Weekend Reads 10/21/17

The Supreme Court Is Allergic To Math

Four of the eight justices who regularly speak during oral arguments1 voiced anxiety about using calculations to answer questions about bias and partisanship. Some said the math was unwieldy, complicated, and newfangled. One justice called it “baloney” and argued that the difficulty the public would have in understanding the test would ultimately erode the legitimacy of the court.

Judge shocked to learn NYPD’s evidence database has no backup

If the database servers that power NYPD's Property and Evidence Tracking System (PETS)—designed and installed by Capgemini under a $25.5 million contract between 2009 and 2012—were to fail, all data on stored evidence would simply cease to exist.

Me Too: So Now What?

Burke says the campaign is for survivors to share their experiences with each other. It was never the intention to have women relive terrifying experiences to show men how harrowing our world can be — this was only a side effect that called men in, to begin to understand what existing as a woman in this world looks and feels like.

Looks Like the Canaanites Got a Raw Deal

If we read this in another ancient book, we’d call it propaganda—a story to justify, not explain, hatred of the Canaanites. At least that’s what it looks like.

Israel’s later sworn enemies, the Canaanites, are set up as failures from the beginning, and no treatment—not even extermination—is too harsh for these people whose ancestor’s father saw his father drunk and naked.