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Hi 👋 

We’re back again with another reading list of some of the best longform journalism across the internet ✨

Last week was extra hectic for me 😮‍💨 I had very little time to squeeze in longform reading—so much so that for the first time since launching, I contemplated sending out a painfully abridged list. 😔

But we push through 💪💪💪

I had to cram and stay up very late these last few days (even had to give up some of my book-reading hours) but we made it!! And I honestly couldn’t be prouder of this week’s list.

Here’s what you can expect:

• A compelling first-person account of the Israeli society’s sentiments about Gaza—from someone who used to serve in its armed forces.

• This massive political crime story in Guatemala, a country torn between deeply entrenched conservative powers and a determined (but increasingly corrupt) left-leaning force.

• A look at what the porn industry could become from before the rise of OnlyFans.

• An investigation into one of the maritime industry’s biggest disasters.

I also want to take this opportunity to address the Thursday emails. They’re part of—or sort of a prelude to—a new series that I’ve been cooking up for the past few months: Weekly themed reading lists 🎉🎉🎉

Basically, longform recommendations that fall under a specific topic (ghosts, for instance, or the business of news).

The goal is to also make it a weekly thing, but because that’s going to be so much extra work, I probably will have to build up to that over a couple of months. Let’s try for every other week at first. The Thursday emails will also let me run ads in a hopefully more satisfying way for you guys—with a thoughtfully curated reading list corresponding to the sponsor.

If you have any feedback on this, I’d love to hear them!

You can reply to this email or fill out this super quick survey 🙏 It’ll only take a few minutes at most. I promise! And it’ll be a huge help.

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Happy reading and see you again next Monday!

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Story in Spotlight

I’ll be honest: I almost dropped this story early on.

But that’s not to say anything about the writer’s skill—I was mostly just annoyed because I thought it would be another of those stories about the burgeoning (but in my opinion misdirected) field of green tech or whatever.

I was about to hate-drop a banger.

That said, I wasn’t totally wrong about this story. The writer (who, btw, was previously a professor of bioengineering; take that however you will) dedicates a lot of space to fontier climate technologies that are designed to help mitigate or reverse planetary warming. In fact, the reason I wanted to drop the story is because it was initially positioning tech as something that would save us from our own environmentally destructive tendencies.

Thankfully, the story quickly concedes that really, the most effective solution to the climate crisis is simple (albeit exceptionally difficult): Stop burning fossil fuels. It also recognizes that this is probably going to be impossible, especially given how humans (and by extension, our societies) work.

Seen in this light, these new climate technologies—reflecting the sun’s rays back at it, using chemical-coated structures to suck carbon dioxide from the atmosphere—serve as the next-best thing. Or sort of a contingency plan, if all else fails.

I’m paraphrasing here, but the story puts it really well: Like chemotherapy for the planet. Cancer patients don’t want to be pumped full of toxic chemicals. But faced with the prospect of endlessly multiplying malignant cells taking over their bodies, they mostly don’t have any other choice. That’s what these green technologies represent for our planet.

In the spirit of providing constructive criticism, I’ll say that I wish there was more discussion about economy and how our consumerism drives the climate crisis. The writer touched on it extremely briefly (maybe one sentence?) but I think that’s a very important facet of the discussion. Sadly, I don’t see any of the big Media outfits give it space and earnest reportage.

Very long, but also very important. For those of you in the U.S., please make climate solution a part of what you look for in a candidate. I’d say allot 1 hour for this so you can really digest its details. 

The Longform List

✡️ As a Former IDF Soldier and Historian of Genocide, I was Deeply Disturbed by My Recent Visit to Israel | The Guardian, Free

This was a difficult read, so I can only imagine how much more difficult it was for the writer to pull it off—especially given the tension between his history of service in the IDF and a professional background of research about genocides and state-sponsored violence. As a third-party observer to the entire thing (though I admit I’m very opinionated about it), this essay was very insightful for me, and forced me to look at the issue with a more level head.

Like the writer, though, I’m still choosing to stand on the side of human rights and human lives.

Reasonably long, but very informative. If that’s somethijng that drives you, then this will be an easy read for you. I took 30 ish minutes.

🐧 The Burning Man of Birding: Inside Iceland’s Puffin Festival | Audubon, Free

Oh I loved this story. It’s seemingly about the conflict between human culture—traditions, expansionist impulses—and the fate of a species. It traces a centuries-old Icelandic custom of hunting and eating puffins (which, btw, are just the cutest widdle things >3<) which is now running up against the very real and very concerning phenomenon of species collapse. Thankfully, local communities are more mindful than most (at least that’s what the story portrays) and they seem to be open to changing for the betterment of the planet.

Read through to the end. The writer takes a really nice turn of meaning in the last few paragraphs. It’s helped me reframe how I look at the nexus between human culture and the climate crisis.

Not too long and can get the tiniest bit slow in some spots, but I still found it thoroughly enjoyable. Maybe 15 minutes tops.

🕵 A Murder Foretold | The New York Times, $

Unlike the previous story on this list, this one is incredibly long. But still, I never felt like plot points or sections were unnecessary. I think that speaks to two things: the sheer complexity and intricacy of the subject (and of Guatemalan politics, by extension) and the enviable talent of David Grann to keep you hooked.

A bit unrelated: Grann wrote Killers of the Flower Moon, which is one of the best non-fiction journalistic books I’ve read. Ever. It threw me into one of the most violent reading slumps I’ve been in.

Very, very long. Will take you easily more than 1 hour. Maybe even 2 hours if you take breaks in between.

🪨 The Green Economy Is Hungry for Copper—and People Are Stealing, Fighting, and Dying to Feed It | WIRED, Free

This story raises an important point that I think is largely underapppreciated: Shifting away from fossil fuels is ideal, but it also comes with its own requirements that themselves will prove destructive to fulfill. Copper—which is crucial to electrify the planet—is the perfect example of this. As WIRED illustrates, people kill and are killed over copper.

Slightly related: It hit me while reading this, but recently, WIRED has been doing a lot of longform stories that rely a bit too heavily on desk research and interviews. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but I think this story could have benefited from more groundwork.

Pretty long and has a lot of technical stuff. But the writer did a great job of breaking it down into manageable bits. Maybe 40 minutes.

🔫 Armed and Underground: Inside the Turbulent, Secret World of an American Militia | ProPublica, Free

Even if I live outside the U.S., I know that this is a massive thing to be aware of going into the elections later this year.

As ProPublica reports, there are these military-types, hiding in plain sight, who are apparently ready to turn things violent if they don’t get their way in November. These groups organize very brazenly, using mainstream social media and messaging platforms—not even the highly secure ones that criminal rings prefer.

With all the surveillance it applies, does the U.S. just not see these people? Or is it choosing to ignore them?

Not too long. Maybe 20 minutes at most.

💦 Meet The Tech Entrepreneurs Trying To Take Back The Porn Industry | Buzzfeed News, Free

RIP Buzzfeed News 🙏 When they were active, they produced some of the best longform journalism—like this one. It might not be a hard-hitting investigation (though Buzzfeed News did many of that, too) but, if I remember correctly, this is one of the first, bravest and most honest looks at the porn industry.

Speaking of which: It’s interesting to see where the industry was nearly 10 years ago. And it’s depressing to see that the most interesting and potentially revolutionary innovations (at the time) ultimately amounted to nothing. Instead, the industry has mostly not moved from where it was, only slightly empowering individual performers through platforms like OnlyFans, which, if you’ve been following this news letter, you know is rife with many massive problems.

Pretty long, but its overall structure is simple enough to follow and the writer does a good job of walking you through the story. Maybe 20 minutes if you can stay focused.

🙈 She Faked Her Chimp’s Death. Then Things Went Apeshit | Rolling Stone, Free

First thing’s first: My most heartfelt congratulations to the editor who successfully took this headline to press. Incredible work. I hope you have many more years in the industry ahead of you.

Especially because “apeshit” is the best word to use here. I understand that there are a lot of crazy animal people in the world but I think this is a different level altogether. Read the story to get a full picture of what happened to the chimp, but I’m convinced that several degrees of animal abuse were breached here, and yet the person at the center of it all doesn’t seem to be in danger of any real legal consequence?

Long, but the story is truly apeshit. It’s easily going to hook you and keep you interested. I took 25 minutes, distractions included.

🐢 To Catch a Turtle Thief: Blowing the Lid Off an International Smuggling Operation | The Walrus, Free

I will always find animal trafficking stories to be deeply interesting, but also profoundly sad and infuriating. This one uncovers a network of traffickers running from the U.S. and Canada all the way to China, highlighting not just the twisted cultural and financial impulses that power the trade, but also how week and unwilling enforcement seems to be.

That said, I do feel a bit let down by this. I wish it was more investigative than it is informative, and paid more attention to the demand side of the trafficking scheme.

Not too long. And even shorter still if you like to rage-read. Maybe 15 minutes if you can stay focused.

🚢 Monsterwellen | Outside Magazine, Free

I know virtually nothing about ships or shipfaring. And if I’m being honest, it’s not something that I’m not terribly interested in, either. But for some reason, this story—about one of the biggest maritime disasters of all time and the ocean forces that brought it about—was very fascinating to me. Incredible archival reportage by the writer here, paired with his own experiential reporting trip aboard one of the ships that ply the world’s dangerous waters.

Very long, but it’s very worth the time, in my opinion. Set aside maybe 50 minutes of leisurely reading for this.

📜 An Intoxicating 500-Year-Old Mystery | The Atlantic, $

Even if it’s not immediately obvious what their concrete value is, I still really enjoy these types of hidden-history stories—those that fixate on one tragic or momentous (or even just strange) thing forgotten by time. In this case, the obsession revolves around an arcane text that, despite countless attempts, has never been decoded.

So we don’t actually know what the text holds, or if it’s even possible to unlock its meaning in the first place. But I guess that’s what makes it so magnetic. Not just for me (and hopefully for you), but also for dozens (hundreds?) of academics all over the world who are now mounting another rally to translate the damned thing.

Very long and—if this isn’t your speed—can be a bit boring in some spots. But I personally found it compelling enough to read through. But allot 1 hour or more, I’d say, so you can take breaks and not tire yourself out.

🤬 The Dirty Business of Hosting Hate Online | Gizmodo, Free

This is an old argument at this point (this story is from 2019)—that social media and other Internet companies need to be more accountable for the content that they host. And I understand. Why wouldn’t we use any force we have available to us to achieve the greatest good possible?

But I also resonate with the flip-side: Rich, privileged, sheltered tech moguls shouldn’t be the arbiters of what can and can’t be said online. Especially since the Internet has become a massive global force, spanning different cultures and belief systems. It’s a dangerous proposition to put the stewardship of it in the hands of a small group of businessmen.

Which means that despite this being a near-constant debate, I still don’t know where I stand.

Not too long. Maybe 20 minutes if you can stay on it.

Around the world

Here are some of the most important/interesting/infuriating news bits from around the world last week:

1 - On needless wars:
+ Zelensky met with India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who reportedly supports Ukraine’s sovereignty.
+ The U.S. has also approved another assistance package for Ukraine, valued $125 million.
+ Meanwhile, Israel unleashes a fresh round of attacks on Gaza, killing 37.
+ Biden is reportedly pressuring Netanyahu regarding the urgency of a ceasefire, but several observers have pointed out that any break in the fighting could be temporary as Israel has expressed its commitment to violence.

2 - Meanwhile, the DNC has snubbed a Palestinian speaker, alienating a formidable voting bloc. Not the best electoral decision, no?
+ You know who wasn’t snubbed? Several Republicans, who spoke out strongly against Trump.

3 - Elsewhere in the U.S., a hospital in California told a patient’s family that she had checked herself out. Turns out she had died.
+ The family spent a year looking for her.

4 - In the Philippines, a local mayor who had been the subject of a lengthy and well-publicized Senate inquiry for being accused as a Chinese spy has fled the country.
+ The mayor’s siter and mother were caught in Indonesia and have since been sent back to the Philippines.
+ The mayor herself may still be in hiding in Indonesia.

5 - Top Venezuelan athlete and five-time Olympian was found dead in Las Vegas after reportedly choking on her food.

A tiny PS: I’m rethinking the tiny news blitz at the bottom, at least until the U.S. elections have wound down. That’s been overshadowing everything else in the news cycle (I know, I know 😒) and it’s become a pain to look for other equally important and interesting things to feature.

Thanks for reading! Please, please reach out if you have feedback, suggestions, or questions. I know some of the stories I recommend might be behind paywalls, and maybe I can help you with access to those, too!

Also, I’d appreciate it so much if you help me grow by sharing The Lazy Reader with friends or family who you think might also enjoy a good longform story 🫶

Until next Monday! 👋