Trump administration issues demands on Harvard as conditions for billions in federal money National News Apr 5, 2025 FILE - Students protesting against the war in Gaza, and passersby walking through Harvard Yard, are seen at an encampment at Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass., April 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis, File) By COLLIN BINKLEY AP Education Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration has issued a list of demands Harvard University must meet as a condition for receiving almost $9 billion in grants and contracts, federal money that is being threatened during an investigation into campus antisemitism. In a letter to Harvard’s president on Thursday, three federal agencies outlined demands described as necessary for a “continued financial relationship” with the government. It’s similar to a demand letter that prompted changes at Columbia University under the threat of billions of dollars in cuts. Some alumni and faculty members implored Harvard to push back, decrying the government intervention as an attack on academic freedom. The government’s letter is a “dominance test,” not an effort to fight antisemitism, said Kirsten Weld, a Harvard history professor and president of the campus chapter of the American Association of University Professors. “If Harvard, the wealthiest university on the planet, accedes to these demands, the task force won’t go away — it will simply return with additional demands, just like a schoolyard bully,” Weld said in a statement. “Harvard must contest this patently unlawful attack in the courts.” Harvard is the fifth Ivy League school targeted in a pressure campaign by the administration, which also has paused federal funding for the University of Pennsylvania, Brown, and Princeton to force compliance with its agenda. The letter describes Harvard’s federal money as a taxpayer investment that’s based on performance. Harvard has “fundamentally failed to protect American students and faculty from antisemitic violence and harassment” and must take immediate action to keep its funding, the letter said. Harvard did not comment beyond confirming it got the letter. The letter calls for a ban on face masks, a demand that was also made at Columbia and targets pro-Palestinian protesters who have sometimes worn masks to hide their identities. Harvard also must clarify its campus speech policies that limit the time, place and manner of protests and other activities. Academic departments at Harvard that “fuel antisemitic harassment” must be reviewed and changed to address bias and improve viewpoint diversity, the letter said. It does not single out any campus department or order a change in leadership, as Trump administration officials did for Columbia’s Middle East studies department. The demands are generally less prescriptive than the Columbia ultimatum, mostly calling for broad changes focused on “lasting, structural reforms,” the letter said. It also provides no deadline, while Columbia was given about a week to comply. In a letter to university leaders Thursday, a group of alumni said Harvard should “legally contest and refuse to comply with unlawful demands that threaten academic freedom and university self-governance.” “It’s a time for courage, not capitulation,” said Anurima Bhargava, one of the alumni behind the letter. “This is an unlawful attack and an attempt to coerce Harvard by threatening the very lifeblood of the institution, which is its researchers, innovators, entrepreneurs and scholars.” Some others supported the move. Alexander “Shabbos” Kestenbaum, a graduate of Harvard Divinity School who is suing the university over campus antisemitism, said Trump’s Republican administration is right to threaten the money. “In the same way that the federal government threatened to withhold funds from racist school districts that refused to integrate, the power of the purse is the last tool available to coerce Harvard to treat all its students with equality and justice,” Kestenbaum wrote in an opinion piece for The Crimson student newspaper. In a separate investigation of campus antisemitism, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has subpoenaed the University of California for the employment status and contact information of hundreds of faculty members who signed two open letters. One in October 2023 condemned the Hamas attack on Israel and also expressed sympathy for the people in Gaza, and another in May 2024 expressed concern over the safety of Jewish students during campus protests. Severin Borenstein, a professor at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business who signed the first letter, said Friday he believes the Trump administration is looking to interview signatories who experienced antisemitism. “I think this is just part of the Trump administration using antisemitism as a smokescreen to attack higher education,” said Borenstein, who is Jewish, “so it makes me pretty unhappy.” Some demands in the Harvard letter align with Trump’s political agenda but appear less directly connected to the investigation on antisemitism. It includes orders to adopt “merit-based” admissions and hiring policies and to remove any preferences based on race, religion, sex or other characteristics. Harvard also must work to end diversity, equity and inclusion programs that teach students and faculty to “make snap judgments about each other based on crude race and identity stereotypes,” the letter said. The letter separately says Harvard must comply with a federal law requiring the disclosure of foreign gifts and contracts, a priority of some Republicans in Congress who have raised concerns about Chinese influence at U.S. schools. It was sent by officials at the General Services Administration, the Education Department and the Health and Human Services Department. Federal officials notified Harvard on Monday that the university faces a review to determine its eligibility to receive $255 million in contracts and more than $8 billion in grants. Harvard President Alan Garber responded with a campus message saying the school had “devoted considerable effort to addressing antisemitism” and would provide a full accounting to the government. ___ Associated Press reporters Michael Casey in Boston and Janie Har in San Francisco contributed to this report. ___ The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Find the AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.
-
Has the fight against antisemitism been effective???? The effectiveness of the fight against antisemitism is currently a subject of intense debate, yielding highly mixed results. While organizational advocacy and institutional policy adjustments have achieved measurable legal, administrative, and educational successes, the overall real-world outcome has failed to stop a record-breaking escalation in hate incidents and physical violence. The current landscape of this effort reveals critical areas of progress balanced against compounding structural challenges: 1. Where the Fight is Proving Effective • Institutional Accountability on Campuses: One of the most concrete administrative successes has occurred within higher education. The Anti-Defamation League's (ADL) 2026 Campus Antisemitism Report Card showed widespread, year-over-year improvement in university grades, with the percentage of schools earning an "A" or "B" jumping from 23.5% in 2024 to 58%. This progress was driven by schools actively enforcing mandatory training, implementing stricter code-of-conduct policies, and establishing dedicated task forces. • National and Legal Mobilization: Governments have substantially tightened policy and infrastructure. Initiatives like the U.S. National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism have institutionalized security grants for houses of worship and streamlined civil rights protections under Title VI. Additionally, coalitions like the Combat Antisemitism Movement have successfully mobilized localized anti-hate policies across hundreds of global town councils and municipal authorities. 2. Where the Fight is Failing or Stalling • The Surge in Real-World Violence: Despite administrative policy gains, actual safety on the ground has deteriorated. Global monitoring reports reveal that violent and lethal attacks have reached historic highs. While overall property vandalism or harassment plateaus in some areas, physical assaults are scaling aggressively upward, emphasizing that institutional policy shifts have not yet translated to safer public spaces. • The Failure of Digital Content Moderation: Online spaces remain a massive failure point for civil rights advocacy. A 2026 global audit by the World Jewish Congress (WJC) and the HO:PE project revealed that 81% of reported antisemitic content remains active on social media platforms. Despite years of algorithmic tracking and public pressure campaigns, platforms continue to fall significantly short in filtering hate speech and AI-generated disinformation. • The Educational Void: While intergovernmental bodies like UNESCO push for widespread curriculum reforms, systemic implementation is lagging. Over 75% of European teachers report encountering antisemitic behavior in their classrooms, yet more than 70% state they have never received targeted training on how to address it. 3. Emerging Strategic Concerns • The Redundancy Problem: A comprehensive study published by the Jewish Funders Network found that while philanthropists poured historic amounts of capital into more than 160 different anti-antisemitism organizations, many of these initiatives proved redundant and could not demonstrate measurable impact. This lack of centralized efficiency has prompted major donors to pivot funding models toward more direct, grassroots security and baseline resilience rather than broad awareness campaigns. • The Conspiracy Confirmation Trap: On public forums like r/Judaism, opinions among community members are highly mixed regarding the utility of "combat movements". Some users point out that widespread, loud public counter-campaigns (like billboards or public shaming) often provide minimal educational value and can accidentally feed into pre-existing conspiracy theories regarding the group's institutional power and influence. Summary Verdict: If "effectiveness" is judged by institutional commitments, updated legal frameworks, and campus policy overhauls, the movement has been highly successful. However, if effectiveness is judged by the literal reduction of antisemitic sentiment and the baseline physical safety of the Jewish public, the efforts have not yet been able to reverse the global surge.
-
-
-
-
-
— Three months after Ali G, one of the buffoonish alter egos of the actor Sacha Baron Cohen, resurfaolics Anonymous Fremont at 4500 Thornton Ave serves as the immediate local baseline for physical 12-step meetings in your city. • Tri-Valley Resource Base: Moving slightly out of the Bay Area over the hills, Tri-Valley Fellowship and the Valley Service Center at 6500 Dublin Blvd in Dublin act as centralized hubs providing literaure, physical rooms, and offline network support. • South Bay Connection: Down in the Silicon Valley area, the Intergroup Central Office at 274 E Hamilton Ave in Campbell provides hybrid, online, and local in-person direction for adults seeking recovery resources. • East Bay Core: The East Bay Intergroup at 3989 Howe St in Oakland acts as the primary administrative engine coordinating offline groups across the entire East Bay landscape. It looks like you've provided a comprehensive list of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) central offices and resource hubs across the Greater Bay Area, including Fremont, the Tri-Valley, South Bay, and East Bay. These locations are vital starting points for finding local meeting schedules, recovery literature, and physical or hybrid community support. If you are looking to take the next step with these resources, let me know if you would like me to find: • Specific meeting times or formats (in-person, online, speaker, or discussion) at any of these hubs • Contact numbers or helplines for immediate support from these intergroups • Directions or transit options to one of these specific addresses How would you like to proceed? AI can make mistakes, so double-check responses What if the addiction is addiction to technology? When addressing technology addiction—often referred to as screen addiction, internet addiction, or digital dependency—traditional 12-step frameworks are adapted to focus on sustainable moderation rather than complete abstinence, since completely eliminating technology is rarely practical in modern life. Because tech addiction doesn't have the same centralized physical infrastructure as substance recovery programs, support is heavily organized through specific fellowships and specialized digital wellness strategies: Specialized 12-Step Fellowships • Internet and Technology Addicts Anonymous (ITAA): This is the primary 12-step fellowship specifically modeled after AA to help people recover from compulsive internet and technology use (including smartphones, social media, gaming, and streaming). They host extensive daily online meetings and a growing number of local in-person meetings. • Computer Gaming Addicts Anonymous (CGAA): A fellowship specifically tailored for those tracking compulsive video gaming habits, offering peer support, a 12-step program, and online discussion forums. Structuring a "Digital Sobriety" Plan Unlike substance recovery, recovery from tech addiction utilizes concepts like a Top Lines / Bottom Lines framework: • Bottom Lines (Abstinence): Identifying the specific, toxic digital behaviors that trigger compulsive loops and must be avoided entirely (e.g., infinite-scroll feeds, specific video games, or late-night compulsive browsing). • Top Lines (Recovery Behaviors): Focusing on real-world, screen-free activities that restore balance, such as offline hobbies, physical exercise, or face-to-face social connections. Local & Professional Resources If you are looking for localized support in the Bay Area, individuals navigating digital dependency often utilize: • Outpatient Therapy: Many local licensed therapists specialize in behavioral addictions, cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), and digital detox strategies. • Smart Recovery: A secular, science-based alternative to 12-step programs that focuses on self-empowerment and behavioral modification for all forms of compulsive behavior, including behavioral addictions. If you want to look further into this, let me know if you would like me to find: • A directory of upcoming online or local ITAA or CGAA meetings • Strategies for setting up strict hardware or software boundaries to limit daily screen time • Information on how behavioral therapy frameworks tackle digital dependency How would you like to explore this topic? This is for informational purposes only. For medical advice or diagnosis, consult a professional. AI responses may include mistakes. Learn more Try without personalization Internet and Technology Addicts Anonymous (ITAA): This is the primary 12-step fellowship specifically modeled after AA to help people recover from compulsive internet and technology use (including smartphones, social media, gaming, and streaming). They host extensive daily online meetings and a growing number of local in-person meetings. TELL ME WHERE TO GO! To tap into the Internet and Technology Addicts Anonymous (ITAA) network, your entry points span both physical locations in the Bay Area and a continuous global online network. [Rich media excluded from paste] 📍 The Physical Meeting Location (Bay Area) ITAA has an established weekly, local in-person meeting in Northern California: • San Francisco Meeting • When: Saturdays from 1:00 PM – 2:00 PM • Where: First Unitarian Universalist Church and Center (UUSF), 1187 Franklin Street, San Francisco, CA • Note: This is an ideal place to connect directly with a small, focused group of local peers who are actively navigating digital recovery. 🌐 The 24/7 Digital Meeting Rooms Because of the nature of technology addiction, ITAA's most robust and extensive infrastructure is hosted virtually, with dozens of free, anonymous daily Zoom and phone meetings running across global time zones: 1. Accessing the Schedule: Go straight to the official ITAA Online Meetings Calendar to see a live tracker of today’s upcoming sessions. 2. Filter by Meeting Types: • Blue Meetings: Standard meetings restricted to tech addicts and individuals exploring if they have a problem. • Pink Striped Meetings: "Speaker Shares," where a long-term member shares their deep experience, strength, and path to recovery. • Purple Meetings: Open to newcomers, observers, friends, or family members looking to understand the program. 💡 What to Do at Your First Meeting • The "Six Meeting" Rule: ITAA highly encourages newcomers to try six meetings within a short timeframe before deciding if the program is the right fit for them. • Zero Pressure to Speak: If you join a virtual or physical room, you do not have to share. It is entirely acceptable to introduce yourself by your first name and simply say, "I'm just here to listen." • Non-Judgmental Space: Members share their stories uninterrupted. The program utilizes a strict "no cross-talk" rule, meaning others will listen without giving unrequested comments or advice.
-
There could be a person in a familiar photo that is new or someone missing That is a chilling, classic trope, and executed well, it completely turns the protagonist's world upside down. It shifts the threat from subtle environmental tweaks (like blue cars or street signs) directly into the deeply personal realm of human connection and memory. Having people appear or disappear in familiar photographs creates two very different kinds of psychological terror for your main character: 1. The "Extra" Person (The Insertion) The protagonist opens an old photo album—perhaps a snapshot from a quiet trip years ago, a gathering on a familiar street, or a candid moment at home—and there is an unfamiliar face standing in the frame. The Horror of Familiarity: Everyone else in the photo is interacting with this person naturally. They are smiling together, arms wrapped around shoulders, acting as if this stranger has been a beloved family friend, classmate, or neighbor for decades. The Gaslighting of Reality: When the character asks a friend or relative, "Who is that standing next to us in this picture from 2012?" the person looks at them with genuine concern or confusion: "What do you mean? That's Marcus. He lived down the block for five years. Don't you remember him?" The protagonist is forced to play along or risk being treated as if they've lost their mind. 2. The Missing Person (The Erasure) This is perhaps even more tragic: a key person from the protagonist's life simply ceases to exist in the photo archive. Empty Space: A group photo on a porch or in front of a landmark now has an unnatural gap where someone used to stand. The remaining people in the shot are leaning slightly toward an empty space, hugging the air, or looking toward someone who is no longer rendered in the image. Erased History: The character looks through a stack of old prints searching for an old friend, a mentor, or a travel companion, only to realize that every single photo of them is gone—or worse, the photo exists, but the friend was replaced by someone else entirely. When the protagonist brings up that person's name, nobody recognizes it. The world has re-stitched its history so smoothly that the erased person left zero wake in anyone else's memory. 3. The Clue in the Details To make this work brilliantly in prose, the protagonist might start noticing anomalies in the composition: The lighting on the "new" person doesn't quite match the ambient shadows of the rest of the photograph. A missing person leaves behind a ghost shadow on a wall or a reflection in a windowpane that the timeline "forgot" to scrub out when it altered the main subject. Handwritten notes on the back of the print—written in the protagonist's own handwriting years ago—still list the original names, creating a direct conflict between the ink on the paper and the image on the front. It turns the photo collection into a terrifying puzzle. Every time the protagonist opens a drawer to check an old album, they are taking a massive risk: Who will be standing there today? And who will be gone?
-
-
NEW FICTION: In the neon-soaked labyrinth of New York City, where the Statue of Liberty had just been re-routed to operate as a giant, motorized soft-serve ice cream dispenser, the chaos reached a fever pitch. The Handsome Man stood atop a speeding taxi cab, his jawline reflecting the moonlight so sharply it accidentally sliced a nearby billboard in half. He checked his diamond-encrusted watch, realizing that the eighty-eight percent of voters terrified of imaginary numbers had now manifested as a physical, roaring fog of pure anxiety! From the sky, a literal rain of burning Fox News poll pamphlets began to fall, setting fire to the clouds and causing the Hudson River to boil with sudden political outrage. Suddenly, a giant mechanical pigeon piloted by corrupt city officials swooped down, its metal wings beating to the rhythm of skyrocketing zombie insanity. Trapped in its beak was Mrs. Lips, whose magnificent pout was emitting a high-frequency romantic distress signal that shattered every martini glass in Manhattan. "Save me, Handsome Man!" she screamed, her words in flashing neon. The Handsome Man flexed his flawless biceps, causing the fabric of reality—and his tailored suit—to tear slightly at the seams. With a heroic leap that defied all known laws of physics he launched himself off the taxi and grabbed onto the mechanical bird’s tail feathers. As they soared past the Chrysler Building, Mrs. Lips managed to throw a handful of high-interest loan documents directly into the pigeon's exhaust pipe, causing it to sputter dramatically. The giant robotic bird began to plunge, spinning toward the earth like a fallen angel of love blind economics. The Handsome Man swung himself into the cockpit, threw the corrupt pilot out into a giant pile of recycled newspapers, and took the controls. He steered the crashing contraption directly into the middle of Times Square, landing with a spectacular explosion of glitter, red tape of unrequited passion. Out of the smoke walked the two lovers, completely unharmed and looking effortlessly runway-ready. Mrs. Lips locked eyes on the Handsome Man, her lips glowing with a level of passion that instantly lowered the city's gas prices to go perfect. As the astonished crowd of New Yorkers broke into wild applause, The Handsome Man swept her into his arms, kissing her with his giant pulsing mouth.
-
• Internet and Technology Addicts Anonymous Online/Phone Meetings Sep 14, 2026 — Purple meetings are for internet and technology addicts, newcomers, and non-addicts interested in ITAA's program of recovery from ... • Internet and Technology Addicts Anonymous Internet and Technology Addicts Anonymous Free help for Internet and Technology Addiction Regardless of how large or small you feel your problem may be, we encourage you to... • Internet and Technology Addicts Anonymous In-Person Meetings – Internet and Technology Addicts Anonymous ITAA In-Person Meetings Overview: New attendees are encouraged to try six meetings. Active and potential locations span the US (CA... Show all Is there a growing awareness in the bay area about the problem of tech addiction? Yes, there is a profound and rapidly growing wave of awareness about tech addiction across the San Francisco Bay Area. In fact, because the region is the birthplace of the very apps and devices that dominate global attention, the Bay Area has become a primary testing ground for grassroots resistance, legal pushback, and experimental "digital wellness" solutions. The cultural shift is manifesting across several key fronts: 🏢 The 'Insider' Counter-Movement Some of the loudest warnings about digital dependency come from Silicon Valley insiders themselves—former product managers, engineers, and executives from tech giants who understand exactly how psychological hacks like infinite scroll and variable dopamine rewards were engineered. • Organizations like the Bay Area–based Center for Humane Technology (founded by former Google design ethicist Tristan Harris) have successfully reframed tech addiction from a "personal lack of discipline" to a systemic public health crisis caused by coercive design. • There is a well-documented culture among high-level tech executives who enforce strict "no-screen" rules or low-tech environments for their own children, recognizing the addictive nature of the products their companies build. 🏫 Campus and Grassroots Resistance Young adults and students in the East Bay and Silicon Valley are starting to aggressively push back against the constant pull of the screen: • At UC Berkeley, student-led initiatives have gained national attention for organizing "Digital Detox" events, where participants voluntarily trade their smartphones for analog connections. Local neuroscientists tracking these groups have found that even temporary detoxes radically reduce anxiety and restore cognitive control. • Programs like Project Reboot operate heavily in local schools, treating screen time not just as a bad habit, but as a behavior manipulation issue that requires deliberate lifestyle design to break. ⚖️ Legal and Institutional Crackdowns The awareness has moved past social commentary into massive structural and legal action within California: • Massive Legal Settlements: California recently led a massive multi-state legal push targeting social media companies for deliberately creating addictive features that harm youth mental health. Landmark lawsuits handled in Bay Area courts have forced promises of structural changes, such as mandatory daily time caps for minors and strict "School Mode" dead-zones. • Statewide School Bans: Reflecting widespread parental anxiety across California school districts, state lawmakers have continuously tightened restrictions on smartphones in public classrooms, treating devices as significant disruptions to emotional development and social skill building. 🌲 The Rise of the 'Detox Economy' Because the hyper-competitive tech environment can drive extreme digital burnout, a localized economy has sprung up around disconnecting: • Programs like Digital Detox (headquartered in Oakland) run adult summer camps and off-grid retreats where tech workers surrender their devices at the door to experience literal digital withdrawal—complete with "phantom pocket vibrations"—before finding relief in offline community building. • Specialized outpatient therapy clinics and support groups focused specifically on behavioral digital addictions are seeing a major surge in demand throughout the Silicon Valley corridor.
No comments:
Post a Comment