In the latest example of third-party payment processor crackdown on sex work, Visa and MasterCard have announced they won’t process payments to Backpage.com, a popular adult advertising site.  Of course second-wave radical feminists frame it as a “progressive” way to “make the average trafficker or pimp’s life more difficult.” But as Miss Andrie argues in…

On July 18th, Donald Trump enraged fellow Republicans by stating that Arizona Senator John McCain is “not a war hero.” Trump referenced McCain’s imprisonment by the North Vietnamese stating, “I like people that weren’t captured.” Americans like to think of all their armed servicemen as heroic, and this is especially true of McCain, a POW who was imprisoned…

In a July 10 article at Reason, David Harsanyi (“Bernie Sanders is the Future of the Democratic Party“) describes the rise of Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders as “a completely predictable outcome of the Democratic Party’s trajectory,” and a portent of the party’s “socialistic future.” I’m more worried about what Harsanyi portends for the future…

A certain headline-grabbing Republican presidential candidate offered up his latest soundbite at a campaign event in Iowa on July 18 when he declared he “like[s] people who weren’t captured.” The reference was to Sen. John McCain, an ex-POW who spent five and a half years in a Vietnam prison camp. In America’s troop-worshipping society, there’s no greater offense than to disparage…

July 15 was the final day for FAO Schwarz’s iconic flagship retail store, a New York City fixture since 1870. What, exactly, closed the toy box? The immediate cause, increasing rent, was merely the last straw. The store’s approach was more and more out of step in an economy in which personalized service from Amazon.com-style warehouses is replacing brick-and-mortar retail…

Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant nationalism has positioned him far to the right of his fellow 2016 GOP hopefuls and has given him a serious boost in the polls. Such support for a man who made, and repeatedly defended, the patently racist claim that undocumented Mexican immigrants are “rapists” should serve as a clear indicator of the depth…

To the people of Greece. We at Center for a Stateless Society extend our sympathies for your recent disappointment from the Syriza government’s acceptance of the austerity regime imposed on you by the European Union. Unfortunately, movements that focus on capturing the state as the primary axis of struggle find themselves, not only not empowered,…

On July 13, President Obama announced that he will commute the sentences of 46 imprisoned individuals. Among them are several dozen drug offenders and a score of other nonviolent lawbreakers. Thirteen of them were serving life in prison. This is undeniably good news. Any victory, no matter how small, in the fight against the racist prison-industrial complex is worth celebrating. Obama’s…

The attacks on sex workers by paternalistic politicians and their armed enforcers at the local, state, and federal levels grow worse by the year. As of 2008, only two states — Nevada and Rhode Island — allowed individuals to buy and sell sex. In 2009, Rhode Island closed its legal loophole which allowed for paid…

If you watched Batman when you were growing up, chances are you saw him torture someone. If you watched Jack Bauer from the hit show 24, chances are even better that torture scenes were involved. And if you watched the Netflix show Daredevil, you probably saw it in almost every single episode. The problem with relying…

Every time I write a commentary on one of John Stossel’s godawful columns, I tell myself I’ll lay off him for a while. But good lord, this latest wretched little piece of pro-corporate apologetics (“Corporations Have Become Hollywood’s Go-To Villains,” Reason, July 1) is about the worst thing he’s ever done. The biggest challenge any…

Carly Fiorina’s main talking point throughout her time as 2016 Republican presidential candidate has been that she is an outsider.  Posturing herself as Hilary Clinton’s real challenger, Fiorina takes every opportunity to accuse Clinton of being a career politician.  On this, Fiorina is right.  During a recent Fox News appearance, Fiorina cited a poll that…

Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez falls under that unfortunate class of persons the American state labels illegal immigrants. His immigration status is important because Lopez-Sanchez is accused of the June killing of a San Francisco woman, Kathyrn Steinle. Nationalists on the right and left of the American political class are aghast because Lopez-Sanchez was released from police…

As Americans celebrated Independence Day, the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries ruled that the owners of Sweet Cakes by Melissa, A Portland area bakery, owes $135,000 in damages for refusing to bake a cake for a same-sex wedding. This is insanity! There is absolutely no justification for the claimants in this matter to be awarded almost three…

On June 30th, New Zealand’s parliament passed a bill that attempts to outlaw cyber-bullying and other forms of inappropriate online behavior. The Harmful Digital Communications Bill’s maximum penalties include two years in jail or fines of up to $33,900 in American dollars. The law establishes a new agency to investigate damage caused by digital communications. Digital bullying is…

One of the more disturbing trends on the American Center-Left (which sees itself, entirely without justification, as “the Left”) is the increasing popularity of the right-wingers as “seditionists” or “traitors” meme. The most notable recent example, in the wake of the racially-motivated massacre in Charleston, is the identification of the Confederate battle flag with “treason.”…

I’ve written often about the systemic lack of police accountability, a problem which has cost the lives of hundreds of people in 2015 alone. But what tactics should be taken to combat police brutality? What do we do to counter this lack of accountability? Genevieve Huizar has protested peacefully for the last three years and…

Hanging upside-down, swinging like a pendulum and naked, the grimacing face of the female victim from Rihanna’s new (NSFW) “Bitch Better Have My Money” music video seems to be the face that has launched a thousand think-pieces. In seven disturbing minutes, Rihanna takes revenge on her dodgy (white) accountant by kidnapping his (white) wife, stripping her,…

Adam Smith, in The Wealth of Nations, listed the appropriation of most land and the “original accumulation of capital” as the two main things that altered the primitive state of affairs where the price of goods reflected the labor involved in production. Instead, returns on capital and land became major components of price alongside the…

The Export-Import Bank’s charter finally expired on June 30th. Ever since it was created during the New Deal, the Ex-Im Bank has supported exports by American corporations, all at taxpayer expense. The top recipients of Ex-Im Bank subsidies were big corporations, with the war-profiteers at Boeing receiving more Ex-Im largess than any other company. The…