Civil Reads: May 25 — Good Reads for the Long Weekend

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Reading time: 4 minutes.

A holiday weekend is a great time to get caught up on good things to read. Here are some suggestions from our staff and readers:

Screenshot: Wired

  • — You probably know by now that National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden was working for an intelligence contractor in Hawaii when he decided to turn over classified documents to news reporters. This story traces his activism to a “crypto party” in the back of the Kakaako furniture boutique, Fishcake. Who’d a thought? — Wired
  • — Just in time for Memorial Day comes this interesting piece about the guy who carves the stars in the memorial wall for fallen CIA operatives, a once-obscure tribute made popular in movies and TV shows in recent years. — Washington Post
  • — A small beluga whale made his voice heard to the handlers who wanted to train him to look for torpedoes and underwater mines. A really great read that chronicles some of the history of the Navy’s marine mammal training program. — Smithsonian
  • — In a similar vein to calls for reparations from some Native Hawaiians, this is a sweeping and thought-provoking essay on why America must provide reparations to African-Americans as the only way for the country to heal itself and “represent America’s maturation out of the childhood myth of its innocence into a wisdom worthy of its founders.” — The Atlantic
  • — City University of New York journalism professor Jeff Jarvis takes us on a trip back through time to the early days of his newspaper career when he was a rewrite man in a newsroom that was still on typewriters. We travel with him back to the present, helped by a great narrative and very cool photos, as technology advances. — Medium
  • — We weren’t too shocked to learn that people — especially women — are less stressed when they’re at work than at home. The study measured the level of the stress hormone cortisol in people throughout the day. It turns out women are happier at work while men are happier at home. Go figure. — Washington Post
  • — There was much attention this week on the U.S. decision to charge Chinese nationals with hacking American corporate computers in order to steal business secrets. This piece traces what’s known about the three men, members of a Chinese military unit, to explain what’s behind the industrial espionage. — The New York Times
  • — An inside look at one of America’s most prominent political families and the forces that have driven the Bush brothers to choose the political spotlight. — Politico
  • — A yearlong investigation reveals how courts throughout the country are charging defendants more and more fees and court costs. Those who can’t afford even nominal fees often wind up in jail. — National Public Radio
  • — A recent European court decision protects a person’s “right to be forgotten.” Google disagrees. — The New Republic

And this is your last chance to catch up on Civil Beat’s stories of the week on our current website. Don’t forget we’re switching to our new design on Sunday, so here are a few stories to keep you occupied while we’re powering up our new back-end system.

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