Post editor Emma Ockerman read some stuff this week that you might want to check out.
It snowed today for a total of (maybe?) ten minutes. Crank that holiday music. It's time, everyone.
In a complete turn of events, though, I'm listening to The Pogues this Sunday afternoon. Irish-punk tunes rule. It's sort of a celebratory nod toward how the week of Thanksgiving is a complete academic illusion where classes hardly exist and I really, really desire those class parties I had in fourth grade. Cheers to fourth grade.
Anyways, here's what I read this week:
1. I've been following The Columbus Dispatch's heartbreaking series regarding suicide and the stigmas associated with it — as well as the incredible lack of care provided to those that are at risk of suicide — throughout this past week, and read the final installment as I woke up this morning. The article describes those that were edging closer to ending their life, and instead shifted their fates and became suicide awareness advocates — potentially saving some people that would have otherwise ended their lives. One quote: “It just helps me to know I am helping someone else. I know the hopelessness that they are feeling.”
2. Okay, this doesn't count as reading, but this week I watched the chilling PBS Frontline documentary on the emergence of ISIS in Afghanistan. Journalist Najibullah Quraishi, who has embedded himself within the Taliban several times for stories and calls Afghanistan home, met with and interviewed ISIS fighters in the villages of Afghanistan that are being trained remotely. Some of those being trained to wield guns and conduct suicide bombings are elementary-school aged children. Quraishi said of witnessing these events: “When I saw these young children, I was really, really upset, really sad. I was thinking about Afghanistan’s future, Afghanistan’s next generation, what we have next. These children who learn how to kill people, how to do jihad, how to behead, how to fire, this would be Afghanistan.”
3. Post reporter Tony Wolfe took us into the past and future of Ohio coach Frank Solich this past week with his profile on the longest-tenured coach in the Mid-American Conference. With three of the 10 longest-tenured head coaches in Division I announcing that they'll be stepping down at the end of the season, it's hard not to think about Solich's next move.
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4. On a lighter note, my reading this week took me to Ohio University's famed two-legged pup, Tumbles. We all know Tumbles at this point. Thanks to 3D printing via the OU Innovation Center, Tumbles has his very own dog-sized wheelchair so he can cruise at his leisure. If you haven't seen our video, it's remarkably cute.
— Emma Ockerman is a junior studying journalism at Ohio University and editor-in-chief of The Post. Want her to read something? Tweet her at @eockerman or email her at eo300813@ohio.edu
