longform

THE WOMAN WHO HELPED CHANGE HOW POLICE TREAT TRANSGENDER PEOPLE—BUZZFEED

"On the night of Dec. 10, 2009, 44-year-old Patti Hammond Shaw was drinking at her house in the Fairfax Village neighborhood of Washington, D.C., with her cousin’s friend. They were sitting on the couch, watching TV, when Shaw says the man put his hand on her leg. She pushed him away and he became violent, she says. When she fought back, he hit her across the face with an 18-inch, gold-painted replica of Michelangelo’s “David.” The statue knocked out one of her teeth and left a raw, purple welt on her head.

When the police responded, the man claimed Shaw punched him first. Despite Shaw’s injuries, the officer arrested only Shaw. He brought her first to the United Medical Center so she could receive medical care for the wounds on her face, and then to the 6th District police station. At the station, Shaw was placed alone in a cell — in the men’s cellblock."

AN AMERICAN BOAT SAILED TO VIETNAM DURING THE WAR. THEN IT DISAPPEARED—ATLAS OBSCURA AND MENTAL FLOSS

The Phoenix of Hiroshima has had a long, strange trip.

WANTED: MACHO MEN WITH MUSTACHES—THE BELIEVER

"Jacques Morali and Henri Belolo had been spending a lot of time in Greenwich Village that spring. It reminded the two music producers of Paris, and besides, the gay clubs had the best DJs. Though Henri, unlike his business partner, was straight, both men were infatuated with fashion, America, and, above all, disco."

CLICKING THE BEAN: THE HISTORY OF THE INTERNET'S MOST POPULAR LESBIAN BLOG—BROADLY

"It's been 22 years since a New York magazine cover of a brooding k.d. lang challenged America to embrace 'Lesbian Chic.' Today we have lesbian mayors, TV stars, mothers, and CEOs. We have Ellen. But the everyday nuances of lesbian women's lives remain largely invisible in mainstream media. This is why we also have Autostraddle—an online publication exclusively written by and for queer women. Although the site receives around four million pageviews a month according to its founder, few outside the queer community—even heterosexual women with asymmetrical haircuts—know about the site."

UNEARTHING THE SEA WITCH—HAZLITT

"Although the sea witch is singular among Disney villains, there is a person behind this character. She is a real-life Ursula with a crimson mouth, eyebrows sharp as switchblades and a homicidal gleam in her eye. She is Divine."

EDDIE IS GONE—THE BELIEVER

"Winter is big-wave season on Oahu’s North Shore—on the radio, on the bus, in bars and restaurants, everyone was talking about 'the Eddie,' a surf competition named after big-wave surfing icon Eddie Aikau, which only takes place when the waves at Waimea Bay are consistently breaking at over twenty feet. After I’d spent a deadening series of days composing pro-imperialist schlock for tour buses, Aikau’s story captured my imagination. His life seemed to epitomize the tension between Hawaii’s often-violent struggle against cultural interlopers and the popular image of a lush paradise for western recreation and consumption."