We’ve seen the word extremist thrown around a lot to brand political opponents as well as any of the others across the political divide. Though it also gets used among opponents within the same political party. Kansas’s Governor Kelly, during the recent primary, labeled fellow Democrat Senator Cindy Holscher an extremist as part of her visible efforts backing another candidate for governor.

Given the seemingly ridiculous use of the term for Holscher, considering her record and candidacy, or the poor strategic play here by the governor — gifting Holscher’s now primary Republican opponent Ty Masterson with a golden pull quote (Holscher won the primary in the end) — have we overused this term to the point that it’s lost its effectiveness?

Maybe we need to revisit the definition of the word and consider how to apply it more systematically. What follows is an attempt to do this.

What is an Extremist?

I started by reviewing a basic definition. The following is from Dictionary.com: a person who favours or resorts to immoderate, uncompromising, or fanatical methods or behaviour, especially in being politically radical.

Ok, that’s a start, but it’s still somewhat vague. What’s considered immoderate, uncompromising, or fanatical? What’s the baseline to compare against? And those terms can get thrown around a bit as well. To dig deeper, I next engaged Microsoft Copilot to do a deep dive and review various definitions, interpretations, and analyses of extremism. I asked it to review the academic literature as well as global government and intergovernmental websites and provide me with a several page overview (including references) as well as a 2 to 3 sentence definition of extremist.

Not surprisingly (to the point of duh), there’s no single, universally agreed definition of extremism or extremist (hence the inherent vagueness of many definitions). Even the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime recognizes this in some of its teaching materials, acknowledging there is no universal consensus regarding what exactly constitutes violent extremism, an absence that has at times been problematic. It’s a fairly subjective term that categorizes thought, speech, and actions (generally political or religious) with respect to mainstream attitudes of society or subgroups within society. Here are a few key points from Copilot’s overview.

In addition to being subjective and a form of othering in general, power differentials also play a role in who is labeled an extremist, with the acts of low power groups often judged more extreme than similar acts by dominant groups (Coleman and Bartoli 2002). Such minority groups can sometimes flip this on its head, equating so-called extreme resistance against the dominant group with prosocial acts benefiting us all, as Martin Luther King Jr. did in his 1963 Letter from a Birmingham Jail:

Was not Jesus an extremist for love… So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice? In that dramatic scene on Calvary’s hill three men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were crucified for the same crime — the crime of extremism. Two were extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment. The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth and goodness, and thereby rose above his environment.

In this framing extremism may be prosocial or antisocial — it may be for love or hate. National governments, however, often define extremism either by the willingness to use violence for ideological ends or by opposition to the democratic constitutional order, often centering on threats to fundamental rights (see the list of government and intergovernmental sources reviewed in the References section). Many scholars, meanwhile, define extremism relationally, viewing it as extreme distance from the political mainstream (Sedgwick 2010), a form of in-group/out-group hostility (Berger 2018), and a rejection of the democratic state (Bötticher 2017). These varied definitions create legal and practical challenges, particularly regarding the protection of free speech and the real risk of mislabeling groups or individuals (Williford 2019).

From this analysis, Copilot’s synthesized the following definition (and all of the cited references are included in the reference section at the end of this stack).

An extremist is an individual or group whose beliefs, goals, or tactics lie far outside a society’s prevailing political, religious, or social mainstream, marked by a rigid in-group-versus-out-group worldview that rejects pluralism, compromise, and core democratic norms such as the rule of law and minority rights. Extremist ideologies characteristically justify, threaten, or employ violence or other unlawful means to achieve their ends, though most legal and scholarly definitions treat holding extreme beliefs alone as distinct from — and insufficient to establish — violent extremism.

As indicated by the second part of the first sentence — marked by a rigid in-group-versus-out-group worldview that rejects pluralism, compromise, and core democratic norms such as the rule of law and minority rights — this definition is moving towards equating antisocial worldviews, policies, and actions with extremism. Here, love is the norm; hate is extremist. However, there’s still inherent contradictions embedded within this definition, because the rule of law and/or parts of the prevailing mainstream, driven by dominant groups, may still be in conflict with minority rights and pluralism.

What if we build on this prosocial framing? Could this help reduce some of these embedded contradictions?

Integrating a Prosocial as well as Structural Violence Framing

I next asked Copilot to build on that second half of the first sentence a bit more, integrating ideas and concepts regarding prosocial behavior and protecting the commons into this analysis and definition. I recommended looking at Elinor Ostrom’s work on the commons, ’s work on economic changes to protect the commons, work in the cultural evolutionary sphere focusing on prosocial and sustainable behavior, as well as other related areas in the academic literature. In addition, relative to extremist violence, I also asked it to consider a) how people’s words and actions can inflame passions and help instigate violence from others even if they don’t commit physical violence themselves and b) state-sanctioned or structural violence ( has been referencing this quite a bit as of late). Again, see the Reference section below for the complete list of sources.

Research on prosocial behavior and commons governance provides a complementary explanation for extremism that includes group dynamics rather than ideology alone. Choi and Bowles (2007) describe parochial altruism as the combination of self-sacrificing loyalty to one’s own group and hostility toward outsiders, an evolved tendency that may have helped groups succeed in conflict. Building on this idea, Reeve (2023) argues that extremist violence often reflects perceived threats from outgroups, while Berger (2017) notes that extremist movements view politics as a struggle for dominance rather than a shared effort to advance the common good. In this sense, extremists seek to capture civic life for their in-group instead of stewarding it collectively. That should sound familiar, reflecting the actions of authoritarians, oligarchs, fossil fuel interests, and many Republicans.

This perspective links extremism to the challenge of maintaining a shared commons (social and physical). Ostrom’s research showed that a healthy commons depend on mechanisms such as collective decision-making, monitoring, fair conflict resolution, and accountability, while Wilson et al. (2023) warned that their absence can lead to exploitation by elites and endless power struggles. Extending these ideas to democracy, Farrer (2022) argues that the public sphere itself is a commons that can be degraded (or overgrazed) by divisive and sensational political behavior (e.g. Trump and other MAGA politicians), fueling polarization and extremism. Similar concerns are echoed by Mazzucato (2026) and Raworth (2017), who argue that neglecting shared public goods erodes trust, concentrates power, and deepens political alienation, creating conditions in which exclusionary and extremist movements can thrive.

Scholarship on extremism also increasingly recognizes that violence can extend beyond direct physical acts committed by identifiable individuals. Concepts such as stochastic terrorism (Molly and Meloy 2021) and dangerous speech (Benesch 2013) argue that repeated dehumanizing or inflammatory rhetoric can increase the likelihood that others will commit violence, morally and socially implicating speakers even when they neither command nor personally carry out attacks.

A related tradition, rooted in Galtung’s (1969) concept of structural violence and expanded by Farmer (2004), views harm embedded in social, economic, and political institutions as a form of violence when it systematically prevents people from realizing their full potential or meeting basic needs. Under this broader understanding, violence includes both rhetoric that catalyzes harm and policies or social structures that foreseeably produce suffering, complicating definitions of extremism that focus solely on direct acts of physical aggression by individuals.

Given the added focus on prosocial behavior, governance of the commons, inflammatory rhetoric, and structural violence, Copilot’s updated synthesized definition is as follows:

An extremist is an individual or group whose beliefs, goals, or tactics lie far outside a society’s prevailing political, religious, or social mainstream, driven by a parochial form of altruism that channels intense loyalty toward an in-group while treating an out-group as an illegitimate threat rather than a partner in a shared social commons. This worldview rejects the pluralism, compromise, and collective-choice, monitoring, and conflict-resolution mechanisms — the rule of law, minority rights, and accountable institutions — that allow diverse groups to govern shared civic life together, seeking instead to capture or dismantle that commons for the in-group’s exclusive benefit. Extremist ideologies characteristically justify, threaten, incite, or enact violence toward this end — whether through direct physical acts, rhetoric that foreseeably provokes others to violence, or harmful policies imposed through institutional power — though most legal and scholarly definitions treat holding extreme beliefs alone as distinct from, and insufficient to establish, violent extremism.

This definition expands the concept of extremism to include antisocial behaviors and policies that damage the social or physical commons. And by recognizing that institutional power (and the mainstream) can be a source of extremism as well, the previous embedded contradictions have been reduced.

An Extremism Rubric

To ease the use of this definition in evaluating how extreme voting records, policies, rhetoric, etc., might be, I then used Copilot to help develop an Extremism Assessment Rubric based on this updated definition and the underlying analysis and references examined from government and intergovernmental sources, political science research, terrorism studies, commons-governance literature, and scholarship on violence and group behavior.

After several iterations, I was able to produce a structured, evidence-based scoring framework for comparing how far a given artifact sits from democratic, prosocial, and pluralistic norms — the farther it is, the more extreme it is. It was designed to evaluate a range of artifacts, including policies or laws (enacted or proposed), a politician’s rhetoric, legislative voting records, party platforms, an organization’s strategic plan, etc. Critically, it is explicitly not a legal determination or a substitute for close reading. A high score doesn’t establish criminality, unconstitutionality, or anything else of a legal nature; it’s a starting point for structured comparison and a signal for where deeper research is warranted. It currently resides in an Excel workbook with the following five tabs: Read Me, Rubric, Artifact Guidance, Scoring Tool, and References.

The rubric consists of six dimensions (listed below), each with a Grounded In citation column mapping it back to the specific sources used to justify it. Each dimension is scored as 0 (no meaningful marker present), 1 (mild indication), 2 (moderate indication), 3 (strong indication), or 4 (sever indication), allowing users to distinguish between mainstream positions, radical but non-extremist positions, and genuinely extremist positions. The underlying premise is that extremism is not defined by a particular ideology but by patterns of behavior, institutional attitudes, treatment of out-groups, and willingness to undermine pluralistic democratic processes.

• D1 Distance from Mainstream: measures how far a position sits from prevailing political or social norms, ranging from broadly accepted positions (0) to ideas wholly outside legitimate public discourse (4).

• D2 Opposition to Constitutional & Democratic Norms: evaluates attitudes toward rule of law, minority rights, checks and balances, and democratic institutions, progressing from active support of those institutions (0) to explicit advocacy for dismantling them (4).

• D3 Violence (direct, incited, or structural): broadens the traditional violence criterion to include direct violence, incitement, dangerous speech, stochastic terrorism, and forms of structural violence; scores range from no threat or harm (0) to explicit endorsement of violence or severe targeted harm (4).

• D4 In-Group Loyalty & Out-Group Dehumanization: measures the extent to which an actor treats outsiders as illegitimate, dangerous, or undeserving of rights, ranging from inclusive treatment of all stakeholders (0) to explicit dehumanization or denial of fundamental rights (4).

• D5 Rejection of Accountable Pluralistic Process: draws heavily from Elinor Ostrom’s commons-governance research and evaluates whether actors work through deliberative institutions or seek to concentrate power by weakening oversight, independent monitoring, courts, elections, or accountability mechanisms; scores range from full participation in established processes (0) to elimination of independent checks (4).

• D6 Absolutism & Rejection of Compromise: measures willingness to negotiate and coexist with disagreement, progressing from openness to amendment and compromise (0) to treating a goal as an absolute mandate that justifies any means necessary (4).

Each dimension also has an adjustable weight (default 1.0), and the weighted total divided by the maximum possible yields a percentage that maps to the following four bands:

• Mainstream (0–16%)

• Radical/Non-Extreme (17–41%)

• High Extremism Risk (42–66%)

• Severe/Extreme (67–100%)

Every score requires a quote, bill number, roll-call citation, page reference, etc. in the adjacent Evidence column; so the scores are anchored to observable behaviors rather than ideological content — evaluators need to explain and defend their ratings using evidence. Four calibration examples were also pre-loaded spanning all four bands (the Infrastructure Act, the 1913–17 suffrage movement, a composite hypothetical, and Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM)’s 1994 Rwanda broadcasts), calibrating the rubric with a broader range of examples beyond current U.S. circumstances.

The Excel workbook includes guidance for applying the dimensions to different types of evidence and emphasizes safeguards against partisan misuse, including a swap test to ensure identical standards are applied across ideological groups, explicit time-and-place definitions of what counts as mainstream, and recommendations for multiple independent raters. In practice, the tool is designed less as a mechanism for labeling opponents and more as a transparent framework for evaluating how closely a position aligns with or departs from the norms of pluralistic democratic society.

Applying the Rubric — Cindy Holscher vs Ty Masterson

I recently applied the rubric (using the default weighting of 1.0 for each dimension) to the legislative voting records of Kansas’s two gubernatorial candidates: Democrat Cindy Holscher and Republican Ty Masterson. Both have been in the Kansas legislature long enough to make such an evaluation worthwhile. Senator Holscher first served in the House from 2016 - 2020, and then was elected to the Senate in 2020. Senator Masterson first served in the House from late 2005 - 2008, and then began serving in the Senate in 2009.

The table below presents the results of this analysis. I had Copilot reference multiple sources for voting records and other legislative activities (listed in the “Rater” row of the table) — including committee assignments, sponsored bills, scorecards, and independent news sources —- and then use the rubric to assess each candidate’s associated degree of extremism. Data were examined specifically for the dates listed in “Date/Date Range” row; Ty Masterson’s range begins when he assumed the Senate presidency. However, these results are only from one “rater” - Copilot. Ideally I would have done this myself as well as used other LLMs to increase the number of raters. The score is given for each dimension, followed by the evidence for the score in the row below. Confidence levels for the overall ratings are generally assigned as follows:

High Confidence

• Primary sources available and reviewed directly.

• Evidence exists for most or all dimensions.

• Little dispute regarding the factual record.

• Multiple independent sources corroborate key findings.

Medium Confidence

• Some primary sources available but supplemented by secondary reporting.

• Evidence gaps exist for one or more dimensions.

• Material requires moderate interpretation.

• Reasonable raters might differ by 1-2 points on some dimensions.

Low Confidence

• Limited evidence.

• Reliance on summaries or third-party descriptions.

• Significant uncertainty about facts or context.

• Score could plausibly change substantially if additional information emerged.

Masterson scores higher than Holscher on every dimension, sometimes significantly so. Masterson’s total is 15 (62.5% of the maximum possible 24) compared to Holscher’s total of 4 (16.7% of the maximum possible 24). This places Masterson at the high end of the High Extremism Risk band while Holscher sits at the border between the Mainstream and Radical/Non-Extreme bands. Masterson’s overall score received a high confidence level while Holscher’s received a medium confidence level. Holscher’s lower confidence level was due to the use of more secondary sources and an interpretation that different raters might vary on their scoring more for Holscher than Masterson based on the sources referenced.

Holscher’s borderline result was primarily the result of her highest score of 2 for D4: In-Group Loyalty & Out-Group Dehumanization, driven by some adversarial (us vs. them) but non-dehumanizing framing of political opponents (Masterson scored a 3 on this). Though based on the rubric’s guidance, I would have interpreted this adversarial but non-dehumanizing framing as a 1 instead of a 2 (one reason muliptle raters are needed). Regardless, it’s important to note that Holscher’s framing in this context has been a reaction to consistent, long-running efforts by the Kansas legislative GOP to attack public services (the commons) that Kansans depend on as well as minority rights via culture war issues — key parts of the definition defining extremist actions. Such extremist efforts have also been consistently supported and instigated by Masterson.

And anyone familiar with Kansas politics and its legislative history shouldn’t be surprised by the huge gap in the score totals between the two candidates. Masterson has consistently supported legislation and constitutional amendments designed to:

• restrict voting rights (including eliminating drop boxes, mandating full hand-counts, ending the mail-ballot grace period, and banning ranked-choice voting)

• restrict local control (including the ability of cities and counties to ban or limit natural gas in new construction)

• overturn the will of Kansas voters (including voter affirmation of women’s access to abortion)

• politicize and inject dark money into the state’s Supreme Court to reduce judicial independence

• restrict the governor’s veto powers (one of the few checks a governor has over the legislature)

• defund and attack public education (including historical underfunding efforts such as the 2015 Block Grant bill, the refusal to fully fund special education, ongoing efforts to shift public dollars to private/religious schools without sufficient oversight, targeting districts who support trans youth and DEI efforts, and generally stepping on the toes of the Kansas Department of Education and state/local boards of education)

• disproportionally harm low-income Kansans (including legislating ridiculous and dehumanizing welfare restrictions and verification requirements)

• refuse the expansion of Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act (limiting needed healthcare for many Kansans and further jeopardizing rural hospitals)

• restrict the use of state funds to assist non-citizens (including barring undocumented immigrants from state benefits and higher education subsidies and restricting state funds to cities, counties, and law enforcement agencies if they adopt policies limiting cooperation with federal immigration authorities).

• support ICE’s efforts to aggressively target Kansas residents (including bypassing local control, expanding detention windows, expanding the immunity of officers acting under ICE agreements, and restricting the rights of community protesters and watchers)

• implement regressive tax policies (including a high sales tax on food, an over-reliance on sales and excise taxes rather than progressive income brackets, on-going pushes for single-rate flat taxes, 20-year tax breaks for Data Centers, and Brownback’s previous huge tax “experiment” failure that slashed individual income tax rates and completely exempted business pass-through income from state taxes — Masterson was a strong supporter)

• restrict the rights of minorities (including access to gender-affirming healthcare by trans youth; some of this legislation will also be costly to implement).

Masterson’s voting also reflects a pattern of ruling out an accepted bi-partisan compromise (or even intraparty compromise) rather than negotiating within it. In contrast, Holscher has demonstrated a willingness to have discussions, open debate, and work across the aisle when those opportunities arise. She has also demonstrated an openness to revising previous positions given new evidence, expert opinions, and/or constituent feedback (changing her position on data centers is one example).

While Ty Masterson’s rhetoric hasn’t outright promoted violence, some of it certainly could contribute to it. Regarding legislation impacting trans youth access to gender affirming care, he has branded such care as radical transgender ideology and the mutilation of minors. And he has framed sports bans and bathroom bans as necessary to protect women and girls in private or competitive spaces from biological men (language that critics argue portrays transgender women as predators or unfair competitors). Above I referenced scholarship arguing that repeated dehumanizing or inflammatory rhetoric such as this can increase the likelihood others will commit violence. And recently shared an example of such rhetoric likely doing just this — contributing to the brutalization of a trans couple.

Masterson’s uncompromising nature and rhetoric align with his authoritarian style of leadership during his tenure as Senate president. He and Speaker of the House Dan Hawkins commonly circumvented rules and norms to meet their agendas and bullied members of their own party to keep them in line (threatening to revoke committee leadership roles is one example). In conversing with a GOP House member regarding one past anti-transgender piece of legislation he replied as follows: Thanks for the update, I’m on the fence right now, I’m getting tremendous pressure and threats from the spk [speaker’s] office. Said more the I should have, sorry.

Given all of this, it’s not surprising that Trump endorsed Masterson during the primary or that Masterson gladly accepted it, displaying the Trump seal of approval on his campaign website. He proudly displays the endorsement of a convicted felon, adjudicated rapist, pedophile protector (who is quite possibly a pedophile himself), authoritarian, bigot, misogynist, white supremacist, and arguably the most corrupt President in U.S. history who is completely out of touch with the plight of most Americans.

Even if you don’t agree with all of Cindy Holscher’s positions (or even that many of them), she’s been in the legislature for the right reasons — to listen to and serve her constituents and Kansans overall. She wants to make Kansans lives better. She wants a rule of law that respects minority rights and holds institutions and leaders accountable. She wants more progressive tax policies, resource conservation and environmental protection, and for Kansans to have access to healthcare, affordable housing, healthy food, childcare, a good quality education, and a decent wage — protecting the Kansas commons. And she really would like Topeka to be more bipartisan. Plus she’s willing to do the work to try and get there. Masterson, however, has demonstrated that he’s about serving himself, corporate and wealthy elites of a similar mindset, white Christian nationalists, and the Trump regime. He’s also apparently all about cushy jobs that he doesn’t have to show up for.

Masterson is the real extremist here — and we have the receipts to back it up.

Come November, all Kansans need to remember that, as I’ve pointed out previously, the extremism of Masterson and the Kansas MAGA GOP hurts all of us.

The results highlight areas where the rubric may need additional calibration. Whether some dimensions, particularly structural harms and threats to pluralistic governance, deserve greater weighting remains an open question. And assessing the potential for additional sources to review needs to be done as well. In addition, the use of the terms Mainstream and Radical to describe the first two bands needs to be revisited. Something like Prosocial should probably be used in place of Mainstream.

References

Foundational Sources

Coleman, Peter T., and Andrea Bartoli. “Addressing Extremism.” International Center for Cooperation and Conflict Resolution, Columbia University, 2002. https://www.cve-kenya.org/media/library/Coleman__Bartoli_2002_Addressing_Extremism.pdf.

Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. “Extremism.” Accessed August 9, 2026. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extremism.

Williford, Anna C. “Blurred Lines: What Is Extremism?” University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform 52, no. 4 (2019): 937. https://repository.law.umich.edu/mjlr/vol52/iss4/7.

Government and Intergovernmental Sources

Australian Security Intelligence Organisation and Office of National Intelligence. “Director-General’s Annual Threat Assessment 2025.” February 19, 2025. https://www.oni.gov.au/news/asio-annual-threat-assessment-2025.

Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz. “Glossar: Extremismus.” Accessed August 9, 2026. https://www.verfassungsschutz.de/SharedDocs/glossareintraege/DE/E/extremismus.html.

European Commission. “Communication on Supporting the Prevention of Radicalisation Leading to Violent Extremism.” COM(2016) 379 final, June 14, 2016. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:52016DC0379.

European Commission, Migration and Home Affairs. “Radicalisation Awareness Network (RAN).” Accessed August 9, 2026. https://home-affairs.ec.europa.eu/networks/radicalisation-awareness-network-ran/about-ran_en.

Federal Bureau of Investigation and U.S. Department of Homeland Security. “Domestic Terrorism: Definitions, Terminology, and Methodology.” November 2020. https://www.fbi.gov/file-repository/fbi-dhs-domestic-terrorism-definitions-terminology-methodology.pdf.

Public Safety Canada. “National Strategy on Countering Radicalization to Violence.” Accessed August 9, 2026. https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/rsrcs/pblctns/ntnl-strtg-cntrng-rdclztn-vlnc/index-en.aspx.

Scottish Government. “Understanding Extremism in Scotland: Review of Definitions and Terminology.” July 27, 2023. https://www.gov.scot/publications/understanding-extremism-scotland-review-definitions-terminology/pages/2/.

UK Commission for Countering Extremism. “Challenging Hateful Extremism.” GOV.UK, October 7, 2019. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/challenging-hateful-extremism.

UK Home Office and Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities. “New Definition of Extremism (2024).” GOV.UK, March 14, 2024. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/new-definition-of-extremism-2024/new-definition-of-extremism-2024.

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. “Counter-Terrorism Module 2: Key Issues – Preventing and Countering Violent Extremism.” Accessed August 9, 2026. https://www.unodc.org/e4j/en/terrorism/module-2/key-issues/preventing-and-countering-violent-extremism.html.

United Nations Office of Counter-Terrorism. “Plan of Action to Prevent Violent Extremism.” A/70/674, January 15, 2016. https://www.un.org/counterterrorism/en/plan-of-action-to-prevent-violent-extremism.

General Academic and Scholarly Sources

Berger, J. M. Extremism. MIT Press Essential Knowledge series. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2018. https://direct.mit.edu/books/book/4142/Extremism.

Bötticher, Astrid. “Towards Academic Consensus Definitions of Radicalism and Extremism.” Perspectives on Terrorism 11, no. 4 (2017): 73–77. https://www.jstor.org/stable/26297896.

Mudde, Cas. “The War of Words: Defining the Extreme Right Party Family.” West European Politics 19, no. 2 (1996): 225–248. https://scispace.com/pdf/the-war-of-words-defining-the-extreme-right-party-family-lb1fjz83pw.pdf.

Neumann, Peter R. “The Trouble with Radicalization.” International Affairs 89, no. 4 (2013): 873–893. https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2346.12049.

Schmid, Alex P. Radicalisation, De-Radicalisation, Counter-Radicalisation: A Conceptual Discussion and Literature Review. The Hague: International Centre for Counter-Terrorism (ICCT), March 2013. https://www.icct.nl/sites/default/files/import/publication/ICCT-Schmid-Radicalisation-De-Radicalisation-Counter-Radicalisation-March-2013_2.pdf.

Sedgwick, Mark. “The Concept of Radicalization as a Source of Confusion.” Terrorism and Political Violence 22, no. 4 (2010): 479–494. https://doi.org/10.1080/09546553.2010.491009.

Prosocial Behavior and Commons Governance Sources

Berger, J. M. “Extremist Construction of Identity: How Escalating Demands for Legitimacy Shape and Define In-Group and Out-Group Dynamics.” ICCT Research Paper, April 2017. https://icct.nl/publication/extremist-construction-identity-how-escalating-demands-legitimacy-shape-and-define.

Cassam, Quassim. Extremism: A Philosophical Analysis. London: Routledge, 2022. https://www.routledge.com/Extremism-A-Philosophical-Analysis/Cassam/p/book/9780367343873

Choi, Jung-Kyoo, and Samuel Bowles. “The Coevolution of Parochial Altruism and War.” Science 318, no. 5850 (2007): 636–640. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1144237.

de Groot, Thomas, and Sophie Bloemen, eds. “The Potential of the Commons: A Conversation with Kate Raworth and George Monbiot.” In Our Commons: Political Ideas for a New Europe. Amsterdam: Commons Network, 2019. https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Conversation_with_Kate_Raworth_and_George_Monbiot_about_the_Potential_of_the_Commons.

Farrer, Benjamin. “Political Communication as a Tragedy of the Commons.” Political Studies, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1177/00323217221138414.

Mazzucato, Mariana. The Common Good Economy: A New Compass. London: Penguin Allen Lane, 2026. https://marianamazzucato.com/books/the-common-good-economy/.

Ostrom, Elinor. Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990. https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/governing-the-commons/7AB7AE11BADA84409C34815CC288CD79.

Raworth, Kate. Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist. White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green, 2017. https://www.chelseagreen.com/product/doughnut-economics-paperback/.

Reeve, Zoey. “In the Eye of the Beholder: Parochial Altruism, Radicalization, and Extremism.” ProSocial World, November 2, 2023. https://www.prosocial.world/posts/in-the-eye-of-the-beholder-parochial-altruism-radicalization-and-extremism.

Wilson, David Sloan, Elinor Ostrom, and Michael E. Cox. “Generalizing the Core Design Principles for the Efficacy of Groups.” Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization 90, Supplement (2013): S21–S32. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0167268112002697

Wilson, David Sloan, Guru Madhavan, Michele J. Gelfand, Steven C. Hayes, Paul W. B. Atkins, and Rita R. Colwell. “Multilevel Cultural Evolution: From New Theory to Practical Applications.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 120, no. 16 (2023): e2218222120. https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2218222120.

Wilson, David Sloan, and Dennis J. Snower. “Rethinking the Theoretical Foundation of Economics I: The Multilevel Paradigm.” Economics 18, no. 1 (2024): 1–18. https://doi.org/10.1515/econ-2022-0070.

Incitement and Structural Violence Sources

Amman, Molly, and J. Reid Meloy. “Stochastic Terrorism and Incitement to Violence: A Linguistic and Psychological Analysis.” Perspectives on Terrorism 15, no. 5 (2021): 2–13. https://pt.icct.nl/article/stochastic-terrorism-and-incitement-violence-linguistic-and-psychological-analysis.

Benesch, Susan. “Dangerous Speech: A Proposal to Prevent Group Violence.” Dangerous Speech Project, February 23, 2013. https://dangerousspeech.org/.

Farmer, Paul. “An Anthropology of Structural Violence.” Current Anthropology 45, no. 3 (2004): 305–325. https://doi.org/10.1086/382250.

Galtung, Johan. “Violence, Peace, and Peace Research.” Journal of Peace Research 6, no. 3 (1969): 167–191. https://doi.org/10.1177/002234336900600301.

This is an expanded version of my op-ed that ran in the Kansas Reflector on 7/20/2024.

Buildings and republics are both susceptible to deferred maintenance. The mold that develops from roof leaks addressed only with buckets, the concentration of power among wealthy elites and corporations resulting from unfettered dark money, and the loss of voting rights that comes from passing legislation designed to suppress the vote — these are all examples of how both buildings and democratic institutions deteriorate without proactive care.

Kansas land, water, wildlife, schools, universities, hospitals, courts, government institutions and our right to vote are all part of the commons — they’re all part of the shared infrastructure, democratic norms and natural resources our communities rely on. On Aug. 4 and Nov. 3, Kansans will either vote to keep deferring that maintenance or they’ll recognize that protecting the commons protects us all.

Kansas K-12 public school facilities’ 2025 deferred maintenance levels were estimated to be about $316 million — the sum of a $157.8 million annual maintenance and operations shortfall and a $158.2 million annual capital renewal gap (2025 State of Our Schools, Kansas profile). Deferred maintenance, through inflation and the additional problems created by it, always costs more down the road. It’s been estimated that every dollar of deferred maintenance costs four to six dollars to address later. And this doesn’t include the very real harm to students’ learning or occupant mental and physical health.

Yet we choose to let these parts of our commons decay while the Legislature and governor hand subsidies to professional sports stadiums and 20-year tax breaks to data centers (which can strain local energy and water resources, negatively impact local air quality and noise levels, as well as delay our transition to renewables).

Our social and governmental infrastructure is also on the line. Will voters continue electing officials (i.e., Republicans) who refuse to expand Medicaid? Who starve our state government to fund tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy, underfunding special education and other parts of the commons in the process? And the Aug. 4 amendment to elect Supreme Court justices and abolish their merit-based selection — promoted by Republican leaders and lobbyists — is a partisan attempt to undermine the court’s independence. Justices could have greater allegiance to party and special interest groups than the state’s Constitution or its citizens. It will further destabilize the foundations of democracy in our state — voting against the amendment is necessary maintenance to help stabilize that foundation.

Unfortunately, these same Republican leaders are also trying to limit Kansans’ ability to vote at all. The new House Bill 2437 voter roll purge (facing an ACLU and League of Women Voters challenge), the voting eligibility amendment on the Nov. 3 ballot and the end of the three-day grace period for mail-in ballots are all designed to suppress the vote.

This is all occurring amid the Trump administration’s own efforts to undermine voting, including dismissing the Democrats on the Election Assistance Commission and aggressively pushing the inaptly named SAVE America Act (of course HB 2437 is named the SAVE Kansas Act). Voting is a defining ritual of a democratic society. Impinging on that right says you no longer belong; you can no longer help maintain your society.

Protecting and maintaining the commons and ensuring equitable access to its resources — healthcare, education, healthy food, clean air and water, energy, land for growing and recreation, affordable housing, a voice in governance — isn’t radical. It isn’t extremist. It’s one of our oldest adaptive strategies as humans.

Crumbling infrastructure, environmental degradation, corruption and wealth gaps are all outcomes of the commons’ deferred maintenance. They’re both symptoms and causes of societal decay. Coming together to protect the commons is the antidote: It’s how we coexist and cooperate with one another while protecting the resources we all need to thrive, benefiting every Kansan.

Kansans for Conservation is an example of this. The diverse coalition of 40-plus agricultural, environmental, educational, and recreational organizations are dedicated to protecting Kansas’s natural heritage, working lands, water quality and wildlife habitats. The group has successfully introduced bipartisan legislation, House Bill 2063, to establish a dedicated state-level fund for conservation efforts and will build on that success during the next legislative session.

This isn’t an extremist endeavor. I doubt the Kansas Farm Bureau would consider itself radical. No, this is simply basic maintenance of the commons.

Gov. Laura Kelly’s veto and the courts have been the commons’ last line of defense, even if they haven’t always been successful. If the MAGA/authoritarian right maintains control over the Legislature while taking the governorship, and the courts become partisan, those checks are gone. Imagine such a scenario under a Ty Masterson governorship - that would be a nightmare come to life. The Kansas commons can’t afford that to happen, and we really need to break the GOP supermajority in both legislative bodies.

And while a Democrat will certainly be better than a Republican with respect to this broad definition of the commons, not all Democrats are equal. It’s important to keep this in mind when you cast your August 4^th primary vote. Among the Democrats I’m supporting include Cindy Holscher for Governor and Christy Davis for U.S. Senate. I was already supporting Senator Holscher, but the frankly weird targeting of Holscher by Governor Kelly (see this from ) only further solidified my support.

In this 250th anniversary year of our nation, let’s recognize that the commons is something we inherit, protect, maintain, improve and pass on to future generations. Make sure you vote on August 4^th and November 3^rd, talk to your friends, family, and neighbors about these issues, and back the candidates who will maintain what we collectively share.

Imagine trying to fall back asleep at two in the morning when the space you're in feels like 98°F. The stagnant, humid air envelops you like a hot, damp blanket you can't untangle yourself from. There's no thermostat to adjust, no fan to turn on, no window to open, and nowhere else cooler to go. Your best option is to press yourself against a concrete floor and hope the slab has shed enough of the day's heat to provide some small degree of relief. This isn't a hypothetical. It's what inmates at a Florida correctional facility have been living through - recorded by sensors, documented in court filings, and the subject of a class-action lawsuit scheduled for trial this summer.

A study conducted by Professor Stefano Schiavon, associate director of research at the Center for the Built Environment at UC Berkeley has put numbers to conditions that had long been described anecdotally. The findings, summarized in the following article: Inside the “concrete battery”: CED researcher Stefano Schiavon exposes lethal heat in Florida prisons, were included in a subsequent report commissioned by the Florida Justice Institute (FJI) as part of their class action lawsuit on behalf of inmates challenging the lack of air conditioning in Dade Correctional Institution (Dade C.I.), a state prison in Miami-Dade County.

After installing 31 sensors throughout the facility and logging air temperature and relative humidity every five minutes from May through October 2025, Schiavon found that the indoor heat index (HI) was above 88°F for 97% of the measured period. The heat index, which accounts for both relative humidity and air temperature, is a better proxy than air temperature alone for what thermal conditions feel like to the human body. Not only was the indoor heat index almost always above 88°F, the median indoor heat index across the facility during this time frame was 98°F, with recorded peaks near 120°F. At every sensor location, at every hour of the day, it was consistently hotter inside the prison than it was outside.

Note: The wet bulb globe temperature (WBGT) is an even better proxy than the heat index, as it accounts for air temperature, relative humidity, solar radiation (radiant heat), and air speed. However, this can’t be captured at scale with standard dataloggers. Hand-held meters with the relevant sensors are needed to record spot measurements of the indoor WBGT, making the use of this metric impractical for this type of study.

You might think that night would at least offer some opportunity for inmates to find relief. You would be wrong.

Dade Correctional is mostly brick and concrete, and Schiavon describes the effect plainly: the building acts like a battery, absorbing solar energy throughout the day and radiating it back into occupied spaces after dark. In a temperate or desert climate, that thermal mass can be a positive feature as it helps moderate wide interior temperature swings. In humid Miami-Dade county, where nighttime temperatures rarely drop enough to discharge the load, it becomes a trap, and heat accumulates. With limited ventilation and no air conditioning, it has nowhere to go. And the inmates inside have no way to escape it.

The demographics make this worse. More than 50% of the prison’s population is over age 50, and nearly 24% are over 65. These are people with hypertension, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and physiologies that are generally less adaptable - conditions that dramatically reduce the body’s ability to regulate core temperature under sustained thermal stress. According to FJI, at least four deaths at the facility have been attributed to the inability of inmates to lower their body temperatures, and the lawsuit argues that these conditions constitute cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment.

Translating Measurements into Health Burden

Schiavon’s heat index data establishes one representation of occupant experience. But can we use this data to quantify, in some way, what these thermal conditions could be doing to the bodies of the inmates over time?

I recently updated happē‘s Thermal Comfort & Temperature module, adding a set of Health Impacts algorithms based largely on the following two papers:

• Estimating Indoor Heat-Related Health Impacts in Social Housing Using DALYs: A Preliminary Framework (summarized here).

• Heat exposure impacts on urban health: A meta-analysis

The module takes measured indoor thermal conditions and translates them into the following public health metrics:

• DALYs (Disability-Adjusted Life Years): A combined measure of years of healthy life lost to illness, disability, or premature death. One DALY represents one year of full health lost. It’s the WHO’s preferred unit for comparing disease burden across populations and conditions.

• Mortality increase: The estimated number of excess deaths above a baseline rate.

• Morbidity increase: The estimated excess hospital admissions or emergency department visits above a baseline.

To run the analysis for Dade Correctional, I used the following inputs drawn from the summary article of Schiavon’s study as well as other sources:

• Current indoor heat index: 98°F - The median value Schiavon recorded, which I’m using as the representative condition for the measured period to keep the analysis simple.

• Baseline indoor heat index: 77°F - An estimate of the average indoor heat index in Miami from May to October for air conditioned buildings (primarily residences) based on multiple sources, including the following: Interactions between indoor heat and energy affordability amplify household risks in hot-humid US climate zones.

• Minimum Mortality Temperature (MMT): 85°F - The thermal threshold below which heat-related health risk does not compound meaningfully - for Miami this is based primarily on Climate Central‘s updated city-level MMT data (summarized here).

• Baseline all-cause mortality rate: 750 deaths per 100,000 people per year - estimated from multiple sources, including this from the Florida Department of Health for Miami-Dade county.

• Baseline all-cause hospitalization admission rate: 11,000 patients per 100,000 people per year - estimated from multiple sources, including Florida AHCA and AHRQ HCUP.

• Correctional Institution population: approximately 1,406 inmates. This is the reported capacity of the facility. Using the reported demographic breakdown, then at maximum capacity this equates to approximately 1,055 individuals under age 65 and 352 aged 65 or older.

What the Models Say

The two figures below present the results of the analysis using these Health Impact algorithms, broken down by the two demographic age groups.

For inmates under age 65 (~1,055 people): During the six-month measured period alone, the model estimates 9.8 DALYs lost, which is equivalent to roughly 3.4 healthy days lost per person for this larger number of inmates. The expected mortality increase is 0.71 deaths above baseline during the period, or about 1.41 annualized. The morbidity increase is approximately 7.0 additional hospitalizations during the period, or 13.9 annualized.

For inmates 65 and older (~352 people): The picture is significantly worse. The model estimates 15.2 DALYs lost during the same period, which is roughly 15.8 healthy days lost per person for this smaller number of inmates, nearly five times the per-person health burden of the younger cohort. The expected mortality increase is 0.34 deaths above baseline during the period, or 0.68 annualized. Morbidity shows 2.3 additional hospitalizations during the period. For mortality and morbidity, remember that the younger cohort is approximately 3 times the size of the older cohort.

Combined across the full population: The Health Impact models estimate approximately 25 DALYs lost during the six month measured period, 1.05 expected excess deaths, and 9.3 additional hospitalizations. And these estimates are based on the measured median indoor heat index only. With heat index peaks substantially higher, the physiologies of these inmates have been, are, and will continue to be subjected to substantially more stress than this analysis represents.

It’s worth pausing on the mortality figure. The lawsuit attributes at least four deaths to the inability of inmates to lower their body temperatures. The Health Impact models, run on the median condition of 98°F, project roughly one additional death over the six month period. These simplified models (with estimated inputs) capture the population-level probabilistic burden for 6 months, while the lawsuit is documenting the more complex realities of specific individuals experiencing periods of extreme heat, up to near 120°F in some cases, for over a presumably longer period. Both are telling the same story - such conditions place human bodies under such extreme stress that some inmates are dying as a result.

The DALY disparity between age groups is particularly important. The older cohort is only about a quarter of the population, but they lose nearly five times more healthy days per person during the same period. This means the most medically vulnerable people in this facility are bearing the most concentrated health cost — with no ability to adapt, self-protect, or leave.

I know there will be individuals arguing these are criminals, and that we shouldn’t be “wasting” time addressing their needs. Setting aside arguments for needed criminal justice reform, these individuals are still human beings, and their sentencing didn’t include suffering from such intolerable conditions, the subsequent loss of healthy days and years from their lives, or the direct and immediate loss of their lives. They weren’t sentenced to death. And as the lawsuit argues, these conditions violate the eighth amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment, interpreted by the Supreme Court to refer to barbaric, torturous, or disproportionately severe sentences. Shortened lives or immediate loss of life from having to live in hellishly hot environments without relief would seem to fit the bill.

What This Means for the Built Environment

Let’s be clear about what this is: a building performance and operations failure - exacerbated by climate change as well as societal and economic factors surrounding attitudes towards incarceration, privatization, and built environment evaluations - with life-safety consequences. And these consequences are suffered mostly by those with limited power to take any action to protect themselves.

Nor is this only a Florida story. Schiavon has already been contacted by nonprofits and state officials about California prisons. The Central Valley heat wave patterns, combined with an aging incarcerated population, are setting up a similar crisis. Similar lawsuits have been and are being filed in Texas and Missouri, as this problem is increasingly being recognized across the U.S. South. It’s a story about what happens when we ignore or significantly downplay thermal comfort, thermal stress, and associated health impacts in buildings where vulnerable people have little to no agency.

Nor is this only a correctional facility story. Any high-mass, poorly conditioned and/or ventilated building housing people with limited mobility - nursing homes, emergency shelters, affordable multifamily housing with aging HVAC systems, hospitals without sufficient emergency power - carries a version of this risk profile. And while other facility types may not have the mobility or agency issue to the same degree, depending on the physical nature and condition of the facility and its regional location, there can still be real health impacts for those in schools, university campuses, community centers, warehouses, corporate offices, etc. The thermal mass battery doesn’t care about the facility type. And climate change for many locations is making the exposure window longer and more intense every decade - really every year now.

Nor can I leave this topic without also mentioning the concentration camps across the U.S. this administration continues to make use of (with no sign of backing down, given ICE’s recent surge in arrests). Some of these facilities are hellholes in their own right, including the high heat conditions experienced at many locations by detainees, including the elderly, the very young (including infants), pregnant mothers, those with pre-existing conditions, etc. From my referenced piece on these facilities:

... according to an analysis by the Washington Post, the hottest 10 percent of ICE facilities experience an average of 93 days of unhealthy temperatures each year.

I wouldn’t be surprised if a more comprehensive analysis including measurements of the type completed by Schiavon would find that it’s more than 10 percent of the facilities (though most would be in the south), with an average extending well beyond the 93 days. For the infants, toddlers, and other children incarcerated in these camps, they are being robbed of future healthy days before they’ve even had a chance to live their lives.

Schiavon states the building conclusion plainly:

Above a certain point, particularly when you have comorbid health conditions, safety becomes the priority and energy becomes secondary. At this Florida prison, only the use of air conditioning could reliably and consistently keep the heat index below 88°F.

Mechanical cooling effectively becomes a life-safety requirement in such conditions. Not a comfort upgrade. Not secondary to energy. A requirement. However, it is possible to design such facilities in an energy- and carbon-efficient manner (and even a regenerative manner in some cases).

The Role of Data, Models, and Transparency

The legal case Schiavon’s work is supporting - and the Health Impact analysis I’ve described here - only exist because Schiavon measured the prison’s conditions. The Florida Department of Corrections currently relies on outdoor weather data to trigger heat-safety protocols, like limiting outdoor exercises or providing ice. But as the measurements indicated, the indoor heat index routinely exceeded outdoor heat index. The measurements confirmed that the facility and its operations are inadequate for protecting the inmates from extreme heat conditions.

Data is the only way we can prove these environments are unsafe before it’s too late, Schiavon says.

Data (gathered via sensors built into BMS systems, IEQ assessments, post occupancy evaluations, etc.) is also the only way we can verify how any building is performing and what occupants are experiencing. And arguably that data should be a mix of quantitative and qualitative data (e.g., Where’s the Social? Reflections on POEs from EDRA57 and The Power of People’s Stories - Using Ethnography to Improve our Built Environments).

The Health Impacts algorithms I’ve compiled represent one attempt to carry that measurement a step further - from a heat index reading to a human health cost that policymakers, building owners, designers, consultants, and facility operators can act on. Nor is the methodology limited to correctional facilities - it can be applied to any building, any population, any thermal extreme. If you have a measured or modeled indoor heat index, the framework can translate it into DALYs, mortality risk, and expected hospitalizations, and this will be increasingly important to consider as global temperatures continue to rise. Similar approaches can also be taken to estimate the impacts on different learning and productivity metrics.

Such modeling efforts can be extended to other aspects of indoor environmental quality (IEQ) and beyond, necessarily informed by various types of measurements and facility evaluations. They can provide additional context and insights for assessing the impacts of existing conditions on occupants as well as evaluating among different system types, design and sustainability strategies, energy conservation measures (ECMs), retrocommissioning recommendations, certification system credits/features, etc.

And the transparency as well as accountability gained from sharing such data and modeling efforts - whether at the behest of a thoughtful building/portfolio owner or developer, or because of human rights advocates and a judge’s ruling - will only help increase the rate that we’re equitably creating healthy and sustainable/regenerative environments.

It should also help decrease the number of inmates or detainees desperately pressing their bodies against a concrete floor in the middle of the night, searching for some minimal degree of relief.

Last week, on the last day of Pride Month, the majority of the Supreme Court spat in the face of everything that month of celebration holds dear by ruling ...states may ban transgender athletes from women's and girls' sports, holding that Title IX permits schools to determine eligibility based on 'biological sex', as covered by in her Substack post: Supreme Court Rules Title IX Means “Biological Sex” In Devastating Anti-Trans Ruling.

While the nature of the ruling could have been worse, the damage will still be significant...

• Public schools and universities that choose to support and protect trans kids and students will be more vulnerable to political attacks, investigations, defunding threats, and lawsuits.

• Bathroom and sports bans targeting trans students will spread, now with this legal justification for discrimination.

• Isolation and persecution felt by trans kids and students, their families, and the trans community at large will deepen — their mental health will suffer, they will be less physically safe, and suicide rates will rise.

It’s even more important now that those of us in the AEC Industry continue helping our clients apply what the biological, behavioral, and medical sciences tell us about biological sex and gender to justify the creation of physically and socially inclusive built environments:

• Design Implications of Entangled Sex / Gender Spectrums

• DEI as a “Fitness” Program

And it is even more important now that we advocate for this as citizens and professionals, that we actively support public education and higher ed, and that we work really hard to elect legislators and officials who support (and will tirelessly work for) LGBTQIA+ rights, human rights in general, public education and higher ed (as well as education for the trades), science, climate action, decarbonization, democracy, and a vision for a more inclusive and equitable world.

• The Legislature’s Trans Obsession Harms Every Kansan

• Majority Rule Does Not Preclude Transgender Minority Rights

And if you need a few more reasons to step up, then read what the impacts of such bigoted, state legislation are on the people most directly impacted by them, in the words of trans individuals themselves, as reported in a recent Lawrence Times article: Some transgender people in Lawrence feel Kansas law is pushing them out. Here are a few examples:

Waiting until we are harmed by a law to strike that law down as harmful is asinine… it’s not how human rights work.

Every morning we wake up and hope that things won’t get any harder for us to live our lives in Kansas, she said. It’s exhausting, having to live in a constant state of fear that our government will choose to make our lives worse because of immutable aspects of our identities.

I am rearranging it [a show for trans performers] because I’m scared. I’m scared there’s going to be a day where somebody might walk in and try to harm us.

At the end of the day, a piece of paper does not define me, she wrote. I know who I am and… I’m gonna use whatever bathroom I’m most comfortable using because I’m a woman. At any moment, I am ready to throw that brick.

And to my fellow white, cisgender, and heterosexual men, stop living in the same blissful ignorance that Douglas County District Judge James McCabria apparently lives in. After the Kansas legislature passed a horrendous bathroom / gender marker bill (House Sub for SB 244) during the last legislative session, the American Civil Liberties Union and Ballard Spahr LLP filed a lawsuit on behalf of two Lawrence, KS, trans men to challenge the law. The judge, justifying his decision to deny the plaintiffs’ request to temporarily halt the legislation while the lawsuit plays out, stated the following in his memorandum:

In hearing the arguments of each side, the Court is struck by a basic assumption each side makes about the other that our ‘lesser angels’ drive our choices, McCabria wrote. Yet, the very paucity of actual examples that either side has put forward in any of the arguments suggests the opposite — that the vast majority of Kansans are tolerant, understanding, accepting and generally supportive of each other and that the vast majority of transgender persons have experienced this as Kansans.

Such a statement indicates a degree of willful ignorance that only white, cisgender, and heterosexual males seem capable of displaying, afforded by their blinders of privilege. That or the judge is deliberately hiding his bigotry in the flowery, yet dismissive prose of the majority’s privilege. It’s pretty easy to compile a summary of the existing evidence demonstrating how such legislation is harmful and dangerous to the trans community. I don’t doubt some of that was in the plaintiffs’ arguments, and the judge’s staff could have performed their own search easily enough. There’s plenty available to justify halting the legislation while the lawsuit plays out.

So don’t be that white, cisgender, heterosexual guy wearing your privileged-colored glasses, blinding you to the injustices around you — ESPECIALLY if you’re a judge or in some other position of power and authority.

And if you’re happily and enthusiastically just a bigot, well, then fuck you.

A few weeks ago I attended the annual Environmental Design Research Association conference on the campus of the University of Massachusetts Amherst. I was there in part because the digital short that Flavia Grey, PhD and I had produced (with extensive help from Lahmi Kim), on the POE process that ZGF Architects, BranchPattern, Daylight, and The Decision Lab co-developed with and for Princeton University Facilities, had been accepted. I also had the honor of accepting, on behalf of BranchPattern‘s Embodied Carbon Benchmark Study team, a Certificate of Research Excellence (CORE) award. This was my first time attending the conference, and it turned out to be a great opportunity to reconnect with design researchers I already knew, meet in person those I had only engaged with virtually, as well as expand my network.

Late one afternoon Flavia and I took a little self-guided tour through campus. What struck us most was the eclectic nature of the campus’s built environment - varying architectural styles, building heights, envelope and system types, and the like (and the varying experiences they created). At one point we joked that every new construction and major renovation RFP (request for proposal) must require applicants to familiarize themselves with all of the architectural and system variation and subsequently propose something unique. Points will be deducted for every repeated element.

I asked Microsoft Copilot to describe the campus’s architecture for me. The following paragraph from the output captures a lot of what we saw:

UMass Amherst’s 1,463-acre campus is best described as an eclectic palimpsest of American architectural styles, reflecting more than 150 years of evolution as one of the nation’s oldest land-grant public universities. The campus reads as a visible timeline of American institutional architecture — Victorian agricultural roots, a heavy mid-century brutalist core that defines its skyline and identity, and a contemporary layer of timber-forward, sustainability-driven buildings that consciously contrast (and in many ways critique) the concrete monoliths surrounding them. All of it sits within the pastoral landscape of the Pioneer Valley, which gives the harder built forms a softening counterpoint.

Strolling through campus, while impressed with the variation and the history captured within it, I couldn’t help but wonder about the maintenance challenges it all presented to the university’s Facilities and Campuses Services department. The different trade skills, parts, and materials required, how the variation contributes to deferred maintenance and difficulties in achieving decarbonization goals, the variation in the types of discomfort and other user complaints that must be addressed - it all must be quite challenging. It’s a situation where a formalized, systematic, and adaptable post-occupancy evaluation (POE) process - that includes a searchable database to house gathered insights, short and long-term recommendations, and general lessons learned - would be helpful in addressing the complexities of the campus environments.

Systematically conducted POEs for all new and major renovation projects would allow facilities to address problems early, before they worsen and become deferred maintenance issues. By gradually building the database and making the insights, recommendations, and lessons learned accessible to those doing the planning and design (all of which are contextually relevant to the campus in question), potential problems could be avoided in the first place - decreasing the list of recommended improvements that would be made by a subsequent POE.

The POE framework I mentioned above that we developed for Princeton is such a process, and you can view the digital short we submitted to #EDRA57 below; it’s six minutes long. And I would argue that a key component of its success is the socio-technic nature of the methodology, allowing Princeton to not only get a handle on aspects of building and site performance, but also understand the nuances of occupant experience and behavior (even including experiences like sense of belonging), and how all of these factors impact and interact with one another.

Short writeups of the process are also available here:

• Princeton PLACES (People, Learning, Access, Culture, Environment, Sustainability), via BranchPattern

• PLACES People | Learning | Access | Culture | Environment | Sustainability, via ZGF Architects

While POEs are increasingly incorporating a socio-technic framework (certainly more than when I started doing socio-technic POEs back in 2004 with or explored ethnographic type engagements with lab operators at Sandia National Laboratories in the 1990s as a young engineer), arguably the socio is still somewhat on the light side. A 2026 journal article I recently read - Post-occupancy evaluation and human-centered indoor environmental quality in higher-education buildings: a structured review - supported that assessment.

The article is essentially a lit review of existing research on post-occupancy evaluations (POEs) and indoor environmental quality (IEQ) in higher-education settings, focusing on actual building performance for occupants. Unsurprisingly, based on the research reviewed, it finds that temperature, air quality, lighting, and acoustics have a direct impact on people’s comfort, health, and ability to learn or work effectively. The authors also show that meeting standards or earning certifications doesn’t guarantee a good user experience, highlighting a gap between technical performance (even when achieved) and real-world satisfaction. Overall, the paper is generally aligned with BranchPattern‘s approach to different types of validation - POEs, IEQ performance testing, continuous commissioning, etc., emphasizing the need for ongoing evaluation that combines measured data with occupant feedback and operational factors, so buildings can be continuously improved based on how people actually use and experience them.

Where it differed from our approach (and Princeton’s framework), is that, within the studies reviewed, occupant engagement - the socio component - was generally limited to surveys (more on the limitations of surveys below). In addition, two disciplines from the social sciences key to understanding the social - anthropology and sociology - were left out of discussions regarding the interdisciplinary nature of POEs and IEQ research. Take the following quote for example:

Because POE and IEQ research spans building science, environmental psychology, facility management, education, and health-related fields, this approach supported comparison across study designs, evidence types, and building contexts. - p. 02

Despite the omission above, other quotes from the paper demonstrate author (and referenced studies’) acknowledgement (even if indirectly) of the importance of grasping the social to understand occupant experience and building performance:

• “Satisfaction is shaped by thermal conditions, adaptive opportunity, cultural expectations [emphasis added], and perceived control, which makes flexible comfort management especially relevant in university buildings.” - p. 05

• “... field studies show how ventilation, maintenance, and occupancy patterns [emphasis added] shape everyday user experience.” - p. 06

• “The ASHRAE Global Thermal Comfort Database II study by Ličina et al. (2018) demonstrated that people’s subjective reactions to their environment differ substantially from the actual conditions, underscoring the need for user-centered [emphasis added] POE methods for practical assessment.” - p. 08

• “The study by (Brambilla and Capolongo, 2019) demonstrated that human ratings in surveys are affected by short-term workplace pressures and social environments [emphasis added], ...” - p. 11

• “ISO 7730 can quantify thermal comfort through PMV/PPD-based indicators, but it may underrepresent individual adaptation, cultural expectations [emphasis added], and variation among occupants exposed to similar conditions.” - p. 11

• “ISO 3382 provides measurable acoustic parameters, but these indicators cannot fully explain subjective experiences of distraction, privacy, or annoyance [emphasis added] in learning and work environments (I. ISO, 2012).” - p. 11

The authors (and apparently the referenced studies) acknowledge the importance of the social, but fail to acknowledge that the methods of engagement reflected in these referenced studies (primarily surveys) aren’t adequate to fully capture and understand the various socio-cultural influences at play. This may, in part, be due to not fully grasping the limits of surveys, reflected in attributing qualitative-level capabilities to surveys. Such a characterization of surveys is generous, and it’s usually made in reference to the data generated from any open-ended questions included within a survey. But as recently wrote:

The comment box at the end of a survey can give you useful language, examples, and clues about how people explain a rating. But it is a self-selected set of written comments attached to a quantitative instrument, and calling it a qualitative strand gives it more status than the design earned.

As Bakhshi further points out, surveys are good at estimating distribution: how common something is, how responses vary across groups, how strongly people endorse a statement, how priorities rank when people are forced to choose, or how thermally comfortable they are in a space via a subjective rating. I like how she contrasts surveys with qualitative methods (e.g., ethnography) that help determine meaning, mechanism, context, language, sequence, and breakdown. [They show] how people understand something, where a process gets distorted, and what is actually happening when a metric looks strange from a distance. Qualitative methods are more likely to close that distance compared to surveys.

Bakhshi also contrasts each of these with behavioral data (gathered through such methods as behavioral mapping in the built environment), that shows what people did at scale, though not why, what they thought they were doing, or what the logged action failed to capture. Again, qualitative methods are better positioned to get at these why and what questions than behavioral data (or surveys), and this is why behavioral mapping is often paired with in-context interviews and general observations.

Each of these methods - surveys, behavioral mapping, and qualitative methods like ethnography (which are all included within the Princeton POE process) - when integrated within a socio-technic POE can be a powerful combination for illuminating the contextual social. Unfortunately, in practice the latter two methods are commonly excluded as exemplified by the 43 studies reviewed in this paper. And their absence is apparently due in part to not fully understanding the limits of surveys. For example, the authors of the paper attribute more capabilities to surveys than they typically provide:

Environmental monitoring provides precise, standard-compliant data, while survey data capture behavioral adaptations, usage habits, and emotional reactions that sensors cannot detect. - p. 13

Yes, surveys may help shed some light on this through specifically designed questions or the open-ended responses, but behavioral mapping and qualitative methods will provide far more nuanced insights into behavioral adaptations, usage habits, and emotional reactions. Now, it’s likely there are more studies of higher ed environments out there making use of such methods than represented by this paper. The authors’ means of data extraction and coding (discussed on pp. 02-03) as well as the focus on IEQ domains itself, may have skewed the final selection of the 43 studies examined. Studies focusing on other aspects of occupant behavior and experience, such as belonging, likely would have included qualitative methods. However, even with an IEQ focus, a deeper, more nuanced understanding of the social is needed to fully understand what’s going on. See the following:

• Comfort is a Social Construct

• Why Thermal Comfort is Elusive—The Role of Socio-Cultural Factors

But Marcel, some of you are pondering, surely at EDRA57 - the conference of an environmental design research association whose founding members included social scientists - you saw more qualitative applications and related methods focused on gathering behavioral data? Well, you would be correct in your pondering. But even among the presentations I sat in on, there was some room for improvement, especially those focused on IEQ conditions.

Of the ten presentations that I listened to involving some form of built environment evaluation or assessment of people’s experiences and perceptions (including POEs), all of them involved some type of qualitative method(s) and/or behavioral data gathering method(s) in addition to surveys. That’s certainly a better showing than the 43 studies reviewed in the paper discussed above, though only one presentation involved a field methodology that approached ethnography (at least as presented).

Out of these ten presentations, five involved at least one presenter and/or author who identified as having some type of behavioral science background (that I could tell from bios and google searches). None happened to have a background in anthropology or sociology (though a minor author of one presentation had a background in social psychology). Psychology and environmental psychology can provide important insights into the social, but anthropology and sociology both have methods and theoretical frameworks designed to investigate and analyze the socio-cultural sphere (e.g., Creating Environments that Promote Efficiency and Sustainability: Anthropological Applications in the Building/Construction Industry, The Power of People’s Stories - Using Ethnography to Improve our Built Environments, Design Ethnography: Research, Responsibilities, and Futures, and Why the World Needs Anthropologists). It’s their primary focus, and design research, building science, and the AEC industry as a whole would likely benefit from greater use of both.

Here are three of the presentations that provide some indication of the variation I observed. The first I’ll share, Connecting Place, Performance, and People: A Regional Post-Occupancy Study of Daylight and Thermal Comfort in South Central Texas, was a really interesting study examining how high-glazing architectural strategies in South Central Texas affect daylight performance and occupant comfort, revealing that poorly managed facades - especially east/west orientations - often lead to glare, overheating, and heavy reliance on blinds that undermine original daylighting and wellness goals. Using post-occupancy evaluations of workplace and education settings, the research highlights discrepancies between simulated and real-world performance and demonstrates the value of regionally grounded, human-centered data to validate performance, improve design practices, and calibrate predictive tools.

According to the session description, the POE methods consisted of seasonal environmental monitoring of illuminance, temperature, humidity, and mean radiant temperature, spatial daylight mapping, simulation model comparison, timed behavioral observations, and occupant surveys. However, very little was presented regarding the observations - either the fieldwork or resulting insights - and this may have been in part due to the authors not having a behavioral science background or sufficient staffing to accomplish this in a meaningful way along with the remaining fieldwork. And from the slide below, such observations (along with impromptu occupant engagements) may have been limited to what could be accomplished while taking the field measurements.

The study asked different questions of various envelope/glazing, shading, and orientation combinations, such as the question posed in the slide below: Do some orientations make balanced daylight harder to achieve? The bullets list some of the building performance findings related to this question. And a subsequent slide then asks the right follow-up question (or at least one of the right follow-up questions): Do daylight metrics that indicate “good” performance align with occupants’ reported experience of the space? Another important question to ask would be: How does a space’s daylight performance (as indicated by these daylight metrics) correlate with, and potentially impact, how occupants use and interact within the space?

The primary insight into occupant experience came from surveys. To help correlate responses with specific rooms, the researchers left QR code links to the surveys in 30+ rooms for at least a week. I’m not sure how many different buildings this represented, and I assume the QR codes were unique for each room. Unfortunately only enough responses were obtained for four rooms to be analyzed, making it difficult to correlate responses with orientations, workplace vs education environments, etc. But the researchers did try to infer that the spread in satisfaction responses within a single room may indicate different daylight conditions and resulting experiences within the same room (see slide below).

The accuracy of that inference and additional nuances to varying daylight experiences within the same room, as well as a more general understanding of how occupant use of, and interactions within, these spaces were impacted by varying daylight performance, would have been obtained with additional forms of occupant engagement - behavioral mapping, activity area analyses, walk-through interviews (of occupants and facilities staff), in-context interviews, and observations over a longer period of time. The next presentation I’ll share - Mapping the Patron Arrival Experience: Research-Informed Theater Design - does move beyond the use of surveys to understand occupant experience and behavior.

These researchers investigated how patrons use theater arrival spaces, revealing that spatial configuration significantly influences behavior, including uneven utilization of key amenities such as ticketing, concessions, and circulation zones. Through two mixed-method case studies they demonstrate how evidence-based insights can inform redesigned arrival experiences that enhance overall patron satisfaction and theatrical engagement. Methods included social media reviews, general observations, a form of behavioral mapping, and space syntax analysis. The slide below lays out the basic field methodology.

And below is an example of the field notes taken, in conjunction with photographs.

Such data gathering methods combined with social media reviews generated a rich dataset and an understanding of movement through the space (see the heatmapping slide below), wait times at concessions and the restrooms (that varied by gender), ticket scan times (impacting flow), and variations in visibility throughout the space. All of which was used to generate design opportunities to improve the patron experience.

As impressed as I was with the case studies, additional insights could have been gained performing walk-through interviews with willing patrons, shadowing and engaging them from the initial queues outside to finding their seats. Shadowing ticket scanners and concessions staff would also have been beneficial (with both also providing potential opportunities for participant observation) as well as performing this data gathering on multiple nights (ideally across different seasons). And making this more of a socio-technic evaluation by including different types of IEQ measurements would have provided additional, important context relative to patron experience. In addition to gender, there were also likely experiential inequities related to age, mobility, neurodivergence, class, ethnicity, etc., that such methods would have helped dig into further.

The last presentation I’ll mention - Exploring Spatial Use & Satisfaction: A Case for Community-Engaged Programming In Public Library Design - examines how community-engaged programming influences public library use and user satisfaction, verified through a post-occupancy evaluation (which also highlighted how participatory design advances spatial justice by honoring community voices beyond the design process). Preliminary findings show uneven use across programmed spaces, with further surveys and interviews planned to assess how well community input aligns with actual spatial use and to inform more effective participatory design practices. The methods used by this young researcher included a simple utilization analysis, observations, interviews conducted just outside the library, and an online survey (that had low response rates); technical methods were not employed.

While the researcher I think learned as much (or more) about how to employ these methods within the context in question as she did about the library’s spaces and how they meet the community’s needs, I was struck by how her observation methods seemed to systematically look at key aspects of the activities, environment, interactions, objects, and users within a space. This is beginning to approach what an ethnographer might do relative to observations, despite her not having a background in anthropology or sociology (though she’s obviously been exposed to the literature with perhaps mentors having such a background).

Admittedly, these ten presentations were only a small subset of the presentations, workshops, posters, and digital shorts that were to be found at #EDRA57. Though I wouldn’t be surprised if the same two general characterizations of this subset are applicable overall - a) applications of qualitative and related methods focused on gathering behavioral data are common and b) direct involvement of anthropologists and sociologists is less common. So, pre- and post-occupancy evaluation related work by EDRA members, both in academia and in practice, does a better job of capturing the social than the industry does at large. But even here there’s likely room for more direct engagement of two of the disciplines arguably best positioned to capture the social.

Pointing out these areas of improvement is all well and good you say, but limited budgets, tight schedules, liability related fears, limited understanding of the value of grasping the social, the Pandora’s Box perception associated with engaging users, and a lack of knowing where to even start when going beyond surveys all work against POEs in general, let alone those of the comprehensive socio-technic variety. All true, and such laments were expressed sitting around the Researchers in Professional Practice table at EDRA’s Knowledge Network Informational Lunch, even with POEs more the norm among the projects EDRA members are involved with compared to the larger industry.

Truth is, if the types of POEs reviewed in the Post-occupancy evaluation and human-centered indoor environmental quality in higher-education buildings: a structured review paper - with the socio generally limited to surveys - were actually the norm, then I’d probably be doing backflips in celebration. Well, I’d probably be in the hospital recovering from trying to do backflips in celebration, but I’d be happy lying there in traction. If this was actually our current baseline, building up to more comprehensive socio-technic POEs would be easier.

Regardless of where we are now, though, we should be conducting post-occupancy evaluations, and they should be human-centered. As the authors of the review paper stated:

To fully conduct a human-centered assessment, one must have a technical means of integrating the systems and a critical understanding of how occupants interact with the systems in their buildings, and how they may change or sometimes resist using them (Li et al., 2023; Roberts et al., 2019). - p. 14

We also need to know how those building systems impact occupant interactions and experience, and how interactions among occupants and with building systems impact building performance. Technically focused POEs won’t capture all of this, nor will the addition of only surveys. Buildings are socio-technic systems in and of themselves, so how could we expect to understand what’s going on without using a comprehensive socio-technic evaluation methodology?

The question is how do we get from here to there? I don’t pretend to have all of the answers, but here are a few interrelated items that would probably help. Each requires more exploration and explanation than what I’ve given below. Feel free to leave your insights in the comments.

Adaptable POE Processes: We need POE processes that are easily adaptable to varying building/campus types, occupant/community demographics, project scopes, and organizational/governmental policies. POE implementers need to be capable of working with building owners, clients, users, community members, etc., to generate the POE objectives, key performance indicators, and associated metrics tuned to their specific needs (and no more). We then need to pick from a suite of socio-technic methodologies those most aligned with the objectives, key results, and metrics. And high-level initial assessments allow subsequent more in-depth assessments to be targeted and more narrowly focused, limiting time and cost. The result is a streamlined, yet comprehensive process (as comprehensive as needed). Creating a searchable database to house the results for future use only adds to the value.

Value: Speaking of value, we need to get better at understanding and communicating the value of comprehensive, socio-technic POEs. There are real benefits that have been explored and demonstrated in various peer reviewed studies, white papers, and case studies, as this quote from the review paper demonstrates: The research by Lolli et al. (2022) demonstrates that educational building improvements through POE result in improved student performance, higher satisfaction, and reduced energy consumption - p. 09. In a paper I presented at the 2012 ACEEE Summer Study on Energy Efficiency in Buildings, I laid out a methodology for integrating anthropology within design, retrocommissioning, and post-occupancy evaluations. As part of the paper, I conservatively quantified the financial benefits of including ethnographic methods within an earlier retrocommissioning project (in the image below). Compiling all of this would be useful for communicating the quantitative and qualitative benefits.

“Subterfuge”: We can integrate various socio-technic methods and focal areas, even if at a high level or simpler, into the workflows and deliverables of energy audits, retrocommissioning projects, facility assessments, design narratives and reviews, charrettes, kick-off meetings, the development of OPRs (Owner Project Requirements), warranty walkthroughs, etc. The point is to do this without adding significant scope and cost. It really just takes the development of some templated tools, a little training of our engineers, commissioning agents, building scientists, and sustainability consultants, and the occasional, brief swooping in of the big guns. And the additional insights and benefits need to be pointed out to the client, also painting a picture of what could be gained with more extensive socio-technic efforts. In an essay B Sanborn recently wrote they make a similar point relative to gaining traction:

Focusing on enhancing existing deliverables rather than creating new ones, and on using the main formats that design teams already use (drawing sets, client-facing presentations, lessons learned reports) has helped in my own experience.

The Right Clients: Capitalize on those clients, building owners, etc., who initially recognize the value - how verification and subsequent improvements via socio-technic POEs positively impact decarbonization, reduce operational costs, improve university student retention rates, or increase occupant sense of belonging. Those who are excited about and proud of what they’ve accomplished typically want to share what they’ve done - via news articles, industry publications, conferences, podcasts, etc. Encourage them, do it with them, help facilitate it for them. This can spur others to follow suit through varying combinations of seeing the possibility and not wanting to be left behind. In addition, portfolio clients may be well-positioned to recognize and capitalize on the value of a POE process that also incorporates a searchable database of insights, recommendations, and lessons learned to apply to their portfolio at scale.

Education: It’s clear from the attendees of the EDRA conference that many higher education programs and departments with varying ties to the AEC industry are teaching the importance of POEs (including the importance of the socio part in some cases) as well as how to carry them out. I know that Traci Rose Rider, PhD teaches this in her courses, as my colleague and friend Sarah Gudeman, PE, LEED Fellow gave a presentation to one of her classes last spring on the what, why, and how of different types of validation and evaluation post-occupancy. This only needs to further expand into more programs, such as architectural engineering, construction science, building science, among others. These programs also need to seek partnerships with anthropology and sociology departments, as well as various UX-related programs.

Codes, Standards, and Certification Systems: Socio-technic POEs (and other types of validation) need to be required by codes and standards and more commonly integrated within certification systems. Industry members, building owners, portfolio managers, some professional organizations, and others will balk. Many would fight it, some likely vigorously. Then after they’re integrated, many will still complain. Then they’ll figure out how to get them done, and then they’ll do them. Then socio-technic POEs will become the norm. We can advocate for this as professionals.

Politics and Government: Integrating POEs into codes, standards, and certification systems would be easier with a political environment, policies and legislation at all levels of government, and government officials themselves at least somewhat amenable to this (certainly not hostile to it). As an educated citizen and voter who is also an industry professional, you are positioned to affect change here - educating candidates, elected and appointed officials, and the general public, becoming informal or formal advisors to candidates and officials, running for office yourself, volunteering on related boards, commissions, task forces, and committees, pushing the professional organizations you’re a member of to advocate for this, writing op-eds and journal articles, appearing on podcasts, and the like. And we should be publicly asking our city commissioners, mayors, county commissioners, legislators, etc., how they justify not requiring POEs for construction projects involving tax dollars. How do they justify increasing the risk of wasting the tax dollars we all pay? Framing and messaging are important.

It really is foolish that systematic, comprehensive socio-technic POEs (and other types of validation) aren’t the norm in our industry. This lack of accountability hamstrings us in achieving so many of our goals: decarbonization, creating healthy, productive, and safe environments for everyone, minimizing operational costs, efficient use of tax dollars, and so many more. I’m sure it would make managing the eclectic built environment of UMASS easier. I would urge everyone to keep working towards this, individually and collectively.

I’ll leave you with the following quote from Professor Alan M Jones, made when he was the RIBA President in the foreword to Post Occupancy Evaluation: An Essential Tool to Improve the Built Environment (RIBA):

The knowledge of how our buildings perform functionally and environmentally must inform future design and delivery to ensure spaces truly meet the needs of those using them… We need to embrace a culture of accountability and continuous improvement.

Liminality is essentially and always a middle. It is the moment of in-between-ness where what has been is gone, but what will be has not yet arrived - Michelle Trebilcock.

I find the concept of liminality fascinating. In anthropology, liminality refers to a transition stage between two different states of being. In its earliest formulations, liminality tended to refer to various rights of passage in small-scale societies that formalized transitions from one status or social role to another (such as child to adult or single to married). And during that transition, one was typically separate from society - physically, mentally, emotionally, and symbolically - as the old you was discarded and the new identity embraced before re-entering society.

However, anthropologists and others now generally use a much broader interpretation, applying liminality to various physical, socio-cultural, and political changes, to changes at various scales - from the individual to society, and to changes ranging from the single moment to entire life-spans (or longer). Such transitions, shaped by cultural norms, power differentials, and environmental conditions, can be destabilizing, disorientating, and full of anxiety as well as possibility - the break down or reorganization of the former self, structures, hierarchies, and institutions is necessary to create or assume the new state.

As an example, the American Franciscan priest, Richard Rohr, defines liminal space as follows:

It is where we are betwixt and between, having left one room or stage of life but not yet entered the next. We usually enter liminal space when our former way of being is challenged or changed—perhaps when we lose a job or a loved one, during illness, at the birth of a child, or a major relocation. It is a graced time, but often does not feel “graced” in any way. In such space, we are not certain or in control.

In this case Rohr is using room and space more metaphorically to refer to changing stages of life. But the built environment itself serves to trigger, or facilitate liminal experiences through its configuration, context, and operation - building (verb) liminality. It also serves as the manifestation of larger social and temporal changes, providing a record of the before, the liminal, and the after - building (adjective) liminality. Relative to the evolutionary dualism of the built environment, this manifestation is an example of the built environment as extended phenotype while the facilitation of liminal experiences is an example of the built environment as part of our selective environment.

I was recently in Denver, CO to attend and present at the USGBC ADAPT conference, arriving the day before the conference started. Walking from the A-line’s 38th & Blake Station to our BranchPattern Denver office in the RiNo (River North) Art District, I passed this older light industrial structure, bedecked with street art and, from my vantagepoint, juxtaposed against this much newer mid-rise office building looming over it from behind. As I took the photo that introduces this essay, I wondered about the changes to the neighborhoods within the district represented by these two buildings.

A friend of mine, , often posts photos from his day-to-day on Substack with the following statement: This is what my world looks like. What does your world look like? It’s an invitation for others to share their day-to-day as well. Photos range from the mundane to the fabulously cool to the head-scratching What am I looking at? Occasionally I’ll share something back from my own daily excursions, and this photo seemed like a good one to share.

Shortly thereafter Bob replied that I should write an essay on the contrasts between the two buildings. For sure I thought, and replied something along the lines of so many interesting things to write about but so little time. Yet the thought stuck around and periodically surfaced out of my subconscious during the rest of my stay in Denver and over the next week.

That afternoon I met with Meredith Banasiak, the Director of Research at Boulder Associates. We first met (virtually) probably 15 years ago or so, but had never met in person. So we took advantage of my trip to finally make that happen, and I’m really glad we did. Among our topics of conversation was her recent article in Psychology Today - From Horror to Healing: The Neuroscience of Liminal Spaces. In it she discusses how these spaces - such as corridors, stairwells, and the disturbing Backrooms phenomenon - can unsettle us because our brains use physical boundaries to organize memory and experience, and featureless, ambiguous transition zones strip away the context cues we rely on to feel oriented and make decisions. Neuroscience shows we’re highly sensitive to these transitions (e.g., the Doorway Effect), and ambiguous, repetitive environments keep us in a state of uncertainty and heightened alertness. But thoughtful design can counter this by adding context, reducing ambiguity, and creating opportunities for pause, turning these spaces into supportive environments for processing change.

I particularly enjoyed Meredith’s use of the psychological horror of the Backrooms movie itself to demonstrate an extreme version of the transitional state of liminality and its impacts (not too long ago I made use of a gothic horror podcast to help make some points about friendship).

Relative to building (verb) liminality, there are so many contributing factors to how the built environment and its operation shapes and facilitates experiences of liminality - IEQ conditions, space flexibility/functionality, wayfinding, impacts on sense of belonging, accessibility, cultural norms associated with liminality, evolutionary factors shaping how we perceive and react to the surrounding environment, among others.

I haven’t seen the movie yet, but I could imagine the disturbing, disorientating, and disconnecting experiences generated by the unchanging dull yellow finishes, unending maze of rooms and corridors, strangely arranged furniture, and constant buzz of fluorescent lights would be further enhanced by other static, uncomfortable IEQ conditions. Think of a steady 80°F with no ventilation or air movement of any kind. And if an absence of thermal sensations - thermal stasis - potentially contributes to psychologically experiencing a state of betwixt and between - a consistent state of liminality, then thermal alliesthesia (the change to a thermal sensory experience - stimuli - that can be perceived as positive or negative relative to its impact on our internal state) potentially represents a transition from one thermal experience to another, moving through the betwixt and between but not staying there.

In Meredith’s article, she points out that we can design liminal, transitional spaces to provide a supportive pause, allowing us to linger in transition without trapping us in uncertainty, and provide the opportunity to meaningfully integrate context, reflect internally, and prepare for what comes next. Such transitional spaces (like a vestibule), if designed to provide thermal experiences in between that of the outside and inside, can also provide our physiologies with supportive pause to help ensure a positive experience of thermal alliesthesia transitioning from the outside to interior spaces (as well as extend the length of that experience).

Transitioning to building (adjective) liminality, the opening frames of the movie trailer above depict the store front of the furniture store that is a primary setting of the movie, located within what appears to be a strip mall and an almost empty parking lot, followed by some interior shots of the empty furniture store itself. It suggests to me an area in decline - the strip mall a record of the before as it seemingly transitions to either abandonment or some form of revitalization.

As we experience this ongoing disruptive global transition involving the climate, extreme weather events, and changing environments, the importance of our built environments for equitably keeping us safe and healthy while transitioning them to a more regenerative nature only increases. For many communities across the globe, it will be a factor in what the other side of this long liminal period looks like — abandonment versus hanging on versus revitalization. And this is where the USGBC ADAPT conference tread, focusing on the growing impacts of climate change, population growth and extreme weather in the Midwest, Southwest and Mountain regions, exploring scalable real-world strategies for building communities that are healthy, sustainable and future-ready.

But doing this requires both a) a detailed understanding of the contextual individual, organizational, and community needs such built environments must meet, and b) ongoing validation that those needs are equitably being met as the climate continues to change. This allows us to meaningfully integrate context and prepare for [and adapt to] what comes next as the world changes, borrowing Meredith’s phrasing. Current practices arguably aren’t yet sufficient or widespread enough to ensure this needed built environment metamorphosis occurs - this breaking down and reorganization of AEC Industry processes and intellectual traditions, as well as the built environments themselves.

Setting aside the larger social, political, governmental, and economic changes needed to help facilitate all of this (potentially including the development of a common good economy), we also need greater inter- and transdisciplinary methods for comprehensively monitoring and evaluating our built environments at the individual, campus, and community levels. My colleague Andres Rodriguez-Burns and I presented on exactly this at the ADAPT conference, arguing that resilience and its validation must be human-centered. Resilient buildings must equitably support the physical, social, and emotional needs of occupants, especially during times of crisis created or exacerbated by this global liminal state we find ourselves in.

What does this look like in practice? It means combining quantitative and qualitative methods - environmental testing and human-centered inquiry - to see what neither reveals alone. IEQ testing and monitoring gives occupants an indirect voice: for example, schools with real-time air quality monitoring and improved filtration can better maintain clean indoor air during wildfire smoke events - a growing threat along the Front Range - keeping students and teachers healthier, reducing closures and family disruptions, and even creating opportunities for teaching environmental and building science.

But ethnography gives occupants a direct voice, uncovering how people actually use spaces versus design intent, what workarounds they create when systems fail, who feels welcome and who doesn’t, and whether spatial configurations support or hinder community formation. In corporate settings, ethnographic evaluations reveal that during organizational disruptions - such as pandemics, extreme weather events, or leadership changes - adaptable environments that reduce stress and provide control help employees stay engaged and productive, whereas environments that add friction (such as through space scarcity) can drive talent away.

Combining these methods is where the real power lies. Comprehensive, socio-technic post-occupancy evaluations (POEs) employing a mixed-methods approach are better able to determine if and why campus environments equitably support all students - including first-generation students, international students, LGBTQ+ students, neurodivergent students, and students with disabilities - during immediate heat waves and over the long term as the climate changes (see figure below). This better positions universities to address these issues as the climate changes, positively impacting wellbeing (student, staff, and faculty), retention rates, and recruitment success.

And short of the larger social, political, governmental, and economic changes needed to help facilitate creating or renovating regenerative environments that equitably keep us safe and healthy during this liminal period, modeling health and productivity impacts (at the building, campus, and community level) can help drive decisions. Disability adjusted life years, or DALYs - a measure of disease burden combining years of life lost to premature death and years lived with disability - offer one way to make the case more concrete.

Referencing the figure below, during a six-day heat wave on a university campus in the fall of 2023, the delta in estimated DALYs from heat exposure above the minimum mortality temperature (24.4°C / 76°F) between an older and newer residential hall complex was 0.07 DALYs per day or 0.42 for the full event. Not even half a day, but for the kitchen staff in the older complex, who endure these high temperatures throughout the warmer months, the annual difference could exceed four DALYs compared to their counterparts in the newer facility. Such heat waves are only going to become more the norm, and quantifying these disparities helps make the business and ethical case for addressing them - information that developers, building owners, community leaders, and policymakers need to see. And IEQ measurements and ethnography make such modeling efforts more contextually relevant.

Returning to the image that introduced this essay, which of the two buildings shown are likely the more resilient in their current state? The answer is more complicated than it might appear when we start considering different definitions of resiliency, who they’re resilient for, and their building (adjective) liminality. Note that not being from Denver, the following discussion is based on what I could find myself as well as using Microsoft Copilot.

The newer building in the background is T3 RiNo, a six-story, 384,000 SF mass timber office tower at 3500 Blake Street. It holds LEED Gold, WELL Silver, ENERGY STAR, and WiredScore Platinum certifications, with its cross-laminated timber (CLT)-and-glulam structure sequestering over 4,000 tons of CO₂. Most of the office space is leased by Xcel Energy Colorado as their new Denver headquarters, housing approximately 1,200 employees relocated from downtown.

The older building at 3563 Walnut Street appears to be a 16,000 SF (listed) light manufacturing flex space built in 1948 with masonry walls (insulation unknown), single-pane steel-sash windows, and limited HVAC (two available photos show a duct). It has previously housed the Fusion Factory, a volunteer-run nonprofit arts collective supporting Denver’s creative underground, and other small local organizations, though it now appears to be a location for Optimum Golf (at least for part of the building). By most conventional standards, T3 RiNo is the superior building. But as a record of building (adjective) liminality - the built environment as manifestation of larger community, social, and temporal changes - these two structures capture something certification systems, standards, and codes don’t effectively address: the threshold condition of a neighborhood, a climate, and a culture caught between what was and what is arriving.

Consider first the physical liminality - which connects directly to the passive survivability and human-centered resilience themes of the ADAPT presentation. These two buildings are inversely resilient. The 1948 warehouse, with its heavy masonry thermal mass, low window-to-wall ratio, and operable openings, possesses what might be called accidental summer resilience. Masonry walls delay peak interior temperatures by three to eight hours. Denver’s mean daily temperature range during the hottest month is approximately 30°F, meaning nighttime cross-ventilation through operable windows could help reset the thermal mass overnight (though they’re not likely left open overnight in practice), extending habitable conditions during a summer power outage.

In winter, the building is likely more vulnerable. Experimental data has demonstrated insulated masonry buildings with ground coupling maintained temperatures above 59°F for over 60 hours during heating blackouts, but 3563 Walnut likely lacks the critical factors enabling that performance: wall insulation unknown (potentially limited), single-pane windows, and no ground coupling (as far as I could verify). ASHRAE 2021 data lists Denver’s 99% winter design condition at approximately 5.7°F, with 20-year extreme return temperatures of -20.7°F, and heat loss through an envelope with limited insulation at those temperatures would be substantially faster.

T3 RiNo’s winter profile is stronger. Its CLT structure provides thermal mass and inherent insulation, supplemented by continuous insulation to meet its LEED Gold and ENERGY STAR certification requirements. Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) research indicates CLT’s thermal mass moderates indoor temperatures and that the ability of CLT buildings to bridge periods without HVAC operation…provides a certain level of resilience against power outages. However, the floor-to-ceiling glass curtain wall with an estimated 10 ft glazing height is a significant liability in both seasons: rapid radiative heat loss on clear cold winter nights, and potential solar overheating during summer power outages with 1,200 occupants generating roughly 144 kW of internal heat and no documented passive ventilation path. As Daniel Overbey writes in Building Enclosure, even buildings constructed to today’s most up-to-date energy codes may struggle to stay within the SET [standard effective temperature] range of 54°F to 86°F required by the LEED passive survivability pilot credit.

During wildfire smoke events - increasingly common along the Front Range, with wildfire-generated PM2.5 across the western US projected to increase by at least 50% by midcentury - T3 RiNo’s sealed, well-insulated envelope and HVAC systems (consistent with its LEED Gold and WELL Silver certifications) would offer meaningfully better shelter-in-place protection than the 1948 facility, whose likely leaky envelope and filters with lower MERV ratings provide limited protection against outdoor particulate infiltration.

Neither building, however, was designed for the compound climate-and-infrastructure disruptions that are becoming the new normal (that I can tell), and neither meets the LEED pilot credit IPpc100 standard of passively maintaining thermally safe conditions during a four-day power outage (as far as I know). And there are increasing health implications - estimated DALYs from heat exposure above the minimum mortality temperature, as the ADAPT presentation demonstrated - for the occupants of buildings optimized for normal operations rather than for the disruptions a changing climate increasingly delivers.

But physical resilience is only one dimension of what these buildings reveal. The 1948 structure sits in Five Points - the Harlem of the West - a historically Black community shaped by segregation and discriminatory housing practices that concentrated much of Denver’s Black population in the area during the early–mid 20th century (see Colorado Virtual Library and History Colorado). The RiNo Art District designation, established in 2005 by local artists (see Denver Public Library RiNo history), accelerated a transformation already underway in these industrial areas. The Urban Displacement Project documents that 61% of Denver neighborhoods experienced rapid increases in housing costs between 2000 and 2017, and notes that low-income Latinx and Black households are being displaced to parts of the region with poorer access to transit and needed services.

The 1948 structure’s previous tenants - including the Fusion Factory, a volunteer-driven nonprofit arts collective supporting fringe culture in Colorado - represent the grassroots creative economy that flourished in inexpensive industrial spaces during this transitional period. T3 RiNo, by contrast, with its global development team, Canadian-sourced timber, and large tenant, reflects a different phase of urban development - one increasingly shaped by external capital and institutional actors rather than local sources. As CU Denver highlights in its Gentrification and Social Equity course, students examining RiNo’s street art are explicitly asked to consider how it reveals who shapes [the neighborhood], who’s pushed out, and who’s pushing back. Community resilience - the capacity of a neighborhood to endure disruption while retaining its identity and serving its people - is therefore as critical as any envelope specification.

The artwork on the 1948 structure’s wall makes some of this social liminality visible. Painted during CRUSH Walls 2020 - an annual RiNo Art District mural festival involving roughly 100 artists across dozens of walls - the mural is attributed to KD Crew (Kings Destroy), a graffiti crew founded in the Bronx around 1982 by Cope2 (Fernando Carlo), originally named Kids Destroy before evolving into Kings Destroy as the group expanded. The wall features multiple wildstyle renderings, primarily of the word FEVER adjacent to the large, highly legible block letters spelling out BMONEY and a character figure, a composition consistent with collaborative crew production walls in graffiti culture (and both words may be monikers). Wildstyle itself is widely recognized as a highly complex lettering system built from interlocking forms that often appear illegible to outsiders while remaining readable within the culture - what scholars describe as a coded or insider visual language. However, the adoption of this style for commercial activities and art district usage (like RiNo) has created tension as it loses some of it’s original street-coded context.

This context matters because at that same 2020 festival, Denver artist Jolt produced a satirical mural critiquing gentrification in RiNo that was later whitewashed, sparking public debate. Reporting by Kyle Harris in Westword notes that Jolt’s work directly targeted developers (like those of T3 RiNo) and cultural figures associated with neighborhood change and was subsequently covered over with white paint shortly after installation. Harris further observed in that reporting that, [i]f graffiti is the language of powerless communities finding their voice and resisting dominant culture, permitted street art has too often become the trendy wallpaper decorating cultural domination.

The KD wall operates within this tension: it is part of a sanctioned festival, yet its visual language - dense, coded, and grounded in Bronx-derived graffiti traditions - resists easy consumption and commodification. At the same time, the wall sits on a parcel zoned C‑MX‑12, which allows mixed-use development up to 12 stories under the Denver Zoning Code (see Naked Denver zoning summary). And the 1948 structure’s occupancy focus itself seems to have evolved from community to commercial. In this sense, the mural exists on a surface that is both culturally expressive and economically provisional - a visible artifact of a neighborhood in transition that may ultimately erase it (or at least erase any connections with those pushed out).

Returning to Michelle Trebilcock’s quote that opened this essay - liminality is essentially and always a middle. It is the moment of in-between-ness where what has been is gone, but what will be has not yet arrived - these two buildings occupy that middle with links to what was and what will be. Because both remain in active use, neither belongs wholly to the past or the future, even if the 1948 structure is clearly a fading record of what was. The mass timber tower behind it, firmly of the present, also signals some of what may be emerging more broadly. Together they hold the viewer in a condition that is neither fully past nor fully future, but instead rooted in our present state of turbulence, angst, and possibility.

Earlier in this essay, the discussion of building (verb) liminality showed how featureless transition zones, ambiguous thresholds, and unclear boundaries strip away the contextual cues we rely on to feel oriented and connected, increasing uncertainty and anxiety (with Meredith’s use of the Backrooms movie illustrating the extremes). The juxtaposition of these two buildings extends that same logic to the neighborhood scale, where ongoing transition (and gentrification) can similarly unsettle residents’ sense of orientation, boundary, and continuity. Within the frame of the photograph - and within these neighborhoods - the old and the new, the local and the global, the permeable and the sealed, and the grassroots and the corporate are compressed into an unresolved spatial and cultural tension. The street art heightens that condition, not by merely ornamenting the older structure but by making visible the struggle between erasure and continuity, memory and redevelopment.

That unresolved middle is not only cultural and political; it’s also climatic and institutional. As the earlier discussion of the ADAPT conference suggested, we are already living through a prolonged transition in which climate change, extreme weather, smoke, and heat are forcing communities to rethink what resilience actually means for the physical and social environment. In that sense, these buildings do more than represent neighborhood change: they expose the incompleteness of the systems now replacing one another. The older light industrial flex space carries traces of a more informal, locally rooted urban fabric but is physically ill-equipped for the disruptions ahead (as is). The newer tower is optimized for contemporary performance standards yet remains vulnerable in different ways under extended outages and extreme weather. What stands between them - materially, socially, and symbolically - is a city still negotiating what kind of future it is building, for whom, and at whose cost. If liminality is the middle, then this destabilizing and disconcerting transition isn’t simply a passage from the before to a future after; it’s a reminder that, for many communities, the most anxious parts of this middle have become their day-to-day reality.

But we can change that.

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Having recently attended KACEE’s 2026 Awards Banquet, the links between environmental education, decarbonization, and human-centered design have been front of mind lately. So, I thought I’d share a piece here that I originally shared on my LinkedIn newsletter last November. If you take nothing else from this piece, take the following: A greater focus on people and the social within the AEC Industry will improve our ability to decarbonize while equitably creating healthy environments that also recognize our connections to the natural world. Environmental education (EE) helps facilitate this as it shapes the next generation of innovative AEC Industry professionals and developers driven to finance, design, build, and operate equitable, healthy, sustainable, and resilient built environments. And those educational experiences that entrench connections to the natural world early on also help make these professionals happier, healthier, and more resilient human beings.

Fall of 2025 was a busy conference season for me, attending and presenting at ASHRAE/AIVC IEQ 2025, ASHRAE Decarbonization, and then at the Kansas Environmental Education Conference (facilitated by the Kansas Association for Conservation and Environmental Education (KACEE)) and Greenbuild International Conference & Expo. As should be apparent from my key takeaways above, I think the focus and themes of these latter two conferences (as well as the ASHRAE conferences) are integrally tied together.

For any unaware, Greenbuild is the world’s largest annual event dedicated to green building professionals, bringing together architects, developers, sustainability experts, and industry leaders from over 60 countries. The theme of 2025’s conference, held at the Los Angeles Convention Center, centered on Building a More Resilient Future Together. Pre-event summits focused on Healthy Spaces for All, Innovative Building Materials, Resilient Design, Passive House Principles, and Practical AI Applications in the Built Environment. Over 100 conference sessions were presented on wide ranging topics, including LEED v5 implementation, green building in the current political climate, health/wellness, equity in accessibility, and green financing. It’s a massive conference with thousands of participants and numerous associated education and social events filling your day from early morning to late in the evening.

In contrast, KACEE‘s Kansas Environmental Education Conference (KEEC) is a much smaller annual gathering bringing together educators, students, administrators, researchers, and community leaders to advance environmental literacy and conservation across the state. The conference emphasizes non-biased, science-based environmental education and serves as a platform for professional development, collaboration, and inspiration among formal and non-formal educators. The theme of 2025’s conference, held at the Sunflower Nonprofit Center and the Kay McFarland Japanese Garden, centered on Environmental Education is the Answer, reflecting the role of environmental education (EE) in addressing challenges such as youth anxiety, climate resilience, academic engagement, and whole-child well-being. Sessions and keynotes covered such topics as the impacts of technology on student learning and wellness, green schools and sustainability-focused curriculum, outdoor learning and safety, science literacy through ecology, social-emotional learning and school gardens, as well as our innate connections to the natural world.

Just looking at the themes themselves we can see how one helps set the stage for the other: Environmental Education is [at least part of] the Answer to Building a More Resilient Future Together. Playing the long game, environmental education (EE) can inspire, be a source of innovation for, and create a sense of urgency to equitably build a more resilient future... for people and for the other species we’re connected to on this planet.

As I indicated in my reflections on the ASHRAE Decarbonization conference, I expected to see a greater focus on people at Greenbuild than what I saw at ASHRAE Decarb. Though I didn’t anticipate seeing the ideal I had laid out in that reflection piece - more consistently integrating a heavier qualitative focus involving the social, including methods like ethnography and behavioral mapping as part of a mixed methods approach that also includes quantified impacts on health and productivity. My concern was that this “... too common framing of decarbonization or resiliency without a major focus on the human or the social hampers our ability to meet our [decarbonization] goals and targets while also equitably meeting human needs.”

Not surprisingly, KEEC - a conference devoted to equitably providing EE and outdoor experiences to kids - included a greater focus on people and the human condition than ASHRAE Decarb (or several of the IEQ 2025 sessions). Primary focuses included the experiences, learning, and well-being provided by EE, associated school environments, and being outdoors. The social sciences (as well as other behavioral sciences) were also included in some of the various research referenced. It was also a good mix of presenting research and applications to various environmental education endeavors, all of which were generally guided by anticipated impacts on educators, students, and communities. These impacts were also included in the metrics used to evaluate said applications. Comparing this to how I framed it for decarbonization, the goals and targets of EE can’t be met without including this major focus on the human and the social.

Turning to Greenbuild, with over 100 sessions, plus the tours and pre-event summits (which I wasn’t able to attend), I can’t fully assess the conference’s focus on people without spending more time than I have trying to review all of the session materials. But considering those I did attend (skewed by my interests), I would say there was a greater focus on people, but with some room for improvement. I’ll reference three sessions I attended that captured the range of fulfilled opportunities I saw for focusing on the human.

One of the first sessions I attended was Unveiling the Hidden Carbon Impact of MEP Systems, with Kayleigh Houde, Aurora Jensen, Wyatt Ross, and my BranchPattern colleague Kristy M. Walson, PE, LEED Fellow, BEMP, members of the Whole Life Carbon Pilot team. The panel provided important insights, methods, and discussions related to understanding and reducing the contribution of MEP systems to whole building, whole life carbon emissions - an issue our industry must address. And similar to my commentary on the ASHRAE Decarb‘s session covering the ASHRAE / U.S. Green Building Council Guide to Strategic Decarbonization Planning, I think that technically focused panel sessions like this one provide great opportunities, varyingly fulfilled, to more explicitly connect the technical to associated human behaviors and needs. The following is from the session’s description:

The session will highlight the critical role of whole building carbon trade-offs, including balancing lower MEP embodied carbon against operating energy in evolving grid scenarios, optimizing envelope design for both embodied and operational carbon, and strategic MEP placement to reduce structural carbon demands.

There was an opportunity here to explicitly reference occupants, operators, and communities in optimizing or balancing these tradeoffs. But as is common in technically focused sessions, they’re not mentioned in the slides from the session below, nor really during the panel discussion that I recall - either their needs or including them within the process of balancing these tradeoffs. Even just mentioning this is arguably important because it reinforces the fact that the design of MEP systems and envelopes isn’t just about minimizing embodied and operational carbon - it’s ultimately about creating safe, comfortable, and healthy environments where people can thrive in their day-to-day. And if we don’t meet those needs, aspects of operations and behaviors often result that negatively impact decarbonization goals.

I want to be clear, though, that I’m not knocking this session, nor really any of the conference’s technically focused sessions. The content was excellent, it was well presented, and the discussions were informative. The Whole Life Carbon Pilot‘s collaborative effort to understand, measure, and reduce the carbon emissions across the whole life cycle of building MEP systems is really important, and I’m proud that one of my BranchPattern colleagues is an integral part of this effort. I’m simply pointing out that such technically focused sessions also provide us with opportunities to connect these topics to their relevant associated people factors - the ultimate reason we’re doing the work to being with.

For a specific example, in the slide below, there are two areas where people could be more explicitly referenced. The first is in the lower left call to action, which could be revised as follows - Better HVAC Load Calculations: Align HVAC loads and MEP equipment sizing with passive load reduction strategies that meet occupant thermal comfort needs. As an industry, we don’t do a great job of consistently meeting thermal comfort needs as it is (driven in part by not understanding and accounting for how such experiences are socially constructed). Emphasizing the importance of meeting those needs in technical presentations like this one reinforces the ultimate human centered goals of design, operations, and the development of associated guides and standards.

The second involves the reduction-first mindset in the bottom right call to action. Such a mindset arguably should consider how any reductions impact the various relevant users. So the phrase Keep users in mind could be added to the end of the call to action. Users may have been mentioned presenting the slide - I don’t remember at this point - but including it on the slide would further reinforce that. Owners are mentioned in the upper left call to action, which is great, though operators could also be mentioned here (and there’s an argument for including occupants and community members depending on the project).

Some may think that adding an emphasis on relevant human factors isn’t necessary for such sessions. The focus here, after all, is minimizing the impact of our building systems on carbon, not considering aspects of user experience. I get that, but I would counter that such a perspective assumes occupant, operator, and community needs are generally met equitably. It assumes that humans are adequately centered throughout planning, design, construction, operations, and the development of standards, and therefore we can talk about other aspects of building performance without needing to reference their ties to users or impacts on non-users. But that’s not the case (at least as much as it should be), as anyone knows who’s spent time conducting POEs, audits, facility assessments, workplace studies, and retrocommissioning projects.

As I proposed in the ASHRAE Decarb reflections:

Placing people at the center of the process also allows us to frame decarbonization more directly with respect to human impacts. Instead of just EUIs or GHGs, we can also include metrics like DALYs (Disability-Adjusted Life Years). So, for example, when weighing the tradeoffs of increasing ventilation rates, instead of using just GHGs or energy cost, maybe it’s also weighing an increase in community or population DALYs versus a building-level increase in cognitive function or a reduction in airborne infection risk. It’s not decarbonization versus human needs, it’s weighing trade-offs relative to human needs at multiple scales and time frames.

Basically, I would propose we include some type of framing with respect to human experiences, behaviors, and impacts every time we design, analyze, verify, present, or otherwise engage in various built environment related activities, even if it’s just a brief mention. And by we, I really do mean all of us. Because even BranchPattern, including myself, have room for improvement here (though I’m also proud to work for a company that recognizes and acts on the importance of placing people at the center of everything we do). Doing this I believe has the potential to pay off in dividends.

Technically focused sessions provide us with opportunities to tie the social to the technical. Reinforcing this whenever we can will likely improve the quality of our technical solutions by emphasizing the importance of centering people throughout the development and implementation of said technical solutions. When relevant, that framing should also include our intertwined connections with the natural world around us, that impact our ability to thrive. I should note that such a holistic outlook is also part of what environmental education teaches (environmental education is part of the answer for building a more resilient future together).

The second session I’ll briefly reference provides a greater focus on people, but with some room for improvement relative to the ideal I mentioned above. This was the Well-being by Design: Maximizing Impact & ROI Through Integrated Strategies, presented by Koray Aysin, Kate Rube, LEED AP, WELL Faculty, GRESB AP, and Tanya Eagle. The session sought to explore and provide recommendations for embedding health and wellness into every phase of a project. Topics covered included the impacts of healthy buildings on leasing, valuation, market demand, user experience, and business success, topped off with a LEED and WELL certified elementary school case study.

Notably, the session’s description recognized that buildings often don’t meet user needs, referencing the International WELL Building Institute (IWBI)‘s stat that 81% of employees believe their physical environment affects their well-being, yet most buildings fail to deliver. And the panel members called for post occupancy evaluations (also included in the case study) to validate experiences and performance as part of an integrated design process. I mean, this is really trying to check all of the boxes for me - it certainly represents more of what we should be seeing at the project level to create sustainable, resilient, and healthy environments where everyone can thrive.

But there’s an opportunity here to further improve our understanding of user needs and behaviors, as well as increase our ability to include the voices of all who are impacted. And that would be to make use of social scientists, or at least relevant methodologies, such as ethnography, to engage users in their day-to-day spaces to more fully understand the nuances of what’s going on. Post-occupancy evaluations, listed in the slide below, should really consist of a mixed methods approach - addressing both the qualitative and quantitative, looking at the the physical environment, the social environment, the individuals, the groups, other species, and the interactions among all of these.

This recommendation also applies to our engagement of the relevant constituents during planning and early design - designers, engineers, educators, administrators, custodians, operators, other staff, students, and community voices (for a school in this case). The slide below focuses on charrettes, but these can be limiting both in the voices heard from and the understandings provided of user needs, behaviors, day-to-day activities/schedules, etc. Ethnographic activities, stand alone or as part of pre-occupancy evaluation efforts, can fill in the gaps and help avoid post-occupancy problems. See the following for additional information: The Power of People’s Stories - Using Ethnography to Improve our Built Environments.

This may be an area where EE has an edge over the AEC Industry, at least in terms of equitably engaging impacted constituents (educators, students, and communities) and including them all the way through the process of developing curriculum, professional development, and learning spaces. In one of the KEEC presentations, Growing Together - How Green Schools Can Support Student Wellness, Learning, and Leadership, educators Jena Simms and Michelle Perez highlighted ways in which outdoor learning, sustainable practices, and student-led initiatives support academic success, spark curiosity, foster wellness, and build leadership skills that extend beyond the classroom (and into their future careers, including within the AEC Industry). The students are integral to these efforts - developing them, carrying them out, and even presenting them to others.

While it’s not uncommon for consultants to co-present with the leadership of the organizations they’re working with, actually including the users closest to the day-to-day action isn’t as common (reflective of their level of inclusion in general). Though their stories and quotes are sometimes at least shared, as they were in this Well-being session (see the slide below). Perhaps our industry can follow EE’s lead and continue improving the direct involvement of all of the relevant users, from early planning through post occupancy, even including them when presenting - environmental education is part of the answer for building a more resilient future together, emphasis on together.

For the third session, I’m going to be a little self-serving and include the one that my colleague Sarah Gudeman and I co-presented - Beyond Air Quality: Integrating Microbiome into Indoor Environmental Quality Metrics, based on a paper that we coauthored with Sarah Haines and Stephanie Taylor, MD (who unfortunately weren’t able to be with us at Greenbuild). Here, we presented an exploration of the scientific, technological, socio-cultural, ethical, and policy implications of incorporating microbiome health into IEQ frameworks.

Some of you might be thinking, well sure, the topic is the combined health of humans and the indoor microbiome as shaped by our physical and social environments. So, yeah, it’s easy to provide a pretty heavy focus on people. True, but one of the reasons I’m including it as an example is that we specifically call for the inclusion of the social and other behavioral sciences in conducting additional research on the indoor microbiome and applying that research to the development of standards and the design and operations of our built environments. People, our own internal microbiomes, and the indoor microbiome all interact with one another - our individual behaviors and the larger social realm heavily impact the health of the indoor microbiome and our own health as a result.

Designing environments for people requires understanding the various physiological, psychological, and socio-cultural factors at play. That requires expertise and methods able to provide that understanding, and it’s even more critical when we start considering other species, like the microorganisms making up the microbiome. Which brings me to the other reason for including this session as an example.

Recognizing the importance of the indoor microbiome, for someone not already steeped in the relevant literature, is facilitated by a general understanding of our connections to the natural world that shape our general well-being and are heavily influenced by our evolutionary history. Environmental education and outdoor experiences in our youth can go along way to facilitating that understanding and instilling a sense of curiosity for examining such connections. And as I’ve been writing this, I’ve wondered what the formative experiences of my co-authors were that led them down their own paths to eventually recognizing the indoor microbiome’s importance.

For me, the formative experiences of farming in my youth, supplemented with high school biology classes involving multiple experiments and lessons involving our local ecosystems, set the stage for choosing a cultural evolutionary framework to conduct my dissertation work within. And that has strongly shaped my views of the reciprocal relationships between people, other species, and their environments, not to mention my recognition of the importance of environmental education.

The keynote presenter, Dr. Elizabeth Heilman, from the second day of the KEEC conference even brought up the indoor microbiome during her presentation - Strengthening Body, Mind, and Emotional Resilience through Outdoor Environmental Education - emphasizing similar points we made during our presentation about the relationship of the outdoors to our internal and indoor microbiomes. And I suspect if I had asked the students in attendance if they thought we should be exploring integrating the microbiome into IEQ metrics, they probably would have answered something along the lines of Well, yeah. Duh. Environmental education is part of the answer for building a more resilient future together.

There were other sessions I thought did a pretty good job of integrating a focus on people in different ways (as well as our connections to the natural world). Designing for Resilience and Equity: Climate-Ready Schools in Practice with Hannah Carter, Darien Clary, Kesta James, and Ashley Stoner and Beyond Comfort: Designing for Sensory Delight in the Built Environment with Gail Brager, Larkin Johnson, Catie Ryan Balagtas, and Marilyn Specht come to mind. The keynotes and the Women in Green Luncheon provided inspirational stories demonstrating in varying ways the importance of placing humans (and our connections to the natural world) at the center of what we do. And I’m sure that the Tuesday pre-summit, Healthy Spaces for All, provided a heavy focus on people and our connections to nature, with perhaps even the social and other behavioral sciences included to a degree (though it would be fair to ask how well the other pre-event summits did with this).

So, if I were to give Greenbuild a letter grade here, I’d probably give it a B- overall. Improving on that - better integrating the behavioral sciences as well as referencing the impacts on, and relationships to, people, regardless of the topic - I believe will ultimately help our ability to decarbonize and create healthy, resilient spaces where everyone can thrive. I’ve often wondered if Greenbuild and the Behavior, Energy, and Climate Change (BECC) conference could figure out a way to combine forces, especially since their dates almost always overlap. That would be one way to improve the letter grade, and it’s arguable our current political circumstances (particularly in the U.S.) and the inequities, actions, decisions, ignorance, apathy, and other factors that have led us to our current circumstances are additional reasons for getting this letter grade to at least an A- overall.

Our current political circumstances were in the background of both Greenbuild and KEEC - the actions of the Trump administration negatively impacting our ability to equitably accomplish decarbonization, sustainable and resilient design, human-centered design, environmental education, public education, among other things, as well as similar actions by some state governors and/or legislatures. They were the subject of conversations, sessions such as What the new political order means for green building (with Ben Evans, Monte Hilleman, Jason Gleason, and Jetta Wong), and mentioned during Keynotes. Julia Louis-Dreyfus referenced it several times during her morning keynote after the November 4th elections the day before, celebrating the outcomes as rejections of the administration’s actions negatively impacting climate action, renewables, and human-centered design (even if just by association with other driving issues top of mind for many citizens).

We can build on this backlash momentum by providing a greater focus on people through such things as quantifying cognitive function impacts, airborne infection risks, DALYs, rental rates, occupancy/vacancy rates, etc., to help demonstrate the financial benefits of various wellness and decarbonization strategies - at multiple scales. Methods from the social sciences, such as ethnography, provide a significantly richer and more complete understanding of what’s going on in our built environments, greatly improving the quality of these quantifications. And the on-the-ground stories gathered during ethnographic activities can put an actual human face on the data gathered for the decision-makers, often providing an emotional connection that has it’s own power for influencing outcomes. See Gaming the System, The Power of People’s Stories - Using Ethnography to Improve our Built Environments, and Taking on Climate Change with Stories.

And environmental education teaches us about out connections to the natural world, our interdependence, and how our futures are integrally tied to other species. It helps us understand how to bridge science, equity, mindfulness, and cultural relevance when developing strategies to protect our land, water, air, and biodiversity. It provides outdoor experiences to help solidify that understanding, germinating a love of the natural world in the process. And all of this helps inoculate against unsustainable decisions, policies, voting preferences, and other actions - actions that have led to our current political circumstances. Those experiences outdoors also positively impact our wellbeing, providing some respite from the stresses of our daily lives, increasing our own resiliency as we work to increase the resiliency of our built environments. See We need more Calm and Curious Minds, Save Environmental Education, Save Democracy and Increasing Curiosity Through Environmental Education.

So, I would encourage you to support environmental education and provide a greater focus on people in your day-to-day work because...

Environmental Education is [at least part of] the Answer, along with Providing a Greater Focus on People and the Social, to Building a More Resilient Future Together.

Here’s a short, building-focused post more reflective of my day-to-day professional life. Enjoy a brief break from our disturbing national and state politics.

I really enjoy sharing studies involving a) mixed-method post occupancy evaluations (POEs), b) a recognition of the reciprocal relationships between contextual social/behavioral factors and indoor environmental quality (IEQ) - thermal comfort in this case, and c) exposing the biases underlying building standards, design, and operations (often involving North American, temperate climate, commercial, and WEIRD contexts).

The following study by Dr. Juan M. Medina and Dr. Carolina Rodríguez - Thermal Comfort, Policy, Regulation, and Public Health: Rethinking Sustainability from a Human and Territorial Perspective in Tropical Social Housing - checks all of those boxes. This is recommended reading for designers, operators, and commissioning agents, especially architectural and mechanical engineers.

A few things from the study to highlight.

✳️ The discussion of the adaptive comfort model points out how such frameworks push us to account for the “variability in occupant behaviour and environmental context.” But, as I understand it (see Design Implications of Entangled Sex / Gender Spectrums), the metabolic rates and clothing insulation values used in the model are essentially averages built into the formulas (based on a large number of globally observed behavior in various field studies). When applying the model via ASHRAE 55, designers are limited to contextually modifying the operative temperature, prevailing mean outdoor temperature, and air speed. This means applications of the model are still limited in their ability to account for behavioral variability and may not adequately account for clothing and activity related variation among occupants - something designers should be aware of.

✳️ Though I believe the authors recognize this when they discuss how thermal comfort (in both standards and design) isn’t really “... treated as a socially verified outcome under real conditions of occupation.” Which is one reason why and I have argued ethnographic methods need to be part of the mixed-method approach to better understand how social factors are influencing thermal comfort (and comfort in general) - see Why Thermal Comfort is Elusive - The Role of Socio-Cultural Factors and Comfort is a Social Construct. If thermal comfort is in part socially constructed, then we need methods capable of “measuring” this (that also help cut through the biases mentioned above).

✳️ I greatly appreciated the authors pointing out the need for systematic post-occupancy verifications of our built environments. As they put it, this lack of POEs (in regulatory systems, standards, industry education, etc.) reinforces “... the institutional separation between measured experience and policy enforcement.” It contributes to far too common occurrences of regulatory and design intent not translating into operational reality and actual experience.

✳️ I’ll end this with the following quote from the study: “A dwelling that meets efficiency targets but remains thermally unhealthy fails to achieve the broader objectives of sustainable development. Thermal comfort must therefore be repositioned as a core policy indicator that links housing quality, public health, energy governance, and social equity.”

It’s a powerful statement that really applies to all aspects of IEQ as well as all building types.

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Never ended up being far too short a time, as the U.S. continues a trend of breaking its unhyphenated American promise while increasingly flirting with fascism and authoritarian oligarchy under the Trump regime. But Americans are speaking out in greater numbers against these broken promises and actively resisting, including those in the AEC Industry (but we need much, much more of this).

In January 2026 architects and designers across the U.S., following the lead of several Minnesota firms, participated in a national strike in protest of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention practices. This came on the heels of ICE’s and the Custom Border Patrol’s (CBP) increasingly cruel and disturbing actions in these centers as well as on American streets.

There’s the 1,037 credible reports of abuse in ICE facilities occurring between January 20, 2025, and January 12, 2026, as documented by Senator Jon Ossoff’s investigation, 33 deaths in ICE facilities over the course of 2025, and 11 deaths so far in 2026 (as of March 9th). A large percentage of these deaths were likely preventable considering a June 2024 report by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and others stating that 95% of deaths in ICE custody between January 1, 2017, and December 31, 2021, were preventable or possibly preventable with adequate medical care. Among those suffering so far in 2026 have included a nine-year-old boy with severe autism, detained with his mom for over 80 days at a center in Texas, who was denied therapy, begged to go back home, cried every night, and eventually began hitting himself.

We’ve also seen the spread of disease in these facilities. A February 2026 measles outbreak in Camp East Montana in El Paso, one of the nation’s largest detention facilities, forced the quarantine and isolation of many of the people being housed there. According to experts (including the author with expertise in the minimization of airborne infection risk within the built environment) this was a foreseeable outcome, noting that crowded conditions plus a highly contagious disease plus limited ventilation plus no systemic vaccination safeguards (and a lack of other infection risk minimization protocols) make outbreaks practically inevitable.

For a regime bent on establishing some form of authoritarian rule, with roots in fascism, bigotry, white supremacy, and white Christian nationalism, the cruelty provided by the nature and operations of these physical environments is the point. So, let’s look at just how cruel these environments actually are, focusing on the negative mental and physical health impacts endured by detainees.

But let’s be honest. These facilities are, in actuality, concentration camps (an assertion justified later in the article). And the local officials approving their construction, renovation, and operation within their communities, as well as the real estate and AEC (Architecture, Engineering, and Construction) professionals contributing to their existence, represent a moral failing with disturbing historical precedents. Their actions echo the bureaucratic justifications that helped facilitate the construction and operation of concentration camps in early Nazi Germany as well as the U.S.’s Japanese-American internment camps during World War II.

The Cruelty of the Physical Environment and its Operations

Senator Ossoff’s investigation mentioned above revealed systemic housing abuses across ICE detention facilities. These included documented reports of people sleeping on concrete floors in overcrowded cells, exposure to extreme temperatures, and denial of adequate food, water, bedding, clothing, and medical attention. A KFF briefing reports severe overcrowding, a lack of ventilation, and poor sanitation conditions (including limited access to showers, toilets, and hygiene products).

Water has been reported as dirty and foul-tasting. An ACLU News and Commentary piece references raw sewage bubbling up from shower drains at the California City detention center, with people detained there referring to it as a torture chamber. Other facilities have reports of human waste sitting in the open, regular occurrences of sewage backups, and common failures of plumbing infrastructure, all contributing to some people fasting to avoid defecating. And the smells from all of this - exacerbated by the lack of ventilation, the overcrowding, the lack of adequate hygiene and sanitation - have been described as overwhelming.

Reports also exist of solitary confinement occurring in isolated small rooms with no exterior windows. Though a lack of daylight and view access is common throughout many of these facilities, with detainees living under a perpetual twilight of fluorescent lights. The environments are also consistently noisy, caused in part by staff and loud televisions playing all day as well as the overcrowded conditions and detainees themselves, often children, who sometimes cry out in anguish. On top of all of this are the instances of physical abuse and assaults that occur at the hands of the guards and other detainees. Many occurrences similar to what I’ve laid out above (and more) can also be found in a DHS Inspector General’s Report dating back to 2019.

These are obviously conditions that, in addition to basic human decency, also varyingly violate a plethora of building codes (examples here and here), standards (examples here, including ICE’s own detention standards), CDC and WHO guidelines and recommendations (examples here, here, and here) as well as the state laws and city codes / ordinances, including zoning ordinances (examples here, here, and here). The conditions have been so dire that federal judges have issued a variety of rulings, ranging from ordering facility and operational improvements be made to stopping the barring of members of Congress from making unannounced visits to ICE detention facilities.

What the Research Says

The harm to physical and mental health is certainly made explicit by listening to those harmed by these conditions, but there’s also a significant amount of supportive research.

Circadian System Disruptions: Limited to no daylight access combined with electric lights on 24/7 can result in severe disruption to our circadian system. As I’ve written previously, this system…

refers to an approximate 24-hour cycle of physiological activity that our bodies go through every day. Circadian photoentrainment is the process of using light to “entrain” our bodies to a specifically-timed cycle, where light synchronizes our biology with the external world. And our eyes are the windows this exterior light signal passes through to reach our clock.

Being day-active animals, our circadian clock is evolutionarily designed to promote wakefulness during the day and sleep at night in response to the day-night cycle. Disruptions to our circadian rhythms and sleep, as have been reported occurring in ICE facilities, can result in a variety of increased short and long-term health risks, including mood impacts, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, infertility, depression, dementia, cancer and premature death. And some detainees are reporting having to endure such conditions for as long as 10 months.

Thermal Stress: We know that exposure to extreme temperatures causes physiological stress to the body, the degree dependent largely on how extreme the temperature is as well as time of exposure. Heat becomes medically dangerous when the Wet-Bulb Globe Temperature (WBGT) reaches 82.4°F (equivalent to 100°F on a dry day), though physiological stress will occur at temperatures lower than this. And according to an analysis by the Washington Post, the hottest 10 percent of ICE facilities experience an average of 93 days of unhealthy temperatures each year. Health risks include the following:

• Physical Health Risks: Exposure leads to dehydration, heat exhaustion, and potentially fatal heat stroke. Chronic exposure is linked to organ damage, particularly to the kidneys, liver, and cardiovascular system.

• Exacerbating Factors: Detainees are often unable to self-cool due to sealed windows, lack of air conditioning, or limited access to ice and water. Overcrowding further exacerbates indoor heat.

• Mental Health and Suicide: Extreme heat is associated with a 30% increase in daily suicide-watch incidents in carceral settings (and a 22.8% increase in suicide deaths after a single extreme heat day). It also correlates with increased agitation, irritability, cognitive impairment, and risks of severe violent incidents.

Extreme cold conditions, often described in legal cases as cells with ice forming on walls or broken heating, lead to immediate and long-term ailments. Detainees and guards have both described some of these facilities as iceboxes. Health risks include the following:

• Reported Illnesses: These often consist of chronic “flu-like” symptoms, frostbite, and trench foot.

• Chronic Pain: Reports frequently consist of joint swelling and persistent musculoskeletal pain following prolonged exposure.

• Systemic Effects: Severe cold can trigger hypothermia, which impairs brain function and decision-making, and increases the risk of stroke and cardiovascular events.

Acoustic Trauma: The accumulated evidence suggests that the acoustic conditions in ICE detention - high-volume, unpredictable, constant low-level, and lack of privacy - are not merely uncomfortable but act as a mechanism for producing negative short and long-term mental and physical health impacts, including chronic sleep deprivation, increased anxiety, and the exacerbation of pre-existing trauma. More details consist of:

• Sleep Deprivation and Circadian Disruption: The constant presence of noise, unpredictably at high levels at times, exacerbated by the overcrowded conditions and lack of privacy, also disrupts sleep and our circadian system, increasing risks for heart disease, diabetes, and mental health issues as discussed above.

• Chronic Stress and Mental Health Decline: Constant, low level noise exposure triggers the sympathetic nervous system, leading to heightened stress, annoyance, anxiety, and depression.

• Cardiovascular and Physical Impacts: Chronic noise exposure triggers stress responses, increasing blood pressure and sympathetic nervous system activation, which in turn elevates the risk of heart disease and stroke.

• Auditory Fatigue and Damage: High-intensity noise can lead to auditory fatigue or temporary shifts in the ability to hear. Prolonged exposure can result in permanent hearing loss, tinnitus (ringing), or hyperacusis (sensitivity to normal sounds).

Poor Air Quality and a Lack of Ventilation / Filtration: Research regarding the health impacts of poor air quality, odors, and inadequate ventilation in detention facilities - including ICE detention centers - documents significant physical and mental health issues arising from overcrowded, poorly ventilated, and sometimes chemically polluted environments. Studies show these conditions facilitate the spread of communicable diseases, cause chronic respiratory issues, and exacerbate mental health trauma. More details consist of:

• Airborne Chemical and Odor Exposure: Some facilities are located near industrial sites (e.g., fracking and Superfund sites). This, and the use of industrial chemical disinfectants, can expose detainees to various VOCs (volatile organic compounds), hydrogen sulfide, and other chemicals (via the air, water, and soil). However, chronic exposure to the smells of raw sewage, intense body odors, and spoiled food can also be harmful. Symptoms reported are wide ranging, and include headaches, nausea, dizziness, vomiting, throat irritation, loss of appetite, and the exacerbation of asthma. Chemical exposure can also contribute to neurological problems, developmental damage, and various diseases, including different types of cancer.

• Mold and Particulate Matter Exposure: Different combinations of poor ventilation and filtration, high humidity, water leaks, drafty building envelopes, and inadequate maintenance / custodial practices can contribute to varying occurrences of mold (and other biological contaminants) as well as particulate matter (including dust). Such exposures can contribute to respiratory distress, the triggering of asthma events, headaches (including migraines), skin and eye irritations, and lethargy, as well as increase the risk for various cancers, cardiovascular diseases, and neurological and psychiatric disorders. Particulate matter exposure is exacerbated by one’s proximity to the sources of such pollution, such as industrial farming activities or wildfires.

• Airborne Disease Exposure: The World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines on detention facilities stress infectious disease resilience through adequate ventilation as essential. Low ventilation and poor filtration, exacerbated by overcrowded conditions, poor systemic vaccination safeguards (along with a lack of other infection risk minimization protocols), facilitate the rapid spread of airborne infections, including measles, tuberculosis, COVID-19, influenza, mumps, and chickenpox. In such environments, precisely what we see in these ICE facilities, outbreaks are practically inevitable, impacting not just the detainees, but also staff and the surrounding communities.

Poor Sanitation: Research documenting poor sanitation in ICE detention facilities - specifically focusing on water / food quality, hygiene, and waste management - indicates significant health impacts. Some of these include:

• Food-Borne and Water-Related Illnesses: Detainees have reported being forced to drink or use contaminated water and served food contaminated with maggots or mold. This, combined with poor hygiene in communal eating and living areas (including raw sewage pooling in cells from broken toilets), as well as limited access to soap or functional showers, exacerbated by chronic stress, has contributed to high rates of gastrointestinal issues, including abdominal pain, outbreaks of vomiting and diarrhea, and severe constipation and hemorrhoids.

• Skin Diseases and General Hygiene Deficits: Physical health deterioration is often visible through skin conditions directly resulting from unhygienic living environments. Frequent occurrences of scabies, as well as bacterial and fungal infections, which reflect overcrowding and poor hygiene have been reported. Detainees have also reported being deprived of showers for extended periods and lacking access to basic sanitary products like menstrual pads, leading to severe discomfort and secondary medical complications.

• Infectious Disease Transmission: Unsanitary conditions - specifically a lack of soap, hand sanitizer, and clean water - combined with overcrowding conditions create ideal conditions for the rapid spread of various communicable diseases (which can also extend to staff and the surrounding communities as mentioned above). Documented outbreaks of influenza, chickenpox, and mumps have been directly linked to environmental crowding and poor health conditions in many of these facilities. Previous research identified 486 cases of Hepatitis A between 2019 - 2023 across 20 facilities, with outbreaks often attributed to poor infection control and hygiene standards.

Solitary Confinement: Research indicates that solitary confinement (the practice of isolating people in small cells without meaningful human contact for 22 hours or more per day) creates a toxic combination of physical and social isolation, sensory deprivation, and forced idleness, leading to lasting damage. Among the harm done includes:

• Severe Psychological Damage: Documentation shows that solitary confinement leads to extreme psychological distress, including hallucinations, panic attacks, severe anxiety, depression, and cognitive dysfunction (confusion and memory loss). It’s often considered a form of torture itself, leading to PTSD, self-harm, and heightened suicide risks. Many detained immigrants are also survivors of previous torture and/or other trauma, so for them this can be retraumatizing.

• Worsening of Preexisting Physical Conditions: Detainees with pre-existing conditions (like diabetes) have reported the denial of medication and appropriate care while in isolation, resulting in further physical deterioration. Imagine what those with epilepsy must endure. Other documented physical impacts include lasting brain damage, hallucinations, and heart palpitations.

• Cruelty Campaign Trends: A 2025 Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) report found that between April 2024 and May 2025, over 10,500 people were placed in solitary, with vulnerable detainees having medical and mental health conditions kept in isolation for an average of 38 consecutive days in early 2025. This far exceeds the 15-day limit that the UN defines as torture - remember that cruelty is often the point here.

I should also note that the adverse effects of solitary confinement are magnified by the substandard physical environments in ICE facilities, which are often described as terrible and disgusting. The 24/7 lighting, lack of daylight access, loud noises, extreme temperatures, poor air quality, lack of adequate ventilation and filtration, and poor sanitation discussed above all serve to make solitary confinement more tortuous.

These are not minor discomforts or even just substandard building conditions - these are inhumane physical environments and operational policies that have been weaponized to produce physiological and psychological harm, often with lifelong consequences. For many detainees, this is torture.

Vulnerable Populations: Children, Pregnant Women, and Others

But one only begins to fully grasp the cruelty of these facilities when considering the impacts of systematic medical neglect, environmental stressors, and prolonged confinement on our most vulnerable populations. We consistently see that detention acts as a catalyst for worsening health, with outcomes such as depression, PTSD, and chronic illness exacerbation becoming significantly more prevalent the longer an individual is held.

Children: Studies indicate that NO period of immigration detention is safe for children, as it causes irreversible harm to their physical, mental, and social development. Yet, as of January 2026, more than 900 children were held beyond the 20-day U.S. legal limit (notably longer than the U.N.’s limit for being designated as torture), with 270 detained for more than twice that long. The nine-year old autistic boy mentioned above exemplifies the trauma many children are experiencing: detained at the Dilley Center in south Texas for over 80 days with no therapy, no school, and a constant sensory assault - 24/7 electric lighting, loud and constant noises, guard patrols, unfamiliar and contaminated food. He began having meltdowns consisting of hitting himself, pulling at his clothes, and screaming until he would lay exhausted on the floor. Other impacts consist of:

• Mental Health Harm: A meta-analysis found a 42.2% prevalence of major depressive disorder (MDD) and a 32.0% prevalence of PTSD for detained children. They often experience anxiety, night terrors, regressive behaviors, emotional problems, self-harm, and suicidal ideation.

• Physical and Developmental Harm: Documented issues include weight loss, sleep disturbances, abdominal pain, and developmental delays or regressions, such as language delay.

• Long-term Harm: Severe enforcement experiences during childhood are significantly associated with ongoing mental and physical health issues into young adulthood. The prolonged detention of any child, particularly an autistic child, is the antithesis of good treatment and risks irreparable harm.

Above is an audio of children just separated from their parents, taken from inside a U.S. Customs and Border Protection facility, obtained by ProPublica.

Women: Women in ICE custody face unique reproductive and mental health challenges, often exacerbated by trauma and gender-based violence experienced prior to detention. Some of these include:

• Maternal Health Risks: Reports include pregnant women being held in solitary confinement, sleeping on floors in overcrowded cells, being transported in shackles at the ankles, hands, and waist, and even miscarrying in shackles. In fiscal years 2017 and 2018 alone, 28 women reported miscarriages while in ICE custody. In October 2025, an investigation by the ACLU of Georgia and other advocacy groups revealed medically neglectful and abusive cases. One woman miscarried after an invasive procedure was performed without her consent. She was returned to detention for two more months, still experiencing bleeding, fevers, and abdominal pain with sick call requests going unanswered.

• Severe Complications: Inadequate care has been linked to life-threatening complications; for example, one detained pregnant woman developed eclampsia, a condition characterized by seizures and dangerously high blood pressure. Another woman, a graduate student legally in the U.S., was detained for over 20 weeks during a high-risk pregnancy. When she asked about her prenatal vitamins, a nurse told her You won’t die if you don’t take them. Only released after legal advocates intervened, she later developed eclampsia, endured a difficult delivery, and continues to struggle with postpartum depression linked to her detention trauma.

• Psychological Distress: Women are more likely than men to develop psychiatric disorders and higher levels of depression while detained, in part due to their experiences of sexual harassment and assault at higher levels while detained. Acute emotional crises are frequently observed in women separated from their children, with impacts extending well beyond detainment (though men are impacted as well).

Other Individuals: Those with preexisting mental health challenges or a history of trauma are among the most vulnerable to the harms experienced in detention facilities. In addition, LGBTQ+ individuals often experience targeted harassment, the elderly may experience accelerated aging, and neurodivergent individuals are often impacted more by different elements of the surrounding environment than the general population. More specifics include:

• Detainees with Mental Health Challenges or Past Trauma: Individuals with various mental health challenges are disproportionately placed in solitary confinement, which often worsens their condition. Approximately 57% of recently detained immigrants with diagnosed with different types of mental illnesses reported difficulty accessing medical services while in custody. Note that the suicide rate in 2020 among individuals in ICE facilities increased substantially compared to the previous decade.

• LGBTQ+ Detainees: Studies indicate that LGBTQ+ individuals (especially transgender women) experience higher rates of harassment and violence than non-LGBTQ+ detainees. In FY 2017, LGBTQ+ detainees were 97 times more likely to be victims of sexual abuse than non-LGBTQ+ detainees. Some reported being targeted by other detainees while officers failed to intervene or even facilitated the abuse. The cruelty is the point.

• Elderly, Disabled, and Neurodivergent Detainees: Older adults in carceral settings face accelerated aging, where they experience greater geriatric morbidity (such as mobility and hearing impairment) at a much younger age than community-dwelling peers. They are also more likely to report multiple chronic health conditions, such as hypertension and diabetes, which may be inadequately managed, all of which makes them more vulnerable to dying while detained. And neurodivergent individuals like the nine year old boy mentioned above typically receive no accommodations for their conditions, cruelly subjecting them to a constant sensory assault.

Above, listen to a Minneapolis resident and U.S. citizen, who is disabled and has autism as well as a traumatic brain injury, describe being rounded up by ICE, booked into a detention facility, and experiencing the facility’s conditions. Source: PBS Newshour YouTube channel

Warehouse Conversions

Thanks to Congress more than tripling ICE’s annual budget via the Big Beautiful Bill (including $45 billion for expanding its detention system), the Trump regime has increased efforts already in progress to expand its detention system at an unprecedented pace. Such fast tracking is being accomplished with the help of a) no-bid contracts, b) skirting environmental reviews, c) claiming federal immunity from state and local codes and zoning restrictions, d) the unacceptably vague nature of the Performance-Based National Detention Standards (PBNDS) to begin with (particularly related to health metrics), e) an ineffective inspection process, and d) reduced transparency and oversight in general. Detention infrastructure expansion has included reactivating previously closed prison facilities (many of which were closed due to serious problems), expanding existing facilities, building new facilities, erecting tent cities (one of which sits on the site of a former Japanese internment camp), and converting warehouses into detention centers.

And converting warehouses to house people instead of goods comes with it’s own unique brand of cruelty and dehumanization. These structures, originally designed as logistical hubs for storing, sorting, and distributing goods, are being repurposed to hold up to 10,000 people per facility. While adaptive reuse is certainly something many of us in the industry push for, this particular kind of reuse comes with significant challenges requiring time and money to address - and the Trump regime doesn’t seem that interested in doing its due diligence here.

Such challenges include, but aren’t limited to, significant HVAC system and building controls upgrades, plumbing system upgrades / renovations / redesign (likely requiring slab demolition and repouring), fire protection redesign, interior space build outs / modifications, potential envelope modifications, and, in some jurisdictions, environmental or floodplain permitting. And this assumes the local community can handle the increased utility and sanitation demands such a facility brings with it, which isn’t always the case. Here’s an overview of what such adaptive reuse consists of for one warehouse facility in New Jersey.

These challenges exist because codes and standards require such adaptive reuse efforts take human health, safety, and general wellbeing into account (as well as environmental impacts). For example, the International Building Code Change of Occupancy Requirements - Chapter 10 requires that any change in building occupancy - such as converting a warehouse (Group S) to institutional detention use (Group I-3) - must ensure safety and health of occupants through upgraded ventilation, life safety systems, accessibility, and sanitation. Yet the Trump regime’s efforts to skirt such requirements - to literally warehouse people, package them, and figuratively, if not literally, stack them like cordwood - will result in additional versions of the inhumane conditions laid out above, allowing them to be cruel to significantly more people per facility now.

But again, the cruelty is the point.

The Cruelty of Bureaucratic and Capitalistic Complicity

The Moral Failure of Leavenworth’s City Council

While many state and community leaders have resisted the Trump regime’s efforts to place these detention centers in their communities, the Leavenworth, KS city commission recently voted (4-1) to approve CoreCivic’s special use permit to re-open its 1,000 bed, privately run, for-profit prison for ICE detainees. This decision came despite the recent history leading to its closure. Note that a federal district judge previously described the facility (open from 1991 to January 2022) as an absolute hell hole.

A September 2021 letter from the ACLU and a group of public defenders noted: CoreCivic Leavenworth is dangerously understaffed, poorly managed and incapable of safely housing its detainee population. Stabbings, suicides and even homicide have occurred with alarming frequency in the last year with weapons, drugs and other contraband now a common occurrence. They pointed out that food, medical care, and showers were limited, and that contact with legal counsel and family members had been denied.

A 2017 audit of this facility and its operations by the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, found multiple issues affecting safety and security, including understaffing, triple bunking, and a lack of sufficient oversight of CoreCivic by the U.S. Marshalls Service (USMS). The facility closed in January 2022 when its contract expired without renewal following President Biden’s executive order preventing federal agencies from contracting with private prison operators. Since then it has remained unused, but maintained by CoreCivic.

Despite this documented history of violence, neglect, abuse, and poor management of this specific facility, despite the outcry from community members, and despite the knowledge of the harms ICE is inflicting on detainees directly and through contractors, Leavenworth officials nevertheless approved CoreCivic’s return. Max McCoy’s recent Kansas Reflector opinion piece title perfectly captured the moment: ICE just added Leavenworth to its chain of detention islands. Blame a failure of moral leadership. So did one of ‘s recent pieces: Leavenworth City Commission Capitulates to Greed.

In justifying her decision, Commissioner Holly Pittman used the following bureaucratic language, devoid of the human impacts: It is a land use decision governed by law and by the constraints of our political authority. After reviewing all the legal framework, the zoning standards and the court rulings, I believe denying this permit would expose our taxpayers to a significant financial risk, and I will not gamble the financial stability of this city.

And Commissioner Joe Wilson stated: This has been an agonizing process. Everybody wants to make this morality over fiduciary responsibility, but I think there is a real risk to the future of the city, based on how the vote turns out that has to be considered, that could have long-term ramifications for our children, for our tax base, for our law enforcement and our firefighters and the services that we can provide.

I’ve been a local elected official. Governing isn’t easy - I recognize the difficulties and nuances often involved in governing decisions, and I have some sympathy for these officials. But in the end such moral considerations must, ABSOLUTELY MUST, outweigh community fiscal concerns - and it shouldn’t have been this hard of a decision given the number of community members willing to back them up.

Such justifications, as given by these commissioners, in my opinion exemplify what political theorist Hannah Arendt, reporting on the war crimes trial of Adolph Eichmann, termed the banality of evil: bureaucrats making administrative decisions (often narrowly focused and broadly thoughtless) that enable atrocities while appealing to the importance of regulations, procedural correctness, fiduciary responsibilities, local issues, etc. While not intending to, they are acting as (willfully ignorant) cogs in the gears of evil.

Historical Parallels: Nazi Germany and Japanese Internment

The initial concentration camps of Nazi Germany in 1933 weren’t centrally planned or administered, this was done via a mix of local, regional, and central authorities. Local officials in this early stage actively enabled the concentration camp system through routine administrative actions and legal justifications: they provided sites and infrastructure (from readapting hotels and sports stadiums to warehouses and ships) for camps, coordinated with local police and paramilitaries to run them, and invoked emergency laws like the Reichstag Fire Decree and protective custody to legitimize extrajudicial imprisonment. This bureaucratic facilitation – couched in the language of legal authority, public safety, and political necessity – was crucial in the eventual transformation of ad-hoc detention sites into a nationwide network of centrally controlled concentration camps.

There are a few key parallels here with what’s going on in the U.S. ICE is making use of local county jails, private prisons, military bases, converted warehouses, and even hospitals to house detainees before eventually releasing them, deporting them, or feeding them into larger detention centers (if they’re not sent to these centers to begin with). These county jails, prisons, and tent camps are part of our vast carceral state as author and journalist Andrea Pitzer has pointed out, and where… there is not an existing concentration camp network already in place, the natural thing is to take advantage of where you already have the appropriate facilities. And doing this - bureaucratically facilitating it - allows the concentration camp system to take on the local culture and specifics, helping to normalize it, to embed it. The way you get to a more totalitarian style state is once you harden it so that it exists everywhere, all the time, then anybody is susceptible to it - this is basically what happened in Nazi Germany - facilitated by local, compliant, authorities.

Local authorities became indispensable partners in the Nazi regime’s machinery of repression, demonstrating how ordinary bureaucratic decisions – about who could be detained where, and under what pretext – helped enable the rise of the concentration camp system. This was the beginning of the operation of the concentration camps outside the laws of the German state, facilitated by the blessing of local, cooperative officials. And the efforts of local authorities were a form of bureaucratic normalization - per Christopher Browning’s seminal work Ordinary Men - where officials were just making administrative decisions, citing legal frameworks, and following procedures. Atrocities of increasing severity were committed through the normal machinations of bureaucracy (divorced from morality and sometimes coerced by higher authorities) - until the end result was genocide.

Similarly (and in addition to the U.S.’s internment of Native Americans), the U.S. government’s internment of over 120,000 individuals of Japanese ancestry during World War II - two-thirds of whom were native-born American citizens - was facilitated in part through a system of bureaucratic compliance. Executive Order 9066 (1942), signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, authorized the military to designate exclusion zones and remove individuals deemed threats to national security. The executive order also explicitly authorized the assistance of state and local agencies in carrying out the internment.

For the most part, local and state authorities, such as California Attorney General Earl Warren, supported and enforced these measures, citing legal obligations and wartime necessity. They were empowered to facilitate the internment through routine administrative actions under the War Relocation Authority (WRA), a civilian agency. The process of internment was deliberately framed as an ordinary administrative relocation - Japanese Americans were called evacuees and were ordered to report to Civilian Control Centers with what belongings they could carry.

Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas, was one of several U.S. Army facilities used during WWII to detain Japanese, German, and Italian nationals. In 2025 the site was repurposed as the largest ICE detention center in U.S. history (as of August 2025), drawing condemnation from Japanese American advocacy groups. Organizations such as the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL) and the Japanese American National Museum (JANM) criticized the move, with JACL calling it a disgrace to the memory and legacy of the more than 125,000 Japanese and Japanese Americans unjustly imprisoned during World War II. These groups drew direct parallels between the historical internment and contemporary immigration detention, warning against repeating past injustices under similar justifications of national security.

Let’s Face it, ICE Detention Centers are Concentration Camps

It’s not hyperbole to label these centers concentration camps (or deranged and lazy as former DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin claimed). Journalist Andrea Pitzer, author of One Long Night: A Global History of Concentration Camps (2017), defines concentration camp systems as:

systems… designed to incarcerate civilians on the bases of race, political affiliation, ethnicity, religion or some aspect of who they are, rather than what they’ve allegedly done. Much of its workings occur outside whatever is the existing legal system in that country. In the United States, this has manifested in the form of detention without trial, abuse and even killings that have run afoul of the law, and the suppression of documentation and accountability.

This would certainly seem to apply to ICE detention centers and the system the Trump regime has set up. It’s a system of mass detention based largely on (actual or presumed) national origin and immigration status (that has extended to civilian protesters and political opponents), generally without meaningful judicial process. They fit within the broader historical category of concentration camps that have emerged across numerous countries and political systems.

This broader, historical category exists because, unfortunately, concentration camps are globally ubiquitous - over the last 100 years, they have existed continuously at varying locations on the planet (including in the U.S.). Though people - the hardliners, true believers, and sadists as well as the compliant officials and others going along to get along - will convince themselves that their country’s detention camps aren’t like those other concentration camps, because they as a people are not like that, and these people in the camps are actually bad (or are there for their own good). That’s part of the normalization process, as are the backlashes we’ve seen against using the term concentration camp.

While not every historian or scholar may agree with calling these facilities concentration camps, a significant number do. Michael Zank, a College of Arts and Sciences professor of religion and Jewish studies as well as director of BU’s Elie Wiesel Center for Jewish Studies is one of these scholars: By referring to the caging of asylum seekers as “concentration camps,” she [Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez] managed to get our attention. The analogy is correct, as many scholars have confirmed. Historians note that ICE detention shares the definitional features: mass detention without trial, punitive conditions designed to deter others, detention based on identity. The term fits longstanding academic definitions of concentration camps.

And there is evidence that U.S. officials intended the cruelty and brutal nature built into these camps (as laid out earlier in this piece in great detail) to act as a deterrent. In 2018 a top HHS official openly stated the family separation policy (that is apparently still informally part of this larger concentration camp system) will result in a deterrence effect on future immigration. Historian David Silbey notes that when modern concentration camps first emerged (by the British during the Boer War, in Spain’s campaign against Cuban insurrectionists, and during the U.S.’s campaign against Philippine insurgents), the intent was to isolate and punish civilians to cut insurgents off from their support – an effective but brutal tactic leading to mass suffering. This aligns with the Trump regime’s logic of using severe measures (like separating families or confining children and pregnant women in inhumane conditions) to deter asylum-seekers. In other words, as I’ve stated many times already, the cruelty is the point - it’s an immoral policy tool.

In different locations concentration camps evolved over varying periods of time before some became formal death camps. We know this history. We know where we’re currently at. We know where this path can lead. We should resist the beginnings.

The AEC Industry - the Good, the Bad, and the… Indifferent?

This resistance should extend to developers, building owners, the real estate sector, and other AEC Industry organizations and businesses. But there are definitely financial incentives working against people’s better natures.

The private prison sector, acknowledging the presence of some volatility, is nevertheless looking to prosper overall under this expansion of the concentration camp system (particularly those at the top). CoreCivic and GEO Group stock prices soared following the 2024 election. CoreCivic CEO Damon Hininger told shareholders: Never in our 42-year company history have we had so much activity and demand. Their contract for the Dilley Immigration Processing Center in Dilley, Texas alone is expected to generate approximately $180 million in revenue annually. Their Leavenworth six month contract is worth $4.2 million per month. Hininger himself earned over $7 million in 2024.

GEO Group’s CEO Executive Chairman George Zoley told investors that the company has about 6,000 idle beds at six of its facilities that, if fully utilized, would generate more than $300 million in combined incremental annualized revenues. That’s significant incentive to fill those beds, regardless of how it’s done, what it will lead to, or how many people are harmed. As is ICE’s use of no-bid contracts to bypass competitive bidding, awarding hundreds of millions to firms with minimal oversight. Michael A. Hallett, a professor of criminal justice at the University of North Florida who studies private prisons has called it the gold rush. When demand is spiraling and you’re the only provider that can meet demand, you can pretty much set your terms.

Other examples include global defense contractor KVG LLC’s award of a $113 million contract to convert a Maryland warehouse (originally designed to hold big box store goods) into a 1,500-bed facility. The contract also contains potential growth options set at $642 million over three years. GardaWorld Federal Services, a Canadian based security contractor, was also recently awarded a $313.4 million contract to renovate a warehouse to hold detained immigrants in Surprise, AZ. And in the greater Kansas City area, while community efforts seemed to initially put the breaks on Platform Venture’s deal to sell a local warehouse to the government for use as an ICE concentration camp, the story may not be over. As reported by Melinda Henneberger at (and followed up by ), the government may simply take possession of the warehouse by condemning the property, compensating Platform Venture in the process. It’s then a win / win for the Trump regime and Platform Ventures while being a lose / lose for humanity and democracy.

And for all of these deals, there are the unnamed contractors, architects, consulting engineers, manufacturers, etc., providing the services and materials to design and build / renovate these facilities, enabling the expansion of a concentration camp system they know - or should know - undermines democracy, supports a fascist, authoritarian takeover, and causes systematic harm to so many, including to some of our most vulnerable populations. I hope these companies and individuals do some intensive soul searching.

However, there are examples of better natures prevailing. The Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation fired leaders of one of its businesses - KBP Services, a subsidiary of the the Nation’s business arm, Prairie Band, LLC - in response to accepting a $30 million contract for ICE detention center related services. The tribe also confirmed that they successfully exited all third-party related interests affiliated with ICE. But this doesn’t come without financial risk to the Nation - the $30 million is itself a loss, and they risk losing future government contract awards. But, as Joseph Rupnick, chairman of the Tribal Council stated:

We know our Indian reservations were the government’s first attempts at detention centers. We were placed here because we were treated as prisoners of war. So we must ask ourselves why we would ever participate in something that mirrors the harm and trauma once done to our people.

At the beginning of this article, I mentioned the January 2026 national strike protesting ICE detention practices by architects and designers across the U.S., following the lead of several Minnesota firms. Previously, in August 2018, The Architecture Lobby (TAL) and Architects / Designers / Planners for Social Responsibility (ADPSR) issued a joint statement calling on…

architects, designers, planners and allied professionals to refuse to participate in the design of any immigration enforcement infrastructure, including but not limited to walls, checkpoints, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) offices, detention facilities, processing centers, or juvenile holding centers.

History has taught us that what is strictly legal is not always what is just. It is time for this to end. We call on professionals to join us in this pledge: We will not design cages for people.

In July of 2019, the American Instituted of Architects (AIA) issued a statement denouncing the conditions at ICE detention centers. Key parts of the statement are as follows:

The American Institute of Architects urges local, state, and federal leaders to work together to safeguard the dignity, safety, and welfare of everyone regardless of race, creed, gender, age or national origin in their custody and care at detention facilities.

Above all, the misuse of these buildings and the impact on the occupants in them are contrary to our values as architects and as Americans.

AIA calls for building inspectors and others (with appropriate authority) to proactively evaluate facilities to ensure that they are in full compliance with applicable laws and regulations to ensure the health, safety, and welfare of inhabitants. Consistent with applicable laws and codes, we urge swift correction and mitigation of all building code violations and that existing building codes be used to ensure the safety and welfare of all.

This last paragraph of AIA’s statement is particularly important in my opinion. So many of these facilities - these concentration camps - are NOT in compliance with various applicable building codes and laws. Our industry must step up here and forcefully and loudly advocate for these inspections and appropriate follow throughs. And then finally in December 2020, the AIA officially added new rules to the organization’s Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct prohibiting members from “knowingly designing spaces intended for execution and torture, including indefinite or prolonged solitary confinement of prisoners.”

But where are the other professional organizations here? Where are the statements, code of ethics revisions, etc., from the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), the International WELL Building Institute (IWBI), the National Society of Professional Engineers (NSPE), the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE), the Illuminating Engineering Society (IES), the Design-Build Institute of America (DBIA), and others? Why the apparent indifference?

Those of us in the industry need to make some noise here - with the professional organizations we’re members of and with the companies we work for. While there are firms who refuse to work on such facilities - HOK for one - not every firm has made this commitment or publicly stated so. However, employee resistance can make a difference.

Things are apparently still playing out, but in the case of DLR Group, protests from a good percentage of employees against an existing contract to convert an old private prison in Oklahoma into a new detention center (involving CoreCivic) did make a difference. It led to leadership committing to no more new work involving ICE detainment or deportation facilities (though they wouldn’t walk away from the current contract or other correctional facility work overall, even though some employees walked away from DLR Group themselves). And the AIA’s statement and code of ethics revision above only came about after more than a decade of debate and discussion involving members. It may take some time (hopefully not more than a decade), but making noise can have an impact.

[Full disclosure, BranchPattern (my employer) doesn’t have a correctional facility focus or expertise, though we have occasionally worked on such projects (mostly county jails). To my knowledge, we have not worked on detention centers such as these, but nor have we publicly stated our opposition to such work to my knowledge.]

In a previous article Who Gets to Shape Federal Architecture, I argued that federal architecture should reflect democratic values and a pluralistic society, not a white, oppressive, authoritarian state. The choice to design concentration camps is a choice about what values American architecture will embody. When AEC Industry professionals choose to provide the design, technical, construction, and operational expertise to create harmful environments that end up violating codes, standards, laws, and basic human decency through their use, they are making their choice of values clear. They are declaring that American architecture will embody cruelty and white supremacist authoritarianism, will enable suffering, and will prioritize profit over human dignity. But we can choose not to do this. We can choose to speak out against this.

Concentration Camps - Resist the Beginnings

Never again was too short a time. We broke the unhyphenated American promise (though some Americans’ fingers were likely crossed behind their backs to begin with). We’re flirting with fascism and authoritarianism rooted in white supremacy and white Christian nationalism. We’re rounding up people because of what they look like, what they sound like, what papers they don’t have, and what political side they’re on. We think their due doesn’t include due process.

We’re concentrating these people in camps - brutally cruel environments - to deport them. If some die along the way, what does it matter? The goal is to remove them from society - from what we think society should look like - White and Christian and Cishet and Authoritarian.

According to the Trump regime, these people aren’t Americans or real Americans. They’re incompatible with Western civilization. They’re diluting U.S. society. They’re poisoning the blood of the country. They’re parasites. They’re the worst of the worst. They’re invaders. They’re traitors. They are the other. They’re due brutal treatment and inhumane environments - they’re due concentration camps.

Above, listen to a U.S. citizen describe her and others’ treatment at the hands of ICE and the conditions in a detention center - this is what happens when ICE agents fully embrace and embody the language of the Trump regime. Source: Senator Dick Durbin’s YouTube channel.

And so we have camps of weeping mothers, crying children hitting themselves, pregnant women bleeding alone on concrete floors, people crammed together like sardines, people denied food, water, and human contact, people living in filthy, tortuous conditions, people dying - killing themselves - being murdered. These are camps of despair. This is what we’ve allowed to be created. This is what some of us have helped create. These are the atrocities we’ve allowed.

So far… It could get worse, as it has before.

And many in the Trump regime and MAGA world may very well like it to get worse. Which means the German phrase Wehret den Anfängen - resist the beginnings - likely captures the urgency of the moment.

We can’t be indifferent and keep our heads down. We can’t hide behind bureaucratic language and narrowly focused administrative decisions. We can’t hide behind shareholder profit margins or just doing what my firm’s leadership tells me to do. We can’t tell ourselves we’re just making a bad situation or inhuman conditions less bad. We can’t let ourselves be cogs in the gears of evil.

We need to take action. We need to speak up and protest as citizens. We need to have a moral compass as elected officials and be brave. We need to have conversations with our fellow employees and the leadership of our firms, and not be afraid to walk away in protest. And we need to make complicity visible… and shameful.

We need to resist the beginnings before they become the even greater horrors we will one day struggle to comprehend. Before someone, again, must say Never again.

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Hope is a powerful human emotion, feeling, and expectation capable of providing our lives with greater meaning. It’s also been described as a weapon, a blade and a shield for us to wield as we resist injustice.

A friend recently shared the following video with me from writer, songwriter, and storyteller . Take a moment to listen before reading on.

She shared it with me after the Kansas legislature - composed of a GOP supermajority dominated by its MAGA, white supremacist leadership - voted to override our governor’s veto of the equal parts cruel, ludicrous, and costly bathroom / gender marker bill. And this was the bill that tipped the scales for , shifting Kansas to the do not travel category, putting us in the elite company of Texas and Florida, above that of even Missouri and Iowa.

It was frustrating to watch the legislature pass the bill initially and then subsequently override the governor’s veto after cutting debate short, with many smirking along the way. It was disheartening to have Republicans who knew better tell me they couldn’t stand up to their leadership. It was infuriating to have Republicans tell me, after laying out the human and fiscal impacts (to all Kansans) of this legislation, after appealing to whatever sense of curiosity they might have regarding the realities of sex and gender, after pleading with them as a parent, after all of that to then actually tell me my son is mentally ill, that he doesn’t matter because trans people are such a small percentage, or that they just don’t agree with me (or the overwhelming amount of opponent testimony submitted by Kansans, experts, and the LGBTQ+ community) but to nevertheless have a good day anyway.

My anger only increased last week when the Kansas Division of Vehicles began sending out letters to transgender individuals letting them know their driver’s license was no longer valid. It’s so enraging - this senseless cruelty that is itself the point (though the first lawsuit has been filed). As far as I’m concerned these legislators can have the fucking day they deserve.

My friend sensed my anger, frustration, and concern. It’s why she shared the video with me. And in sharing ’s video, she was reminding me that kindness still exists in the quiet spaces, that people still show up when you’re trying to make something better, and sometimes hope reappears in unexpected forms.

It’s true. I recall the kindness of another friend who hugged me last year at the Capitol, expressing solidarity and empathy. People are also protesting and submitting gobs of opponent testimony (and now submitting lawsuits), not to mention all of the Democrats in the legislature constantly showing up to do what they can to resist (and set the stage for breaking the supermajority). And there’s the hope of my son - still expressing compassion for those Republicans voting for this out of fear - that their conscience will at some point be the seed that grows into a spine.

Arnold’s expression of gratitude above is a follow up to an earlier, longer video he made discussing hope as a weapon. You can view it here.

I understand the choice of language, of describing hope as a weapon, of using the language of war and armed conflict. Because there’s much requiring our active resistance and various forms of individual and collective action. Words of war, even if not being used literally, can help rouse us off our couches to peacefully resist against:

• Support of the Trump regime’s brutal, inhumane, deadly, authoritarian, and unconstitutional immigration policies enforced by the actions of ICE and the CBP, including support of efforts to obtain maximum cooperation from local and state law enforcement in these unlawful federal actions.

• Equating biological sex with gender, claiming there are only males and females, and claiming the white Christian nationalist very narrow definition of family and marriage forms the moral foundation of society, while denying the realities of, and overwhelming evidence for, the complexities of the entangled sex / gender spectrum. Then using this to justify eliminating same sex marriage and erasing the transgender, non-binary, and intersex communities.

• Telling women their bodies are not their own, and declaring the lives of children only really matter while they’re still in the womb - once they’re born they best start figuring out how to make it on their own. People need to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps, even if those boots are only toddler-sized.

• Decreasing access to affordable healthcare, with real negative consequences to our poorest citizens, rural communities, and even our veterans, by focusing on for-profit healthcare solutions and refraining from expanding Medicaid and other federal healthcare programs - to enrich corporate administrators, lobbyists, and the legislators in their pockets.

• Promoting limited and regressive (flat) taxes that starve government, public services, and social safety nets while increasing privatization and the associated private capture of revenue streams, all of which continues shifting money upward, further increasing the wealth gap, while also stigmatizing the poor in the process.

• Defunding / underfunding public education, forcing unfunded mandates on school districts, disrespecting teachers as autonomous professionals, using culture war issues to attack both public education and vulnerable minorities, and stripping control away from local school boards.

• Promoting the arming of teachers - forcing them to act as law enforcement and shields against the bullets aimed at ripping through the bodies of their students - instead of addressing the underlying causes of mass shootings, including ineffective gun control legislation.

• Denying the realities of, and the overwhelming evidence for, anthropogenic climate change and the impacts of greenhouse gases on our ability to flourish as a species. This denial is necessary to support the fossil fuel and chemical industries while standing in the way of efforts to rapidly decarbonize society. This includes everything from subsidizing fossil fuels (and undermining the market’s favoring of renewables), to stripping municipalities of their ability to restrict the use of natural gas in new construction, to preventing the adoption of codes requiring various sustainable and regenerative measures for our built environment.

• Adopting direct elections of state Supreme Court Justices and judges statewide to make them partisan and help ensure minority rule by the most extreme part of the GOP / MAGA party, and

• Supporting the myth of rampant voter fraud (the myth is the real fraud) to disenfranchise voters - through such things as purging voter roles, restricting the use of mail-in ballots, reducing the time for early voting, requiring the use of a government-issued photo IDs to vote, supporting the deployment of ICE and CBP at the polls, etc. - to also help ensure minority rule by the most extreme part of the GOP / MAGA party.

Note that each and every one of these items are part of the Kansas Republican Party platform adopted on January 31, 2026. I may have added some interpretations not explicitly stated in the document, but they are there nonetheless if you read between the lines, taking legislative actions and words into account. You can also find these and other bigoted, regressive, racist, fascist, white supremacist, and authoritarian goals in the GOP party platforms and actions of other states as well as in Congress and, of course, Trump’s executive branch. They’re woven throughout Project 2025 and Project 2026, including the dismantling of representative democracy within the U.S.

So yeah, the language of war and conflict, in addition to being an effective call to action, can also just feel good to utter when you’re really angry about all of this (with some profanity thrown in for good measure). But the language of conflict isn’t always enough for everyone. Nor is it really sustaining - intense, fiery emotions require a lot of fuel to keep raging before burning out, before burning you out. It also exacerbates the othering that occurs with respect to those you’re struggling against, contributes to dehumanizing them, and reduces the curiosity we need to understand the other side (and ultimately undermine their harmful ideologies as we hold them accountable).

And so, is it enough for hope to be a weapon?

What is hope, exactly? Merriam-Webster defines it as a desire accompanied by expectation of obtaining what is desired or belief that it is obtainable; an expectation of fulfillment or success. It’s basically an expectation of successfully achieving a desired goal. Clinical psychologist Anthony Scioli put it another way, stating [h]ope is best viewed as an ameliorating emotion, designed to fill the liminal space between need and reality.

And research (summarized here) has shown that, as part of the human condition, it goes beyond this simple expectation or filling of liminal space. As I stated earlier, hope and the positive feelings associated with it have been found to give our lives meaning, particularly by increasing our perceptions of purpose, coherence, and significance, and particularly during difficult times. Feelings of hope are also intertwined with degrees of social support, strong social networks, and a sense of belonging - there are both individual and social experiences of hope.

But at the heart of all this does lie the desired goal(s), vision(s), and need(s). And one could argue that the more concrete they are, the stronger, more inspiring, and more sustainable are the associated feelings of hope.

This is one reason why hope is a weapon often works (at least initially). Resisting something - fighting against something - is concrete; the associated steps and actions are relatively easy to define and there’s a more easily defined end result. The associated emotions are also primed to bring people together and generate action. But if these immediate goals are reached, then what? If people burn out, then what?

Hope must be more than a weapon of resistance, pushing us away from bigotry, racism, fascism, white supremacy, white Christian nationalism, and authoritarianism. It must also pull us toward a vision of a more socially and environmentally just, democratic society. And we can use hope to help us build that society - as such, hope then becomes more than a weapon, it’s more broadly a tool (as Arnold also mentioned). And it’s a promise we make to ourselves that we’ll not just resist and fight, but also come together to build a better society.

To do that, though, the goals and vision of a better society need to be more concrete, something that arguably needs significantly more effort spent doing and communicating.

I think the Kansas Democratic Party platform portrays a vision of our state (and the world) that is significantly more socially and environmentally just, more beneficial to us all, than the Republican Party platform. But it’s not a roadmap of how to get there - it’s not full of concrete actions to overcome misinformation and disinformation, to undermine the current elite capture of society, or to remake our socially constructed free-market economic system (currently rooted in the neoclassical economic paradigm), all of which greatly constrain achieving the platform’s vision, and even corrupt individuals and groups within the Democratic party itself (as well as other parties).

Without some idea of the path(s) forward, what are we promising ourselves to build together? What are we hoping for? We need some place to start, even if we recognize we’ll be building the plane as we’re flying it. So, here’s one potential path forward.

What if we started with some basic, guiding principles related to aspects of individual and collective human behavior? Something like political scientist/sociologist and Nobel Economics prize winner Elinor Ostrom’s core design principles (CDPs) of cooperation. These principles, common to our species, evolved among our ancestors who lived in small groups, primarily as a means to protect access (within and between groups) to a variety of common pool resources. But, as it turns out, they’re beneficial for the cooperation of achieving any goal, and I’ve written about them in more detail here and here.

ProSocial.World, supercharging Ostrom's work by combining it with cultural multi-level selection (CMLS), an extension of general evolutionary theory, and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), developed a process to help the members of groups and organizations (regardless of type and size) cooperate in achieving prosocial goals. The CDPs, once successfully implemented, act as a sort of inoculation against behaviors, decisions, actions, etc., that undermine the group, from wealth gaps and inequitable access to resources to bigotry and the undermining of democracy. Using the language of evolutionary theory, they select for prosocial behaviors. And they’re most effective when we mindfully assess how to best implement them for the scale, location, and group in question, as well as monitor and adjust that implementation over the long term.

I’ve previously written about applying the CDPs to human-centered and integrated design approaches (here), as well to the AEC Industry as a whole (here and here), and even to government (here and here). Bipartisan and/or prosocial governing actions, such as the Kansas legislature passing a conservation funding bill out of committee, Congress saving ENERGY STAR from the chopping block, or the European Parliament's recognition of trans women as women, occur because at least some of the CDPs are actively at work, whether intentional or not.

The mission of economist to re-envision and recreate global economic systems based on equity and the common good, as well Kate Raworth’s Doughnut Economics model of achieving human prosperity within planetary boundaries, replacing the goal of endless growth with a safe and just space for humanity, both integrate the CDPs (though I don’t believe that was explicitly intended). Shifting back down to the local scale, Daniel T. O’Brien’s work also indirectly touches on the CDPs, focusing on how the environment at the scales of neighborhoods, streets, and individual addresses impacts our quality of life and behaviors, and how city policy changes (changing the social environment), which in turn also changes the physical environment, can prosocially improve things.

Understanding how to contextually implement the CDPs requires engaging and understanding the people impacted. Anthropologists, sociologists, ethnographic methods, and other aspects of the behavioral sciences are really important for this. ’s and ’s series, Portraits of Hunger in Iowa, is an example of listening directly to the people impacted, hearing their stories, and giving them a voice. Such efforts, along with more academic efforts like the work by , begin to generate the understanding necessary to co-create prosocial policies with those directly impacted, rooted in the CDPs, that actually address the challenges society faces.

And our young people really need a vision for the future; hell, they need a vision where they have a future. And they need to be part of creating that vision as well as the road map for how to get there. They need to be part of creating these contextual implementations of the CDPs, as well as their long-term monitoring and subsequent adjustments. They need to be part of the promise we’re making ourselves to come together to build a better society - to build a future for them and their children. They need hope, and I’ve found ’s substack and ’s substack both insightful in understanding, embracing, and including the next generation.

Finally, a recent book by , , and Daniel Kelly - Somebody Should Do Something: How Anyone Can Help Create Social Change, ties a lot of this together while indirectly touching on the CDPs, focusing on how individual and collective actions are intertwined in their efforts to create change, while also acknowledging the importance of the physical and social environment.

Do the CDPs, and this particular outline, represent the best way to build a concrete vision, set of goals, and associated road map to get there, to provide a vision we can promise to build together? Can it help generate the hope necessary to sustain us over the long haul of creation after the resistance is done? Maybe not, and there’s certainly significantly more details and smarter people than me needed to map everything out, but because all of this recognizes and acts on key realities of the human condition, it could be a good place to start…

It could be a good place to start building our promise of a socially and environmentally just future as we resist the hate and bigotry of MAGA-controlled state legislatures and a fascist, authoritarian regime conducting illegal military actions, brutalizing its own citizens, and bent on destroying democracy. It could help fill the liminal space between need and reality and, in the process, add necessary meaning to our lives. It could do this because…

Hope is a weapon, a tool, and a promise.

On the January 15th episode of What Next, Mary Harris interviewed Bishop Robert Hirschfeld,10th Bishop in the Episcopal Church of New Hampshire. This was after ICE murdered Renee Good, but before CBP murdered Alex Pretti, with other forms of brutality exhibited by federal agents throughout and since. During that episode, entitled Would You Die to Stop ICE?, they discussed the bishop’s call to action he made at a rally. He asked his clergy to prepare themselves.

He asked them to get their affairs in order to make sure they have their wills written. Because it may be that now is no longer the time for statements, but for us with our bodies to stand between the powers of this world and the most vulnerable.

And that’s exactly what Alex Pretti did. He put his body in between himself and a woman whom agents had pushed to the ground. He was trying to see if she was ok, trying to help her up. And they executed him for it.

What would you have done in that situation? Would you have given your life for your neighbor? For children being taken from their families? For the right to assemble peaceably? For the right to film ICE and blow whistles? For democracy?

Minnesota’s Attorney General Keith Ellison put it a slightly different way on the January 19th episode of What Next:

Every great American you’ve ever read about was a person willing to risk for the greater good of us all. I mean, I’m not asking people to die. I’m asking people to live for democracy.

So, how would you live for democracy?

Would you get training to peacefully protect your neighbors if ICE or CBP invades your neighborhood?

It’s important to acknowledge here that white people, especially white males, are now experiencing at the hands of the Trump regime what black and brown people, the LGBTQIA+ community, and women have experienced in the Americas since before the founding of this nation. There’s always been inequitable access to freedom, safety, opportunities, and self-determination in the U.S., with white, cisgender, heterosexual men having more access than most. I should note that Keith Porter, a black man, was shot and killed by an off-duty ICE agent on New Year’s Eve in LA.

So, what would you do to create a democracy where that access was equitable?

What would you do to protect our free press, the fourth estate of a functioning democracy? Would you speak out against the arrests of journalists (such as the recent arrests of two black journalists - Georgia Fort and Don Lemon) for doing their jobs, reporting on protests and what the government is doing, and keeping us informed?

Would you cancel your subscription to Paramount for turning CBS News into state TV? Would you support through paid subscriptions the regional and local newspapers still struggling to do this critical work, such as the Kansas City Star or the Lawrence Times? Would you support independent journalists like Georgia Fort, , , , , , , , , , , , , and many others?

What would you do to protect free and fair elections? Would you speak out against the FBI seizure of Georgia voting records and AG Pam Bondi’s leveraging of the ICE and CBP state terror in Minnesota to gain access to the state’s voter rolls? Would you protest out in the streets the obvious efforts of the Trump regime to sow doubt in election results, harass and threaten voting officials, pressure states into reckless purges of voter rolls, and increase the difficulty in voting ahead of the 2026 midterms?

Would you get training to become a poll watcher or volunteer to drive people to the polls, especially knowing such efforts might put you at risk next fall as the Trump regime continues expanding its secret police force of ICE and CBP agents? Note this expansion will be fueled by a gross explosion in funding as a result of the One Big Beautiful Bill, with no restrictions on how this funding is used.

What would you do to resist the EPA’s decision to stop accounting for the economic benefits to human health that result from the regulation of fine particulate matter and ozone, or its decision to roll back a rule limiting smokestack emissions burdening neighboring states that are downwind? Knowing that such actions make it easier for infrastructure that emits high levels of air pollution to be built and operated; knowing that excluding health and productivity benefits at any scale decreases the quality of our decision-making; knowing this, what would you do?

Would you write op-eds against these decisions? Would you call your members of Congress? Would you support organizations like the USGBC’s Advocacy Working Group and their efforts to lobby against these types of actions and advocate for green building and all things policy adjacent? Would you encourage your state legislatures and municipalities to mitigate the EPA’s decisions as best as they could through their own rules and regulations? Note that such efforts aren’t in vane, as ENERGY STAR, at one point seemingly destined for the chopping block, has now been fully funded.

What would you do to protect the trans, non-binary, and intersex communities, including being able to meet their needs in the built environment? Knowing that anti-LGBTQIA+ legislation is an attempt to legislate groups out of existence; knowing that the legislation and associated rhetoric puts a target on the backs of already vulnerable groups, including kids; knowing that genocidal scholars have recently warned that “… the attacks on transgender and nonbinary people in the U.S. represent a ‘genocidal’ attempt ‘to destroy a gender group;’” knowing that such legislation and rhetoric harms all of us - knowing all this, what would you do?

Would you submit testimony opposing anti-LGBTQIA+ legislation to your state legislatures? Would you put your body in between a trans individual and someone accosting them in a restroom? Would you educate your clients on the importance of, and advocate for, gender neutral restrooms, as well as the reality of entangled sex / gender spectrums? Would you walk away from a project that refused to be inclusive? Would you hug a trans, non-binary, or intersex kid and tell them they’re enough, that they belong?

And so many more things from protecting our federal architecture from the whims of an autocrat to protecting an organization’s right to implement genuine DEI initiatives, to protecting against attacks on science and expertise, to protecting relationships with our allies. But you get the drift.

In the end, what would you do to save democracy? How would you live to save democracy?

Will you talk to friends and family about it? What are you sharing on social media? Are you engaging with your elected officials, at all levels of government? What candidates are you supporting, and how? What corporations are you boycotting? Are you participating in strikes? Are you marching in the streets? Are you supporting food banks? Are you checking in on your neighbors? Are you asking your company leadership to support democracy? To post signage that says ICE isn’t welcome on your premises? To decline work that supports the Trump regime as well as those implicitly or explicitly supporting the Trump regime, authoritarianism, white Christian nationalism, and white supremacy?

You don’t have to do everything, but we all should be doing something.

And FYI corporate and business leaders, such actions demonstrate to your own employees, especially minorities and immigrants, that you support them and their civil and human rights.

Being a citizen in a democracy comes with responsibilities (and yes, I’m using democracy in the general sense to refer to our form of government which is both a constitutional republic and representative democracy). Being engaged, protecting democracy, standing up for human and civil rights, resisting an authoritarian takeover - that is the responsibility of all of us - from custodians to corporate CEOs. But maybe those with the most power and privilege shouldn’t continue sitting back while ordinary citizens do the bulk of the heavy lifting here.

Along those same lines, in the AEC Industry where I work, I know there are black and brown professionals, LGBTQIA+ professionals, and non-citizen professionals working here legally who are nervous about speaking out. Some do it anyway while others quietly resist and advocate in the background. This is where white, cisgender, heterosexual males need to step up, especially CEOs, politicians, organizational board members, and community leaders.

We need to expend whatever political, economic, reputational, and otherwise privileged capital we have in support of democracy. And when we’re out in the streets we need to follow Alex Pretti’s lead and put our own bodies in between the vulnerable and fascist forces, to protect our colleagues of color, to protect our neighbors, to protect democracy.

And as we’re resisting this authoritarian takeover, we need to seriously consider how we’re going to build a more just and equitable society. As I stated earlier, actions of resistance won’t be enough - we must also create a democracy where access to freedom, safety, opportunities, and self-determination is equitable. That’s a necessary component of protecting democracy from authoritarianism.

None of this is easy, but this is the price of living in a democracy.

It’s how we live for democracy.

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If you want to understand what our Legislature leadership prioritizes, look at what it does first. On January 13th, one day after the Kansas legislative session officially convened, the House Judiciary Committee held a hearing on House Bill 2426, which would make the terms gender and sex equivalent in state law.

This is a Deliberate Choice

HB 2426 is only the latest example of anti-trans legislation, and it unfortunately won’t be the last. The details have, and will, vary from bill to bill - IDs one week, schools the next, health care after that. But the through line is constant: an ongoing fixation on transgender Kansans - on transgender kids - as a legislative priority. That fixation obviously harms the transgender community and their families and friends directly. But it also harms every other Kansan by consuming our collective bandwidth through political theater, increasing administrative and legal costs, degrading school and health system capacity, and crowding out the actual work a legislature should be doing.

To get a feel for what’s been going on with respect to anti-trans actions in the Kansas legislature over the last several years, see the following (though it goes back farther than this):

• Majority Rule Does Not Preclude Transgender Minority Rights: February 17, 2025

• KS Legislators - Sustain an SB 233 Veto: March 31, 2024

• Adding Some Curiosity to Common Sense: March 19, 2023

• Popping Bubbles of Hate and Ignorance: November 27, 2022

And yes — I know there are Republican legislators who privately dislike this but succumb out of fear to the leadership’s arm-twisting and/or the pressure from some of their more vocal constituents (ramped up under the Trump regime) - fear of losing legislative positions, fear of being primaried, fear of being ostracized, and fear for their physical safety. A few of them have confirmed this to me in previous email conversations. This post is probably more for them than any of the other legislators.

This is Personal

For my family, this is personal. Here’s what the fallout looks like from my perspective, taken from one of the multiple emails I’ve previously sent to Kansas legislators. This is the partial text from an email sent in reference to a specific bill (SB 233 in 2024) targeting gender affirming health care for trans youth. I’m not looking for any sympathy. I’m simply pointing out what the impact can look like at an individual and family level.

I am emailing you as the parent of a transgender young adult, and I know first hand from the gender affirming care our son has received that there is no reason for these bills other than to try and legislate my son and other trans people out of existence.

The falsehoods and hateful rhetoric spread in support of this bill, and subsequently reported in the media, only further the effort of spreading fear and disinformation. Words have consequences - they can decrease a youth’s mental health and increase the risk of physical and verbal attacks.

Nex Benedict, the Oklahoma trans teenage student who was recently beaten and subsequently died, is but the latest example of the psychological and physical abuse LGBTQ+ individuals experience, fueled by anti-LGTBQ+ rhetoric and fear-mongering, especially when it comes from places of authority.

This is the nightmare scenario for my family. That our youngest will lose his life because someone thought he was an abomination or a pervert - that he didn’t deserve to live simply because of who he is. It’s always in the back of our minds - and that stress and fear is always a little more during our state’s legislative session. Bills like this and the rhetoric that goes with them just make this horror more likely to happen to our family and others.

I’m pleading with you to stop doing this to trans individuals. Stop sacrificing the physical safety and mental health of my son and other LGTBQ+ individuals so you can score some political points with your base. Legislating should be about improving the lives of ALL Kansans, not targeting different groups for political or religious purposes.

I rarely get a response from Republicans. When I do, it’s either from a) members who recognize the harm, but essentially admit they’re too afraid to speak up or b) members ignoring the supporting science and raw emotions included in the emails, providing the basic form response of Thanks for your input. Occasionally the latter group will also rub salt in the wound by spouting MAGA, White Christian Nationalist, bigoted, anti-trans talking points (which aren’t supported by the evidence).

Now expand those impacts to every other trans person in the state, along with their families and friends. We know that such talking points, the legislation, the words and testimony of these GOP legislators and anti-trans lobbyists, and the hate and othering that all of this helps generate makes the trans community less safe. Genocidal scholars have recently warned that “… the attacks on transgender and nonbinary people in the U.S. represent a ‘genocidal’ attempt ‘to destroy a gender group.’” And some families are leaving the state to help ensure access to gender affirming care for their minors, as well as seek less hostile environments in general. It galls me to know this is exactly the outcome many GOP legislators desire.

No wonder there are days when things seem really bleak for my son and the other trans and nonbinary people I know. Those are the people you need to have sympathy for, or really empathy for, and take some action.

This Harms all Kansans

But it’s not just the trans community who is harmed. This weird fixation of the far right also comes with a hefty public price tag that includes the direct administrative and legal costs associated with the passage of these bills. Even when a fiscal note can’t fully quantify the costs, the impacts are generally the same: government agencies, schools, and healthcare organizations must rewrite policies, retrain staff, modify record systems, create complaint processes, conduct investigations, and brace for litigation.

Direct Costs

For state agencies, such laws can impose an implementation burden because they require agencies to change core administrative systems and workflows - recordkeeping, notices, document issuance, and enforcement - often while anticipating continued legal conflict. For example, Kansas’s fiscal note for HB 2426 shows executive agencies being directed to review and correct vital records, correct DMV records, send written notices, and reissue documents, with costs tied to staff time, IT/developer work, and mailing. It also notes the Attorney General expects continued litigation because the underlying subject is already being litigated. Similarly, the fiscal note for SB 63 shows executive agencies and boards being pulled into enforcement and risk management. It describes a framework that triggers more complaints/investigations and anticipates increased litigation defense costs for the Attorney General’s office. The costs associated with all of this are ultimately paid by us, the taxpayer.

For health care, such laws can impose an implementation burden because they require operational changes across billing, compliance, and clinical workflows. For example, as documented in Kansas Medicaid guidance, a Kansas Medical Assistance Program (KMAP) bulletin (reposted by Sunflower Health Plan) notifies providers that “new initiation of pharmacologic (hormonal) treatment … among Medicaid members under the age of 18 years will not be covered,” and that treatment initiated prior to the law’s effective date “must be terminated by December 31, 2025.” In addition, the SB 63 fiscal note references the mechanisms that increase legal and regulatory exposure for clinicians and institutions, including the creation of a civil suit pathway (increasing cases in district court) and the Attorney General’s expectation of increased litigation defense costs.

When required operational changes, reimbursement restrictions, and increased legal/regulatory exposure occur together, combined with the lack of needed details often associated with such legislation, health systems may respond by adopting simpler, more restrictive internal rules to reduce ambiguity and organizational risk, limiting the scope of services offered or referrals made. This interpretation is consistent with peer‑reviewed research findings that in states where bans were proposed/passed, providers reported institutional pressure (perceived and actual) limiting the ability to provide care (including mental-health components that are ordinarily part of multidisciplinary care) due to the increased burden and concerns about legal action. The reduction in services and associated staffing and expertise can reduce capacity and continuity for broader pediatric, adolescent, and behavioral‑health services that share the same teams and infrastructure, negatively impacting more than just the trans community.

For school districts, bills like this can impose a significant implementation burden because they push districts to build (or expand) compliance systems: revising policy, training staff, documenting decisions, handling complaints, and coordinating with counsel (without the additional funding provided to do so). Kansas’s own fiscal materials for SB 76 (Given Name Act) make the exposure explicit: the fiscal note states the bill creates a civil cause of action allowing claims for “injunctive relief, monetary damages, [and] reasonable attorney fees”, and it adds that KSDE cannot estimate the fiscal effect on local school districts even though the cause of action could create one. The same fiscal note includes the Kansas Association of School Boards’ warning that enactment could have a long‑term fiscal effect on districts and postsecondary institutions “primarily from legal fees, investigations, and dealing with Title IX complaints.” Geary County USD 475 (Fort Riley Middle School) has already had to pay $95,000 for a lawsuit settlement involving a names/pronouns controversy, including damages and attorney fees.

And the SB 76’s supplemental note points out how this just adds more litigation‑risk management work to the day-to-day of district leadership. These laws take away from a school district’s primary mission, and often forces educators, staff, and administrators to weigh supporting vulnerable kids versus minimizing legal and financial risks. It takes away from the funding needed for a district’s core mission, reduces educational effectiveness, increases the stress among teachers, staff, and students, and it decreases teacher and staff retention.

And Kansas fiscal notes, including that of SB 180 (2023), warn that when these policy fights are embedded in contested constitutional frameworks, litigation can be prolonged and expensive. The SB 180 (2023) fiscal note states constitutional challenges are likely, could run two to four years, may require specialized outside counsel, and could expose the state to paying plaintiffs’ attorney fees and costs if challengers prevail - conditions that increase uncertainty for public institutions (including school districts) operating under overlapping state and federal obligations. For a concrete sense of what outside counsel can look like in public-sector budgeting, Kansas has posted outside-counsel contract templates showing hourly rates (though these appear to be from 2010).

Lost Opportunity Costs

In addition to the these direct costs harming Kansans, there are numerous lost opportunity costs due to finite legislative bandwidth and public resources. Gov. Laura Kelly’s SB 63 veto message explicitly argues that lawmakers should be focused on “ways to help Kansans cope with rising prices” and warns that this kind of legislation can worsen a “workforce shortage,” instead of “focusing on issues that improve all Kansans’ lives.” Meanwhile, Kansas political reporting (KCUR, Kansas Reflector) shows the 2026 session opening with both parties publicly prioritizing “affordability” issues -property taxes, housing costs, wages, childcare costs, and rural health expenses -precisely the kinds of outcomes that get crowded out when committees and floor time are consumed by divisive culture war issues, particularly those targeting vulnerable groups.

The lost opportunities are visible in what Kansas leaders and Kansans themselves say they want funded and improved. The Governor’s FY 2027 budget framing (based on the statewide People’s Budget tour) highlights priorities Kansans identified: fully funded public schools and special education, investments in health care and mental health capacity, early childhood/childcare systems, and long‑term water planning and infrastructure. Independent reporting (Kansas Reflector, KSNT) on that budget rollout similarly emphasizes outcomes like special education capacity, mental health services, and a long‑term water plan as top priorities - work that competes for the same attention and budgetary focus as these culture war issues attacking a vulnerable minority.

Referencing the legislature’s YouTube page, I used Microsoft Copilot to provide a rough estimate (emphasis on rough) of the percentage of committee time spent on anti-trans legislation during the 2025 regular session (through April 11, 2025). Three committees - House Committee on Education, Senate Committee on Education, and House Committee on Health and Human Services - were the easiest to estimate for Microsoft Copilot. These three committees held approximately 86 hours worth of combined standing committee meetings and hearings (excluding conference/joint meetings), and the tracked anti-trans bills accounted for up to 11% of those hours. That’s not an insignificant amount of committee time devoted to attacking a very small group of Kansans (about 0.4% in 2022).

The lost opportunity costs boil down to this: Every committee hour and public dollar spent policing identity, targeting a vulnerable minority, is an hour and a dollar not spent lowering costs, strengthening schools, expanding health care access, addressing water conservation issues, or keeping communities healthy and connected.

Curiosity (Due Diligence) Checklist

We hear common sense sometimes used as a shortcut - an easy label to support ignorant and ideologically driven perspectives and policies while avoiding the harder work of gathering and evaluating evidence, tradeoffs, and consequences. But we need our legislators to be curious while employing critical thinking skills (e.g. Adding Some Curiosity to Common Sense) because that’s what competence looks like in public service. Curious legislators ask questions, dig into the nuances, and expand their understandings based on the available evidence before casting a vote, writing a press release, spreading their talking points, or posting on social media.

In governing, curiosity is due diligence. It forces clarity: What problem are we solving? How will it work in real life? What are the consequences? What does it cost - money, time, staff capacity, trust? Who will it impact, benefit, or harm, and how? Honestly and transparently answering these questions is how you separate serious from performative policymaking. When leaders stay curious, they maximize the benefits for all Kansans, reduce unintended harm, minimize legal risks, and protect limited legislative time for issues that actually improve people’s lives.

So here’s a potential test: if a bill can’t survive a basic curiosity examination - if it doesn’t address a verified and measurable need(s), if the implementation realities aren’t spelled out in detail, if the predictable impacts aren’t honestly estimated, and the lost opportunity costs not considered - then there’s a good chance the bill is a distraction, and likely a harmful one. Performative culture war bills are easier to assemble than solving hard problems, they’re easier than actually governing. And vulnerable groups like trans kids pay the price. Here’s a basic curiosity checklist legislators and the public may want to consider using to evaluate proposed legislation. But these must be answered honestly and transparently.

• What Kansas problem or issue is this addressing - measurably?

• Who will be impacted (including benefits and harms) and how?

• What are the implementation and administrative costs?

• What legal risk or enforcement burden does it create?

• What predictable impacts land on state agencies, city/county governments, healthcare organizations, schools, universities, etc.?

• What priorities get delayed because we spend time on this?

An Ask

Good governing means making sure all legislative agendas are centered on measurable Kansas outcomes that benefit all Kansans - what will reduce harm, improve services, strengthen public safety, and build trust - rather than rewarding culture war legislation that generates attention but doesn’t demonstrate positive impact (and in fact often harms different groups of Kansans). When the public sees discipline, follow-through, hard questions asked early (curiosity), fairness, transparency, and a focus on the common good, confidence rises: not because everyone agrees, but because the process becomes a serious effort focused on benefiting all Kansans.

So here’s the ask: raise the bar. Make curiosity the default - require real impact assessments, implementation planning, administrative capacity checks, and legal and fiscal scrutiny before moving bills forward. And for constituents, engage in ways that reward competence (with your votes and advocacy being key here). The goal is to build a legislature that spends its limited time on actions that improve daily life across Kansas. Though this will also likely mean voting out multiple GOP members (because of some combination of a) lacking a spine and b) an embracement of white supremacy, white Christian nationalism, autocracy, and oligarchism).

Ask: Legislators

• Stop making anti-trans, identity-policing bills session priorities.

• Make sure all committee agendas are centered on measurable Kansas outcomes and issues having a real impact on Kansans.

• Require genuine fiscal, implementation, human impact, and legal analyses (that are transparent) before advancing bills with significant administrative, enforcement, legal risk, and financial risk implications.

• Meet directly with affected constituents and frontline professionals (with actual expertise) before legislating complex real-world impacts. AND LISTEN TO THEM.

Ask: The Public

• Contact your legislators and tell them to stop attacking vulnerable minorities - stop wasting our taxpayer dollars - and instead focus on legislation that will benefit us all.

• When the opportunities arise for various bills, submit written testimony. Pull from your own experiences and expertise when possible. If you’re able to provide verbal testimony in person or remotely, do so.

• Thank lawmakers who demonstrate curiosity, compassion, and courage - reinforce the behavior we want to see.

• Vote when the time comes and give your support (dollars and time) to the candidates who embody curiosity, compassion, and courage (not to mention those who actually support democracy as opposed to a dictator).

• Sources available to help you do this include, but aren’t limited to, , KIFA, Trans Lawrence Coalition, and .

This all boils down to the following: Obsession with culture war issues and what’s in people’s pants weakens our ability to govern and positively impact the lives of all Kansans. It’s cruel and divisive, makes Kansas less inviting to individuals, families, and businesses, and tarnishes our collective soul. Nor does Kansas benefit when limited legislative time is consumed by bills that a) target vulnerable minorities, b) can’t show measurable gains, c) can’t be implemented cleanly, or d) carry predictable downstream costs in administration, enforcement, and lawsuits, all of which damages the public trust. And this is further compounded by the lost opportunity costs of delayed work on the issues that actually impact our lives - from economic stability, to water conservation, to quality public education, to equitable health care access.

Kansans deserve better than these repetitive, culture war performances that legislators find easy (or that have been decreed by the dear leader - either at the state or federal level). If we want a stronger Kansas, we have to demand the standard that produces it - competence, evidence, and expertise over theater, outcomes over optics, benefiting all Kansans vs attacking vulnerable minorities, and a process that proves its claims before it asks Kansans to bear the cost.

And I’ll say it again, stop worrying about what’s in the pants of trans kids. It’s creepy.

Share Dispatches from Oz

A gift is… the truest expression of love. It doesn’t matter whether it’s home-made or bought for a year’s salary. It’s thinking of someone else. It’s telling that person that they matter. And you matter so much. (Shaky exhale.) You never stole my eyes, John. (He sniffs.) I gifted them to you.

- Arthur Lester to his friend John, from Malevolent, Part 56 The Parting Glass (Guthrie 2020-present).

Most of the podcasts I listen to are non-fiction, but a few fiction podcasts are regulars among my favorites. One of these is Malevolent, a Lovecraftian styled gothic horror serial spanning multiple seasons. But the genre really just serves as the backdrop to a story of friendship and what it means to be human.

The above quote was spoken during an episode from the latest season, the last season - season 6. A few lines later John responds…

I owe you… so much, I… I owe you everything. You taught me… to care for people. For humanity. You taught me that it’s okay to be… frail, to love. To… to be afraid. You’ve taught me… to love poetry. (They both laugh.)

Over these six seasons the relationship between Arthur and John evolves - from antagonists, if not outright enemies, to (with monstrous hiccups, dark and despairing setbacks, and god-like leaps forward along the way) friends with a bond so strong it becomes impervious to death itself.

Friendship has been on my mind a lot lately. And so I did what I always do when my brain fixates on something - I dig into the details of what makes that something part of the human condition.

The Anthropology of Friendship

We are a social species, and friendship is one of humanity’s most powerful social adaptations. It’s not just a warm fuzzy feeling between two or more people; it’s not just a source of free labor when you need to move. It’s a dynamic and highly adaptive part of our social toolkit - one that’s evolved across cultures and ecologies to help us survive, grow, thrive, and make meaning in a world that’s often unpredictable, sometimes hostile, and always complex. And the story of Arthur and John, fictional as it is, demonstrates this in the most extreme circumstances.

Anthropologists recognize that friendship, while seemingly universal, is anything but uniform (Bell and Coleman 1999; Desai and Killick 2010). Daniel Hruschka’s (2010) cross-cultural work shows that friendship serves different functions depending on ecological constraints, kinship structures, and political organization. In some societies, it’s formalized through ritual (think blood brotherhoods or co-godparenting), while in others it’s indistinguishable from economic exchange. But underlying all of this variation is a mechanism for navigating uncertainty - a way to build trust, share resources, and create social resilience.

Functionalist thinkers like Malinowski and Durkheim can be interpreted as framing friendship as a stabilizing force - a glue that helps hold communities together (Allan 1989; Radcliffe-Brown 1952). Durkheim’s (1893/1997) theory of social solidarity emphasized how interpersonal bonds create cohesion through shared values and interdependence, while Malinowski’s (1922) ethnographic work demonstrated how reciprocal relationships in the Kula exchange system reinforced alliances and social hierarchies, creating obligations essential to community stability. Marcel Mauss’s (1925) classic work on gift exchange revealed how reciprocity isn’t just transactional; it’s symbolic, moral, and deeply human. It really isn’t just the thought that counts. Friendship, in this sense, is a form of social capital - a network of obligations and support that helps us weather life’s storms.

And sometimes those storms are pretty traumatic. As the first episode of Malevolent unfolds, Arthur - a private investigator - wakes up newly blind, with a fractured memory and, even more disturbingly, the voice of a disembodied entity sharing his body. While Arthur is now blind, the entity (who eventually takes the name John) is able to see through Arthur’s eyes. The beginning of their relationship is all about mutual survival. Arthur needs John to see for him; John needs Arthur to act, as he has very limited control over Arthur’s body. It’s a forced partnership, but over time, through shared trauma and mutual sacrifice, it evolves into something more - a friendship forged in fire (sometimes literally). Their arc mirrors what anthropologists observe in real-world contexts: trust built through repeated interactions, emotional vulnerability, and the slow shift from strategic cooperation to genuine care.

Symbolic anthropology adds another layer. Clifford Geertz (1966; 1973) and others (Boon 1982; Ortner 1973; Shankman 1984) have emphasized how meaning (including the many meanings of friendship) is made through shared symbols. Geertz has argued that symbols - through rituals, narratives, and sacred objects - establish powerful, pervasive, and long-lasting moods and motivations by formulating conceptions of order and meaning that feel uniquely real to those who practice them. In many cultures, naming itself is a sacred act — a signal of trust, belonging, and personhood. When the Entity in Malevolent chooses the name John, it’s not just a plot point. It’s a symbolic gesture - a move toward humanity, toward relationship, toward becoming someone who can be known and cared for - a move that Arthur recognizes. And that recognition is critical for the development and evolution of their friendship.

Anthropologists have documented the diversity of friendship across societies (Adams 2005; Hruschka 2010; Lu et al. 2021). For example, in Ghana, friendships are fewer but deeper when compared to the U.S. where they’re more numerous but often more superficial (Adams and Plaut 2003). This reflects broader patterns where individualistic cultures promote extensive but bounded friendships, while collectivistic cultures emphasize fewer but more deeply integrated friendships embedded within kinship and community networks. Michele Gelfand’s (2018) work on tight vs. loose cultures adds an additional layer to this. Tight cultures (such as Japan and Singapore) have strong norms and formalized friendships. Loose cultures (such as the U.S. and Brazil) allow more flexibility (like a pair of loose fitting jeans) - but also more fragility.

The work of other researchers, including Joseph Henrich (2015; 2020), Peter Richerson, and Robert Boyd (Richerson and Boyd 2005; Boyd and Richerson 2009), can be interpreted to show how friendship is part of our evolutionary toolkit - one of our survival strategies. Their work reveals how humans developed prosocial emotions like empathy and shame to support cooperation (which can lead to or deepen friendships). Tooby and Cosmides (1996) argue that friendship evolved as a solution to the banker’s paradox - the problem of finding reliable partners who will help during unpredictable crises. Just as banks paradoxically want to lend money only to those who don’t need it, individuals facing emergencies need help from those who have surplus resources at that moment. Friendship adaptations, the argument goes, evolved to identify and maintain relationships with individuals who would provide crucial assistance during times of need. And David Sloan Wilson (2015; Wilson et al. 2008) argues that groups with strong internal cooperation - often facilitated by friendship and/or leading to or deepening friendships - outcompete those without it. In the case of Arthur and John, the forced cooperation is one of the factors that lead to their eventual friendship (and the prosocial emotions they eventually felt for one another).

The Fragility and Opportunities of Friendship

These varying reasons for, and manifestations of, friendship, unique to regions, environments, and cultures as a result of varying combinations of adaptability and historical accident, are subject to stresses when conditions change. As stated above, in loose cultures (like the U.S.) friendship can be more fragile as a result of it’s contextual flexibility. And in the U.S., we’re seeing cracks in our abilities to form and maintain friendships. Researchers like Daniel Cox (2021) have documented what’s been dubbed a friendship recession. Over the past three decades, the number of close friends Americans report having has plummeted. Men, in particular, are struggling. Pew Research (Parker and Goddard 2025) found that while men and women report similar levels of loneliness, men are far less likely to seek emotional support from friends.

Middle-aged and older men face additional challenges (Adams and Ueno 2006). A longitudinal study (Petrova et al. 2024) followed 235 men over 71 years and found that their emotional support networks declined by nearly 50% between ages 30 and 90. Life transitions - marriage, retirement, relocation, health decline - all contributed to shrinking social and friendship circles. And unlike women, who are more likely to maintain emotionally rich friendships, men often rely heavily on a spouse for emotional support (or to maintain some degree of a social network for them - see the SNL Man Park take on this below). When that relationship ends - through divorce or widowhood - many find themselves without a safety net. Even those with a few close friends aren’t necessarily better off. Americans with three or fewer close friends report high levels of loneliness and isolation. And for men, the emotional depth of those friendships is often lacking.

Unfortunately, I recognize a lot of this in my own life. For me, moving across multiple states twenty years ago at the same time I underwent a major shift in my career trajectory contributed to an erosion of multiple circles of friends, along with difficulties in building new circles, something that I still struggle with to this day. Many of my current friends are really driven by my wife’s friendships, or they’re relationships that have developed through my employment or community involvement. While a few of these friendships have moved beyond the superficial (or at least did for a time as a result of close collaboration) none are really as deep as I would like some of them to be. And this has been particularly a struggle relative to male friendships.

A metasynthesis (Vierra 2023) of multiple qualitative research studies found that certain masculine norms - toughness, stoicism, homophobia - make it harder for men to form deep friendships. A recent scoping review (Nordin et al. 2024) echoed this, showing how self-reliance and emotional restraint increase vulnerability to loneliness (and I think this probably rings true for me to a degree). Nor are these findings just academic. They’re public health concerns. The U.S. Surgeon General’s 2023 advisory (Murthy 2023) labeled loneliness and isolation as an epidemic - one with real consequences for cardiovascular health, cognitive decline, and mortality - for anyone experiencing chronic loneliness and isolation.

Returning to Malevolent, Arthur and John’s relationship exemplifies many patterns observed in male friendships: initial emotional guardedness, difficulty expressing vulnerability, conflict avoidance alternating with explosive arguments, and communication focused on shared tasks rather than feelings. Their journey toward deeper emotional intimacy - with John learning to express care and Arthur learning to accept support - mirrors the developmental work many men must undertake to form truly intimate friendships. It’s only in Parts 40 and 44 that we hear them first talk about their love for one another and at the end of Part 56 and the beginning of Part 57 that we hear them say the actual words I love you to one another. The podcast’s popularity may also reflect a longing for narratives that model emotional vulnerability and male friendships. I honestly think their evolving friendship is the main reason I kept listening (though the writing, production, and voice acting are excellent).

Part of the struggle for developing and maintaining friendships (that I also relate to) is the lack of, or decreased normalization of, physical spaces in the community that facilitate friendships. Third spaces (Littman 2021; Oldenburg 1989) - bars, gyms, churches, places for hobby groups - have historically served as incubators for friendship. But these spaces are disappearing, especially in rural and marginalized communities, exacerbated by the pandemic. Research from CU Boulder (Sun et al. 2025) found that closures of third places between 2019 and 2021 were most severe in socially vulnerable areas. Without these spaces, with decreasing normalization of the use of these spaces, opportunities for spontaneous connection dwindle. And in a culture already steeped in individualism, this just increases isolation.

Generational shifts compound the issue. Gen Z reports lower well-being than any previous generation (also I think exacerbated by the pandemic). Stanford psychologist Jamil Zaki’s work (Zaki and Pei 2025) shows that young adults underestimate how kind and open others are - a cognitive bias that leads to social withdrawal. His interventions - simple nudges that reveal peers’ warmth - have helped students form more friendships. It’s a reminder that sometimes all it takes is a little data, a reminder that your fears aren’t unique, and a little hope.

And Arthur and John’s friendship, fictional as it is, should, as an example of building trust across radical differences, give us hope - if they can build a friendship surely the rest of us can. Arthur and John begin as adversaries literally from different worlds - one human, one an eldritch entity. But through shared experiences, mutual dependence (their existence literally depends on one another), and emotional risk, they become something more. John’s desire to become a better version of himself - to be human, to be known - is a narrative arc that resonates because it reflects our own struggles. To be a friend is to be vulnerable. To be vulnerable is to be human. Friendship is a defining human trait.

I’ve previously written about an interaction I had during the last Kansas legislative session with a Republican legislator regarding a particular piece of transphobic legislation. While our interactions started out as antagonistic, because we eventually both chose to show some vulnerability and recognize our shared humanity, those interactions turned respectful and curious. I wouldn’t say we’re friends at this point, but these are certainly steps along the way towards some kind of friendship if things were to progress. And it gives me hope, not just for myself, but for our contentious, divided, hyper-partisan society in 2026.

This is the last season of Malevolent, with the last Part (60) coming out in late January 2026, ending this story of Arthur and John. While I’m looking forward to hearing how the story ends, I really don’t want to say goodbye to these two characters I’ve grown to love. But maybe it’s time to stop living vicariously through their story, time to stop making excuses and putting things off, time to stop relying on my wife or waiting for a Man Park, and actually try deepening some existing friendships, building new ones, and rekindling a few old ones.

If we all spent more time focusing on friendships - their building, maintenance, and restoration - we not only would increase our own emotional support networks, health, and resiliency, we would also strengthen our ability to see others as fellow humans who share the same basic needs, vulnerabilities, and fears. I think this is something we very much need in our ever growing fragmented world, as we struggle against everything from oligarchy and authoritarianism to bigotry and othering.

And we should definitely be investing more in third spaces - normalizing them, creating them, building them - physical and social environments that foster inclusion, interaction, and connection instead of isolation. And we should keep telling stories - like Malevolent - that model friendship as a process, not a given. As a choice, not a default. As emotional, not just task-focused. As a part of the human condition.

So, in 2026, let’s all create more of our own stories of friendship.

References

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Adams, G., and Plaut, V. C. (2003). The cultural grounding of personal relationship: Friendship in North American and West African worlds. Personal Relationships, 10(3), 333-347.

Adams, R. G., & Ueno, K. (2006). Middle-aged and older adult men’s friendships. In V. H. Bedford & B. Formaniak Turner (Eds.), Men in relationships: A new look from a life course perspective (pp. 103–124). Springer Publishing Company.

Allan, G. (1989). Friendship: Developing a Sociological Perspective. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.

Bell, S., and Coleman, S., eds. (1999). The Anthropology of Friendship. Berg Publishers.

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Shankman, P. (1984). “The Thick and the Thin: On the Interpretive Theoretical Program of Clifford Geertz.” Current Anthropology, 25(3), 261-280.

Sun, Y., et al. (2025). As community spaces disappear, new CU Boulder research warns of health and equity risks. Institute of Behavioral Science, University of Colorado Boulder. Retrieved from https://ibs.colorado.edu/new-research-on-disappearing-third-places-warns-of-risks/

Tooby, J., and Cosmides, L. (1996). Friendship and the banker’s paradox: Other pathways to the evolution of adaptations for altruism. Proceedings of the British Academy, 88, 119-143.

Vierra, K. D., Beltran, D. R., & Robnett, R. D. (2023). A metasynthesis exploring the role of masculinities in close male friendships. Psychology of Men & Masculinities, 24(4), 311–324.

Wilson, D. S. (2015). Does Altruism Exist? Culture, Genes, and the Welfare of Others. Yale University Press.

Wilson, D. S., Van Vugt, M., and O’Gorman, R. (2008). Multilevel selection theory and major evolutionary transitions: Implications for psychological science. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 17(1), 6-9.

Zaki, J., and Pei, R. (2025). Why is social connection so hard for young adults? Greater Good Magazine. Retrieved from https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/why_is_social_connection_so_hard_for_young_adults

In the spirit of Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, 
Yule, Bodhi Day, New Years Eve/Day, Boxing Day, 
Martin Luther King Jr. Day, 
other December/January holidays I'm missing, 
As well as fairness, facts, democracy, and dignity…

The rich should pay more taxes.
Nor should there be billionaires.
And Christ! 
There really shouldn't be trillionaires.
Pretty sure Jesus wouldn't have been a fan of the 'illionaire crowd.
That whole eye of the needle thing.

Extreme wealth inequality and poverty prevail
In the wealthiest nation on earth. 
That’s not a good thing, 
Regardless of what the Prosperity Theology teaches. 
You know, that whole eye of the needle thing again
Not to mention the flipping the money changers' tables.
Though I guess I mentioned it.

Social safety nets are needed.
Really needed thanks to the above mentioned
Extreme wealth inequality
And poverty.

Everyone should have access to affordable healthcare, healthy food,
And decent housing.
Yes, everyone. 
Have access to all of these.
Why is that so hard to accept for some?

The U.S. is literally a nation of immigrants. 
Remember that.
Immigration policy doesn't have to be based on
Fear, terror, cruelty, bigotry, and racism.
What's that inscribed on a plaque in the Statue of Liberty?
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.

Everyone deserves due process. 
And racial profiling is bad.
And disappearing people off of the streets is bad.
Though it would be nice if ICE disappeared.

The primary cause of the civil war was
Slavery. 
Slavery was a bad thing 
(Apparently some need to be reminded of that - 
Looking at you,
PragerU), 
As was Jim Crow and the KKK, 
And statues memorializing the Confederacy,
Among other things. 
And we have yet to fully come to terms
With all of this as a nation.

Indigenous people have experienced physical and cultural 
Genocide.
Genocide is also a bad thing.
And we also have yet to fully come to terms
With this as a nation.

Sex and gender aren’t binary.
Nor are they the same thing.
No matter how much you click your heels
And wish it so.
Read some biology, medical science,
And anthropology research on this.
So, stop being a pervy dick
And sticking your nose into kids' private parts.
Santa is watching
(Though that's also a little creepy).

LGBTQ+ rights are human rights.
FULL STOP.
Jesus would be mortified at the persecution
Of trans kids and their healthcare providers.
So would Santa.
Some people are definitely getting
Coal in their stockings.

Everyone has inherent worth and dignity.
Yes, everyone.
Even Trump, Vought, Miller, your MAGA uncle, 
And racist, bigoted state legislators (grumble, grumble).
But I'll admit,
They can really push the limit here.

White privilege is real, 
As is systemic racism.
White people - your success
Is partially a result of this.
So stop pouting,
Stop crying about the woke mind virus,
Stop being a dick,
Put on your big boy pants,
And get to work
Dismantling systemic racism.

Anthropogenic climate change is real.
Jesus would say...
Pull your head out of the sand,
Stop listening to the so-called Christian
Ideologues,
Who knowith not what they talk about.
Stop listening to the greedy, selfish
Corporate fossil fuel bastards lining their pockets
With both profits and politicians.
Remember what I said about that camel, rich people,
And the eye of the needle.
It's a pretty simple parable to understand.
Don't act stupid. I know you get it.
Time's a tickin'

Too many toxins ravage the U.S., 
From particulate matter and VOCs
To toxic individualism and toxic masculinity.
Aisle 9 really needs a massive 
Clean up.

Humans are a social species.
We need one another.
And there are a lot of
People hurting right now
Who need you (or someone).

Stop othering people.
The other is simply a brother from another mother. 
We’re all human and
We’re all bound to this planet.

Fuck Mars
(Actually, I like Mars, 
As well as planetary science, astronomy, and exploration. 
But we have a habitable planet here we need to 
Focus on first,
That we need to take care of first,
Before we seriously think about colonizing a barren hellscape - 
No offense Mars).

Vaccines work
(Because they prevent or greatly prevent disease,
Not because they prevent infection).
RFK and his cronies
Are dangerous, pseudoscience-loving
Hacks
And they are getting coal
In their stockings.

Public education is a bedrock of 
Functioning democracies,
As is the free press.
So stop devaluing them.
Stop standing aside while
Ideologues, billionaires, authoritarian/fascist lovers,
And others
Attack them.
Remember, Jesus doesn't like the 'illionaires anyway.
Doubt he cares much for authoritarians
And fascists either.

Gun control legislation saves lives
(including the lives of kids - I think Jesus would like that,
Santa too). 
Civilians don’t need
Assault weapons. 
If you’re worried about some
Authoritarian regime taking over,
Maybe get involved in the democratic process and 
Governing instead of
Running off to the woods
With your buddies to play commando. 
And don’t (I can't emphasize this enough)
Elect the authoritarian wannabe in the first place
After he telegraphed what he was going to do.
Just sayin'

Gerrymandering is bad.
It undermines democracy.
Don't do it,
Unless you're forced to,
To level the playing field
At the national
Level.

Voting should be easy.
Stop making it hard.
Santa is watching
(yeah, that still sounds creepy).

Democracies, 
Including representative democracies, 
Require an engaged and
Informed citizenry 
(hey, a connection to public education and 
the free press).

Expertise
(Including civil servant expertise),
Science, and science funding are 
Good things. 
I repeat, these are good things,
Valuable things, 
Wonderful things, 
Life changing and
Life saving things, requiring
Protection and preservation.
So are literature, the humanities, and
The fine arts.

Being woke
Being aware of racial prejudices, 
Discrimination, and
Other forms of social and
Environmental injustices,
Is a good thing.
Jesus and Santa approve.

Effective DEI is
Hard work requiring 
Long term commitment, and
That’s also a good thing.

Lying, cheating, corruption, bigotry, bullying,
Misogyny, racism, white supremacy,
Authoritarianism, fascism, Nazism, torture,
Overturning fair elections, targeting trans kids,
Rape, and pedophilia,
These are ALL BAD. 
Jesus and Santa don't approve
Of these things.
We shouldn’t place people who
Embrace these things in positions of 
Authority.

A lot of non-Christians embody the
Principles taught by Jesus far more than
White Christian nationalists.

Jesus wasn’t white (if he existed).
ICE would probably
Disappear him.
And then find some coal in
Their stockings
(Because Santa was watching -
Yep, still creepy, almost ICE-like,
Definitely not Christ-like).

The separation of church 
And state  
Is a founding principle of the 
U.S. 
So, keep them separate. 
We have no state religion.

As you take some time over the holidays to
Reflect on the wisdom 
(ok, I might be using the term loosely)
I've generously laid out here,
Make sure you hug your friends
And family.
Spend some time outdoors.
Read a good book. 
Help those in need in your community.
And really think about how
To make the world a better place for
Everyone.
Because our work is cut out for us.

And hey, Santa, you should really stop watching us.

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✳️ ✳️ ⁣✳️ ✳️ Comfort is a social construct. ✳️ ✳️ ✳️ ✳️

Full stop. Yes, environmental and individual physiological and psychological factors are inherent components of comfort, but the key to whether or not comfort is actually achieved (or other quality of life indicators from satisfaction to belonging) typically resides in the social realm. And this isn’t something the AEC Industry does a great job of recognizing or accounting for relative to occupant use of space or the design/construction process itself (though this piece will focus on the former).

In shared spaces, our decisions to modify the environment (via shades/blinds, fans, moving furniture, etc.) are rarely a simple individual response to physical discomfort - they’re shaped by stress, group norms, proximity to controls, as well as the other people sharing these spaces. I recently came across the following conference proceedings paper - Social factors driving adaptive behaviours for indoor comfort: Towards a framework for effective integration - that analyzed this using a small study. It found that discomfort (from temperature, noise, light, and smell) triggers the following socially mediated sequence (at least for the occupants engaged in this study):

• Discomfort (potentially causing distractions or interruptions) → choosing whether or not to consult with colleagues → action (adjustments to building and/or behavior) or inaction (live with physical discomfort). Though see figure 2 in the paper for a more comprehensive flowchart of the sequence.

Throughout this, norms, stresses, physical location, access to controls, and the social dynamics among the occupants all influence how the sequence unfolds, and they often steer people toward conformity (to avoid social discomfort) and tolerating physical discomfort as opposed to taking action to alleviate their physical discomfort.

While the study has its limitations, including such things as a small sample size composed predominantly of occupants who identify as female, limited information on other demographic factors, just one building occupancy type, no ethnographic component, etc., the results align with the work that I and BranchPattern have been doing for years. Let’s look at this briefly relative to thermal comfort, daylighting control in common spaces, and the relationship between indoor environmental quality (IEQ) and the microbiome.

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Thermal Comfort

In our IEQ 2025 Conference paper, Why Thermal Comfort is Elusive: The Role of Socio-Cultural Factors, and I frame thermal comfort as a social construct, heavily influenced by the interaction of socio-cultural and technological factors (the interaction of the social and physical environments). Methods from the social sciences, like ethnography (discussed more at the end of this piece), can help us better account for socio-cultural influences equitably, resulting in design targets, sequences, interfaces, layouts, etc., that better reflect how comfort actually happens.

As you may have gathered, a significant amount of my interest in IEQ lies in it’s overlap with socio-cultural, relational, and individual behavioral factors (also quantifying IEQ related health and productivity impacts, but that’s another story - see Gaming the System and LEED vs WELL in Terms of Occupant Satisfaction). Such factors were the focus of Stu’s and my paper.

While our industry generally does an inadequate job of accounting for social and behavioral factors, I do think there’s increasing recognition that this is a deficiency. Below is one of the slides from the thermal comfort presentation. It lists the twelve factors (or eleven if you lump the temporal factors together) that ASHRAE Standard 55 defines as contributing to the subjective state of mind that reflects the satisfaction people have with their surrounding thermal environment. And while Stu and I are asking that we go beyond these factors, we recognize that as an industry we don’t do as an effective job as we should accounting for just these factors alone, or teaching how to account for them.

But regardless of how well we collectively account for these twelve factors, we still must do a better job of accounting for the social. And that’s because thermal comfort, or really most any experience within the built environment, is socially constructed. Thermal comfort isn’t just our physiological and psychological responses to the physical environment - it’s shaped by things like socio-economic background, socially defined activity levels, organizational policies, and clothing norms. Anthropology and other social sciences teach us that experiences, including comfort are relational, not just individual. For these disciplines, the smallest unit of study isn’t an individual but the relationship between two people and their environment. And we measure it by talking to people while they’re in their spaces, and observing them, making it a behavioral assessment in addition to a building performance assessment.

Measuring air temperature and relative humidity, the most common way that thermal comfort is addressed operationally in our built environments, isn’t just a small part of the thermal comfort story told by all of ASHRAE Standard 55’s twelve factors. No, these measures are also a woefully inadequate proxy for the real target of HVAC / envelope design – the occupant’s positive appraisal of their thermal experiences (and experiences overall). And our codes, design standards, and standard operational policies poorly address thermal comfort (and other aspects of IEQ) as a social phenomenon. So, there’s some work ahead of us to integrate the social into existing IEQ standards, best practices, etc., and the rest of the paper and presentation digs further into that.

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Daylighting Control in Common Spaces

Daylighting control (along with the associated control of solar loads and view access) is often accomplished through the local, manual control of shades or blinds. But in common spaces, as the paper I referenced at the start of the piece stated, the availability and proximity to artefacts regulating indoor comfort (e.g. blinds, fans, noise-cancelling devices) as well as social dynamics within the work environment [or any environment], may either promote or inhibit actions aimed at achieving personal comfort. One’s visual and thermal comfort, as impacted by daylight and solar thermal loads, is socially constructed within common spaces when control is heavily managed via manually controlled shades or blinds. As I’ve previously written:

A common scenario for shades starting out the day raised is that at some point the amount of glare, high visual contrast ratios, and/or heat gain/loss becomes enough to override whatever shade adjusting social barriers exist, resulting in the shades over the offending glazing being lowered. But then, without any corresponding physiological discomfort to drive raising the shades, and through some combination of the social barriers present and inertia, the shades stay lowered, limiting daylight and view access from that point forward through the remainder of the day (as well as increasing the need for electric lighting). How long physiological discomfort is initially experienced before the shades are subsequently lowered to begin with depends on the nature of those social barriers as well as the degree of physiological discomfort experienced, tasks being conducted, and specific individual psychological factors.

Focusing on potential social barriers, different social factors impact one’s perception of ownership of the shades, and whether or not one can adjust them (or even ask others if it’s ok to make any adjustments). Employees with less tenure, employees visiting another office, contract employees, employees who sit farther away from the windows, non-residence hall students making use of the hall’s common spaces, library patrons, job categories with lower perceived status in an organization, and minority groups may all perceive less ownership of common shades (or other forms of common building controls) than other occupants present. Those who feel they have less ownership of manually controlled shades in common spaces will be less likely to make adjustments or ask those around them if it’s ok to do so.

The potential negative social outcomes from either bucking social barriers to take action or acquiescing to the barriers (e.g., tensions between employees, resentment, worry about the consequences of one’s actions, team and organization disfunction, etc.) can also negatively impact individual and organizational success.

Potential solutions (made more successful if informed by ethnography or some type of socio-technic pre/post occupancy evaluation), as I pointed out, consist of the following:

However, we can modify the social/cultural and physical environments to better align more of these different needs (physiological comfort, social/psychological comfort, organizational unity) with the nature and capabilities of the surrounding environments. Solutions to this could consist of varying combinations of a) the use of multiple shades of shorter width versus single shades covering large window sections or an entire wall (see shade photo below), b) an automatically controlled shade system with local manual override capabilities (though this too comes with its own set of issues), and c) implementing policy changes along with messaging (including signage) and education to manage expectations, reduce social uncertainties, and improve occupant use of the manual shades.

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IEQ and the Microbiome

In another IEQ 2025 Conference paper I coauthored with Sarah Gudeman, Sarah Haines, and Stephanie Taylor, Connecting a Healthy Building Microbiome with Indoor Environmental Quality for a Sustainable Future (also presented at Greenbuild this year), we explored how the indoor microbiome shapes occupant health, resilience, and ongoing indoor environmental quality, focusing on everything from the impacts of ventilation and building materials on microbial communities to the role socio-cultural factors and inequities have in determining microbial exposures. And as we’re just beginning to integrate the indoor microbiome into broader IEQ research, practice, and standards (including moving towards a microbiome-based IEQ index), we have a chance to better integrate the social into this from the beginning. Some key aspects to consider include:

• Socio-cultural Norms Shape Microbial Exposure: Personal space preferences, hygiene perceptions, diets, and cleaning practices and other relevant factors vary across regions, cultures, and organizations, differentially shaping microbial environments along with building operations.

• Socioeconomic Disparities: Lower-income communities face poorer quality housing, schools, and other facilities for multiple reasons, including deferred maintenance and limited operations capabilities. As a result they face higher exposure to pollutants and mold and have less resources available to address these challenges, increasing health risks.

• Ethical Considerations: Microbiome “engineering” must prioritize such things as decolonizing microbial studies, incorporating the social sciences, community control of data to avoid reinforcing inequities, and even the rights of microbes themselves. For a really good overview of this see Can societal and ethical implications of precision microbiome engineering be applied to the built environment? A systematic review of the literature.

Viewing our built environments as living systems that change and grow allows us to place more emphasis on the lives housed by these environments as opposed to just the physical environments themselves. The goal - the ultimate targets - should be the quality of experiences - the quality of life - of the people (and other species) housed by the environments we design, build, and operate, not the various metrics related to the performance of the built environment (which are simply proxies for experiences, and sometimes bad ones at that). Focusing on living systems also makes it easier to include the social, which is important because the impact of human behavior on the health of the indoor microbiome, and subsequently IEQ and our own health, is socially constructed.

This focus on the social (relative to the design/construction process itself as well as building occupancy) also requires additional evaluation methods not typically performed in our industry (more on that below). And this results in relevant socio-cultural factors and nuances of interactions/behaviors being overlooked. One exception to this was the work presented by Sarah Haines during her opening keynote at the IEQ 2025 Conference - Community Engaged Frameworks Lead to Healthy and Sustainable Indoor Environments as well as the workshop that she co-facilitated with Natalie Clyke, Becky Big Canoe, Helen Stopps and Joshua Thornton: Indigenous Perspectives and Community-Led Approaches to Shaping Indoor Environments.

This work focused on understanding and addressing the higher rates of poor indoor environmental quality (IEQ) experienced within on-reserve housing. As Sarah stated, addressing these challenges requires more than engineering - it requires listening, collaboration, and culturally grounded approaches. And this is precisely what ethnographic methods are designed to do.

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Ethnography

The second half of Stu’s and my thermal comfort/social paper and presentation covered ethnography - what it is and how it’s done at a high level, as well as four key concepts critical in it’s application - Context, Partnership, Interpretation, and Perspective. As a methodology, ethnography has it’s origins in anthropology, and it’s basically a systematic analysis of human interactions in a defined space and time, with a focus on performance (what’s going on and who’s doing it), power (who has it and who doesn’t), and ritual (habits, processes, procedures, and events).

Ethnographies are looking at the nuances of behaviors, the interactions of people, and the interactions of people with their environments. This provides additional insights into understanding how the physical + social/cultural environment influences the interactions and health/wellness of people, and vice versa. And I should note that the insights gathered and resulting solutions proposed sometimes challenge the status quo. This often results from including voices that have been previously excluded during planning, design, and operations.

If you want to dig deeper into ethnography and its applications I’ll refer you to the paper itself, with its greater focus on thermal comfort, or the following piece - The Power of People’s Stories - Using Ethnography to Improve our Built Environments - that covers its application within the AEC Industry in general. As an industry we should be engaging social scientists more, but short of that, short of formally conducting ethnographies, systematically applying the four concepts - Context, Partnership, Interpretation, and Perspective - to design and operations alone would increase our industry’s ability to create better, more equitable experiential outcomes accounting for the social.

And of course we need to be validating, quantitatively and qualitatively, the design and operational hypotheses shaping our built environments much more frequently and consistently than we currently do. But that’s a subject for another piece.

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I read a reflection on gratitude the other day that spoke to the importance of our connections to the more-than-human world - the world as a whole that includes all other species and their habitats as well as humans and the human built world. The reflection, by and recently shared by , discusses the importance of going beyond simply understanding these connections exist to deeply feeling gratitude for them. The following quote stood out to me:

But in its deepest expression, gratitude is not something we think – it’s something we embody: relational, intentional, alive. And when we extend our gratitude to the more-than-human world – the cycles, textures, and wild creativity of nature – something palpable shifts. We begin to experience a sense of interbeing, a term coined by the Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh, that describes the felt understanding that we are part of a living, interconnected system.

I think we should spend more time considering what our world could like if this recognition of humans as part of nature as opposed to separate from it - a recognition that was also more deeply felt and appreciated - was the norm (particularly among WEIRD cultures). I think it would look significantly different with regards to climate action, decarbonization, environmental justice, biodiversity, healthy environments, inclusivity, and the list goes on.

And that’s why we should support organizations whose mission is to provide kids, the next generation, with this intellectual understanding as well as the experiences that help instill a sense of deep gratitude for the more-than-human world. The Kansas Association for Conservation and Environmental Education (KACEE) is one of these organizations working to equitably create such experiences for all kids. And it’s currently in the middle of its fall fundraiser.

KACEE has also secured a dollar-for-dollar match for donations made on #GivingTuesday (12/2) thanks to an anonymous donor. So mark your calendars to double the impact of your donation, which you can make here:

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This year’s theme is A Calm Mind is a Curious Mind: This is Your Brain on Environmental Education, and I think we could all use more calm and curious minds that recognize our connections to the more-than-human world. Some perhaps more than others - a few billionaires and individuals in Washington, D.C. and some state governments come to mind for no reason.

I was fortunate to have family and educational experiences growing up that instilled my own understanding and appreciation for these connections. Those experiences made it easier for me to recognize the design implications of the Biophilia hypothesis (the innate connection we ALL have with nature and other life forms), the importance of biomimicry (using nature as an inspirational source for design), and the need to mitigate the impacts of our built environment on biodiversity as well as climate change. And they made me more curious about the world around me - less judgmental (getting degrees in anthropology didn’t hurt along these lines either).

Now multiply that calmness, curiosity, understanding, and gratitude across society, industries and professions, political parties, etc. As I recently wrote reflecting on the 2025 Greenbuild and KACEE annual conferences:

[E]nvironmental education teaches us about out connections to the natural world, our interdependence, and how our futures are integrally tied to other species. It helps us understand how to bridge science, equity, mindfulness, and cultural relevance when developing strategies to protect our land, water, air, and biodiversity. It provides outdoor experiences to help solidify that understanding, germinating a love of the natural world in the process. And all of this helps inoculate against unsustainable decisions, policies, voting preferences, and other actions - actions that have led to our current political circumstances. Those experiences outdoors also positively impact our wellbeing, providing some respite from the stresses of our daily lives, increasing our own resiliency as we work to increase the resiliency of our built environments.

Being curious enough to consider the reality and design implications of a sex/gender spectrum is yet another reason to support environmental education. And see Save Environmental Education, Save Democracy for even more reasons.

I know there are a lot of needs right now demanding our financial support. But if you can spare even a small amount, know that you’re helping provide kids with opportunities to develop these understandings and connections, as well as experience the physical and mental health benefits from being outdoors. And all of this is something that will positively shape the rest of their lives. So, help us play the long game of creating a more environmentally just, resilient, and sustainable world.

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In the lead up to the second No Kings protest across the U.S. on Saturday (10/18/2025), I suggested that many of our institutions and corporations are likely going to need to see a measure of sustained, visible resistance from the general population to help them find the courage to visibly resist themselves. I referenced the research of Dr. Erica Chenoweth and Dr. Maria Stephen and their finding’s tipping point percentage of 3.5% of a nation’s population:

So, once we reach the 3.5% or there abouts, and sustain it, might we see more resistance from universities, the healthcare sector, corporations, and other organizations? Potentially, and it’s certainly a reason to keep growing a visible, sustained resistance among U.S. citizens. I’m hopeful we’ll see at least 3.5% of U.S. citizens this Saturday in the streets during the No Kings protests across the nation.

As I write this particular post, the most recent estimate I’ve seen by G. Elliott Morris of Strength in Numbers and the Atlanta-based science newsroom The Xylom (reported by ) puts the number as high as 8.2 million Americans showing up for the protests. While greater than the first one last June, this still doesn’t get us to 3.5% of the U.S.’s population. Even considering that many actively resisting in their day-to-day probably weren’t able to attend, we still may not be quite there, though certainly closer.

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The additional pain that we’re unfortunately going to see over the coming months will likely increase those visibly taking action. But we still need to keep collectively protesting and resisting in our day-to-day - reading, writing, protecting our neighbors from ICE, running for office, supporting public education and teachers, protecting the LGBTQIA+ community, finding ways in our daily work to help our employers say no to the Trump regime, etc., And, as I wrote, we definitely need messages centered on building something better to help increase our numbers - having something to work towards as well as fight against:

The people will lead - through our individual actions and the leaders among us who step up in various ways at the local, state, and national levels to tap into our shared language, effectively message what a better world could look like, and help organize and magnify our efforts collectively.

A better world clearly involves a greater focus on the common good, which in turn requires structuring our economic, political, and social systems to make it easier to do so. , in her recent piece, Directing Economic Growth: A common good approach, asks (and then answers) the following:

But designing an economy for the common good means more than committed altruism in emergencies. It means actually designing the economy so that living a good life together becomes the norm. The question is: How do we normalise this way of being?

As Mazzucato pointed out, it’s partly about bringing more voices to the table - voices that span class, geography (rural to urban), age (young people definitely need to be engaged and feel like they have a future), ethnicity, cultural backgrounds, etc.

Even Aristotle spoke not only of the telos—the goals—but also of the polis—the community. The challenge is how to build community while achieving goals, how to build participation into the way we solve problems, and include the voices of all.

It’s also about redefining economic growth.

This is not about abandoning growth—it’s about redefining it. The question is not how fast we grow, but what kind of growth we create and who it serves. We can choose to invest in making life better for people and the planet.

In other words we must mindfully create an economy (and political / governing systems) that make life better for people and the planet. Mazzucato lays out how to do so by providing an overview of her five pillars of an economics of the common good, as well as how to construct each of them - this is essentially her vision of how we remake our economic systems to facilitate the normalization of living a good life together (emphasis on together). It’s interesting to note that there’s significant overlap between Mazzucato’s five pillars and Elinor Ostrom’s core design principles (CDPs) for helping ensure prosocial behavior and decision-making within and between groups.

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Different disciplines, scholars, practitioners, etc., have recognized these various elements of the social - equitable distributions of contributions and benefits, fair and inclusive consensus decision-making, transparency and accountability, among others - that evolved over our history as a species to help promote and facilitate cooperative, prosocial behavior. The different disciplines may have varying takes on them due to the multiple perspectives represented, but there’s an element of continuity and connectedness across all of these different takes. And the fact that these traits evolved over our history makes cultural evolution, or cultural multi-level selection (CMLS), a great theoretical framework to use when analyzing and applying these different perspectives in the creation of a vision for a better world.

I’ve written a lot about this over the years, mostly within the context of the AEC Industry, though sometimes venturing beyond that. Three examples include:

• DEI as a “Fitness” Program: Using CLMS to help successfully apply DEI initiatives to organizations.

• Blurring the Line Between “Others” – A Practical Application of Cultural Multilevel Selection Theory: Using CLMS to help make the design/construction process more inclusive.

• Gaming the System: Applying CLMS to help drive prosocial outcomes in the AEC Industry despite the constraints of our larger political, economic, and social systems.

The last is from a the series of articles I’ve written on the built environment’s dual evolutionary nature, starting with this not-so creatively titled piece: The Evolutionary Dualism of our Built Environments. And the intent of the article following Gaming the System will be to summarize some of these larger social, political, and economic constraints, how to further improve prosocial decision making at the project level (and community level to a lesser extent) within these constraints, and how we can mindfully make systemic changes at these larger levels, at least where the AEC Industry overlaps, to reduce those constraints to begin with. In addition to ’s work, I’ll be referencing the work of many other scholars, practitioners, and organizations. Some of those will likely include:

• Kate Raworth, Doughnut Economics, and the Doughnut Economics Action Lab (DEAL)

• Prosocial World and the work of David Sloan Wilson

• Embodied Economics: How Our Economic Stories Shape the World and other work by

• A Theory of Everyone and other work by

• Rule Makers, Rule Breakers and other work by Michele Gelfand.

• Going for Zero: Decarbonizing the Built Environment on the Path to Our Urban Future by Carl Elefante

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These are at least some of the people and organizations I believe we should be engaging to capitalize on our current momentum and help build a vision for a better world. Democratic and other leaders at all levels trying to resist the Trump regime ignore the need to create this inclusive vision for a better world at their own (and our collective) peril. It may seem daunting, but frankly it shouldn’t be that hard to create a better vision than what the Trump regime, his billionaire allies, and MAGA are providing for us. We can certainly do better than…

An unhinged, orange wannabe King literally defecating all over us,

Crushing financial pressures on farmers,

Spiking healthcare costs for Americans,

Attacking the trans community, especially trans youth,

Or creating an authoritarian, paramilitary force that denies us due process, disappears people off the streets, and terrorizes kids in the process.

So, let’s roll up our sleeves - it’s time to build a vision for a better world and the plans for achieving it, while we also keep resisting the Trump regime.

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Reading is resistance.

wrote this in her recent Substack post, Silencing Mockingbirds, arguing that teaching full works of fiction (as opposed to prioritizing teaching to the test) - and doing the difficult work of analysis and language processing - is vital for developing critical thinking, empathy, and shared cultural understanding. And this shared understanding is an important part of binding us together as a society, and ideally it allows us to use our shared language [and shared literary experiences] to fight the fascism currently seated in power.

Hence reading is resistance.

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I’ve been struggling with what effective resistance looks like, or more accurately I’ve been struggling with how to contribute to effective collective resistance. We’re facing off against an authoritarian federal government, allied with multiple billionaires and many state governments, along with both a captured Congress and Supreme Court. This means, as I wrote in April, we need large numbers of people and broad coalitions across multiple sectors - mass mobilization and organization - with unifying messages centered around building a better world for everyone to generate effective collective resistance.

Research by Dr. Erica Chenoweth and Dr. Maria Stephen suggests that non-violent protests and actions involving around 3.5% of a nation’s population is enough to effectively resist authoritarian regimes. But we don’t appear to be there yet.

And efforts earlier in the year to generate unified resistance among universities, such as the Big 10’s coalition, appear to have fizzled. Other sectors, such as healthcare, don’t appear to have tried banding together, at least to my knowledge. Public school districts have had more courage than either universities or healthcare organizations / hospitals in resisting the Trump regime, though they too haven’t banded together.

Also earlier in the year, I was part of a small group of people from different organizations exploring what building a broader coalition of resistance in Kansas might look like. Unfortunately, for reasons I’m not completely clear on, but likely involving varying aspects of fear, apathy, perceived scarcity of political capital, and a lack of vision among politicians and leaders we were seeking support from, that effort has stalled.

Not that there aren’t organizations having some success generating the mass mobilization needed, such as Indivisible and the 10 Steps Campaign as examples, but we’re still not at 3.5% of the population. Nor have we really seen much generation of broad coalitions across sectors and industries (or even within sectors and industries).

I’ve felt a little deflated.

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But reading Piper’s words - how the individual act of reading contributes to a shared collective understanding that we can tap into to help generate collective resistance - brought me back to how the individual and the collective are woven together.

It’s not illogical to think that a certain percentage of the population visibly resisting in a sustained manner is needed for industries, corporations, and other organizations to justify taking risky stands against the Trump regime (individually or collectively). There is some support for this in Chenoweth’s and Stephen’s research findings - a visible mobilization among 3.5% of the citizenry was needed to help shift loyalty among a nation’s elites - business, political, media, etc. - away from the authoritarian in power. It shifts the balance of fear - making inaction (relative to resistance) more costly than action.

During the civil rights movement in the U.S., corporations and other organizations began shifting policies (e.g., desegregation, hiring practices) once public support and protests reached a visible, sustained threshold. And this is what essentially happens during boycotts and strikes - consumers banding together and laborers banding together to exercise power and take actions that corporations and governments ignore at their own peril. Disney succumbed to consumer actions and popular opinions when it reinstated Jimmy Kimmel.

So, once we reach the 3.5% or there abouts, and sustain it, might we see more resistance from universities, the healthcare sector, corporations, and other organizations? Potentially, and it’s certainly a reason to keep growing a visible, sustained resistance among U.S. citizens. I’m hopeful we’ll see at least 3.5% of U.S. citizens this Saturday in the streets during the No Kings protests across the nation.

Because in the end, the people will lead. We will visibly lead with our protests, marches, and other day-to-day actions that are also forms of resistance.

But this level of visible resistance will need to be sustained, which means we’ll need to keep seeing the continued interweaving of the individual and the collective. People will need to keep reading.

Reading is resistance.

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And people will need to keep writing and storytelling. If we’re going to read to resist, we need material to keep reading. And there are so many great writers on Substack to read - , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , to name just a few. So many wonderful individual writers here and elsewhere - in the now and from our past - as part of the human collective.

Writing is resistance.

Teaching, public education, and the development of critical thinking skills, are critical to a functioning democracy (and poison to fascist authoritarians), which is why you see the Trump regime, MAGA, and their allies targeting public education and universities.

Teaching is resistance.

Understanding our connection to the natural world and the importance of protecting it and other species - understanding that we are part of nature as opposed to separate from it, is at odds with ideologies embracing our dominion over nature, like white Christian nationalism.

Environmental education is resistance.

Data, the insights gained from its analysis and interpretation, and the transparency it creates are anathema to authoritarians, fascists, and white Christian nationalists. Which is partially why we’ve seen the Trump regime targeting federal agencies (like the Department of Labor), federal expertise, and federally funded research.

Data analysis is resistance.

Transparency and truth telling shine a light on the actions of authoritarians and those greedily holding onto their power, privilege, and wealth in general. Which is why the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, NPR, PBS, other media outlets, and individual journalists have been targeted, as well as partially why we’ve seen media and news source consolidation by the ultra-wealthy.

Reporting is resistance.

The transgender and greater LGBTQIA+ community, especially trans youth, have received a lot of hate and vitriol from the Trump regime and MAGA (at federal, state, and local levels) - targeting a vulnerable minority to flex their muscles and help consolidate their power. Members of the AEC Industry can help counter this by bringing members of this community to the table (directly or indirectly) during the planning/design/construction process and advocating for their needs. Trump is also taking a page from the authoritarian playbook and trying to dictate what federal architecture should look like, and the design community must stand in opposition.

Designing is resistance.

Neighbors who stand against and record ICE’s actions when family, friends, or fellow community members are disappeared off the streets, sometimes successfully stopping ICE in the process, are heroes.

Being a neighbor is resistance.

Musical artists, through their compositions, recordings, performances, and activism, have been opposing the Trump regime. Music can speak to our souls, rouse our emotions, stir us to action, and help spread unifying messages - whether its enjoying a concert with thousands of our friends or singing along in the car by ourselves. And I think I know where Freddie Mercury and David Bowie would have landed on all of this.

Singing is resistance.

Our friends, neighbors, and fellow community members who step up to run for local and state offices - to do the work to keep our states, communities, and school districts running, stand against the various attacks from the Trump regime and MAGA politicians, and endure the vile threats to themselves and their families - deserve our respect, support, and thanks.

Running for office is resistance.

And we know that free and fair elections and the right to vote are certainly anathema to authoritarians, fascists, oligarchs, white Christian nationalists, and minority rule in general. It’s no surprise that Trump is getting us used to seeing federal troops and his paramilitary ICE force in our city streets and calling on red states to further gerrymander their districts. Nor should it be a surprise that the captured Supreme Court seems ready to further undercut the Voting Rights Act.

Voting is resistance.

As is so many other things we do in our day-to-day, from sustainably growing and cultivating, to supporting local food banks, to providing gender affirming care.

The people will lead - through our individual actions and the leaders among us who step up in various ways at the local, state, and national levels to tap into our shared language, effectively message what a better world could look like, and help organize and magnify our efforts collectively. And when enough of us are resisting, visibly and in a sustained manner, maybe the corporations, healthcare institutions, universities, other industries and sectors, and even some politicians, might grow enough of a spine (or just act in their own self interests) to actively resist themselves.

So get out in the streets this Saturday - let’s surpass 3.5% and begin to take collective, non-violent resistance to the next level.

And keep reading, creating, and living your day-to-day - keep resisting.

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Fuck the USA.

A sentiment that’s always existed among others in the world since our nation’s founding for a variety of reasons, both justified and not. This particular sentiment appears to have been driven by the war in Gaza and its cruel, horrific, devastating impacts on civilians, including children, the arguable genocide of Palestinians occurring, and the various forms of passive and active support (including the supply of weapons) the U.S. is providing to Israel’s efforts.

But Gaza isn’t the only reason we’re seeing anti-U.S. sentiment abroad right now. The various actions of the Trump regime are drivers (as well as multiple U.S. administrations previously), but there’s also a basic U.S. tendency to view ourselves as the center of the universe, and that gets under peoples’ skin. I spent last week (9/23 - 9/26) in Montreal at an indoor environmental quality (IEQ) conference. I’ll probably write something about the conference itself at some point, but here I wanted to briefly share a few random images, thoughts, and experiences related to the city itself as well as the anger and confusion many outside the U.S. are experiencing. And yes, the opening image is a controversial slap in the face that some may find offensive, but it effectively provides a cold water plunge into the underlying theme of this piece.

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My friend and colleague and I weren’t able to really explore the city - the day we planned to spend a few hours playing hooky from the conference ended up being full of rain and drizzle. Our forays were limited to varying the route of our 20ish minute walk between our Airbnb and the conference, as well as exploring different directions from the conference venue itself each evening looking for interesting places to have dinner. What little we were fortunate to see, along with some limited interactions with the locals, has put Montreal on my list to visit again and get to know better.

For those not aware, French is the city’s official language (as it is for the entire province of Quebec), though a majority speak both French and English. Signage (at least that we were exposed to) is generally in French with English translations often (but not always) included. Our (very limited) experience was for servers and other locals to initially greet us in French but immediately switch to English upon hearing our response. Even if we tried responding with a simple bonjour, our American accent was likely a clear signal English was needed. And maybe many of them have experienced their fare share of Americans expecting to be catered to in this manner.

One evening as we dined at a restaurant with another conference attendee, Stu astutely observed something along the lines of each new set of patrons being an adventure for a server, not knowing which language they would be using until the initial greeting was made. Our server happened to be standing nearby, and I caught her side-eying us with a wry smile on her face as Stu made the comment. Most of Stu’s observations are pretty aSTUte - inciteful and clever with his own unique spin.

All of us, especially U.S. citizens, especially white, cisgender, heterosexual, male, U.S. citizens, need semi-regular experiences of being in places where our primary language, dialects, customs, norms, needs, privileges, etc., aren’t what’s dominant. We are all born as the center of the universe, and unfortunately through various aspects of wealth disparities, gender dynamics, implicit biases, racism, national dominance, and other forms of privileges/power differentials, far too many of us never grow to fully learn that we’re just a small part of the world around us. We never fully learn the lesson of empathy vs sympathy.

Language shapes how we view the world - as we grow up, the language(s) we learn, along with other formative cultural experiences, contributes to the wiring of our brain, influencing for the rest of our lives how we will perceive the world around us and view others. Learning multiple languages at a young age can, in a sense, expose us to different world views, perspectives, and cultural norms. It makes it easier to approach the exploration of other world views with more curiosity and with less judgement. Everything else held equal, it makes it easier to embrace empathy.

Whenever I attend international conferences like this one, I’m continuously amazed by speakers presenting in English whose primary language isn’t English. I’m not just amazed because it’s something I can’t do, but because their fluency in multiple languages has given them a significantly broader perspective for approaching research or practical applications. It helps them make connections that, while not otherwise impossible, are more difficult to do. One of the biggest regrets I have regarding my own public school education experience was not having an option to learn any foreign language. And as a school board member I should have probably done more to make such learning experiences easier in our elementary schools. Though the historic undervaluing, underfunding, and direct attacks public education has faced in the U.S. have also made that more difficult in general, but that’s the subject of another piece.

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Montreal is also known as the City of Lights (or at least is marketed this way), and that was apparent to us during our evening explorations. As we wandered through downtown, I wondered how experiences of the city’s lights varied between those whose primary language was French vs English. How would the world views embedded within each language shape the emotional reactions and interpretations of the built environment’s illumination? I really wanted to know this for The Ring, a 30 meter diameter, illuminated steel sculpture pictured below. It’s described as framing views to both the past and the future, linking Montreal’s past, present, and future. That may have been the intent, but it would be interesting to know how others interpret it and how their cultural experiences and languages shape those interpretations.

In addition to Montreal’s parks and green spaces, the city also appears to have made an effort to integrate small oases of greenery and biophilia within the downtown city proper itself. The choice of plants, colors, materials, shapes, seats, and images are no doubt driven by local ecosystems, traditions, norms, standards, codes, and other contexts, with subtle/symbolic meanings unknown to Stu and myself. Obviously not being from Montreal or having spent any significant time there contributes to our inability to grasp some of these contextual meanings. But perhaps it’s also because our world views haven’t been shaped by the French language, though that’s also integrally tied to the other contextual reasons.

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Turning back to the protest that started this piece off, after checking into our Airbnb late Tuesday afternoon, we headed to the conference venue for an evening networking event. Along the way we passed the Roddick Gates (the main entrance to McGill University campus), but we were walking on the opposite side of the street. We didn’t initially notice the individual, but after hearing several cars honking as they passed, we looked across to see one man standing in front of the entrance waving a Palestinian flag. Walking back after the event we chose that side of the street, and upon reaching the Gates we noticed Fuck USA chalked onto one of the pillars. On an adjacent pillar, pictured below, was Fuck the IDF with Killer chalked on a nearby column (IDF in this context stands for Israel Defense Forces).

It shouldn’t be hard to understand the anger so many feel against the U.S. and Israel for the evil being done in Gaza. Even beyond the actions (and inactions) of our government itself or the anti-Palestinian sentiment among certain U.S. groups, this anger is also likely fueled by the perception (largely justified) that too many U.S. citizens are oblivious or apathetic to what’s going on in Gaza - that we see ourselves as the center of the universe and what goes on beyond our borders doesn’t really matter that much.

I should also note that empathizing with Gazans / Palestinians doesn’t mean we can’t also empathize with Israel for the evil done to Israelis by Hamas. But one can empathize without justifying the outrageous, way out of proportion, genocidal actions of the Israeli government, supported to varying degrees by the U.S. government. Just as empathizing with Charlie Kirk’s family doesn’t mean we ignore or whitewash the hate that he spread.

A few conversations I was involved in at the conference strayed into U.S. politics and actions of the Trump regime. But instead of Gaza, the focus of such conversations tended to be related to attacks on DEI, federal agencies, science and science funding, higher education, renewable energy, and climate action, as well as the actual or potential impacts on our industry, globally and within the U.S. Non-U.S. citizens tended to express a mix of frustration and dismay, with the following two questions representative of what a few wanted to know.

How do you as a nation not consider - not give weight to - the impacts of your actions on the rest of the world? How did you get this point?

Difficult questions to address during a lunch, between sessions, or at an evening reception, and I felt in the hot seat a bit as an American. How do you succinctly convey the complex, long-term, and more recent history contributing to our national self-centeredness and the rise of MAGA / Trump / white Christian nationalism? Mostly I acknowledged the incredulous state of things while also pointing out that there are still many U.S. citizens trying to respond, stand up to the regime, take note of what’s going on beyond our borders, and work for positive change. But it’s not really a satisfying answer, to give or hear.

I do think finding ways to increase empathy across the divides in the U.S. are critical to defusing the political violence, considering the needs and perspectives of others (in the U.S. and beyond our borders), as well as getting us to a point where we can create something better. But that empathy must also include some form of accountability and justice - hate can’t be whitewashed. I’m not sure how to do all of this rapidly though, or if that’s even possible. Some of what I’ve discussed here - learning foreign languages, creating cross-cultural experiences that challenge our world views, and structuring the built environment to reinforce this - need to happen at a large scale and really shape our formative experiences; it becomes a generational time frame.

Ta-Nehisi Coates was recently on Ezra Klein’s podcast, discussing the aftermath of Kirk’s assassination, Klein’s subsequent controversial opinion piece (that Coates called him out on as whitewashing Kirk’s hate), U.S. political violence (and its history), and where we go from here. Relative to what we do and how long it could take, Coates essentially stated that it could take a very long time. But he also talked about this in a broader historical context. Paraphrasing an unnamed mutual friend of theirs:

This is the best set of white folks we have ever had in the entire history of Black America. This is the most woke, this is the least racist, this is the most aware group that we have had.

He also said,

For us, and for those of us who ground ourselves in a larger tradition, this is not close. This is a remarkable time in terms of our freedom as writers and journalists to speak to people, in terms of the amount of people who are empowered and have some amount of privilege and could just look away and are not looking away.

It’s not a great time politically — you understand what I’m saying? But it’s just not the worst, either. It’s not the worst.

So, while we may have taken some steps backward, we haven’t negated all of the steps forward previously taken. The answer may just be that we have to keep doing the work, keep struggling to find a path forward, keep taking a bite of the elephant. And making use of events (tragedies, disasters, or positive accomplishments) that have the potential of being used to collectively propel us forward at a much faster rate.

But it’s not easy - the world is set up to maintain the status quo. The next morning on our walk to the conference venue we noticed that the chalk had been washed off of the pillars. The powers that be had whitewashed away the pain of others so the city could start its day with a clear conscious, minimize political blowback, and be unburdened from the horror half a world away.

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