Linkgarten Volume III – Marriage, Meat & Space Jam

Aesthetics

• A brief on the “real vs. fake” women dichotomy and the hatred against Kate Moss OR a few million wrongs between the fashion elite and the plebeian public still don’t make a right.

Athletics

• Despite the fact the Mason-OSU game was kind of like watching Space Jam knowing that Bill Murray wasn’t going to save the day (despite the fact that he does, for the record, love Mason), the Patriots managed to win the Men’s National Cricket Championship…Which makes a lot more sense, in a cosmic way.

Culture

• While the claim that “millennials” by in large are reappropriating the institution and mindfully opting-in to marriage as opposed to conspicuously opting-out seems to ring true to me anecdotally, I think this might be a myopic interpretation of the whole goings on. Marriage breeds a lot of ambivalence, as does wedding culture, debt, more relaxed norms about sex, children and the transient nature of our current economy. That, and you know my feelings about liberation rhetoric.

Consumption

• NYT infograph on per capita consumption of meat in the US over the last century.
• The rise in quinoa’s popularity in developed countries now means fewer and fewer people in Bolivia, the main producer, are able to afford it. Its sort of a mixed bag economically and socially, as the exports have also led to a gradually higher standard of living in quinoa producing areas and fewer people migrating to neighboring countries to find work. If you’re buying quinoa, get in contact with the brand you purchase from and ask what they’re doing to make the crop more affordable and appealing for Bolivians. Its something that I plan on doing before I pick up another bag.

Etc. / Important

• The Sociology of Science for Non-Sociologist.
• Also: Sociologist enjoy muckraking, even (perhaps especially) if the muck happens to besmirch their own professional organization.

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