Our weekly recap highlighting the best feature stories from around the internet.
John Campbell. Photo: 3 News
Bizarre changes a turn-off for TV viewers – by Myles Thomas, NZ Herald
“The tragedy is that while John Campbell is a great loss to TV3, he is an even greater loss to New Zealand. Thanks to bad decisions at TVNZ and TV3 we have lost the ability to watch our politicians squirm on prime time for longer than 15 seconds. Our leaders will be sleeping easier now - business leaders, local body leaders, religious leaders and so on. Not a good thing.”
Why It Pays to Be a Jerk – by Jerry Useem, The Atlantic
“Of all the issues that preoccupy the modern mind—Nature or nurture? Is there life in outer space? Why can’t America field a decent soccer team?—it’s hard to think of one that has attracted so much water-cooler philosophizing yet so little scientific inquiry. Does it pay to be nice? Or is there an advantage to being a jerk?”
The Art of Running from the Police – by Alice Goffman, Longreads
“One of the first things that such a man develops is a heightened awareness of police officers—what they look like, how they move, where and when they are likely to appear. He learns the models of their undercover cars, the ways they hold their bodies and the cut of their hair, the timing and location of their typical routes. His awareness of the police never seems to leave him; he sees them sitting in plain clothes at the mall food court with their children; he spots them in his rearview mirror coming up behind him on the highway, from ten cars and three lanes away. Sometimes he finds that his body anticipates their arrival with sweat and a quickened heartbeat before his mind consciously registers any sign of their appearance.”
Could I, a Common Idiot, Land a Plane? – by Hannah Scholte, Vice
“In movies, normal people are often put in situations where they have to land a plane. Maybe the pilot gets shot, has a heart attack, or is thrown overboard by terrorists who are eventually subdued, but not before they incapacitate everyone with aviation experience. But what if that all happens in real life? What happens next? Pilots are generally sturdy men and women, who are capable of handling a complex machine, and have an understanding of physics. I am none of those things, but I was interested to see if the movies were overstating my abilities to step up in a crisis.”
America Is Brutal And Meek Mill Is A Hero – by Will Stephenson, The Fader
“One night, Meek and I meet up at a seafood restaurant not far from his hotel, where we are joined at the last minute by Rick Ross, his longtime mentor and boss at Maybach Music Group. The place is dimly lit and pretentious, the kind of restaurant where waiters make a point to say “quite so” rather than “yes.” Flowing across the length of the floor is a glass-covered stream filled with live koi. We climb the stairs to a table on the second floor and run into T.I., who is dressed nondescriptly in a gray hoodie, and who throws open his arms to pull in Meek for a bear hug. It’s the sort of coincidence that might seem more startling were we not in a five-star restaurant in Beverly Hills.”
How Much Rape Is Too Much Rape on My Favorite Shows? – by Margaret Lyons, Vulture
“In society, I would argue that any rape is too much rape. On television, you're going to have a tough time finding "serious" dramas that include zero rape or things in the vile rape penumbra such as attempted rape, persistent threats of rape, other kinds of sexual assault, generally coercive sexual behavior that could theoretically fall outside a legal definition of rape but one might still categorize as "unwanted sexual contact," and so on. If you are bothered by sexual and sexualized violence on television to the point where you would like never to encounter it or mentions of it, your drama options are going to be sadly limited.”
Scandal in the Slaughterhouse – by Max Rashbrooke, Metro
“For years, these inspectors have kept consumers safe from meat that could make them seriously ill, and maintained New Zealand’s reputation. But times are changing. In some plants, the government and meat-processing companies have introduced a new inspection system: the companies, not the government, now employ the inspectors. The results — as revealed in an official report obtained exclusively by Metro, along with a whole lot more supporting evidence — are frightening.”
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