Mark Oppenheimer Wrote A Dumb Story. Twitter Slammed Him. This Is A Problem.

“In the week to come, I received one of those public Twitter and Facebook shamings that writers now expect as an occupational hazard. Hundreds or possibly thousands of people, including close friends and professional colleagues, wrote or shared critiques of my piece; wondered in public what had become of me; lamented my decline (which had the strangely complimentary effect of suggesting that I had some status to lose, which few writers ever really feel they do).”

One Step Closer To Mind Reading? Scientists Use EEGs To Detect What A Person Is Seeing

“A crime happens, and there is a witness. Instead of a sketch artist drawing a portrait of the suspect based on verbal descriptions, the police hook the witness up to EEG equipment. The witness is asked to picture the perpetrator, and from the EEG data, a face appears. … Is it mind reading? Sort of.” And Canadian researchers are just beginning to make it a reality.

RuPaul Said Trans Women Shouldn’t Be On ‘Drag Race’ – But They Should (And Have Been)

In comments to The Guardian that he later walked back, RuPaul said, “You can identify as a woman and say you’re transitioning, but it changes once you start changing your body. It takes on a different thing; it changes the whole concept of what we’re doing.” And he followed up on Twitter: “You can take performance-enhancing drugs and still be an athlete, just not in the Olympics.” Spencer Kornhaber offers a rebuttal.

A New Low? Casting Women In Tenor Roles Is Not Going To Fix Opera’s Gender Imbalance

Mezzo-soprano Jennifer Johnston responds to an article arguing that we might soon be seeing female tenors on the opera stage: “‘Looser gender divisions in casting’ may well be possible in Shakespearean theatre, where speaking rather than singing voices are involved, but there are no female professional opera singers, even those of us who sing in the contralto range, begging to sing tenor roles such as Rodolfo (in Puccini’s La Bohème) or Alfredo (in Verdi’s La Traviata) at pitch.” (Or even transposed, for that matter.)

After Backlash, Ballet Company Revamps Triple-Bill About ‘Woman’ Choreographed Only By Men

“The Montreal-based Grands Ballets Canadiens has changed the name and theme of its show Femmes, after women” – and not only women – “criticized the company for commissioning a ballet touted as a tribute to women but choreographed by three men. The Grands Ballets was also criticized for the way it promoted Femmes, which included online ads with a picture of three male dancers trapped in ice.”

Buyers Of Weinstein Company Back Out Of Deal After Discovering Millions More In Debt

“Three sources close to the investor group, led by former Obama administration official Maria Contreras-Sweet, said Tuesday that it found at least $50 million in undisclosed liabilities on the New York company’s books. The surprise debts, which would have significantly increased the purchase price of the assets, torpedoed negotiations.”