Table of Contents: Summer 2016
Every One of Us: Equal
Letter to a Young Man
by Kevin Powell, special toUtne Reader
The Trans Revolution
Tracking the course of transgender rights and their liberating potential for us all
By Vanessa Baird, from New Internationalist
Repairing the Circle
What we can learn from the definitions of gender in Indigenous mythology
By Tomson Highway, from Masculindians
Inhumane Incarceration
No Place for Old Men
Texas prisons are filling up with the old and the ill—at enormous expense
by Dick J. Reavis
Solitary and Supermaxes
A closer look at the latest U.S. export to Brazil—the supermax prison system
By Baz Dreisinger, from Incarceration Nations
Exercising Compassion
Choosing Love
A mother explains how she has reacted to her son’s murder
By Scarlett Lewis, from Resurgence & Ecologist
On Course for Compassion
Mindfulness is not enough—we must develop our capacity for altruism
by Christine Toomy from Resurgence & Ecologist
What Keeps Us from Being Kinder to Ourselves?
Busting the five myths of self-compassion
by Kristin Neff, from Psychotherapy Networker
Emerging Ideas
Empowering Communities
Michael Sussman’s empowerment centers are helping communities band together and step up where social services fall short.
by Jessica Cohen, special toUtne Reader
Power Politics
Understanding the GOP’s civil war over off-the-grid energy
by Josiah Neely, from The American Conservative
The See Change
Huge advances in virtual reality are challenging the nature of experience
by Sam Scott, fromStanford
Gleanings
Gone Astray
Values fall by the wayside for a humanitarian aid worker in Sri Lanka
by Satya Doyle Byock, fromOregon Humanities
Living with the Dead
Inside the underground tombs that have become shelter for war-ravaged Syrian civilians
by Francesa Borri, from Syrian Dust
Beautiful Monsters
Ruminating on life with a prosthetic limb
by Emily Rapp, from From Curlers to Chainsaws
Mindful Living
Naked: Triptych
Recognizing the grace of vulnerability
by Shannon Huffman Polson, from Ruminate Magazine
Moving the Goalposts
What Cleve Backster’s research into plant intelligence reveals about the attunement of living things
by Derrick Jensen from The Myth of Human Supremacy
Psychedelics and Systems Change
Prohibitionists are correct: The legalization of psychoactive drugs and psychedelics would indeed mean the end of society as we know it … and that’s a good thing.
by Charles Eisenstein, fromMaps Bulletin
Mixed Media
Folk Artists vs. the State
Truckhenge, Bishop Castle, the Garden of Eden, and the anti-authoritarianism of outsider art
by Reecy Pontiff, from Reason
Plus: Music, film, and book reviews
Editor’s Note
by Christian Williams
Forward
by Eric Utne