The New Yorker

A cartoon by Bruce Eric Kaplan. #NewYorkerCartoons Sign up for our humor newsletter to get immediate access to the cartoons in each week’s issue: https://lnkd.in/gmdwHJsE

Tracy Wolff, the author of the popular “Crave” series, is being sued for copyright infringement by Lynne Freeman, an unpublished author who shared an agent with Wolff. Freeman’s lawsuit rests on hundreds of similarities between her own manuscripts and notes and the “Crave” series. Our staff writer Katy Waldman discusses the case and why romantasy’s reliance on standardized tropes makes proving plot theft tricky. Read Waldman’s full report: https://lnkd.in/ecpsqEvq

A cartoon by Dan Misdea. #NewYorkerCartoons Sign up for our humor newsletter to get immediate access to the cartoons in each week’s issue: https://lnkd.in/g-hqYP9z

From “Midnight Nest,” by Arthur Sze. Read it in full: https://lnkd.in/g4dXY5AY

Overturning Roe was never the ultimate goal of the anti-abortion movement. Rather, as the law historian Mary Ziegler argues in her new book, it has “always been a fetal-personhood movement,” premised on the idea that the fetus is a “separate, unique human individual from the moment of fertilization,” and that because of this status “the Constitution gives (or at least should give) that individual rights.” The goal of recognizing fetal personhood, Ziegler writes, has, for more than half a century, been a “singular point of agreement in a fractious movement.” Ziegler uses the term “fetal personhood,” but “embryonic personhood” might be more accurate: for many in the anti-abortion movement, a fertilized egg, and certainly a cluster of four or eight or 16 cells, is already a human being, and therefore, within U.S. jurisdiction, is entitled to equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution. Margaret Talbot writes about the anti-abortion movement’s new objective: https://lnkd.in/ggtzsCXh

A cartoon by Amy Hwang. #NewYorkerCartoons Sign up for our humor newsletter to get immediate access to the cartoons in each week’s issue: https://lnkd.in/gyiRwdD9

To read the late political scientist James C. Scott “is to feel the fatalistic sense that civilization may have been botched from the beginning,” Nikil Saval writes. “But it is also to be hopeful.” https://lnkd.in/gE4yE4V6

Signs of a recession are already here. Hairdressers are reporting that their clients are ordering less expensive treatments. Young people are hosting home cafés, in lieu of patronizing coffee shops. Applications to law school are up precipitously, a classic indicator that previously freewheeling young people are seeking more secure employment. Even if investors are slightly more confident this week, after President Trump backed off most of his harshest tariff rates, the changes in people’s life-style habits serve as their own kind of affective barometer. “The vibes are off; Americans are panicky and confused,” Kyle Chayka writes. On social media, identifying “recession indicators” has become a meme. A Dunkin’ closing in downtown Boston, in the chain’s home state, is a recession indicator. As is Leslie Odom, Jr., reprising his original role in “Hamilton.” As are Coachella 2025 ticket buyers taking on debt with payment plans to afford their admission. Other recession indicators call back to the era of the 2008 financial crisis: a new album from the d.j. and producer Skrillex, a fixture of recession dance music; reinvigorated interest in “American Idol,” the peak form of 2000s kitsch. Most of these indicators are meant as jokes, but like many internet memes, they hint toward a collective psychological state that’s reaffirmed with each Like and Share. The plethora of seeming indicators hints at the fact that we still don’t know precisely what’s coming down the line. “Trump’s penchant for sudden policy reversals may mean that our 401(k)s will be fine, but what about the damage to our country’s reputation? The uncertainty being felt is not only economic,” Chayka writes. “The recession is in our national character, too.” Read his latest column: https://lnkd.in/gudqty4r

Today’s Daily Cartoon, by Adam Douglas Thompson. #NewYorkerCartoons https://lnkd.in/gjEg-UqV

From poppy-seed to pumpernickle, a definitive ranking of bagels. Disagree amongst yourselves in the comments. https://lnkd.in/gcB4ECWc