Vox: All Posts by Halley Brownhttps://cdn.vox-cdn.com/community_logos/52517/voxv.png2023-10-27T14:25:00-04:00https://www.vox.com/authors/halley-brown/rss2023-10-27T14:25:00-04:002023-10-27T14:25:00-04:00How China is designing flood-resistant cities
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<p>It’s time to redesign cities for climate change. </p> <p id="oV1cQ3">From rising sea levels in Mumbai to unbearable heat in Houston, cities around the world are feeling the effects of climate change. Unfortunately, they don’t always have the right infrastructure to handle its impacts — which is one reason why cities are beginning to reimagine urban design.</p>
<p id="q7I8k8">Dozens of urban areas are experimenting with “spongey” infrastructure as a <a href="https://www.lincolninst.edu/publications/articles/sponge-city-shenzhen-explores-benefits-designing-with-nature">potential solution</a>. It goes by different names around the world, but they all follow <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/2073-4441/14/10/1531">a similar design philosophy</a>: remove existing pipes and drains to manage rain and stormwater, and implement natural infrastructure like rain gardens and vegetation to absorb water instead. The result? Lush, green, rainforests against the backdrop of dense urban areas. These designs are not only great for managing <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/article/flooding-climate-change.html">urban flooding</a>, but they also support biodiversity — which is one of our strongest tools in the <a href="https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/science/climate-issues/biodiversity">fight against climate change</a>. </p>
<p id="cfvJKr">In the video above, we take a look at sponge city designs around the world and explain how they work. Plus, urban wildlife ecology and conservation researcher <a href="https://cafnr.missouri.edu/person/charles-nilon/">Charlie Nilon</a> explains why biodiversity is essential to urban areas, and how natural infrastructure projects, like sponge cities, can help make our concrete jungles rich with plant and animal species.</p>
<p id="jqkzBl"><em>This episode is presented by Delta. Delta doesn’t have a say in our editorial decisions, but they make videos like this possible. For more information, visit </em><a href="http://www.delta.com/sustainability"><em>www.delta.com/sustainability</em></a><em>.</em></p>
<p id="JFO79Y">You can find this video and the entire library of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLXo7UDZvByw2ixzpQCufnA"><strong>Vox’s videos on YouTube</strong></a>.</p>
https://www.vox.com/videos/23932182/urban-design-sponge-cities-climate-biodiversityHalley Brown2023-08-23T12:27:30-04:002023-08-23T12:27:30-04:00The day women shut down Iceland
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<p>The strike that helped narrow the gender pay gap in Iceland. </p> <p id="K2Srxw">Iceland has made significant progress toward closing its <a href="https://data.oecd.org/earnwage/gender-wage-gap.htm">gender pay gap</a> in the past 50 years. In 1975, Icelandic women made around 40 percent less than what men made. Today, that number is around 10 percent, making Iceland one of the few countries in the world where women are paid almost as much as men.</p>
<p id="4jhxCm">To understand how Iceland <a href="https://www.weforum.org/reports/global-gender-gap-report-2023/in-full/benchmarking-gender-gaps-2023/">managed this</a>, you have to take a look at what happened almost 50 years ago. In 1970, a radical feminist group called the Redstockings formed in response to outdated ideas in Iceland surrounding issues like violence against women, reproductive rights, and women’s labor. The Redstockings were known for their loud and public demonstrations, and in 1975 they proposed their biggest idea yet: a women’s strike, a day when women would collectively refuse to work at home and in the office to prove their economic worth to society.</p>
<p id="jnJCfa">The idea was divisive at first, but slowly, women from different political backgrounds got on board. To make the idea more accessible, they changed the name to “Women’s Day Off,” or “<a href="https://kvennasogusafn.is/index.php?page=english">Kvennafrí</a>,” and planned the strike from the ground up. It was a massive success. An estimated 90 percent of Icelandic women refused to work that day, and it shut down the country. Flights were canceled without flight attendants, and schools were closed without teachers. Men had to bring children to work because there was no child care at home.</p>
<p id="F1waGS">The effects of Kvennafrí were felt across the country. Iceland quickly passed its first Gender Equality Act and soon after elected its first female president — the world’s first woman president to be elected democratically. In this episode of <em>Missing Chapter</em>, we talk with one of the women who helped plan the strike and walk through how Icelandic women shut down their country.</p>
<p id="jgsrmg">You can find this video and the entire library of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLXo7UDZvByw2ixzpQCufnA"><strong>Vox’s videos on YouTube</strong></a>.</p>
https://www.vox.com/videos/23842984/iceland-womens-day-off-strike-kvennafriHalley Brown2023-06-29T13:27:21-04:002023-06-29T13:27:21-04:00How flight attendants changed the airline industry
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<p>The “stewardess rebellion” fought the industry and won.</p> <p id="VxIWEr">When flight attendants, known as stewardesses at the time, first took flight in the 1930s, the profession became a token of glamour. Unlike other jobs open to women at the time, like teaching or secretarial work, stewardesses had a unique opportunity to travel the world and meet new people thousands of feet in the air. While the position provided exciting opportunities for working women, it also capitalized on the bodies of these women to benefit the airline industry.</p>
<p id="exavU8">For decades, airlines exclusively hired young, single, unmarried, white women and enforced strict policies — like weight and age requirements — to make sure their employees were up to the standard they were selling. Airlines relied on the glamorous reputation of the jet-setting stewardess to sell luxury air travel, and it worked. Along with imposing extreme qualifications for the job, airlines leaned into a “sexy stewardess” stereotype with advertising campaigns and new uniforms, like Southwest Airlines' “hot pants” that painted stewardesses as sex objects. </p>
<p id="2Xu08e">But in the 1960s and ’70s, stewardesses <a href="https://archive.org/details/sexobjectsinsky00kane/page/84/mode/2up">mounted an organized push</a> against their employers' discriminatory labor practices. They became one of the first groups in the US to fight discrimination in the workplace. And they won.<em> </em>Their activism and legal battles, which used Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, became known as the “stewardess rebellion.” It changed the airline industry into what we know today and paved the way for working women nationwide.</p>
<p id="awYdF8">You can find this video and the entire library of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLXo7UDZvByw2ixzpQCufnA"><strong>Vox’s videos on YouTube</strong></a>.</p>
https://www.vox.com/videos/2023/6/29/23778640/flight-attendants-stewardess-airline-industryHalley Brown2022-03-09T14:30:00-05:002022-03-09T14:30:00-05:00Volodymyr Zelenskyy, explained in 8 moments
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<p>Zelenskyy’s rise in Ukraine, from TV star to president.</p> <p id="gjKrPp">Once known for his political comedy sketches and skits in which he pretended to play the piano with his penis, Volodymyr Zelenskyy was elected as the president of Ukraine in 2019 in a landslide victory. </p>
<p id="8OwMW3">Although he promised that his presidency would be different from other Ukrainian leaders who “promise a lot” yet “do nothing,” President Zelenskyy would soon find himself unpopular with the public. Within two years, he had already navigated scandals like his offshore companies appearing in the Pandora Papers and struggled to fulfill his campaign pledge to end the war against Russia in the Donbas region of Ukraine.</p>
<p id="T5sjvu">But the Russian invasion on February 24, 2022, found him extremely well positioned to offer his skills in performance and storytelling to motivate Ukrainians, rally Europe, and undermine Putin’s propaganda. How will his reaction to Russia’s advances affect his legacy?</p>
<p id="HPirMQ">We chose eight clips that we feel explain President Zelenskyy’s rise from a comedian to the leader of Ukraine and had journalists and experts respond.</p>
<div id="wbNJIn"><div style="left: 0; width: 100%; height: 152px; position: relative;"><iframe src="https://open.spotify.com/embed/episode/05EqniD8MPKNGaBSf9LXSw?utm_source=oembed" style="top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; position: absolute; border: 0;" allowfullscreen="" allow="encrypted-media;"></iframe></div></div>
<p id="YEW6z9">Further reading:</p>
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<li id="YJFjeE">Simon Shuster’s <a href="https://time.com/6154139/volodymyr-zelensky-ukraine-profile-russia/">profile on President Zelenskyy,</a> in Time Magazine</li>
<li id="CGPY5H">Maryana Drach on <a href="https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/2020-08/RISJ_Final%20Report_Maryana%20Drach_2020_Final%202%20%289%29.pdf">how social media shaped Zelenshkyy’s victory in Ukraine</a>
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<li id="gdoN8K">
<a href="https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/just-all-others-end-zelensky-alternative">Zelenskyy’s decline in popularity and the failures of his presidency</a>, by Mykhailo Minakov</li>
<li id="dC5j7L">
<a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2022/01/28/ukrainian-president-downplays-imminent-invasion-00003219">How Zelenskyy downplayed the war in January</a>, in Politico</li>
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<p id="Fq9N9U">You can find this video and all of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLXo7UDZvByw2ixzpQCufnA"><strong>Vox’s videos on YouTube</strong></a>.</p>
https://www.vox.com/videos/22969253/ukrainian-president-volodymyr-zelenskyy-careerHalley BrownJoss FongSam EllisChristophe Haubursin