December 23, 2016

Over the last year and change, conservative lawmakers in Congress and across state governments and legislatures have systematically cut down funding to Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers to record lows. Per a Guttmacher Policy Review article, that may just have been the beginning. / guttmacher.org

Internal Facebook training documents obtained by German paper Süeddeutsche Zeitung, of the Panama Papers, show how third-party contractors are instructed to break down people into various groups that could be considered “protected categories” (PC) or “not protected categories” (NPC). Really all this means is you can talk shit about Irish teenagers all you want and no one at Facebook will ever try to stop you. / Süeddeutsche Zeitung

Ryan Zinke, Montana’s sole representative and Trump’s pick to head the Dept. of the Interior, has roots in Teddy Roosevelt-style Republican conservationism, but while trying to attain higher office, sold out to the oil, gas, and coal industries. / hcn.org

Related: Did Trump pick Zinke just because Donald Jr. wants to kill things on federal land? / Deadspin

Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings release their final music video created before Jones’s death, a lovely claymation rendering of Charles Brown’s “Please Come Home for Christmas.” / YouTube

“The last several weeks have seen the worst wave in years of murders of social leaders, indigenous leaders, land-rights activists, and human rights defenders. The renewed violence casts doubt on whether space for non-violent political activity will truly exist in Colombia’s ‘post-conflict’ period.” By one count, 71 “social leaders” in Colombia have been killed this year, with another 17 attempts. / Washington Office on Latin America

“Moving into the next year, lifting up quality journalism―specifically quality journalism written by women and members of other marginalized groups―will be all the more vital.” Round out your year in reading with this excellent collection of 29 standout pieces of writing and reporting by some of our best women writers published this year. / Huffington Post

Inside the deadly 2012 private prison riot in Natchez, Miss—scant medical supplies, rank food, and a nearly entirely English-speaking staff for a correspondingly Spanish-speaking population. / The Intercept

Related: A DoJ Inspector General report on the Natchez facility published this month found “deeply concern[ing]… significant deficiencies in correctional and health services and Spanish-speaking staffing” at the CoreCivic (until recently CCA) prison. / oig.justice.gov, districtsentinel.com

“Collectively, the team of Mattis, Flynn, and Kelly could not be more symbolic of the ongoing process of subversion of civilian control of the military.” Retired Lt. Col. William Astore on Trump’s generals fetish. / TomDispatch

IP mapping services used by thousands of companies and law enforcement agencies more than occasionally make mistakes. For instance, when one labeled a random point in Kansas as the exact center of the continental US, it turned life for the family that lived in the farm located on that spot into “a digital hell.” / Fusion

“Why are engineers in California getting to decide what constitutes harassment for people all around the world?” Women aren’t welcome on the internet because the internet was created by men, for men. / Pacific Standard

“Finding a product solution for abuse was like looking for a moonshot, but NASA wouldn’t have put a person on the moon if between ’59 and ’69 there were seven heads of NASA.” Inside Twitter’s decade-long failure to meaningfully address its harassment issue. / BuzzFeed

Uber’s rise to empire was built on the backs of hundreds of thousands of laborers who do not make anywhere near what the company claims and are forced into algorithmically-driven work patterns, resulting in having to pee in jars in their cars. / melmagazine.com, BuzzFeed, chicagobusiness.com, uber.com, The Ringer

Related: Airbnb’s similar skyrocket came at the cost of zero safety regulations or enforcement, and a damn near Heruclean effort on the company’s part to deflect responsibility—even in the face of a user’s death. / Medium

“It’s roughly comparable to un-hygenic surgery.” Talkspace—one of many “therapy apps” connecting lower-income, remote, or busy patients with licensed therapists—is a workplace driven by profits, not treatment, according to interviews with current and former therapists. / The Verge

Maybe you’ve heard that Roger Federer is alive, well, and practicing—not just a subject for inspection—asking himself questions like, “Can I still do it? As a player, can my body still do it? Can my mind still do it?” / The New York Times, The New Yorker