Andrew McCluskey

People will, if given the opportunity, read a 5,000-word essay on their phone. And they’ll do it right there, with their head still on the pillow. In those cases, it’s not terrible; it’s wonderful. And if you can capture that, if you can direct that attention to things worth attending to, it’s incredibly powerful. So if you’re a writer, why not go

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The core idea at the end of that chapter was that anything that reduces fear of “the other” also reduces the idea that some people are fundamentally different or dangerous. Wars and hatred often stem from the notion that other people are so different that conflict becomes justifiable. But exposure to other cultures—whether through travel, food, or... See more

I have never come out of a situation where I was negative to or about someone else and felt better. Any time I have been disdainful of another person has ended with me wishing I had kept my mouth shut. Turns out that hurting people, even when I think I’m right, even if they “hurt me first”, just makes me feel worse, and made their life worse in the... See more

“A blog post is a very long and complex search query to find fascinating people and make them route interesting stuff to your inbox.”

In New York, people speak fast. In the American South, they speak slowly. Both of them are a form of politeness, understood in a different way. In New York, you speak quickly because you respect the value of the other person’s time and you don’t want to take up too much of it. In the South, you speak slowly because you want to respect the person by... See more