O-Bits: Lend Us Your Earhart Edition

A scientist has claimed to solve the disappearance of aviatrix Emilia Earhart  one of the enduring mysteries of the 20th Century. Her plane vanished on July 2, 1937 while flying from Papua New Guinea to Howland Island, part of her attempt to fly around the world. Her plane was never found, but in 1941, human bones were discovered on the small island of Nikumaroro. At the time, they were thought to be the remains of a male, but an anthropology professor at the University of Tennessee, Richard Jantz, says they probably were Earhart’s. Since those bones have been lost, there’s no way to confirm his theory…we prefer think she’s  on an island somewhere playing bridge with Judge Crater, Jimmy Hoffa, and D.B. Cooper.

A court in Garden City, Michigan has ruled that a funeral home was wrong in firing Aimee Stephens, a trans-gendered employee. The R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes claimed that allowing the employee, who identified as a man at the time he was hired, to wear women’s clothing would be a distraction to its largely Christian clientle (the home’s owner, Thomas Rost, is a devout Christian), and that the employee was violating the business’ dress code.  The court dismissed the home’s arguments in a 49-page ruling, stating that “simply permitting Stephens to wear attire that reflects a conception of gender that is at odds with Rost’s religious beliefs is not a substantial burden under RFRA [the Religious Freedom Restoration Act]. We hold that, as a matter of law, tolerating Stephens’s understanding of her sex and gender identity is not tantamount to supporting it.”

 

 

 

Steven Mirkin

Steven Mirkin’s diverse career has taken him from politics to pop culture to high art, offering him a front row seat to some of the most fascinating events and personalities of our time: writing speeches, fundraising appeals and campaign materials for Ed Koch, John Heinz and independent presidential candidate John B. Anderson; chronicling the punk/new wave scenes in New York and London; interviewing musicians such as Elton John, John Lydon and Buck Owens; profiling modern masters Julian Schnabel, Paul Schrader and Jonathan Safran Foer; and writing for TV shows including 21, The Chamber, Let's Make A Deal, and Rock Star: INXS.

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