Category: Social Issues

• For Holocaust Remembrance Day, I Watched a Friend Fall for QAnon and into Anti-Semitism

  

  Today is International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the anniversary of when Auschwitz was liberated and the horror of the Holocaust began to truly reveal itself to the world. Instead of sharing the usual photos of emaciated bodies behind barbed wire and spouting #NeverForget hashtags, I want to offer a personal story—one that’s much more recent and…

  Shari Lopatin

  January 27, 2021

  Current Events (and stuff), Personal Posts, Social Issues

  anti-Semitism, Capitol Insurrection, conspiracy theories, cults, current events, fake news, genocide, Genocide Watch, Holocaust Remembrance, QAnon

• Day After #BlackOutTuesday: Dedicating Time to Reading Black Fiction Authors

  Well, here we are, a day after #BlackOutTuesday. I feel like America went through one giant self-awareness “aha” moment during a difficult therapy session. And now we’re all trying to figure out how to change things for the better. It’s hopeful. I am certainly no one to lecture, and hell, this fight is nothing new.…

  Shari Lopatin

  June 3, 2020

  Social Issues

  #blacklivesmatter, #blackouttuesday, American culture, anti-racism, Black Lives Matter, Blackout Tuesday, blogging, book reviewer, books, creative writing, racism, reading, Writing

• ——–

  I acknowledge I may never understand, but I see you, I will continue to listen to you, and I support you. #blackouttuesday

  Shari Lopatin

  June 2, 2020

  Social Issues

  #blackouttuesday, Black Lives Matter, Blackout Tuesday

• 4 Ways to Tell if Information is Real or Fake: Advice from a Former Journalist

  

  When I was a daily newspaper reporter, I always had to navigate through multiple versions of a story before I learned what really happened. We have a saying in journalism. It goes, “There are three sides to every story: side one, side two, and the Truth.” The Truth usually falls somewhere between the first two…

  Shari Lopatin

  May 13, 2020

  Current Events (and stuff), Social Issues

  blogging, commentary, Coronavirus, current events, fake news, Internet, journalism, media, misinformation, news, pandemic, Plandemic, socialmedia, technology, truth, Writing

• Why I’m Cutting Back on Social Media as an Indie Author

  A week before Christmas in 2018, a virus attacked my brain stem. Technically, it was my vestibular nerve, which is responsible for communication between the eyes, inner ears, and brain. The condition is called vestibular neuritis (yes, you can Google it). The result of this random, weird sickness was the world wouldn’t stop spinning and…

  Shari Lopatin

  May 2, 2019

  Personal Posts, Social Issues

  anxiety, blogging, creative writing, dystopia, indie author, mental health, science fiction, self-publishing, Social media, technology, The Apollo Illusion, Writing

• Men: If you’re worried about women falsely accusing you of rape, work to change the culture

  There are a lot of good men out there. My father, the retired elementary school teacher and feminist. My boyfriend, the protective son of a single mother. My former bosses and colleagues, who mentored and shaped me as a professional. With the current political climate involving Kavanaugh and #MeToo, some men are concerned that coercive…

  Shari Lopatin

  October 4, 2018

  Current Events (and stuff), Social Issues

  #MeToo, commentary, current events, Dr. Ford, feminism, journalism, Kavanaugh, Me Too, news, patriarchy, political commentary, social issues, Writing

• Journalists Just Want to Tell Stories. Today, Some Died for It

  I used to be a reporter at a small daily, community newspaper like the Capital Gazette. We had maybe 14 reporters, and we were like family. I couldn’t imagine living through a shooting with that family, watching some of them die. Today, I cry with the reporters and staff at the Capital Gazette. We don’t know the…

  Shari Lopatin

  June 28, 2018

  Social Issues

  blogging, Capital Gazette, commentary, current events, essays, First Amendment, journalism, mass shootings, media, news, press, Writing

• 4 Ways YOU Can Avoid Russian Influence in the Next U.S. Election

  As a former newspaper reporter, and with the recent 13 indictments of Russian nationals who infiltrated our political system during the 2016 U.S. elections, I’d like to offer some advice on how YOU can personally avoid Russian influence during the 2018 U.S. mid-terms. In case you haven’t heard, the FBI warned they would most likely…

  Shari Lopatin

  February 20, 2018

  Current Events (and stuff), Social Issues

  American politics, current events, fake news, news, news stories, politics, propaganda, Russian indictments, Russian influence, U.S. elections, voting

• Yes, I’m Angry. But I’m Choosing Love Anyway

  Let me start with this: I didn’t vote for Donald Trump. In fact, the man has the rare ability to crawl under my skin like lice and turn my blood to lava. Despite these feelings, I have chosen to resist and fight back with the strongest action of all … love. On the day of…

  Shari Lopatin

  March 23, 2017

  Personal Posts, Social Issues

  #lovewins, life, Love, Love Wins, politics, Trump, Writing

• An Open Letter to Mike Pence on ‘Life’ and Universal Health Care

  NOTE: After working in healthcare communications for eight years, this is a subject I felt compelled to write about publicly in light of recent political developments. I’d initially written this letter in January, but refrained from publishing it because of my career. The time has come to speak out, however, so I feel the need…

  Shari Lopatin

  March 7, 2017

  Current Events (and stuff), Social Issues

  blogging, health care, health care reform, Mike Pence, politics, universal health care, Writing