Mayhem @ Twitter, Asian-American College Apps, 2022 Favs

Ravi and Rikki begin with a theatrically absurd week of chaos @ Twitter, discussing a number of high-profile sagas all centering on 2022’s most exhausting person, Elon Musk.

Rikki reacts to a recent piece in the New York Times adding yet more color to the experience of Asian-American college applicants discriminated against by colleges and universities, following up on Ravi’s recent Regressives episode. 

The hosts give their personal favorites of all the content they consumed this year, providing your holiday break with books, articles, TV shows, movies, and podcasts.

Finally, Ravi and Rikki react to a series of voicemails on last week’s segment on assisted suicide.

Mayhem @ Twitter [2:43] 

Why We Went To Twitter (The Free Press, 12/15)
Angry, irrational, erratic: This is Elon Musk’s Twitter (Recode, 12/16)
All Elon Musk All the Time (National Review, 12/19)
Musk blamed a Twitter account for an alleged stalker. Police see no link. (Washington Post, 12/18)
The Twitter Files Part 7 (Twitter/Michael Shellenberger, 12/19)
FBI pressured Twitter, sent trove of docs hours before Post broke Hunter laptop story (New York Post, 12/19)

Asian-American College Apps [16:00]

How Liberals Lost Their Way on Affirmative Action (Persuasion, 11/28)
The Regressives | A Funeral for AA (Lost Debate, 10/30)
Applying to College, and Trying to Appear ‘Less Asian’ (NYT, 12/2)
Democrats Must Deliver for Asian-American Voters or Risk Losing More of Them (Gotham Gazette, 12/9)
As a more diverse Harvard braces for a Supreme Court ruling on affirmative action, what comes next? (WBUR, 12/9)
Study on Harvard finds 43 percent of white students are legacy, athletes, related to donors or staff (NBC News, 9/30/2019)

Rikki’s List [25:40]

“Kindly Inquisitors” by Jonathan Rauch (1993)
“This Is Your Brain on Birth Control” by Sarah Hill (2019)
Everything Is Broken (Alana Newhouse, Tablet Magazine, 1/14/2021)
Why The Past 10 Years of American Life Have Been Uniquely Stupid (Jonathan Haidt, The Atlantic, 4/11)
And Just Like That… (2021)
The Holiday (2006)
Honestly with Bari Weiss (The Free Press) 

Ravi’s List

“On The Move: A Life” by Oliver Sacks (2015)
“Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow” by Gabrielle Zevin (2022)
How an Ivy League School Turned Against a Student (Rachel Aviv, The New Yorker, 3/28)
Narcos: Mexico (2018-21)
The Menu (2022)
60 Songs That Explain the ‘90s (The Ringer)

Voicemails [33:25]