A Huge Climate Change Movement Led by Teenage Girls
It’s all over Europe and coming to the U.S. next
We got dumped on this weekend here in New Mexico. While I’m very happy for all my skier friends, I’m ready for warmer weather, dry crags, longer days, and spring in general now.
I guess it’s pretty, though.
What I’m reading
The Rough Terrain: Kikkan Randall had everything—a long-awaited Olympic cross-country skiing gold medal in Pyeongchang, a family life with her husband and toddler son. And then she had breast cancer. [Bonnie D. Ford for ESPN W]
How Finding Rare Plants Saved Ynes Mexia's Life: After a mental-health breakdown, Mexia grew obsessed with plants in her fifties and became one of the early 20th century’s great botanical collectors. [Kate Siber for Outside]
15 Rad, Influential, and Super-Fast Cyclists You Need to Follow Today: It’s Black History Month, and if you aren't already aware of all the rad folks who are currently making black history in cycling, now is the time to get on that. [Ayesha McGowan for Bicycling]
A Huge Climate Change Movement Led by Teenage Girls Is Sweeping Europe. And It’s Coming to the U.S. Next. Students are going on strike around the world to demand action on climate change, in a movement led almost entirely by teenage girls. [J. Lester Feder, Zahra Hirji, and Pascale Mueller for BuzzFeed]
The Women Keeping the Art of Surfboard Making Alive: Handmade surfboards are a rare commodity. Handmade surfboards crafted by women are even more so. [Regina Nicolardi for Outside]
Is kratom a performance enhancer or a lethal opioid?
Deep in the heart of the Adirondacks, the unexpected death of a small-town police sergeant has added fuel to a nationwide controversy over an herbal supplement. By Peter Andrey Smith:
I thought about how people pulled into kratom’s orbit seemed to occupy two distinct camps: those who were trying to treat pain or transition off addictive and potentially lethal opioids, and those who picked up a supplement as yet another way to probe the physical limits of the human body.
Other reads
The Women Who Contributed to Science but Were Buried in Footnotes: In a new study, researchers uncovered female programmers who made important but unrecognized contributions to genetics. [Ed Yong for the Atlantic]
Even when women do become authors, the systemic biases that pervade modern science can work against them. For a start, they’re outnumbered: One recent study found that, given current trends, it would take 16 years for the number of male and female authors to equalize across the sciences, and 258 years for fields like physics.
