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EDGE WISE: Free speech trumps hate speech

What a month it’s been! In just the past couple of weeks, the Pope made a passionate argument underscoring the need for humans to respect not only other humans, but other species and all life on Ear

JBrowdy

Viewpoints

EDGE WISE: Another summer, another mass murder

Today, I am grieving the beautiful souls gunned down in their place of worship, where they were working together to build a better world.

JBrowdy

News

EDGE WISE: The multi-talented 21st century American dad

The American working world is rarely family-friendly. The Pew study found that “16 percent of working mothers and 15 percent of working fathers say it is very difficult” to balance the responsibil

JBrowdy

Arts & Entertainment

EDGE WISE: ‘Heroine’s Journey,’ answering the call of sacred theater

I awoke on the morning of January 1, 2013 — New Year’s Day — with what one might consider an unusual question. “What can I do to terrify myself this year?” Within an hour of posing t

AChand

Viewpoints

EDGE WISE: Peering beneath the mask of masculinity

The film, ‘The Mask You Live In,’ establishes clear connections between what one expert called “the pandemic of violence in America” and the repressed anger and hurt of boys and young men, as

JBrowdy

Viewpoints

EDGE WISE: It’s On Us — Reflections on campus sexual assault

College-aged women are four times more likely than any other age group to face sexual assault and in 90 percent of reported cases, the victim is acquainted with his or her attacker.

JBrowdy

Viewpoints

EDGE WISE: Waging peace, not war, on Memorial Day

Now, as never before, we have an opportunity to come together as a global society to wage peace in the name of survival…and beyond survival, prosperity. It will take ordinary people like you and me

JBrowdy

Viewpoints

EDGE WISE: Why can’t we all be trans?

In the 21st century, we have the opportunity to break out of gendered limitations and move on to a better personhood. Women can bring their listening and cooperative values to men, and men can bring t

LSchwartz

Viewpoints

EDGE WISE: Mother’s Day reflections

This Mother’s Day, by all means shower your mother with flowers, chocolates, and love. But let’s also think more deeply about the tremendous contribution mothers make every single day, and how we

JBrowdy

Viewpoints

EDGE WISE: Perilous times for humankind

Disasters make us wake up and realize all over again how precious life is, and how important health and security are to human happiness. Even here in the placid Berkshires, we need to think about disa

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Environment

EDGE WISE: Eco-cinema and environmental awareness

I can understand that food waste is a problem, and look at a statistic and tell you that it is terrible, but once I am confronted with images of the sheer magnitude of piles of wasted food and the sto

MCort

Viewpoints

EDGE WISE: The future is ours to create…or destroy

Can anyone doubt that climate change is real and upon us, already melting the glaciers, acidifying the oceans, and setting off droughts, floods and storms of Biblical proportions? The question is, now

JBrowdy

Life In the Berkshires

EDGE WISE: Happy holidays? Yes, happy holidays

I hope that this holiday season and throughout the year, we remember that giving can begin with how emotionally generous we are to ourselves. If we each take a deep breath and remember this, everyone

Tporte

Life In the Berkshires

EDGE WISE: What’s in a gift? Considering generosity in the holiday season

Since joining the Generosity Economy, I’ve been spending less money — especially on food and clothing. But I’ve also changed the way I approach purchasing things in general. I think longer befor

KHewitt

Life In the Berkshires

EDGE WISE: Shopping the winter blues away

I love to give gifts, especially when they’re handmade by some of my talented women friends. What follows is a decidedly idiosyncratic list of some of the local woman-run craft businesses that are h

JBrowdy

Life In the Berkshires

EDGE WISE: Breaking Free: A Winter’s Tale

You hold an unsullied, childish notion that your soul, once breaking free of mortal restraint, will move on the wings of wind in the company of Dolly and other beloved creatures who have left the Eart

Jembree

Life In the Berkshires

EDGE WISE: Yearning in the age of bling

The more we gawk at $2,000 handbags, the less mental space we have for thinking about people who don’t have anything to put in a handbag.

SKaufman

Life In the Berkshires

EDGE WISE: A family Thanksgiving in the age of dietary restrictions

You may have spotted me last week at the grocery store. I was the woman reading the tiny ingredients on the food labels with a magnifying glass.

LKrouss

Life In the Berkshires

EDGE WISE: Are Lesbians Gay? Signposts on road to citizenship

I like being called a lesbian. “Lesbian” sounds so cool, so special, and so different that I choose it for myself. Because I am different, and because words matter.

Tporte

Life In the Berkshires

EDGE WISE: What we show up for: Reflections on small town organizing

While community service really does start at home, it just can’t end there. So I’m going to show up for my family as best I can. But I’m also going to drag them to protests.

KHewitt

Life In the Berkshires

EDGE WISE: The mourning after

Change is accelerating and taking us forward in ways we cannot predict. We are going to need every ounce of community spirit, every fiber of resilience, courage and compassion in the months and years

JBrowdy

Life In the Berkshires

EDGE WISE: An investment in public education is an investment in our future

Our local issue over the upgrading of Monument Mountain Regional High School is about the increasing stratification of American society. Public education is the one American social institution that ca

JBrowdy

Life In the Berkshires

EDGE WISE: Saving a starfish: Women’s rights and social change

Kristof’s central message was that if we put our minds to it and work together, we can make a difference.

JNardacci

Life In the Berkshires

EDGE WISE: Voices, views, visions of women of the Berkshire region

EDGE WISE: A new weekly column that moves women’s voices to center stage. Women of the Berkshire region, you are hereby invited to make this space your own! EDGE WISE will appear weekly, and my hope

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Trade and Commerce

EDGEWISE: Shop fair for the holidays

We are all connected in this world we share and have a responsibility to take care of each other.

Sfish

Viewpoints

EDGEWISE: Climate crises, climate opportunities

I want to be able to write a letter to future generations that tells proudly how in my time, we stood up in the face of impending disaster and made the necessary changes in lifestyle, industry and eco

JBrowdy

Viewpoints

EDGEWISE: On this Thanksgiving generosity for refugees — past and present

Let us remember the real roots of this holiday: The generous spirit of the indigenous ancestors of America, who welcomed the first European refugees.

JBrowdy

Viewpoints

EDGEWISE: After Paris, searching upstream for the source of terrorism

If we really want to defang the terrorists, we should stop selling them weapons, for starters.

JBrowdy

Viewpoints

EDGEWISE: David and Goliath change places

Goliath is now us, ordinary citizens linked together through the Internet, working together to make our dreams and visions real.

JBrowdy

Viewpoints

EDGEWISE: Arts activism can change the world

It was no accident that the realization of equality for gay Americans was preceded by a good decade of arts activism.

JBrowdy

Viewpoints

EDGEWISE: Singing the GB hotel blues

The silver lining of this autumn of our discontent is that the streets and proverbial water coolers of Great Barrington are suddenly buzzing with neighbors newly engaged with the civic life of our tow

JBrowdy

Viewpoints

EDGEWISE: Keeping Great Barrington great — or not

We are the stewards of our community, and every decision we make matters. Letting our high school slide into disrepair…letting the character of our Main Street be lost.

JBrowdy