Class Issues
Stop calling the Baltimore protesters ‘thugs’
Apr 30, 2015 | Class Issues, Criminal Justice/Prison-Industrial Complex, General Advice, mic, Race and Racism
Published: Daily Dot (April 30, 2015) Language matters, and in light of how frequently the word “thug” is used as a substitute for outright racial slurs, it’s time for everyone to eliminate it from their vocabulary when discussing the Baltimore protests. It may not seem like a big deal that Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake sent out a tweet referring to the predominantly African American...
5 ways to fix America’s crippling student debt problem
Apr 28, 2015 | Class Issues, Economic Policy, Education, mic
Published: Daily Dot (April 28, 2015) Back in 2011, Occupy Wall Street swept America due in large part to its members’ savvy use of social media (one professor of journalism even referred to the movement as a “hashtag revolt”). While no catchy Twitter slogan has yet been created for the student loan reform movement, the Internet is warming up to the cause in a similar fashion. “The federal...
The Plight of the Basement Dweller
Apr 21, 2015 | Autobiographical, Class Issues, Gender and Sexism, Mental Illness, mic, Millennials
Published: Good Men Project (April 21, 2015) Basement dwellers. Trolls. We’re all familiar with this personality type: Matthew Rozsa offers an explanation as to why they exist in the first place. ___ “Cellar dwellers.” That was the expression that my friend’s husband used when referring to the trolls who posted misogynistic comments under her latest article. After laughing at the generation gap...
How Elizabeth Warren’s plan to expand Social Security could win the Internet
Apr 6, 2015 | Class Issues, Economic Policy, Internet Culture, mic
Published: Daily Dot (April 6, 2015) If Elizabeth Warren has her way on expanding Social Security, Americans might learn a valuable lesson—namely, that you can be a political game-changer without running for president. Perhaps more importantly, if supporters of Social Security expansion utilize the Internet to its fullest potential, they could fundamentally transform not only one of America’s...
Equality Before The Law – 2014
Dec 10, 2014 | Class Issues, Economic Policy, Mental Illness, mic
Published: Good Men Project (December 10, 2014) Matthew Rozsa explains the difference between the perception of equality and the reality of discrimination. ___ A friend recently observed that I’ve developed a reputation for anchoring my editorials with quotes, and as the year 2014 reaches its close, a particularly choice one by Anatole France comes to mind as capturing the zeitgeist of our...
5 ways to make sure you’re not that customer the Internet hates
Oct 21, 2014 | Class Issues, General Advice, Internet Culture, mic
Published: Daily Dot (October 21, 2014) If there’s one topic food service employees love to discuss, it’s the pros and cons of working in their industry. People seem to hold a different standard for how they treat waiters, fast food clerks, and the wide range of other men and women who serve their meals. This was most recently evidenced by the viral story of a high school football player who...
If “You Pay a Million in Taxes, You Get A Million Votes.” Yes, a U.S. Billionaire Just Said That.
Feb 14, 2014 | Class Issues, Conservativism, Elections, Elections - Other, Libertarianism, mic, Plutocracy, Political Ideologies
Published: mic (February 14, 2014) Billionaire Tom Perkins, who once compared the Occupy movement with Nazism, is again at the center of a storm of controversy. His comment? "The Tom Perkins system is: You don't get to vote unless you pay a dollar of taxes... You pay a million dollars in taxes, you get a million votes." There is something instructive in Perkins's ideas, albeit not in the way...
58 Republicans Supported Increasing the Minimum Wage When Bush Was President
Jan 28, 2014 | Class Issues, Economic Policy, mic, Political Parties, President Obama, Republicans
Published: mic (January 28, 2014) One of the centerpieces of President Obama's 2014 State of the Union address was his executive order that will raise the minimum wage for employees working with federal contractors to $10.10 an hour. The President is taking action on his own because Republicans are deeply set against Democrats' efforts to raise the federal minimum wage. In short, many in the GOP...
You’d Never Believe What Kind Of Economics MLK Believed In
Jan 20, 2014 | Class Issues, Economic Policy, History, mic, Race and Racism
Published: mic (January 20, 2014) If he was alive today, Martin Luther King, Jr. would not have been a Republican. In light of the frequency with which he is cited as a hero and role model, that point cannot be reiterated enough. We often hear about King's crusades to end legal segregation in the South and de facto segregation in the North, but far less attention is paid to the inextricable link...