When I was in college, a friend confided in me that she had an abortion after being raped at a party. That’s the moment I knew I was pro-choice. Up until then, I had never really thought about where I stood on the issue of abortion. That wasn’t something that was...
rwbdrew
Williamson County mom helps launch national campaign pushing back on ‘parents rights’ groups
Williamson County parent and advocate Revida Rahman has linked arms with a national campaign organizing parents against what they call "extremists trying to control what our families and kids believe, read and learn." The campaign, dubbed "Freedom to Parent 21st...
The Book-Bans Debate Has Finally Reached a Turning Point
Across multiple fronts, Democrats and their allies are stiffening their resistance to a surge of Republican-led book bans. President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris in the past month have conspicuously escalated their denunciations of the book bans...
Granddaughter of longtime U.S. senator hopes to reverse legacy of anti-abortion policies
Ellen Gaddy, the granddaughter of former U.S. Senator Jesse Helms, was raised in a conservative family, in the shadow of a man who championed an agenda that included fierce opposition to Roe v. Wade and any effort to compromise on the issue of abortion. For Gaddy,...
Op-Ed: How in good conscience can Rep. Tricia Cotham deny NC residents the abortion access she had?
Republicans in North Carolina have passed a sweeping abortion bill that further restricts access to abortion care — a bill filled with medical misinformation, misdirection and false narratives about abortion. In practice, it will ban medication abortion after 10...
Op-Ed: Lessons for Becoming a Public Scholar
Academics at many colleges and universities today face an uncertain future. Rising tuition and falling enrollments, the lack of tenure-track positions, the dwindling student interest in the humanities in favor of business and STEM degrees, and growing questions about...
What are local schools doing for student safety?
The list is long, as are our memories, of youths who have been victims of school shootings. And as the public cries for a solution become deafening, it is left to school districts and law enforcement to fortify schools with what amounts to bandaids as prevention as...
Abortion policies could make the Republican Party’s ‘suburban women problem’ worse
The 'suburban women problem' Polling shows a majority of Americans disagree with policies that outlaw the procedure, which has become a political liability for Republicans. And the biggest fallout could be with women, like Tiffany Sheffield, who live in the suburbs....
Students, authors fight censorship in PA schools
About four hours before the Central Bucks School District passed a new library policy in July, local high school junior Lily Freeman warned a crowd of about 100 what would follow. The policy, passed by a 6-3 vote, targeted books with explicit or implied depictions of...
The day the book banners lost in Pennsylvania’s culture wars
If you ban it, they will come. For the better part of an hour Saturday, dozens of teenagers and their parents snaked around the towering stacks of tomes inside Kutztown’s Firefly Books and sometimes spilled onto the sidewalks of this quaint Berks County college town —...
Recent Posts
Do This: Make Your 2025 Voting Plan
Election Day – November 4 – is right around the corner, and it’s never too early to make your 2025 voting plan! Use vote.org or your state’s board of elections website to complete this step-by-step checklist: Check your voter registration status. Make sure that your...
Watch This: Why We’re Going Local in 2025
It’s easy to get overwhelmed by the chaotic, 24-hour national news cycle and our emotionally charged social media feeds. Everything can feel so big; so distant; so daunting. So isn’t it comforting to know that the best way out of the chaos is to keep our focus close...
Read This: Five Reasons Why We “Go Local”
Lately, you may have seen Red Wine & Blue say, “When they go low, we go local!” What do we mean by that? Almost a decade ago, Michelle Obama made famous the phrase, “When they go low, we go high.” This was the Obama family motto for responding to cruel, hateful...
Okay, But Why is Gay Marriage at Risk?
The U.S. Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage in 2015, but recent events have people wondering, is gay marriage at risk? The laws of the United States are supposed to protect and lift up all of us. For hundreds of thousands of gay couples across America, the right to get married isn’t abstract – it affects their daily lives, their finances, their health, and their family. Why would we turn back the clock on the social progress we’ve made? And why is banning gay marriage a priority for some people when there are so many real issues affecting Americans?
Okay, But Why is AI a concern?
Artificial Intelligence, or AI, is everywhere these days. Some people think it’s the solution to all of humanity’s problems. Others think it’s going to bring about the end of life as we know it. The truth, as usual, is somewhere in between. But with so many different opinions and so many ways that AI can be used, it’s hard to know exactly what to believe. So let’s look at the facts and figure out, why is AI a concern?