Link Log Roundup for May 13, 2020
In this edition: PTSD at Facebook, bankrupt hospitals, conservation efforts, incel communities and autism, a surreal Senate hearing, black men in masks, losing health insurance, ignoring CDC guidance, disability tech, urban air quality, rent strikes, Oregon counties, failed leadership, protests at the Oregon coast, dogs finding whale scat, vacating non-unanimous verdicts, suburban flight, investing in black neighborhoods, testing and stigma, evolutionary psychology, defending life, and the psychology of consumption.
Your daily look at links I’ve saved to my Link Log (RSS) over the course of each day but didn’t necessarily address or highlight here on the blog. These are the links I logged yesterday, and not necessarily links to things published yesterday.
Facebook will pay $52 million in settlement with moderators who developed PTSD on the job
Each moderator will receive a minimum of $1,000 and will be eligible for additional compensation if they are diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder or related conditions. The settlement covers 11,250 moderators, and lawyers in the case believe that as many as half of them may be eligible for extra pay related to mental health issues associated with their time working for Facebook, including depression and addiction.
Bankrupt hospitals sue feds for Paycheck Protection Program loans
Why it matters: Allowing bankrupt hospitals access to PPP loans could keep their doors open, and could force the federal government to reverse its stance and allow other bankrupt firms to get PPP loans.
Covid-19 Hits Conservation Efforts
The problem is global. Across North America, Africa, and elsewhere, conservation efforts that keep delicate ecosystems in check are struggling as the Covid-19 pandemic keeps many people confined to their homes. There are no tourists, who help fund a range of projects. Volunteers and employees aren’t able to plant trees or remove invasive species, while wildlife rehabilitation centers struggle to keep their doors open. Some programs require large crews that can’t practice social distancing on the job, while many others, like the Platte River restoration, rely on the money brought in from tourism or activity fees to function.
Radical online communities and their toxic allure for autistic men | Spectrum | Autism Research News
The lead investigator of the latter study, Noah Sasson, was dismayed to learn from Spectrum that his research was being used to support what he calls a “misogynistic and sophomoric” ideology, and says his work was misinterpreted. The study applies to both men and women and is not about women’s feelings toward autistic men, says Sasson, a psychologist at the University of Texas at Dallas. In a follow-up study, he and his colleagues found that neurotypical people’s perceptions of an autistic adult depend heavily on whether they know that the adult is autistic, are familiar with autism and have met the autistic person in question. “What this means is that negative judgments about autistic adults are in no way absolute and uniform,” Sasson says. The Incel wiki makes no mention of this more nuanced report.
6 takeaways from the surreal Senate hearing on coronavirus - STAT
The hearing didn’t provide any highlight-reel moments, but it did lend insight into the health officials’ broader views on whether it’s safe to reopen, the ongoing development of coronavirus drugs and vaccines, the accuracy of the U.S. death toll, and the pandemic’s broader impact on health care. Here are the six biggest takeaways.
As a Black man, I think twice about wearing a face mask in public - STAT
Long before Covid-19 existed, I’ve had to plan my wardrobe carefully. Standing 6 feet, 3 inches tall, I’ve become something of an expert at reading microexpressions of discomfort as I walk down a street and see the white person walking toward me trying to decide whether to cross to the other side, especially in the evening.
Eligibility for ACA Health Coverage Following Job Loss
We estimate that, as of May 2nd, 2020, nearly 27 million people could potentially lose ESI and become uninsured following job loss (Figure 1). This total includes people who lost their own ESI and those who lost dependent coverage when a family member lost a job and ESI. Additionally, some people who otherwise would lose ESI are able to retain job-based coverage by switching to a plan offered to a family member: we estimate that 19 million people switch to coverage offered by the employer of a working spouse or parent. A very small number of people who lose ESI (1.6 million) also had another source of coverage at the same time (such as Medicare) and retain that other coverage. These coverage loss estimates are based on our assumptions about who likely filed for UI as of May 2nd, 2020 and the availability of other ESI options in their family (see Methods for more detail).
AP Exclusive: CDC guidance more restrictive than White House
The Associated Press obtained a 63-page document that is more detailed than other, previously reported segments of the shelved guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It shows how the thinking of the CDC infection control experts differs from those in the White House managing the pandemic response.
Let COVID-19 expand awareness of disability tech
Many accommodations demanded under COVID-19 were implemented within weeks, including the ability to work from home, to have flexible schedules, to get what we need without excessive and demeaning documentation, to share and celebrate creative adaptation, to work with the knowledge that all schedules can change. These are all things that disabled and chronically ill people have wanted for a very long time. I hope that when we’ve flattened the curve and saved as many people as possible, we don’t return to a world in which disabled people are ignored (especially when COVID-19 will probably produce more of us).
Urban air quality improves as coronavirus empties U.S. highways
Using satellites, airplanes and ground monitors, NOAA researchers say they have observed a 25% to 30% reduction in smog-causing nitrogen oxide emissions along with big cuts in volatile organic compounds and greenhouse gases in both the heavily populated U.S. Northeast and in Colorado’s urban cluster.
Cancel or strike: Pressure mounts to help U.S. renters amid corona
Covering the housing for vulnerable tenants would cost about $100 billion, according to some estimates, and housing advocates are now rallying around a federal proposal to make that amount available in upcoming emergency funding.
These Oregon counties want to reopen Friday. Their COVID-19 cases are surging
Clatsop, Jefferson, Polk and Umatilla counties each have seen their known COVID-19 infections more than double in the last two weeks, even as statewide restrictions aimed at slowing the spread of the virus remained in place.
The Four Men Responsible For America’s COVID-19 Test Disaster
The government leaders who failed to safeguard the nation are CDC Director Redfield; FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn; Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar; and of course, President Trump. Together, these men had the power to change the direction of this pandemic, to lessen its impact on the economy, and constrain the death toll from COVID-19. Each failed, in a series of errors and mismanagement that grew into a singular catastrophe — or as Jared Kushner described it on Fox & Friends, “a great success story.”
Demonstrators Plan “ReOpen the Coast” Event in Seaside This Weekend
“They have zero reason to be in our community,” Jimmy Griffin, of Seaside Brewing Co., told The Daily Astorian. “We don’t need these people coming into our community lecturing us on our First and Second Amendment rights. They’re not contributing one positive thing to what we’re doing here. They’re just here hoping to cause chaos like they do everywhere else.”
Multiple researchers who were interviewed described the ultimate objective to correlate whale health and behavior changes — for example, by measuring stress hormone levels — with separate datasets of underwater noise levels and boat densities on the surface. The fortunes of the critically-endangered Southern Resident orcas have high priority, but transient orcas, gray whales, humpback whales and other baleen whales are of interest too.
Oregon DOJ Concedes Hundreds Of Non-unanimous Verdicts Should Be Tossed
While the case before the court was out of Louisiana, Oregon was the last state in the country to allow non-unanimous convictions in felony, non-murder cases. Before that ruling, juries could convict defendants by 10-2 and 11-1 verdicts, a practice that was based in discrimination and racism because it made it easier to convict defendants of color and silence perspectives of jurors of color.
City Observatory - City Beat: No evidence that people are fleeing to the suburbs
New York’s population has grown over the last decade, with very slight declines in the past couple of years. The big factor now limiting New York’s growth (and that of many other cities) is not a decline in the perceived value of urban living, but the limited supply and high cost of urban housing in the face of growing demand. The problem is a shortage of cities, not a disenchantment with urban living.
This Is How Hard It Is to Invest in Black Neighborhoods
Community development for places that have been ravaged by racism calls for multiple investments in people and places at a scale that can truly make an impact. Policies similar to those that created wealth for whites after the Great Depression could be applied again if not for Supreme Court decisions barring racial preferences. For the devalued price on property, there are black developers like Rice who can buy a city block with family and friend investors, but those individuals need financing structures to redress the systemic and historic exclusion of wealth creation in this country.
’No One Wants to Be Tested’: How Social Stigma Hurts Containment
Governments around the world have released unprecedented amounts of information about actual and potential Covid-19 cases -- ages, neighborhoods, travel patterns -- all in the name of public health. But it’s also emboldened a new kind of vigilantism and threatened personal privacy, and experts worry harassment and prejudice could undermine the goals of all the disclosure in the first place: containing community spread.
This Philosopher Is Challenging All of Evolutionary Psychology
The evolutionary psychologists I engage with are not silly people. They are thoughtful and philosophical about these matters. However, the attractiveness of evolutionary theory coupled with peoples’ ideological biases forces them to not be as careful as they might be otherwise. I think that the consequences for our world when we misappropriate evolutionary accounts are really serious. People are saying that people of color have smaller brains, which is not true, or that women aren’t as great as men, which is not true... I think we have a special responsibility, when we say evolution made us that way, to recognize that people will read “innate” or “hardwired” as synonymous with evolution. We should be especially careful to not be making claims like these, which can have consequences.
Who Are the Real Defenders of Life?
Because the politics of the occult is occult (veiled, hidden, secret, impervious to any and all critical inquiry), it is not practiced in good faith. It can’t be. If it were, it wouldn’t be occult. It would, therefore, be useless. Writer Julia Ioffe said recently in seriousness: “I still can’t get my head around the pivot from ‘every life matters, even that of the unborn’ [to] ‘some people are going to die.’” She can’t get her head around the pivot, because there is none. A pivot would make sense. The occult never does.
Why is this interesting? - The Psychology of Consumption Edition
Indeed, as the lines of your Whole Foods extend much longer into the shopping aisles, these areas will become de-facto places to position higher-margin or impulse items. More people lingering in a position, spaced apart, means more time to observe the cornucopia of products surrounding you. Much as we are used to the last minute things (tabloids, gum), placed adjacent to the checkout, this mindset will extend down the aisle. This is obviously an opportunity for revenue, but also could be an incredible nudge for health and wellness. But I’m pretty sure we can all guess which one will win out.