairy tale structure ?
Do you see shades of Toni Morrison in Bennett ’ s work ?
Talk among yourselves , either down below in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ communities , and meet us back here next Thursday to see me talk with Brit Bennett herself live on Zoom .
Plus , sign up for the Vox Book Club newsletter to be sure you don ’ t miss a thing .

The Vox Book Club is linking to Bookshop.org to support local and independent booksellers.
When I opened up Brit Bennett’s The Vanishing Half for the first time, I couldn’t stop thinking about Toni Morrison.
Specifically, I couldn’t stop thinking about the opening of Beloved (“124 was spiteful. Full of a baby’s venom.”), and how even though it will be hundreds of pages before the ghost of Beloved shows up, everything in that opening paragraph tells the reader that the book takes place in a grim and vengeful fairy tale world.
The Vanishing Half doesn’t have any full-fledged supernatural elements. But like Beloved, it takes place in a world that is not quite straightforwardly real: a world in which every character is the most whatever they are that the world has ever seen; a world in which fates are intertangled in ways that cannot be fought; a world in which the narrator’s voice is elevated rather than conversational, and has the cadence of a storyteller sitting by a fire. It opens with Lou LeBon telling his waiting customers the story of the Vignes twins — complete with pauses at the dramatic points, as Lou is “a bit of a showman” — and that sense of being verbally told a story continues all the way through the novel. The Vanishing Half takes place within the world of folklore, of oral tradition.
As part of the Vox Book Club’s month-long discussion of The Vanishing Half, I wanted to find out more about how this narrative technique works. So I called up Judylyn Ryan, a professor of African American literature at Ohio Wesleyan University, and I asked her to tell me all about the place of the oral tradition within the Black literary canon. Together, we talked through the way oral traditions work as call and response stories, what that means for us as readers, and how Toni Morrison changed the way America reads. Our full conversation, lightly edited for length and clarity, is below.
So, when I read The Vanishing Half, I think, “This is not a book that’s trying to be a realist novel.” It’s a book where everyone is defined by their epithets — the two beautiful sisters, the darkest girl, the lightest girl — and their narrative trajectories are intertwined in ways that feel fated. It reads in many ways like a fairy tale or a folk story. And there’s a similar effect in Bennett’s first book The Mothers, which is narrated by a Greek chorus of church ladies. What can you tell me about how African American novels in the past have tended to work with oral traditions?
The oral traditions are foundational.
Let me start with a good landmark for most readers: Toni Morrison. In the mid-’80s, she wrote an essay titled “Rootedness: The Ancestor as Foundation” that laid out why and how the oral tradition is important to her and to any number of other Black writers. She says in that essay that her goal is “to have at my disposal only the letters of the alphabet and some punctuation. I have to provide the places and spaces so that the reader can participate.”
This notion of the reader as not just participant, which is in itself progressive, but the more revolutionary concept of the reader as a co-creator of the text, is a principle that is borrowed from the oral tradition. And it becomes an informing philosophy for many African American writers.
If you think about it in terms of the larger expanse of the novel as a genre, the traditional positioning of the reader has been as an observer, right? The writer buries or hides certain meanings in the text, and the task of the reader is to find those meanings and then say, “I’ve done a good job! I’ve found all of the buried treasures!” That’s not the viewpoint they [Morrison and others writing in her tradition] bring to the work of literary artistry. They see it as the reader is a co-creator of the text, much in the tradition of call and response.
It’s an essential dynamic of the oral tradition that the listener will eventually become the caller in the next generation. What you have in call and response is a structure, a performance dynamic, that anticipates and requires that the listener provide a response that may expand, challenge, revise, clarify, transform, whatever, the previous utterance. And they themselves eventually become the new caller.
If you take that principle and apply it to literature, then you have this vision of the reader as the future caller, the co-creator of the meanings possible from the text. The finished novel is itself just a starting point. It’s incomplete. It is a work waiting to be completed by the reader’s engagement.
You have a number of literary techniques that can be used to make that participation possible within the work. But that’s what Morrison says in this mid-’80s essay: that her goal is to take this sensibility, this opportunity that attends the oral tradition, and to make it available in literature.
One of the more prominent authors to work with this tradition recently was Marlon James, who wrote Black Leopard Red Wolf. He is very committed to the idea that pulling from an oral tradition is part of a rejection of the idea of a coherent, stable reality. He said something like, “The African folktale is not your refuge from skepticism.” Is that sense of multiple realities and instability traditionally part of how this technique is understood?
Multiple possibilities, I would say. And once you say possibilities you imply freedoms, but also responsibilities.
To be in a community means to have the responsibility of expanding the growth and future survival of that community. Which requires creative commitment, creative competencies. And those competencies have to be instilled. They have to be taught, they have to be developed, and you have to make room to practice those competencies. The notion is that artistic expressions in their variety — not just the novel but also the poetry, the sermon, the dance, and so forth — must have this as a primary commitment: authorizing the creative competency of all participants. Not just the main performer.
A lot of the canonical African American literature that makes it onto school syllabi, and I’m thinking of books by Richard Wright especially here, exists in a space more of social realism. What does the conversation between these two literary projects look like?
Once you talk about Richard Wright, you bring us back to a moment before what I see as the healing of a bifurcation in the artistic tradition. For some obvious reasons, oral traditions were not given the kinds of respect, the kinds of valuation by the mainstream literary establishment [that the realist novel was]. So you see a break in the tradition between the writers who were very comfortable, were very confident of the value of those aesthetics — people like Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes — and people who on the other hand had a much different orientation. Richard Wright was the most renowned, the most credentialed, the most authoritative of those writers.
That bifurcation has now healed itself with the career and the achievements of Toni Morrison. As a matter of fact, I think that American readers would not accept, or would not have accepted as wholeheartedly, the kind of narrative choices that you see in Bennett’s work without Morrison’s career.
Is there anything else that you think is really essential to this tradition that you think people should know about?
I think Bennett is doing something really interesting in the way in which she builds her discursive authority. I hesitate to use some of the terms we scholars use, because I know everyday readers of literature don’t want to be bothered about it, but I think it’s helpful here!
What she uses is what I would call an ideal narrative audience. That becomes important for Black writers in particular, because of the history of discursive authority attaching itself most frequently to writers who are white and male. So Black women writers end up in an impoverished position in that economy and having to use different techniques to accrue authority. One of those techniques is the positioning within the text of an ideal narrative audience: an audience that accepts the writer’s intellectual judgment, the writer’s aesthetic value, the writer’s credibility.
It’s interesting, the idea of the writer creating or positioning this ideal narrative audience at the same that they’re asking the audience to help co-create the text. It’s like each participant is creating the next.
It might seem at first contradictory, but really it’s not. What the ideal narrative audience does is, it clears ideological space. It relocates both the reader and writer beyond the racialized positionings assigned by society. Because according to those positionings, a Black woman’s voice carries very little authority. But in the experience of Black women, there are spaces where a Black woman’s authority is paramount. So for the artist to bring those spaces within the text, is for the artist to clear a space and then map out a space for their own performance. And then they relocate the reader within that space.
I love the idea that Bennett is relocating us, taking us out of the world and into the one she’s built, and then inviting us to co-create her book with her.
And so now I am turning things over to you, book clubbers. If The Vanishing Half is a novel of call and response, then you are the ones responding. You’re the vanished half!
How do you feel about the idea of a collaborative reading of this book? How did you respond to the fairy tale structure? Do you see shades of Toni Morrison in Bennett’s work?
Talk among yourselves, either down below in our comments section or in your own communities, and meet us back here next Thursday to see me talk with Brit Bennett herself live on Zoom. Plus, sign up for the Vox Book Club newsletter to be sure you don’t miss a thing.


vox--2020-08-22--The UK used a formula to predict students’ scores for canceled exams. Guess who did well.

Every spring , British students take their A-level exams , which are used to determine admission into college .
But this year was different .
With the Covid-19 pandemic still raging , spring ’ s A-levels were canceled .
Instead , the government took an unorthodox — and controversial — approach to assessing admissions without those exam scores : It tried to use a mathematical rule to predict how the students would have done on their exams and then use those estimates as a stand-in for actual scores .
The approach the government took was fairly simple .
It wanted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have done if they had taken the exam .
It used two inputs : the student ’ s grades this year and the historical track record of the school the student was attending .
So a student who got excellent grades at a school where top students usually get good scores would be predicted to have achieved a good score .
A student who got excellent grades at a school where excellent grades historically haven ’ t translated to top-tier scores on the A-levels would instead be predicted to get a lower score @ @ @ @ @ @ @ more top scores than are awarded in any year when students actually get to take the exam .
But many individual students and teachers were still angry with scores that they felt were too low .
Even worse , the adjustment for how well a school was “ expected ” to perform ended up being strongly correlated with how rich those schools are .
Rich kids tend to do better on A-levels , so the prediction process awarded kids at rich schools higher grades .
The predictive process and its outcome set off @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it “ shockingly unfair.
” Legal action was threatened .
After a weekend of angry demonstrations where students , teachers , and parents chanted , “ Fuck the algorithm , ” Britain backed off and announced that it will give students whatever grade their teachers estimated they would get if it ’ s higher than the exam score estimates .
What ’ s playing out in Britain is a bunch of different things at once : a drama brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic exacerbated by bad administrative decision-making against the backdrop of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an illustration of a fascinating dilemma often discussed as “ AI bias ” or “ AI ethics ” — even though it has almost nothing to do with AI .
And it raises important questions about the kind of biases that get our attention and those that for whatever reason largely escape our scrutiny .
Imagine a world where rich children and poor children are just as likely to do drugs , but poor children are five times more likely to be arrested .
Every time someone is arrested , a prediction system @ @ @ @ @ @ @ — that is , whether someone like that person who is arrested for drugs will likely be arrested for drugs again within a year .
If they are likely to re-offend , they get a harsher sentence .
If they are unlikely to re-offend , they are released with probation .
Since rich children are less likely to be arrested , the system will correctly predict that they are less likely to be re-arrested .
It will declare them unlikely to re-offend and recommend a lighter sentence .
The poor children are much @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the system tags them as likely re-offenders and recommends a harsh sentence .
This is grossly unfair .
There is no underlying difference at all in the tendency to do drugs , but the system has disparities at one stage and then magnifies the disparities at the next stage by using them to make criminal judgments .
“ The algorithm shouldn ’ t be predicting re-jailing ; it should be predicting re-offending .
But the only proxy variable we have for offending is jailing , so it ends up double-counting anti-minority judges and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ data scientist who studies data privacy and algorithmic fairness , told me .
If the prediction system is an AI trained on a large dataset to predict criminal recidivism , this problem gets discussed as “ AI bias.
” But it ’ s easy to see that the AI is not actually a crucial component of the problem .
If the decision is made by a human judge , going off their own intuitions about recidivism from their years of criminal justice experience , it is just as unfair .
Some writers have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ decisions as an example of AI bias .
But it ’ s actually a stretch to call the UK ’ s Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation ’ s approach here — taking student grades and adjusting for the school ’ s past year ’ s performance — an “ artificial intelligence ” : it was a simple math formula for combining a few data points .
Rather , the larger category here is perhaps better called “ prediction bias ” — cases where , when predicting some variable , we are going @ @ @ @ @ @ @ disturbingly unequal .
Often they ’ ll be deeply influenced by factors like race , wealth , and national origin that anti-discrimination laws broadly prohibit taking into account and that it is deeply unfair to hold against people .
AIs are just one tool we use to make predictions , and while their failings are often particularly legible and maddening , they are not the only system that fails in this way .
It makes national news when a husband and wife with the same income and debt history apply for a credit @ @ @ @ @ @ @ limits thanks to an algorithm .
It probably won ’ t be noticed when the same thing happens but the decision was made by a local banker not relying on complex algorithms .
In criminal justice , in particular , algorithms trained on recidivism data make sentencing recommendations with racial disparities — for instance , unjustly calling to imprison Black men for longer jail time than white men .
But when not using algorithms , judges make these decisions off sentencing guidelines and personal intuition — and that produces racial disparities , too @ @ @ @ @ @ @ unjust than disparities in real outcomes ?
It ’ s important not to use unjust systems to determine access to opportunity .
If we do that , we end up punishing people for having been punished in the past , and we etch societal inequalities deeper in stone .
But it ’ s worth thinking about why a system that predicts poor children will do worse on exams generated so much more rage than the regular system that just administers exams — which , year after year , poor children do worse on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , there aren ’ t disparities just in predicted outcomes but in real outcomes too : Rich children generally score better on exams for many reasons , from better schools to better tutors to more time to study .
If the exam had actually happened , there would be widespread disparities between the scores of rich kids and poor kids .
This might anger some people , but it likely wouldn ’ t have led to the widespread fury that similar disparities in the predicted scores produced .
Somehow , we ’ re @ @ @ @ @ @ @ up in actual measured test data than when they show up in our predictions about that measured test data .
The cost to students ’ lives in each instance is the same .
The UK effectively admitted , with their test score adjustments , that many children in the UK attended schools where it was very implausible they would get good exam scores — so implausible that even the fact they got excellent grades throughout school wasn ’ t enough for the government to expect they ’ d learned everything they needed for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have backed down now and awarded them that top score anyway , but the underlying problems with the schools remain .
We should get serious about addressing disparities when they show up in real life , not just when they show up in predictions , or we ’ re pointing our outrage at the wrong place .
In the spring , we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone , and last week , we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors .
Well , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Today , we are extending that goal to 25,000 .
Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what is , quite possibly , the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes .
Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers , your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world .
Contribute today from as little as $ 3 @

Every spring, British students take their A-level exams, which are used to determine admission into college.
But this year was different. With the Covid-19 pandemic still raging, spring’s A-levels were canceled. Instead, the government took an unorthodox — and controversial — approach to assessing admissions without those exam scores: It tried to use a mathematical rule to predict how the students would have done on their exams and then use those estimates as a stand-in for actual scores.
The approach the government took was fairly simple. It wanted to guess how well a student would have done if they had taken the exam. It used two inputs: the student’s grades this year and the historical track record of the school the student was attending.
So a student who got excellent grades at a school where top students usually get good scores would be predicted to have achieved a good score. A student who got excellent grades at a school where excellent grades historically haven’t translated to top-tier scores on the A-levels would instead be predicted to get a lower score.
The overall result? There were more top scores than are awarded in any year when students actually get to take the exam.
But many individual students and teachers were still angry with scores that they felt were too low. Even worse, the adjustment for how well a school was “expected” to perform ended up being strongly correlated with how rich those schools are. Rich kids tend to do better on A-levels, so the prediction process awarded kids at rich schools higher grades.
The predictive process and its outcome set off alarm bells. One Guardian columnist called it “shockingly unfair.” Legal action was threatened. After a weekend of angry demonstrations where students, teachers, and parents chanted, “Fuck the algorithm,” Britain backed off and announced that it will give students whatever grade their teachers estimated they would get if it’s higher than the exam score estimates.
What’s playing out in Britain is a bunch of different things at once: a drama brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic exacerbated by bad administrative decision-making against the backdrop of class tensions. It’s also an illustration of a fascinating dilemma often discussed as “AI bias” or “AI ethics” — even though it has almost nothing to do with AI. And it raises important questions about the kind of biases that get our attention and those that for whatever reason largely escape our scrutiny.
Predicting an unfair world
Imagine a world where rich children and poor children are just as likely to do drugs, but poor children are five times more likely to be arrested. Every time someone is arrested, a prediction system tries to predict whether they will re-offend — that is, whether someone like that person who is arrested for drugs will likely be arrested for drugs again within a year. If they are likely to re-offend, they get a harsher sentence. If they are unlikely to re-offend, they are released with probation.
Since rich children are less likely to be arrested, the system will correctly predict that they are less likely to be re-arrested. It will declare them unlikely to re-offend and recommend a lighter sentence. The poor children are much more likely to be re-arrested, so the system tags them as likely re-offenders and recommends a harsh sentence.
This is grossly unfair. There is no underlying difference at all in the tendency to do drugs, but the system has disparities at one stage and then magnifies the disparities at the next stage by using them to make criminal judgments.
“The algorithm shouldn’t be predicting re-jailing; it should be predicting re-offending. But the only proxy variable we have for offending is jailing, so it ends up double-counting anti-minority judges and police,” Leor Fishman, a data scientist who studies data privacy and algorithmic fairness, told me.
If the prediction system is an AI trained on a large dataset to predict criminal recidivism, this problem gets discussed as “AI bias.” But it’s easy to see that the AI is not actually a crucial component of the problem. If the decision is made by a human judge, going off their own intuitions about recidivism from their years of criminal justice experience, it is just as unfair.
Some writers have pointed to the UK’s school decisions as an example of AI bias. But it’s actually a stretch to call the UK’s Office of Qualifications and Examinations Regulation’s approach here — taking student grades and adjusting for the school’s past year’s performance — an “artificial intelligence”: it was a simple math formula for combining a few data points.
Rather, the larger category here is perhaps better called “prediction bias” — cases where, when predicting some variable, we are going to end up with predictions that are disturbingly unequal. Often they’ll be deeply influenced by factors like race, wealth, and national origin that anti-discrimination laws broadly prohibit taking into account and that it is deeply unfair to hold against people.
AIs are just one tool we use to make predictions, and while their failings are often particularly legible and maddening, they are not the only system that fails in this way. It makes national news when a husband and wife with the same income and debt history apply for a credit card and get offered wildly different credit limits thanks to an algorithm. It probably won’t be noticed when the same thing happens but the decision was made by a local banker not relying on complex algorithms.
In criminal justice, in particular, algorithms trained on recidivism data make sentencing recommendations with racial disparities — for instance, unjustly calling to imprison Black men for longer jail time than white men. But when not using algorithms, judges make these decisions off sentencing guidelines and personal intuition — and that produces racial disparities, too.
Are disparities in predictions really more unjust than disparities in real outcomes?
It’s important not to use unjust systems to determine access to opportunity. If we do that, we end up punishing people for having been punished in the past, and we etch societal inequalities deeper in stone. But it’s worth thinking about why a system that predicts poor children will do worse on exams generated so much more rage than the regular system that just administers exams — which, year after year, poor children do worse on.
For something like school exam scores, there aren’t disparities just in predicted outcomes but in real outcomes too: Rich children generally score better on exams for many reasons, from better schools to better tutors to more time to study.
If the exam had actually happened, there would be widespread disparities between the scores of rich kids and poor kids. This might anger some people, but it likely wouldn’t have led to the widespread fury that similar disparities in the predicted scores produced. Somehow, we’re more comfortable with disparities when they show up in actual measured test data than when they show up in our predictions about that measured test data. The cost to students’ lives in each instance is the same.
The UK effectively admitted, with their test score adjustments, that many children in the UK attended schools where it was very implausible they would get good exam scores — so implausible that even the fact they got excellent grades throughout school wasn’t enough for the government to expect they’d learned everything they needed for a top score. The government may have backed down now and awarded them that top score anyway, but the underlying problems with the schools remain.
We should get serious about addressing disparities when they show up in real life, not just when they show up in predictions, or we’re pointing our outrage at the wrong place.
New goal: 25,000
In the spring, we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone, and last week, we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors. Well, you helped us blow past that. Today, we are extending that goal to 25,000. Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what is, quite possibly, the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes. Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers, your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world. Contribute today from as little as $3.


vox--2020-08-22--The Snyder Cut trailer shows off unseen Justice League footage and Darkseid

On Saturday , director Zack Snyder released a trailer for his infamous Snyder Cut of Justice League at DC Fandome , a virtual convention of sorts for all things DC Comics and Entertainment .
The film ’ s four-hour runtime will be broken up into four hour-long parts , Snyder said during a livestream from the Fandome event .
The trailer reconfirmed that the Snyder Cut will debut exclusively on HBO Max sometime in 2021 .
The trailer uses Leonard Cohen ’ s “ Hallelujah ” atop a montage of scenes not seen in the original Justice League .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ appearance of what appears to be Darkseid , the major comic book villain who was notably teased in the film .
We also see glimpses of cut moments , like the death of Cyborg ’ s dad , Wonder Woman receiving the signal from the Amazons , and Superman in his infamous black suit .
Back in May , Warner Bros. announced that it would release the Snyder Cut on HBO Max in 2021 — four or so years after the original Justice League movie hit theaters in November 2017 .
The fight @ @ @ @ @ @ @ long .
Snyder ’ s left the Justice League project just before the film ’ s original reshoots , and was replaced as director by Joss Whedon .
Snyder later said his exit was so that he could deal with the death of his daughter .
( There are reports that dispute this , and claim that Snyder was fired much earlier , however . )
Snyder ’ s departure from the film ultimately sparked a theory that the movie Snyder would have made if he ’ d seen it through to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ critical and box office disappointment the theatrical release of Justice League turned out to be .
Whispers of a possible Snyder Cut began soon after Justice League hit theaters .
The movie that we got , according to Snyder ’ s biggest fans , is a twisted , gnarled , ignorant work that was knee-capped by outside forces that suffocated Snyder ’ s true vision .
That fabled , unseen “ true ” version of Justice League was quickly dubbed the “ Snyder Cut , ” and Snyder ’ s loudest defenders started @ @ @ @ @ @ @ demand : “ Release the # SnyderCut.
” For years , the Snyder Cut existed only in rumors and teases .
But the hashtag campaign churned along and kept the faith .
It reached a peak in December 2019 , when Wonder Woman star Gal Gadot and ex-Batman Ben Affleck both tweeted support for the cut ’ s release — amplifying the volume surrounding it .
Snyder himself had also recently teased its release , posting alleged stills on the social media platform Vero .
At the same time , Warner Bros. insiders @ @ @ @ @ @ @ even existence .
The HBO Max announcement confirmed that it did exist , but didn ’ t specify what kind of shape it ’ s in .
Now , with the trailer revealing these very-existent cut scenes , the last major unknown is when in 2021 the Snyder Cut will premiere .

On Saturday, director Zack Snyder released a trailer for his infamous Snyder Cut of Justice League at DC Fandome, a virtual convention of sorts for all things DC Comics and Entertainment.
The film’s four-hour runtime will be broken up into four hour-long parts, Snyder said during a livestream from the Fandome event. The trailer reconfirmed that the Snyder Cut will debut on HBO Max sometime in 2021.
The trailer uses Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” atop a montage of scenes not seen in the original Justice League. The biggest of all was the first full appearance of what appears to be Darkseid, the major comic book villain who was notably teased in the film. We also see glimpses of cut moments, like the death of Cyborg’s dad, Wonder Woman receiving the signal from the Amazons, and Superman in his infamous black suit.
Back in May, Warner Bros. announced that it would release the Snyder Cut on HBO Max in 2021 — four or so years after the original Justice League movie hit theaters in November 2017. The fight to have it released spans just as long.
Snyder left the Justice League project just before the film’s originally planned reshoots, and was replaced as director by Joss Whedon. Snyder later said his exit was so that he could deal with the death of his daughter. (There are reports that dispute this, and claim that Snyder was fired much earlier, however.)
Snyder’s departure from the film sparked a theory that the movie Snyder would have made if he’d seen it through to the end would have been better than the critical and box office disappointment the theatrical release of Justice League turned out to be.
Whispers of a possible Snyder Cut began soon after Justice League hit theaters. The movie that we got, according to Snyder’s biggest fans, is a twisted, gnarled, ignorant work that was hindered by outside forces that extinguished Snyder’s true vision. That fabled, unseen “true” version of Justice League was quickly dubbed the “Snyder Cut,” and Snyder’s loudest defenders started a social media hashtag campaign with one demand: “Release the #SnyderCut.”
For years, the Snyder Cut existed only in rumors and teases. But the hashtag campaign churned along and kept the faith. It reached a peak in December 2019, when Wonder Woman star Gal Gadot and ex-Batman Ben Affleck both tweeted support for the cut’s release — amplifying the volume surrounding it. Snyder himself had also recently teased its release, posting stills on the social media platform Vero. At the same time, Warner Bros. insiders had downplayed both its possible release and even existence.
The HBO Max announcement confirmed that a Snyder Cut had somehow been assembled, but didn’t specify what form it would take. With the trailer revealing cut scenes, one of the last unknowns is when in 2021 Snyder’s version will premiere.
New goal: 25,000
In the spring, we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone, and last week, we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors. Well, you helped us blow past that. Today, we are extending that goal to 25,000. Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what is, quite possibly, the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes. Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers, your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world. Contribute today from as little as $3.


vox--2020-08-22--Melania Trump’s changes to the White House Rose Garden, explained

Melania Trump unveiled her overhaul of the White House Rose Garden Saturday , a month-long project that included digging up trees , replacing vibrant floral beds with white and pastel roses and laying down paved walkways .
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder , but the decisions still sowed confusion online about how the “ after ” photos showed an improvement from the “ before.
” Trump ’ s revamp was designed , in part , to “ fulfill the dynamic needs of the modern presidency , ” including making the space more amenable to TV cameras and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Donald Trump has been holding press conferences in the garden rather than inside the briefing room in recent weeks because of Covid-19 .
It ’ s expected to serve as the backdrop for Melania Trump ’ s Republican National Convention address on Tuesday , a controversial choice of venue that Democrats say is an illegal use of the White House grounds .
President John F. Kennedy , who commissioned the garden in 1961 , approached the project with a somewhat similar thought , asking horticulturalist and gardener Rachel Lambert Mellon to design something @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he planned for it to be used near daily .
Mellon wrote a first person account for The White House Historical Association on designing and constructing the garden .
Kennedy and the first lady had just returned from a trip abroad in the summer of 1961 to Europe and Australia , where the president “ had recognized the importance of gardens surrounding an official residence and their appeal to the sensibilities of all people , ” she wrote .
Crab apple trees were central to the design .
Melania tore them out .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ component to include in her design , for both aesthetic and practical reasons .
( Washington is sweltering in the summer . )
One tree , a member of the rose family , anchored the long perimeter lines of the garden : The trees we chose were Katherine crab apples .
Crab apples belong to the rose family and would blend well with the roses , perennials , annuals , and herbs that would grow beneath and around them .
Aware that the garden would be used almost every day of the year @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for it , I decided to divide the long beds into sections .
The design , with a crab apple as the center of each section , would repeat itself and run like a ribbon the length of both beds .
A large diamond-shaped outline of santolina would surround each crab-apple tree .
Each diamond would be set in a larger outline : a small clipped English boxwood hedge and , next to the lawn , a low growing hybrid boxwood called Greenpillow , developed by Henry Hohman in Kingsville , Maryland .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ reports the dozen trees will be replanted elsewhere on the White House grounds .
She did , however , introduce a three-foot-wide limestone walkway around the perimeter of the center lawn .
( The White House said less-noticeable changes include improvements to make the garden more accessible for people with disabilities . )
Melania also swapped out the colorful tulips and other bright perennials and annuals in Mellon ’ s design for white and pastel roses and sharp boxwood hedges .
Mellon said Kennedy had asked for the vibrant look .
“ The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ variety of other types could be mixed with the roses .
He had read the published garden notes of Thomas Jefferson and hoped for flowers used in Jefferson ’ s period , ” she wrote .
There are more important things than gardens The changes to the Rose Garden struck a nerve on Saturday , with outrage tweets dominating Twitter .
Why , many critics asked , did Melania need to change the design at all ?
And why take out trees ?
Why make the flowers less vibrant ?
Still , many @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be mad about in Washington these days than landscaping .
There ’ s the failed White House response to the pandemic that has left 200,000 Americans dead , according the the New York Times .
There ’ s the fact that Republicans in the Senate have no plan to pass a bill to help millions of workers who ’ ve been left unemployed because of Covid-19 .
Perhaps , though , amid a dark moment , one where we ’ re all looking for a little good news and a flicker of hope @ @ @ @ @ @ @ get through it , to see the White House take away a patch of brightness feels bigger than it otherwise would .

Melania Trump unveiled her overhaul of the White House Rose Garden Saturday, a month-long project that included digging up trees, replacing vibrant floral beds with white and pastel roses, and laying down paved walkways.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but the decisions still sowed confusion online about how the “after” photos showed an improvement from the “before.”
Before and after photographs of newly renovated White House Rose Garden:
courtesy #Getty and @marycjordan pic.twitter.com/w6bzoNHMjC — Michael Beschloss (@BeschlossDC) August 22, 2020
Trump’s revamp was designed, in part, to “fulfill the dynamic needs of the modern presidency,” including making the space more amenable to TV cameras and other tech needs of the press corps. President Trump has been holding press conferences in the garden rather than inside the briefing room in recent weeks because of Covid-19. It’s expected to serve as the backdrop for the first lady’s Republican National Convention address on Tuesday, a controversial choice of venue that Democrats say is an illegal use of the White House grounds.
President John F. Kennedy, who commissioned the garden in 1961, approached the project with a somewhat similar thought, asking horticulturalist and gardener Rachel Lambert Mellon to design something “useful and attractive,” as he planned for it to be used near daily.
Mellon wrote a first-person account for the White House Historical Association on designing and constructing the garden. Kennedy and the first lady had just returned from a trip abroad in the summer of 1961 to Europe and Australia, where the president “had recognized the importance of gardens surrounding an official residence and their appeal to the sensibilities of all people,” she wrote.
Crab apple trees were central to the design. Melania tore them out.
Mellon decided trees would be an important component to include in her design, for both aesthetic and practical reasons. (Washington is sweltering in the summer.)
One tree, a member of the rose family, anchored the long perimeter lines of the garden:
The trees we chose were Katherine crab apples. Crab apples belong to the rose family and would blend well with the roses, perennials, annuals, and herbs that would grow beneath and around them. Aware that the garden would be used almost every day of the year and that the President had high hopes for it, I decided to divide the long beds into sections. The design, with a crab apple as the center of each section, would repeat itself and run like a ribbon the length of both beds. A large diamond-shaped outline of santolina would surround each crab-apple tree. Each diamond would be set in a larger outline: a small clipped English boxwood hedge and, next to the lawn, a low growing hybrid boxwood called Greenpillow, developed by Henry Hohman in Kingsville, Maryland.
Melania Trump dug them up. ABC reports the dozen trees will be replanted elsewhere on the White House grounds.
She did, however, introduce a 3-foot-wide limestone walkway around the perimeter of the center lawn. (The White House said less noticeable changes include improvements to make the garden more accessible for people with disabilities.)
The Trumps paved paradise and put up a parking lot. https://t.co/XVLthzu37f — The Daily Edge (@TheDailyEdge) August 22, 2020
Trump also swapped out the colorful tulips and other bright perennials and annuals in Mellon’s design for white and pastel roses and sharp boxwood hedges. Mellon said Kennedy had asked for the vibrant look. “The President loved flowers and asked if a variety of other types could be mixed with the roses. He had read the published garden notes of Thomas Jefferson and hoped for flowers used in Jefferson’s period,” she wrote.
There are more important things than gardens
The changes to the Rose Garden struck a nerve on Saturday, with outrage tweets dominating Twitter. Why, many critics asked, did Melania need to change the design at all? And why take out trees? Why make the flowers less vibrant?
Still, many conceded that there are more things to be mad about in Washington these days than landscaping. There’s the failed White House response to the pandemic that has left more than 175,000 Americans dead. There’s the fact that Republicans in the Senate have no plan to pass a bill to help millions of workers who’ve been left unemployed because of Covid-19.
Perhaps, though, amid a dark moment, one where we’re all looking for a little good news and a flicker of hope that our leaders might just help us get through it, to see the White House take away a patch of brightness feels bigger than it otherwise would.
New goal: 25,000
In the spring, we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone, and last week, we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors. Well, you helped us blow past that. Today, we are extending that goal to 25,000. Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what is, quite possibly, the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes. Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers, your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world. Contribute today from as little as $3.