There's beef in the half marathon community
… plus curiosities from seal central, cocaine capitals, and more.
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Plus: 🏃 I’m running the NYC marathon to support Asian American and Pacific Islander journalists! You can support my efforts to uplift AAPI voices and stories here.
Without further ado, here’s what’s on deck this week:
⚓ Why a mega-herd of sea lions has gathered in San Francisco
🏃Unpacking drama in the Brooklyn half-marathon community
👩🌾 Why working with our hands makes us happy
But first, here’s a closer look at what’s been going on around the world lately:
20 — The decrease in percentage points over the last four years among young men (18 - 29 years old) identifying as Democrats. This camp of American voters has overwhelmingly switched allegiance to the GOP as elections approach in November, according to an expansive Harvard Kennedy School study on American voting priorities released this week. The study also reveals that Democrats have maintained favor among young women within the same time frame.
Below is a detailed breakdown from the study of the issues American voters under the age of 30 care the most about. Inflation, healthcare, housing, and jobs were some of the biggest priorities among young voters.
2,000 — The record-breaking number of sea lions that napped, vibed, and sunbathed on San Francisco’s Pier 39 — a whopping 600 more than the previous record of 1,400 big bois that was set in the early 1990s, according to Pier 39’s harbor master, Sheila Chandor. Marine mammal experts suspect the vaulted number is due to there being more food nearby and zero natural predators in the bay. You can view a live cam of the sea lions’ ongoing pool party here.
8 — The number of years that have passed since the Pulse Nightclub shooting in Orlando, Florida, that killed 49 and became the deadliest attack on the LGBTQ community in the United States. This June is Pride month, and while U.S. Congress has a record number of LGBTQ representatives, the country also has a record number of laws racing through the halls of government that would actively threaten the freedoms and safety of LGBTQ people today. The ACLU has tracked every one of these laws — 516 total at the time of this writing — and their potential impacts, which you can find here.
21% — The percentage increase of cocaine users based in Western and Central Europe, according to a 2023 report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Europe has vaulted to the top of the world’s biggest importers of cocaine worldwide, and experts warn that it is contributing to violence, human rights abuses, and instability in Latin America and Northern Africa where cocaine is largely exported. Belgium, Italy, Spain, and the Netherlands have become key points of entry for the addictive drug and are also where cocaine use is highest in the region. Worldwide, the global supply of cocaine has reached record levels this year.
500 — The age in years of a bronze sculpture of a Hindu poet and saint, Tirumankai Alvar, which Oxford University’s Ashmolean Museum has agreed to return to India. The repatriation comes amid a push by several governments — from Nigeria, to Egypt, and Greece — to reclaim antiquities that were questionably taken by the British Empire during the height of its colonial era. The international Antiquities Coalition has created an interactive timeline tracking every instance of antiquity repatriation here.
And now onto the main course — or should I say racecourse?
Brooklyn’s half marathon races, both of which are called the Brooklyn Half Marathon, are dueling.
In February, the longstanding running organization New York Road Runners, which hosts the one and only NYC marathon — filed a lawsuit against NYCRuns for “misleading consumers” by using their trademarked name, “Brooklyn Half Marathon.”
But what’s in a name, really? Apparently, quite a lot. NYRR hosts one of the world’s “big five” races, and it is immensely competitive to enter. (This year, NYRR accepted only 4 percent of applicants and received the second-highest number of applications, at 164,000. That’s even lower than the 2024 acceptance rate at Harvard.) The only way to truly guarantee entry is by raising money for an official TCS NYC Marathon charity partner (which is what I’m doing!) or participating in NYRR’s other races through their 9+1 program, the 4 Out of 6 program, or the Virtual 6 programs.
Here’s where things get dicey. NYRR claims that NYC Runs was intentionally misleading racers to “capitalize on the enormous goodwill” inherent in NYRR. Many racers have complained online that they had accidentally registered for the NYC Runs race instead of the NYRR race, thinking it would allow them to eventually qualify for the NYC Marathon, all due to the near-identical names.
The Brooklyn Paper has covered the nitty gritty details of the spat.
But, why does this matter? A race, is a race, is a race, right? Well, running a marathon is one of the world’s most popular bucket list items, and the NYC Marathon is the second most popular marathon in the world. Runners from as many as 150 countries flock to the Big Apple to participate — not necessarily to torture their bodies, but to prove to themselves, their communities, their countries, their loved ones that achieving great things is possible. It’s such the perfect metaphor for perseverance, that inspiring profiles about race hopefuls routinely enter the zeitgeist.
A simple mistake of running one half marathon instead of another could become a monumental barrier to attaining what many believe is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
Conversely, does NYRR actually deserve race primacy over Brooklyn, or are they simply bullying smaller, less established running organizations from threatening their monopoly over races in the area? Let us know:
Beginning this week — Aid deliveries to Gaza via the newly repaired American-built pier will resume following storm damage, according to U.S. Central Command. The news comes amid a Tuesday announcement by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken that the U.S. will provide an additional $404 million in humanitarian aid, bringing the total assistance to $674 million. However, the pier will become technically inoperable by September, when sea waves will become too high and dangerous.
On Thursday, June 13 — An Academy for Women Entrepreneurs Summit will end in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Hosted by the U.S. Embassy in Ljubljana, the Summit, which began Monday, has gathered 73 Ukrainian entrepreneurs who are focusing on how to revitalize Ukraine’s “entrepreneurial landscape and create sustainable economic growth by further developing the alumni’s business acumen and networks,” according to a statement by the U.S. State Department. This year has marked the first GDP expansion in Ukraine since Russia’s attack in February 2022. Summits like this have the potential to expand the reach and effectiveness of the Ukrainian business community.
On Friday, June 14 — The blood-red, controversial King Charles portrait will end its public display at the Philip Mould Gallery in London. On Tuesday the portrait was vandalized by animal rights activists, who attached a Wallace and Gromit illustration on the face of King Charles and a paper speech bubble that read, “No cheese, Gromit. Look at all this cruelty on RSPCA farms!” Animal Rising, the group who claimed responsibility for the vandalism, claims there have been widespread violations of animal husbandry rules at British farms approved by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
On Thursday, June 13 to Saturday, June 15 — The 50th G7 Summit takes place in Apulia, Italy. This routine gathering among representatives from Italy, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the U.S. will discuss the war in Ukraine, migration, Africa, the Middle East, the climate crisis, and AI. Italy’s hosting of this Summit comes amid heightened tensions surrounding the EU country’s controversial treatment of African migrants seeking asylum and refugee status at ports of entry. Italy is close to launching a program to send migrants to Albania (right across the Adriatic Sea from where the summit will take place) and has been pressuring African countries to monitor their coastlines and return the record-breaking number of EU-bound migrants back to Africa.
On Monday, June 17 — The global day to recognize and combat desertification and drought occurs. Like we’ve covered last week, drought is a major precursor to natural disasters like wildfires, which have become twice as powerful and destructive over the last two decades. And by 2050, three out of four people worldwide will be affected by droughts. The fix? Reforestation and land restoration, the latter of which has newly-formed UN goals agreed upon by 196 countries worldwide.
I recently came across the concept of the effort-driven reward circuit. It’s the idea that when we do things with our hands — cook, clean, garden, knit — it makes us happy. Kelly Lambert, a Professor of Behavioral Neuroscience at the University of Richmond, wrote a whole book on the topic and her findings are really fascinating.
Lambert argues that humans are programmed to build and do things with our hands, and that evolutionarily, we developed a pleasure response to these activities because hunting, gathering, grooming, and building, helped our early ancestors survive. That circuit in our brains — the effort-driven reward circuit — is still alive and active, but in many of our modern lives we tap, scroll, and click instead of creating things with our hands.
“Our brains are programmed to derive a deep sense of satisfaction and pleasure when our physical effort produces something tangible, visible and — this fact is extremely important —meaningful.” - Kelly Lambert, in a 2008 Scientific American Mind article
Lambert’s research illustrates how doing things with your hands activates a whole circuit in your brain which exercises the entire brain, rather than just our cognition-focused frontal cortex (ever-stimulated by computer and phone tasks), and makes us more resilient to depression.
“Anything that lets us see a clear connection between effort and consequence — and that helps us feel in control of a situation — is a kind of mental vitamin that helps build resilience.” — Lambert, Scientific American
— Ben
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P.S. I am running the New York City Marathon this year with the help of the Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA). It was AAJA that helped me get my first job in the field years ago. Now I'm truly grateful to give back to the organization that helped me get my foot in the door. You can follow my running journey and check out my AAJA fundraiser here.