There are many ways to bomb a college commencement speech.  You can tell everyone you composed the talk while high on ayahuasca, like Chris Pan at Ohio State. You can deliver the entirety of your speech in the voices of your incredibly annoying cartoon characters, like Tom Kenny and Bill Fagerbakke at the University of […]

Editor’s note, May 31, 8 am ET: We’re bringing you some of our best-loved Your Mileage May Vary columns while Sigal Samuel is on parental leave. The one below originally published on October 6, 2024. This unconventional advice column offers you a unique framework for thinking through moral dilemmas. It’s based on value pluralism — […]

A few weeks ago, I was zoning out, scrolling through Instagram stories. Among the usual photos of dinner recipes, museum pictures, and selfies, I saw a post that stopped me cold in my tracks. Rapper Megan Thee Stallion said that her then-boyfriend, basketball player Klay Thompson, cheated on her.  The group chats activated immediately. My […]

The Democrats’ call for Americans to “protect democracy” from candidate Donald Trump fell flat in the 2024 presidential election. Over and over, President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris said that Trump and other Republicans represented an existential threat to the political system, calling out things like Project 2025 and the extreme anti-immigration aims […]

Almost a century ago, public health agencies began mandating that milk be pasteurized for human consumption. We’ve been fighting about it ever since. Many, many scientific studies have shown that the process of pasteurization — heating milk to 161° F for 15 seconds and then rapidly cooling it — significantly kills off harmful bacteria, viruses, […]