Karen Benjamin Guzzo
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karenguzzo.bsky.social
Karen Benjamin Guzzo
@karenguzzo.bsky.social

Demographer and Sociologist. Director of the Carolina Population Center. LEGO Karen

Sociology 28%
Political science 28%
C. Jay Engel wants to “repeal the 20th century.”

Matt Walsh is preaching race science on his show at The Daily Wire.

Joel Webbon just launched a ten-hour interview series with Nick Fuentes.

Christian nationalism is getting more extreme. www.liberalcurrents.com/remigration-...
Remigration, Recolonization, Rechristianization, Restoration: How Some of America’s Most Extreme Christian Nationalists See the New (Old) World Order
On the right's masculine, white nationalist, and theocratic framework.
www.liberalcurrents.com
The U.S.-Born Unemployment Rate Rose After Trump Reduced Immigration www.forbes.com/sites/stuart...
The U.S.-Born Unemployment Rate Rose After Trump Reduced Immigration
Government data show the Trump administration’s policies reducing the number of foreign-born workers did not help U.S.-born workers in 2025.
www.forbes.com
The reactionary centrist logic is simple: if the left does something bad it’s the left’s fault, and if the right does something bad, it’s also the left’s fault for making them do it. It’s a simple formula and once you see it every one of their arguments is the same
2/ The "Make America Healthy Again" (MAHA) movement and Project 2025 push FABMs while simultaneously working to restrict Title X funding, ban abortion, defund Planned Parenthood, and more. That's not about expanding options - it's about limiting them. www.guttmacher.org/fact-sheet/h...
How Project 2025 Seeks to Obliterate Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights
www.guttmacher.org

I mean…
America’s unemployment rate is low. But so is its job growth. That means many Americans are locked out of stable, full-time jobs, and many are struggling.

“We just want work,” said Glenn Jones, who is on a waiting list for to drive for DoorDash. “Any work.”

www.wsj.com/economy/jobs...
Slowest Labor Market in Years Leaves Job Seekers Stuck
Job hunts are getting desperate for Americans who find themselves locked out of stable, full-time work in a stagnant job market.
www.wsj.com
Meat-heavy diets, promoted by RFKJ’s new upside-down food pyramid, “have repeatedly been linked to worse outcomes.

“The new food pyramid is simply bananas,” Michael Greger, a physician and founder of NutritionFacts.org, told me. “If nutrition guidelines were medicine, this would be malpractice.”
Opinion | The New Food Pyramid, Brought to You by Big Meat
www.nytimes.com
Good summary of the Goldwater Institute/Martin Center plan to further reduce professional autonomy from educators in order to politicize campus.
They also want to take over journals. open.substack.com/pub/musgrave...
“We can no longer lend our credibility to an organization that has lost its integrity… each of us independently reached the decision to resign in protest of the actions of an administration that treats science not as a process for building knowledge, but as a means to advance its political agenda.”
The NIH has lost its scientific integrity. So we left
“We can no longer lend our credibility to an organization that has lost its integrity,” write four scientists and administrators who recently resigned from the NIH.
www.statnews.com
We've reached the Econowife part of the Project
Heritage Foundation calls on US to prioritize marriage and family in new report
The think tank recommends a “marriage bootcamp" to prepare cohabitating couples for matrimony and discourages online dating.
www.politico.com
This is a HUGE win…and one that happened because we ~collectively~ said “NO!”

But AAAS coming in and saying on record to the NYT “Science is doing ok. Things are not bad at all…” is baffling.

If things are hard for you as a scientist, please share in the comments.

www.nytimes.com/2026/01/10/s...
Congress Is Reversing Trump’s Steep Budget Cuts to Science
www.nytimes.com

Worth a rewatch!

I always get a kick out of manly water.

I feel like I worked hard to give make sure my kids are fully up on their 80s/90s films, lol. Please tell me you’ve seen Stand By Me.

I prefer movies over series, so I am always looking for stuff to watch.

Gotcha. Would you recommend it, then? Is there a plot, with protagonists worth caring about?

Did you *want* to watch it? Like, I just can’t muster the interest. It seems like one of those movies made because someone wanted to make it and not because there is an audience or demand for it.
NEW: in temporary restraining order, judge blocks Trump from freezing childcare funding for 5 states (NY, CA, IL, MN, CO)
The NYT has numbers on the cuts at the Dept of Education.
Almost 800 people have been cut at Federal Student Aid. That's a lot larger than I expected. And IES has been gutted.
Trump: "AFFORDABILITY! Effective January 20, 2026, I, as President of the United States, am calling for a one year cap on Credit Card Interest Rates of 10%."
"On December 22, staff were told that John Beigel, acting director of the NIH Division of Microbiology and Infectious Diseases, was being replaced... by David Spiro, who spoke openly about his support of Trump and contributed to his reelection campaign."

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
NIH leadership turmoil adds to politicization concerns
NIH director was prevented from reappointing institute head
www.science.org
In our upcoming budget, we’re investing over $124 million to support law enforcement – the highest level of funding in state history.

When I took office, we made a promise to deliver a comprehensive plan on public safety—one that responds to crime *and* actually addresses the root of crime.

It is surreal to be in an email back-and-forth about how a university website needs to be revised to comply with new university branding requirements when the US, and the world, seem to be in a pre-apocalyptic state.
a cartoon dog is sitting at a table in front of a fire with the words it 's fine everything is fine
ALT: a cartoon dog is sitting at a table in front of a fire with the words it 's fine everything is fine
media.tenor.com
👶 Low fertility in the UK?!
Our @drjenndowd.bsky.social joined BBC Radio 4’s More or Less to unpack the data and offer a demographer’s perspective — beyond the panic & myths.

🎧 Listen here: www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

✍️ Subscribe to her amazing Substack as well: jenndowd.substack.com
More or Less - The Stats of the Nation - Health - BBC Sounds
Tim Harford explores the numbers that help explain the state of health and the NHS.
www.bbc.co.uk

Something I always wondered is how it would be covered if America became a dictatorship

This is it
Page One.

@nytimes.com
"Vance’s twisted and wrongheaded view of Christianity has been repudiated by two popes. His Catholicism seems to be little more than a political prop, a tool only for his career ambitions and desire for power."

www.ncronline.org/opinion/ncr-...
Catholic Vice President Vance takes to social media to justify killing of Renee Good
After the tragic shooting of Renee Good at the hands of ICE, the Catholic vice president of the United States took to social media to justify the killing.
www.ncronline.org
Study finds women use gen AI less than men not due to gaps in access or skill, but because they view it as harmful to mental health, employment, privacy & the environment. This is not misplaced: AI has significant energy demands and risks of bias and misinformation.
www.unite.ai/research-fin...
Research Finds Women Use Generative AI Less, Due to Moral Concerns
A new study led by Oxford University concludes that women are using generative AI far less than men – not because they lack skills, but because they worry more about AI’s harm to jobs, privacy, mental...
www.unite.ai