Listen To This Story

Climate Change is Coming for Your Bananas (Maria) 

The author writes, “Affordable and nutritious, bananas have long been a supermarket staple for consumers around the globe. But that could soon change, as climate change is contributing to a global shortage of the world’s most consumed fruit…Bananas are the fourth most important food crop globally, with more than 400 million people relying on the fruit for 15% to 27% of their daily calories, and they’re not the only crop at risk.”

Oklahoma Will Test Teachers From New York and California To Guard Against ‘Radical Leftist Ideology’ (Reader Steve) 

From AP News: “Oklahoma will require applicants for teacher jobs coming from California and New York to pass an exam that the Republican-dominated state’s top education official says is designed to safeguard against ‘radical leftist ideology,’ but which opponents decry as a ‘MAGA loyalty test.’ Ryan Walters, Oklahoma’s public schools superintendent, said Monday that any teacher coming from the two blue states will be required to pass an assessment exam administered by PragerU, an Oklahoma-based conservative nonprofit, before getting a state certification.”

Israeli Army Unit Tasked With Linking Gaza Journalists to Hamas (Sean) 

The author writes, “On Aug. 10, the Israeli army killed six journalists in a strike it openly admitted was aimed at Al Jazeera reporter Anas Al-Sharif. Two months earlier, in July, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) had warned it feared for Al-Sharif’s life, saying he was ‘targeted by an Israeli military smear campaign, which he believes is a precursor to his assassination.’ After Al-Sharif posted a viral video in July of himself in tears while covering Gaza’s hunger crisis, the Israeli army’s Arabic-language spokesperson, Avichay Adraee, published three different videos attacking him, accusing him of ‘propaganda’ and of participating in ‘Hamas’ false starvation campaign.’ Al-Sharif identified a link between Israel’s media war and the military one.”

Conservatives’ Long War on Free Thought (Dana)

From In These Times: “There’s a deeper reason for this animosity towards universities that can be seen in the Right’s longstanding wariness of ​’excessive’ intellectualism and the potential of critical thinking — a suspicion that extends across the spectrum of conservatism, and has flowered into unique hostility on today’s US far Right…Leading conservative thinkers of the 18th and 19th centuries warned that educating ordinary people would make them less content with their lot and more likely to demand political power, transforming passive subjects into active citizens.” 

No Company Spends To Guard the Boss Like Meta (Reader Jim) 

The author writes, “Major tech companies are spending more than ever to ensure the personal security of their CEOs, an increase driven partly by attacks on corporate executives and the higher political profile of the bosses during the Trump administration. Alphabet, Amazon, Nvidia, and Palantir all increased their protection budgets by more than 10% last year, a Financial Times analysis shows. But Meta easily leads the field, allocating more than $27 million in 2024 to protect Mark Zuckerberg and his family.”

A Strand of Hair Just Changed What We Know About the Inka Empire (Laryn)

From 404 Media: “For thousands of years, Andean peoples have woven intricate patterns, known as khipus, that encode information into clusters of knots and multi-colored threads. Made from cotton, wool, and often human hair, khipus are an idiosyncratic form of writing used for a range of purposes like arithmetic, census-keeping, calendrical cycles, and more…The discovery confirms that khipus were made by people from different classes and backgrounds, and that Inka women probably made them as well.”