PICKS are stories from many sources, selected by our editors or recommended by our readers because they are important, surprising, troubling, enlightening, inspiring, or amusing. They appear on our site and in our daily newsletter. Please send suggested articles, videos, podcasts, etc. to picks@whowhatwhy.org.
Here’s What You Should Know About Pegasus Spyware (Maria)
The author writes, “It isn’t the first case of electronic spying, but it’s a doozy. Security researchers found evidence of attempted or successful installation of Pegasus, software made by an Israeli cybersecurity company, on 37 phones of activists, journalists, and businesspeople who appear to have been the targets of potentially intense secret surveillance. The phones were on a list of more than 50,000 phone numbers for politicians, judges, lawyers, teachers, and others.”
Conspiracy Thinking Edges Into Olympic Peninsula Politics (Reader Steve)
From The Seattle Times: “Last year, right-wing conspiracy theories from QAnon were injected into the presidential race. This year conspiratorial thinking is creeping into small-town races around the country, including several on the northern Olympic Peninsula in Washington state. A QAnon apologist named Donnie Hall recruits and trains candidates through a group he co-founded called the Independent Advisory Association.”
Dozens Arrested in Los Angeles as Anti-Trans Protest Outside Spa Turns Violent (Dan)
The authors write, “Dozens of people have been arrested in Los Angeles following a chaotic and at times violent demonstration by anti-transgender protesters who targeted a Koreatown spa that has a trans-inclusive policy allowing trans women to use women’s facilities. Saturday marked the second weekend of violent protests this month in the streets around Wi Spa, a neighborhood business that has found itself at the heart of a right-wing media storm over an alleged incident in which a customer filmed herself complaining about a trans woman in the women’s area of the spa.”
Vienna Is the New Havana Syndrome Hotspot (Mili)
From The New Yorker: “Since Joe Biden took office, about two dozen U.S. intelligence officers, diplomats, and other government officials in Vienna have reported experiencing mysterious afflictions similar to the Havana Syndrome. U.S. officials say the number of possible new cases in the Austrian capital — long a nexus of U.S. and Russian espionage — is now greater than the number reported by officials in any city except for Havana itself, where the first cases were reported.”
Europe Wields the Stick to Boost Vaccination as Delta Variant Spreads (Dana)
From the Financial Times: “According to the thousands of protesters who took to the streets of Paris, Montpellier and other French towns [last] week, their country has become ‘a dictatorship’ and its president is reinstating ‘the apartheid.’ The reason for their ire: Emmanuel Macron’s decision to make Covid-19 vaccinations compulsory for all healthcare workers, before possibly imposing it on the rest of the population. French people now have to show that they are either vaccinated or that they recently tested negative for the virus to enter cafés, restaurants, cinemas, high-speed trains or shopping malls. In the Autumn coronavirus tests will no longer be free.”
Stress Can Turn Hair Gray — And It’s Reversible, Researchers Find (Mili)
The author writes, “Legend has it that Marie Antoinette’s hair turned gray overnight just before her beheading in 1791. Though the legend is inaccurate — hair that has already grown out of the follicle does not change color — a new study from researchers at Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons is the first to offer quantitative evidence linking psychological stress to graying hair in people. And while it may seem intuitive that stress can accelerate graying, the researchers were surprised to discover that hair color can be restored when stress is eliminated, a finding that contrasts with a recent study in mice that suggested that stressed-induced gray hairs are permanent.”
Athletes to Sleep on ‘Anti-Sex’ Cardboard Beds at Olympic Games Amid COVID (Dana)
The author writes, “Lustful Olympic athletes should think twice before making the bed rock in Tokyo. The world’s best sports competitors are set to spend their nights on cardboard beds — allegedly designed to collapse under the weight of fornicators to discourage sex amid COVID-19.”
