Lori Falce Columns category, Page 7
Lori Falce: The problem with the word woke
I hate the word woke. Let’s be clear. This is not a conservative hatred of an agenda. It is not a liberal hatred of the right’s reaction to that perceived agenda. It is, however, a loathing that exists on a number of levels. Allow me to explain. First — and...
Lori Falce: National divorce? Marjorie Taylor Greene has it all wrong
One of my favorite movies as a kid was “The Parent Trap.” Not the Lindsay Lohan one — although that was good, too. No, I was a fan of the old-school Hayley Mills version that came out when my mom was a kid. I found it doubly entertaining because my...
Lori Falce: Next train disaster is inevitable
The terrifying thing about East Palestine’s train derailment and the spill of chemicals into land and water and air isn’t just the twisted wreckage or the flames or the absolute pillar of black smoke that rose from it all. It isn’t the social media videos speculating about dangerous residue in...
Lori Falce: Why can’t Hollywood find real fat people?
I love Brendan Fraser. Throughout the 1990s, I loved him in good movies like “School Ties” and “Gods and Monsters.” I loved him in bad movies like “Encino Man” and “Dudley Do-Right.” I flat out adored him in “The Mummy.” And so I was thrilled with the resurgence of his...
Lori Falce: Politics, tribalism and cheering for the Philadelphia Eagles
This is one of those times when it’s really hard to practice what I preach. Politically, I am all about middle ground and doing what’s in the common good. When it comes to sports, I am the radical fringe that doesn’t just want to win. I want to wage war...
Lori Falce: Bad actions hurt good police and all communities
Tyre Nichols was 29 years old the day he was stopped by police officers in Memphis. Body cam videos released by the police department showed an agonizingly long process that led to his death. He was dragged from his vehicle. He was beaten and Tased and pepper-sprayed. He broke free...
Lori Falce: The impossible mission of classified documents
Perhaps I have been misled by a lifetime of movies and television. I have always been under the impression that top secret documents were kind of hard to access. Maybe I didn’t think you needed to drop down from a harness like Tom Cruise in “Mission Impossible” to access a...
Lori Falce: We all need a little help with our bootstraps
My bootstraps have gotten a solid workout over my life. That’s impressive if only because I rarely wear boots. As a rule, I wear flat black dress shoes with bottoms far too slick for Pennsylvania snow or rain. They have frequently led more to spectacular falls than impressive rises. But...
Lori Falce: Why are college girls victims of violence?
College girls and homicide shouldn’t go together the way that they do. Maybe we should blame serial killer Ted Bundy for the way murderers and coeds have become so linked in the American consciousness. Maybe we should blame slasher flicks that make sorority houses and dorm rooms the location of...
Lori Falce: Whataboutism and the pain competition
Whataboutism got a lot of attention during the past few elections. It’s the tendency for someone to deflect the question about one thing with a counter about something else. Ask a politician about a sex scandal, get a return query about why his opponent did another shady thing — whether...
Lori Falce: What do you want in 2023?
Many of our New Year traditions are not, despite our well wishes, about happiness. Well, not on its own. We want to be happy, of course. But, when we are cracking open a new calendar, we are shrugging off a different truism. On Jan. 1, we embrace the idea that...
Lori Falce: The beautiful perfection of an imperfect Christmas
I don’t love Christmas the way I did when I was kid. As a child, everything about the season was a holly, jolly marathon of music and lights. It stretched out for weeks and weeks in a candy-striped scavenger hunt of glee. It started the Saturday after Thanksgiving when we...
Lori Falce: Are we ready for killer robots?
I am OK with robots. Hey, I’m a product of my time. I grew up with R2-D2 and C3PO. My siblings and I were just sharing pictures of Johnny 5 from “Short Circuit” in our chat group this week. I married a sci-fi nerd who adored the various metal monsters...
Lori Falce: Do we really understand gaslighting?
Gaslighting is Merriam-Webster’s word of the year. When I heard this, it set my teeth on edge. I certainly understood the reasoning. The dictionary’s website saw a 1,740% increase in people checking out the definition in 2022 alone, but its use has exploded over the past four years. “Gaslighting” is...
Lori Falce: I want to vote for Jimmy Stewart
When you ask people what they think we need in government, you can get a wide variety of answers. We need more conservatives. We need more liberals. More progressives. More hardliners. More Christians. More business people. More people with experience. Fewer millionaires. More “real” people. There is no shortage of...
Lori Falce: This holiday season, let us all be heroes against hate
This column runs on Fridays, which means that on the day after Thanksgiving, it generally runs toward traditions and holidays. I have used it to talk about Black Friday shopping with my husband, my love of turning leftovers into soup and the Christmas cards I want to mail but never...
Lori Falce: Veterans need support more than sales and free lunch
On Veterans Day, the attention on former service members is obvious. There are offers for free coffee, free sandwiches, free meals and more. I know someone who preps in advance, making sure his identification is ready and loosens his belt, prepared to dine for free all day — and take...
Lori Falce: Should you pay for verification?
On Tuesday, I became a little bit cooler in my son’s eyes. Not much, and I’m not under any delusion it will last. But, for a brief, shining moment, my teenager was moderately impressed by me. “Elon Musk wants to charge people for blue check marks on Twitter?” he mused...
Lori Falce: Facts, opinions and political ads
The one thing I struggle with most in my job is not the task of making deadlines — although the editor who waits with well-concealed resignation for my weekend editorials every Friday might disagree. It is helping people — whether readers or writers — navigate the tightrope between what is...
Lori Falce: Is it fair to criticize a candidate for a health problem?
Ableism refers to attitudes or actions that make assumptions about or throw roadblocks in front of people dealing with a handicap or medical issue. Sometimes it is intentional. Sometimes it is uncaring. Sometimes it is simply unaware. But ableism also is frequently correctable — just like the medical issues in...
Lori Falce: Alex Jones damages the First Amendment
Without a doubt, the best and simultaneously hardest thing about the U.S. Constitution is the First Amendment. Specifically, that tug-of-war is represented in the words, “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech.” It is a masterpiece of protection. It enshrines the absolute right to raise your...
Lori Falce: Will Herschel Walker face same backlash as Tim Murphy?
Oh, the scandal. A man with a documented stance on abortion is outed. He had an affair. There was a pregnancy. He asks her to get an abortion. This could be the story of Herschel Walker, the football star turned would-be Republican politician running for U.S. Senate in Georgia. A...
Lori Falce: Iranian woman’s death latest in list of human rights abuses
I get lists and rankings in my inbox every day. They tell me what states or cities or schools or businesses are the best and worst according to a myriad of factors. Most money. Least education. Highest unemployment. Lowest cost of living. Best quality of life. Worst opportunity for advancement....
Lori Falce: Should parents lead curriculum?
If there is one thing the pandemic taught me, it is that I am not a teacher. Having my son home for the tail end of sixth grade and all of seventh made me appreciate teachers. I thought I appreciated them before. I was wrong. I mean, yes, I was...
Lori Falce: The unreachable cure for cancer
There might be no better way to get people on your side than to say you want to cure cancer. Cancer is an ugly, predatory beast that stalks its victims without regard for age or class or worthiness. It attacks the good and the evil dispassionately. In 2019, the most...
