Every Monday on Global Comment, we share the slow, thoughtful, considerate words that our brains – and souls – need but that it’s easy to miss in our busy world. We distil the best of the web and recommend just three links every week that you absolutely must see.
No fluff, no fuss, just three exceptional reads.
Here are this week’s recommendations:
Unknown Costs: Forty-three million Americans need substance addiction treatment, but only a tiny fraction receive it. We know why. (Wilson M. Sims / Longreads)
Personal absolution might be an oasis in the desert, but in the bleak landscape of addiction treatment, it can be helpful to have a reason to walk. I want to serve and save lives to justify my own, and I’m aware of how wounded this thinking is, but I was born into privilege and then spent most of my life expecting others to serve or save me. Before my story is over I need there to be more evidence of my social contributions than my crimes of action and inaction, and by my count, I won’t get there by going one call at a time. Not while 93% of the people who need what I got aren’t getting it.
So I take call after call and I disregard the sensationally infrequent successes. Instead, I inventory obstacles and categorize them based on cost: What barrier prevents the most substance use sufferers from being admitted to treatment?
Another Christian influencer arrested for child abuse: Why conservatives keep falling for these cons (Amanda Marcotte / Salon)
It’s not true, of course, but the need to believe that they’re one more spanking away from Christian utopia clearly drives a lot of people to consume this Hallmark-style propaganda by the bucketfuls. Worse, this notion that harsh “discipline” is the key to living this saccharine image is used to justify all manner of hurtful policies. Anti-choice activists advocate for abortion bans by suggesting that forced childbirth will turn women from hussies to glowing mothers, gratefully cuddling babies they didn’t know they needed. The current mania for book-banning and bullying LGBTQ students in schools is fueled by the notion that there are “innocent” Christian families that need “protection.” And, of course, this recasting of child abuse as mere “discipline” makes it incredibly difficult for authorities to intercede when children are in danger.
1.9% (Victoria Derbyshire)
@vicderbyshire #russellbrand #police #women Rape Crisis: 0808 500 2222 Russell Brand denies the criminal allegations against him #fyp ♬ original sound – VicDerbyshire
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Image: Gabriel Izgi