New York Magazine 9/4-9/17/17

1 The most recent issue featured an excerpt from Ellen Pao’s upcoming book, Reset, detailing her harassment in the tech world (“This Is How Sexism Works in Silicon Valley,” August 21–September 3 ). Gesche Haas, an entrepreneur who promotes female-founded ventures, wrote, “Having had personal experience with speaking out publicly on a sexism incident, I know how mind-blowingly difficult this choice is and how conflicting the aftermath can be. Ellen has taken it to a whole new level.” Telle Whitney, CEO and president of the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology, commented, “As a CEO working with women technologists globally, I know that sexual harassment and intimidation happens, but most women choose not to speak up. Those who do often lose everything they hold dear—their jobs and their reputations.…

Urbanity New York Magazine all but invented the new-hot-neighborhood feature. In 1969, a cover story by Pete Hamill declared Brooklyn—especially Park Slope—“the sane alternative” to Manhattan living, laying out the template for hundreds of features, columns, and web posts to come. We have never quite stopped helping our readers find a new place to live (or, alas, making them feel anxious about that quest), although the tenor of our coverage has shifted away from the basic idea of pointing out an underpriced and interesting neighborhood, for the simple reason that there’s no such thing anymore. Instead, we zero in on areas where change is happening rapidly and organically or, in the case of our latest look at Long Island City, rapidly and very much nonorganically. The waterfront district north…

WAS HURRICANE HARVEY the result of climate change? The answer is complicated because weather is complicated, and probably the best science can say, really, is “In part.” But the question is ultimately semantic. As journalist Robinson Meyer and scientist Michael Mann explained very clearly and very helpfully in the aftermath of Harvey, global warming means more moisture in the air, which intensifies rainfall and flooding, and significant sea-level rise, which leads to bigger and more invasive storm surges. But the more important matter is not how much blame for Harvey we should parcel out to climate change; it is how often, in this new age of epic weather, storms like it will hit. There are complicated variables there, too, of course. But the big-picture answer is clear: much more often…

IT’S A MUGGY, rainy day in August as a driver opens the door to a black Mercedes SUV parked on West 83rd Street. Inside sits the celebrity I’d been tracking obsessively on the internet for most of the summer: He’d been photographed riding a horse down some Caribbean beach, lounging on a yacht in Miami, on countless red carpets, ringing the bell at the New York Stock Exchange, flirting on Live With Kelly and Ryan. There’s a famous collection of photos from the Beatles’ first American concert, wild-eyed fan-girls seizing up with the pure joy of getting close to the living thing. I’ve never quite understood the spasms—until his shining brown eyes meet mine and he flashes me a big, bright, gummy smile. As I try to collect myself, the…

 AFTER HURRICANE HARVEY made landfall but just before the floodwaters began to rise in Houston, a large portion of America gave its attention to a boxing match unsentimentally dubbed the “Money Fight.” Even in different times and under better circumstances, the pay-per-view face-off between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Conor McGregor was never going to be the kind of event that would inspire sportswriters to wax poetic about the “sweet science” or move Joyce Carol Oates to add a new chapter to On Boxing. Mayweather is a convicted abuser of women, McGregor a preening race-baiter, and they walked away from the weekend with at least a combined $130 million. It simply wasn’t possible to celebrate their showdown except in the most nihilistic, “lol nothing matters” way. But the news from Texas—not…

MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO rounds the corner of a Gracie Mansion porch wearing a broad smile. It’s a Friday afternoon in late August, and he’s had a good week. Three days ago, he announced rising test scores for the city’s third- through eighth-graders. Two days ago, he dominated his main Democratic-primary challenger, Sal Albanese, in the first of two debates. A newly released report shows city unemployment dropping to record lows, and polls predict de Blasio should cruise to a reelection victory in November. ¶ This being New York, however, problems and criticisms keep step with the good news. He is locked in his latest battle with Governor Andrew Cuomo, this time over how to fix the crumbling subway system. Two investigations failed to find any indictable offenses connected to…