Latest news with #RayCharles
Glasgow Times
26-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Glasgow Times
Singer Joy Crookes announces Glasgow O2 Academy show
Joy Crookes, famous for songs like Feet Don't Fail Me Now and When You Were Mine, will be performing at the O2 Academy in the Southside. (Image: Image supplied) The gig will take place on Monday, November 10. READ NEXT: Indie band to perform in Glasgow after TRNSMT performance The singer, who has over two million monthly listeners on Spotify and has performed at the likes of Glastonbury and BBC Radio 1's Big Weekend, first rose to fame in 2013 after she uploaded a cover of Hit the Road Jack by Ray Charles to YouTube at the age of 15. The video gained the attention of over 600,000 viewers, one of which included her current manager. The upcoming Glasgow show follows the singer's latest release, Carmen. READ NEXT: Popular Irish band announce huge Glasgow show Tickets for the show go live at 10am on May 30. Pre-sale tickets will go live on May 29 at 10am. To purchase and/or sign up for pre-sale tickets, visit
Elle
16-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Elle
Beyoncé's Cowboy Carter Tour Is a Reminder That Black Art—and History—Can't Be Erased
When Beyoncé initially announced the Cowboy Carter and the Rodeo Chitlin' Circuit Tour on the very first day of Black History Month, I immediately began to wonder how she planned to meet this moment in history. So much had changed in the past year since she first released the album itself. Many of her fans, myself included, were still trying to process the truths that the 2024 presidential election affirmed about America, only to be met in the new year with an onslaught of executive orders, natural disasters, plane crashes, deportations, and tariffs. The news cycle was so bleak that Beyoncé's tour announcement, and the overdue Album of the Year Grammy win she nabbed a few days later, felt like the first bits of positivity all year. The Grammy wins for Cowboy Carter, especially, were so satisfying. Music's biggest award show was giving its highest honor, as well as the Best Country Album award, to a project that received so much backlash simply because Beyoncé dared to defy genres and infuse country music motifs into her sound. Critics and the country music community reacted as if a Black woman born and raised in Houston, Texas, had no claims to the culture or sound she grew up with. As if enslaved Africans didn't create the banjo and use washboards and bone castanets to try and emulate the music of their homelands with whatever was available. As if Ray Charles, Charley Pride, and Linda Martell never existed. It's almost too on-the-nose how much the rejection she received mirrors the rejection Black women are currently feeling in America. Both the country and its namesake genre have gone above and beyond to downplay, shut out, or outright erase the fundamental ways Black people contributed to their origin. We saw it in the way the Country Music Awards completely shut out the Cowboy Carter album. And we're seeing it now in the various attempts to gut all things dedicated to diversity, equity, and inclusion, and to censor our libraries and museums. So as I walked into So-Fi Stadium for Beyoncé's fifth and final L.A. tour date—a record-breaking run that spanned two weeks—I was excited to see how the greatest performer of our time would set the stage for these parallels to converge. Like the album itself, the Cowboy Carter Tour doesn't take long to let you know what it's trying to say. Opening with the LP's first two tracks, 'American Requiem' and 'Blackbiird,' it's like Queen Bee is holding her own sort of mass for our divided states. She comes straight out of the gate with messages like, 'Nothing really ends, for things to stay the same they have to change again,' 'Take these broken wings and learn to fly,' and 'You were only waiting for this moment to be free,' that address the elephant in the room and hold space for our collective emotions. This feeling is only heightened as she mixes in 'The Star-Spangled Banner' with her cover of 'Blackbird,' a Beatles song Paul McCartney wrote as a message of hope and encouragement to Black people during the Civil Rights Movement. As she sings alone on stage, a visual of the her sitting in front of a large tattered American flag with gaping holes appears on the massive panoramic LED screen behind her, then a bold message flashes into view as she holds the song's final note: 'Never ask permission for something that already belongs to you.' Before you can fully register what's happening, the beat to 'Freedom' drops, a song from her Lemonade album that also soundtracked Vice President Kamala Harris's presidential campaign videos and rallies. Its placement at the end of the medley of ballads shifts the entire energy in the stadium. Now here's Beyoncé marching down the catwalk of the stage, stomping out any and all notions of defeat with each step. Then, as the song ends, another image of Bey appears on the big screen; this time she's wearing nothing but the pageant-like sash she wears on the Cowboy Carter album cover, except this time the message reads: 'The Reclamation of America.' In this moment, it's crystal-clear we're not just experiencing a concert, we're in the midst of a revival. Before getting to the big dance numbers, stunts, props (a golden mechanical bull, flying car, and giant horseshoe awaited), and custom couture costume changes, Beyoncé was making a pointed effort to refuel our spirits and remind us of our power. Without missing a beat, she takes us right into a spirited performance of 'Ya Ya,' perhaps Cowboy Carter's most direct critique of the country at this moment in time. Visuals of the issues discussed in the song (pay inequality, wildfires, floods, freedom marches) flash across the screen to the beat, as well as poignant lyrics like, 'history can't be erased.' To close out this portion of the show, a series of video clips that feel like a short film you'd see projected in a museum begin to play on the screen as the stadium goes dark. Scenes from various facets of Black culture fill the screen: Black cowboys, country musicians, gospel choirs, jazz bands, dance parties, family gatherings; performance footage from greats like James Brown, Nina Simone, Chuck Berry, and Tina Turner; and clips of Beyoncé through the years. Then, the montage cuts to footage of talking heads on cable news (their faces blurred out) who criticized the singer's foray into country music. The video concludes with a visual of Beyoncé turning a stack of TVs off before reappearing on stage to perform 'America Has a Problem' and, the song whose music video launched #BoycottBeyoncé, 'Formation.' The mother of three is holding no punches at this point. She sees the parallels, and she's calling them out one by one. Political messages continue to be sprinkled throughout the entirety of the show, but it's really in the first 30 minutes (yes, all of this happened that quickly!) of the almost three-hour show that Beyoncé's state of the union message is clearest. Donning cowboy motifs and American flag-patterned fabrics throughout, she is the picture of a citizen loving and critiquing her home at the same time. She stands two-boots-on-the-ground down in the truth that both things are possible—and necessary—when you are from a country that was built by your ancestors, but not for them. If part of Renaissance's mission was to uplift us post-pandemic, I'd argue that this second act is here to embolden us as we embark on the difficult road ahead. The Cowboy Carter Tour reinforces the power we have to use our voice and our gifts to protect ourselves and our culture in ways that cannot be touched. I'm sure some critics will write off these moments in the show as symbolic activism, or note ways Beyoncé could be doing more (despite the millions of dollars in charity she donates annually). Some valid points might be made, and (not but) it cannot be denied that Black art is revolutionary. Much like Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl Halftime Show, it stands as a powerful reminder that no amount of effort can erase us from the fabric of American culture.
Washington Post
27-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Washington Post
Red carpet looks from a low-wattage White House correspondents' dinner
A White House correspondents' dinner that lacks the traditional comedy act doesn't necessarily translate to a more somber-than-usual evening. In 2019, the historian Ron Chernow gave a lecture and everyone had a pretty decent time; in 2003, Ray Charles sang instead. Hard to imagine that was anything less than a treat for guests. But at the 2025 White House correspondents' dinner, which took place against the backdrop of a Washington in turmoil, the vibes were in fact a little off. The red-carpet fashion statements — and the celebrity attendance — were similarly half-hearted. Jason Isaacs, fresh off a memorably stressed-out performance on HBO's 'The White Lotus,' looked less so on Saturday, showing off an all-black ensemble and some surprisingly fancy footwork ahead of the dinner. White House Correspondents' Association president Eugene Daniels and his husband, Nate Stephens, attended in white and black tuxes, respectively, while libertarian commentator Kennedy went a more colorful route, in a bubblegum-hued gown with a headpiece to match. Joanna Coles, chief creative and content officer for the Daily Beast, added some much-needed sparkle to the red carpet with her metallic blazer and shoes. Republican strategist and MSNBC frequenter Scott Jennings followed Coles's lead and went the shiny route with his three-piece tux. Former deputy White House press secretary Hogan Gidley's footwear choice was one of the few surprises of the early evening: Gidley wore what looked to be black ballet flats with a bow on each toe. Leo Braudy, a participant on the Washington edition of 'Love Is Blind,' wore the accessory he talked the most about on the show: his Rolex watch. In another daring footwear move, the original Wonder Woman came to the dinner and revealed she'd paired her gown with comfy slip-ons. Dean Norris, America's favorite TV cop, reached for a different kind of uniform on Saturday: the classic black and white tuxedo. Actress Alex Borstein's peekaboo gown in blue velvet stood out as one of the evening's more dramatic color choices.
Telegraph
19-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Tony Robinson: ‘People are supposed to say 'I have no regrets' – but I do'
How do famous names spend their precious downtime? In our weekly My Saturday column, celebrities reveal their weekend virtues and vices. This week: Tony Robinson 7am I'll write. I've been immersed in my new book, The House of Wolf. It's like steel shutters being slammed down, and I concentrate on what I'm doing, regardless of what's going on around me. I was an only child – my parents doted on me and were always talking to me, but I wasn't listening as I was always doing something else. My mum took me to an ear specialist because she thought I was deaf. 9am A slow-burn breakfast because I don't want to eat again until evening. Microwaved porridge, zero-fat yogurt, and blueberries and raspberries decorating it in a pyramid, so you can't see the boringness of the porridge underneath. 10am I drive to see my granddaughters, who are 16 and 13, play football. It's one of the most exciting new things in my life. Women's football has exploded exponentially. If you watch boys' football, from about age 13, you could cut the ambition with a knife. With girls, there's a whole different spirit about it. I shout praise, which might be embarrassing for them to receive from a 78-year-old man, but I would say, honestly, it's when I'm at my happiest. 12pm Down the M4 to watch Bristol City. They're an extraordinary football team. Every year for the past 10 years – and I think I'm only slightly exaggerating here – they have come between 11th and 13th in the Championship, so a really exciting year is when they come 11th and a really depressing year is when they come 13th. This is not what most football supporters see as excitement. At the moment, it looks like we may make the play-offs this year, and consequently I'm in seventh heaven. 5pm Back to west London, listening to the radio. There's been a real renaissance of Radio 4, the imagination of the programmes is great. It could be a show about Ray Charles's childhood, then 'Who's best, Aristotle or Plato?' followed by a documentary about tap dancers with disabilities. If I'm part-way through a programme and get home, I sit in the car until it finishes. 7pm I'll read scripts, like the ones for The Madame Blanc Mysteries [Thursdays at 9pm on Channel 5; or streaming on In fact I didn't even need to look at the script at first, I just thought, '[Co-creator] Sally Lindsay is lovely and it's filmed in Gozo,' but then I read it and it was fantastic. I had a cameo role that turned into a whole series this time. As an actor, the length of your employment is normally so short that there's always part of you thinking, 'How am I going to pay the phone bill?' 8pm My wife and I always have Saturday evenings together; I can't remember the last time we didn't. I've been cavalier in my relationships as far as time is concerned – I think people are supposed to say, 'I have no regrets,' but I do. I wish I'd had the integrity to spend more time with partners. Sometimes you've got nine things on the go and the one you can put at the bottom of the list is your partner, but it's so damaging. 8.30pm Around 60 paces from home, we have an Everyman cinema, which knocks every other cinema experience into a corner. I feel like a little boy living next to a sweet shop. The last thing we enjoyed was the Bob Dylan movie [ A Complete Unknown ]. I'd have thought that, as an actor, I would recognise great actors, but I've never particularly noticed Timothée Chalamet is the truth. He is stunning in it. 11.13pm I turn to my wife and say, 'I'm thinking about going to bed,' and when we look at our watches, it is always 13 minutes past 11. In the middle of the night, I get up, go to my study and write down notes or plot ideas – 'his sister kills him', 'buy choc ices', 'get a new razor'…
Yahoo
25-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Opinion: Two Altadena residents who became homeless in an instant
In a matter of days in early January, some 150,000 Angelenos became homeless as they were displaced by the Palisades and Eaton fires. These individuals' lives did not slowly unravel; they didn't lose a job and then run out of savings and receive an eviction notice. They fled their homes amid a natural disaster, and afterward many had no home to return to. Some have resources to recover financially. Others are now struggling like the estimated 75,000 Angelenos who were unhoused before the fires. Louis and Joyce, who spoke with me in January and early February, agreed to share their stories with The Times on the condition that their last names not be used. — Robert Karron I lived in Altadena, on Poppyfields Drive, between Santa Rosa and Santa Anita avenues. I helped my parents purchase our home in 1975. I was the third owner. By the time they passed on, I was in another house, but it never occurred to me to sell it, because my three younger siblings still lived there. Some cultures have extended family that extends the lineage. It's not like you get to a certain age and you just split. How was I able to purchase a home with my parents when I was only 26? I was on the road with Ray Charles at the time. I play baritone sax. I played with Ray Charles for 20 years, on the road for about five years. It was a great experience. Definitely elevated my ability as a player — you get advice from your fellow, older musicians. It was the first time I was away from home, so I learned a lot about life. It's an experience, coexisting with other people. I got a chance to see America, at a simple level. We didn't stay at fancy hotels. We interacted with people in the community. I spent time in Columbia, S.C. First time I went to New York City was with the band. Back then we'd go to major cities for two weeks. I stayed with a friend in Harlem. Has my early experience of touring, moving from place to place, made dealing with my present situation any easier? Definitely. I'm able to roll with it more. I can move, get what I need. Touring has allowed me to be not as freaked out as I might have been. Don't get me wrong: I'm still freaked out — but not to the point where you're saying: 'I give up.' It's like I've been preparing myself for this. Eventually, I moved back into the house on Poppyfields, with two of my brothers. We were there together, the three of us, on Jan. 7. Tuesday morning — it was windy. But I didn't think anything of it. I knew there was a fire in the Palisades, but that's far away. Then I heard about a fire in Eaton Canyon. But that's far, too, I thought. I got dressed, and I went to work. I had a gig that night at the Vibrato — a famous club near Beverly Glen. I'm there at 7:30, I'm playing, I'm on the bandstand. I think we did two sets. We're starting to finish things up and people start calling me on my phone. 'You OK?' I said, 'Yeah, I'm OK' — not knowing the gravity of what was going on. I — like a lot of my fellow Altadenians — am in shock, but I think there's a firm desire to want to be a part of the process of returning back to some sense of normalcy. Louis I get home around 10. The power's out. But they're still saying the fire is just in Eaton Canyon. But it's real smoky. Around 11, my brothers and my next door neighbor and I assess what's going on. It's pitch black, and the air quality is really bad. I saw what looked like a fire, in the corner of the sky, but I figured that was the Eaton Canyon fire. Sometimes you see fires in the mountains, and they illuminate — they look closer than they are. That's what I thought was happening. We decided to go to the IHOP. We thought, let's have a meal, chop it up a bit. We go home. I'm still wearing my dress clothes, from the previous performance, so I change into something a little more comfortable. The wind is still bad, with the velocity enough to be concerning — but not to the point where we thought the house was going to catch on fire. Until we decided to drive to the shelter. To be honest, I wanted to stay home and wait it out, but my brothers convinced me to wait it out there at the shelter, as a precautionary measure. So we get in the car. We go east on Poppyfields. I did see something then that looked like it was on fire. I thought, 'Man, that's crazy.' But it was still far away. Then we see an emergency vehicle. It's this big black car, with red and blue flashing lights. The guy in the car shouts — I'll never forget this — 'Get out.' We get to the shelter around 1:30 a.m., but we stay in the parking lot. We don't even register. We're just waiting it out. The wind is still howling. My younger brother says: 'Watch out, there's some embers.' I didn't take it seriously. As we now know, those embers were serious — they're the ones that caused a lot of the damage. At no point did I think I was going to lose my house. It was only for precautionary's sake that I went to that shelter. Five hours later, my brother wakes me up. I'd fallen asleep in the car. It's like 7 a.m. now. My brother told me that people were saying that our whole neighborhood was gone. But I still didn't really believe it. … This is a part of the timeline that I can't really remember. At some point I know we traveled to the neighborhood. Turning on Lake Avenue, it looked like a war zone. Fires to a lot of familiar businesses — businesses I've known for years. Downed power lines. We drove around them. Was the area closed? Yes, parts were. In some of the areas they prevented people from driving, sure. But everyone was trying to figure things out then, even the police. A lot of people returned to their homes when it was still possible and saw the damage. Mine? There was absolutely nothing left. Zero. Luckily, because I'd had the performance the night before, a lot of my instruments were still in the car and had been safe with us outside the shelter. I stood there looking at what used to be my house. It was just a plot of land. It was unreal. It was a nice-sized house, four bedrooms in the front — and there was a rear property, too. All gone. I thought: 'Wow. OK.' But you know something? I didn't really process it until I talked to my insurance agent. I called him, told him what had happened. That's when I started crying. That's when it hit me. It was the third most damaging event in my life, after the death of my parents. My mother had a stroke, and I was with her when she was incapacitated. I was on the phone with my father when he had a heart attack. We were sharing a laugh — we laughed a lot together. In the process of laughing at a joke he took his last cough, and that was it. So — that and the house, yes. Those have been the three toughest moments of my life. Fortunately, I have a good insurance company. It helped facilitate things, to make it work. Eventually, we'll rebuild. But first things first. We have to get into temporary housing. My brothers are staying with friends, and I'm staying with a different friend. I'm looking for a place — I have a meeting with a Realtor today. The process of looking for a house, with all the moving parts, is challenging, that's for sure. I'd like to stay in the area. I didn't know this at the time, but Altadena is a historically Black neighborhood. Kind of similar to Baldwin Hills. Didn't know this until people started writing about it. Over the years, it's become increasingly gentrified. So you see a lot of things you didn't see 15 years ago, like people taking their babies in strollers, on major streets. And jogging, at all hours. But I kind of liked that. That made it cool to me—the multiethnic flavor of Altadena. And there were all those great shops. POV (Pizza of Venice) was a very nice place. They had great pizza and specialty items like gumbo and fish tacos. Another place was Side Pie. Great New York-style pizza. Thin crust. Loved that place. I — like a lot of my fellow Altadenians — am in shock, but I think there's a firm desire to want to be a part of the process of returning back to some sense of normalcy. One of the election years, I worked at a precinct, and I got a chance to meet my neighbors. I really enjoyed it. They even let me turn in the tally of votes for that evening — put it in the box. I had a lot of pride, doing that, for my community. (This was a while ago — when Obama won his second term. Different times…) I'm looking forward to getting that community feeling back, let me tell you. I lived in Altadena. I'd been there over 30 years, and my husband's family has been in the area over 60 years. We had three houses. There was ours, my husband's parents' (the family home, which they left to their children) and his brother's. All burned to the ground. The family home actually caught fire two years ago, and they didn't have insurance, so they pooled their money to repair it. The family members that had been living in that house moved in with my brother-in-law, next door, and they were all waiting for the occupancy permit — which was going to come next month — when this fire struck. No insurance this time, either. On Jan. 7, we saw a fire in the distance. But it seemed so far away. We went to the grocery store, which was a bust, because the power was out. When we got home we heard that some neighbors had evacuated, so we put a bag together. But we didn't think we were in real trouble; we were sort of cavalier about it. The fires had never come down that low. The pattern is that they go uphill, toward Mt. Wilson. We thought: 'We'll be back soon, in a few days, tops.' I packed some clothes, a few pictures, and my father-in-law's flag (he served in the Korean War). But that was it. That night, my husband looked out the window, but he couldn't see anything. I went to sleep. At 10:30, though, he woke me up; he smelled smoke. We went outside. A few miles away, we saw this huge flame — 100 feet high, maybe 300 feet wide. It's yellow and white, and it's got these clouds swirling around that look like two dark eyes, and this other cloud that looks like an ugly mouth. It's like a bad cartoon. And now the wind has picked up. I thought: 'Oh my goodness. This thing is coming our way.' We start to move our cars down the hill, in case we need to drive out. We check on our 93-year-old neighbor. We pound on her door. There's no response — we just assume, and hope, she's already left. I'm coughing. My husband says: 'We need to get you out of here.' We drive our two cars down the hill, a few blocks away, but we still smell smoke. So we drive farther down the hill. No, not yet. Finally, we get to Exposition Boulevard and Vermont Avenue, where the air is clear. Only then do we get cell reception. A friend in Glendale tells us to come to his house. My brother-in-law tells us that the house next door to him is in flames. My husband sends me to Glendale, but he goes to help his brother fight the fire. We disagree about this — but that man's got a heart of gold. He drives back up the hill. First he stops at our house. He sees that our backyard is on fire. He goes to our front door. It's locked and chained — that means someone's inside. Our nephew has been staying with us. My husband pounds on the door for five minutes before our nephew finally wakes up. He'd been sound asleep. Together, they try to fight the fire in the backyard, but they find that there's no water in the hoses. Soon the house is engulfed. My husband said that embers the size of baseballs were flying around, and any little spark that touched anything sprung into a new fire, and the wind just gusted it away. He watched as the neighbor's house caught fire, too. Then it went to the next house. And then it was the whole block. My husband and my nephew got in his car and they drove out. It was dark, and it was smoky; they didn't know where they're going. But they got out. Meanwhile, it's 2 in the morning, and I'm in Glendale. My friend makes me grits. She says to go to sleep, but I don't know where my husband is. I don't know where my nephew is. I'm not sleeping. At 6 a.m. a friend from church sends me a screenshot from Facebook. I see that my 93-year-old neighbor is OK, but that her house has burned down. But where's my husband? Finally, my nephew calls. He says: 'It's all bad.' I say: 'What do you mean?' My husband gets on the phone. He says: 'It doesn't get any worse than this. It's all ashes. … Everything burned down.' I ask: 'What? What?' Then his phone dies. I didn't see him until that night. He picked me up, and we drove through the back roads, which they hadn't closed yet, to see our house. There were places in that house — a day later — that were still burning, still on fire. In the house next door I saw something that looked like a sparkler — like those sparkler fireworks that the kids play with, on the Fourth of July. I asked my husband, 'What's that?' He says, 'That there is a propane tank.' So we decided to leave. Driving away, I kept thinking: What happened? I mean, what happened!? And: Why didn't we get an alarm from the sheriff's office? When we were packing our bags, the night before, my husband had asked me if maybe we should leave, right then. I told him: 'Don't worry, honey, if we need to leave, the sheriff's office will let us know. There'll be those cars driving around, with their loudspeakers on the roof, shouting, 'Everybody evacuate. Everybody evacuate.' ' Well, we never saw uno firetruck or police car in the neighborhood. Zero, zilch, nada — except for the ones that were parked at the major intersections. Do we have insurance? In October, just four months ago, those crafty insurance people flew a drone over our house. They said: 'You have two months to get a new roof and to cut those 12 trees down.' We're talking tens of thousands of dollars to do this. I'm on leave from my job now, with a workplace acquired disability. We don't have those kinds of funds. I asked them for an extension. They said no. So, in December — just two months ago — they dropped us. I — like a lot of my fellow Altadenians — am in shock, but I think there's a firm desire to want to be a part of the process of returning back to some sense of normalcy. Louis My insurance agent says that they did this to a lot of people. Those insurance companies are probably partying now. They're going to be partying for a year. But — thank God — since we still owed money on the property, we did get 'lender-placed insurance.' It's not enough to rebuild — and it covers none of the items we've lost — but it's something. We've been at the shelter since that day. I can't believe it's been almost a month. At first, I asked the Red Cross for a housing voucher. But they told me to come here. On that first day, when I walked through, it looked like refugees to me. Like a junior Katrina. These are the wristbands they've given me that signify my journey through this system. The green one was just to get in. Orange — you're staying overnight. Orange and white — the dormitory you're in. Lilac — for when we went to the Westwood Disaster Recovery Center, to see if we could get more help. Blue and white — when they decided to consolidate everyone into one room, on Feb. 2. What a nightmare that one consolidated shelter room is. Dogs and cats in there — dogs barking all night long. Sick people coughing. It's challenging, to be in a room with 350 people, all sleeping on cots. And they clean with harsh chemicals, which I don't do well with. But, I have to say, the community has been so nice to us. Kudos to Pasadena. Most of the fire, of course, was in L.A. County. That's different from Pasadena. They're doing this of their own volition. That night, in fact, during the fires, the only fire truck we saw was a Pasadena fire truck, down on Woodbury Road. Later, we had a town hall meeting. An L.A. County firefighter was there. I asked: 'What happened? I mean, what happened!?' They said that they were stationed at Eaton Canyon — they had 30 trucks there. But then it got past them. … They said, in their 30 years on the job, they'd never seen anything like it. And they said: 'Ma'am, it wasn't a fire. It was a firestorm.' Robert Karron teaches English at Santa Monica College. Instagram: @robertkarron If it's in the news right now, the L.A. Times' Opinion section covers it. Sign up for our weekly opinion newsletter. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
