fb-pixel Skip to main content
A screenshot from police body camera footage shows Mario Arenales Gonzalez on April 19, the day he died in police custody in Alameda, Calif.
Marilyn J. Mosby and Rachael Rollins

The public safety benefits of not prosecuting low-level crimes

Both Boston and Baltimore have shown that new thinking on policing and prosecution promotes public safety and protects communities of color.

Joan Vennochi
Rochelle Walensky, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, testifies before a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions hearing to examine an update from federal officials on efforts to combat COVID-19 on May 11.
Rochelle Walensky has a credibility problem
Credibility is a terrible thing to waste, especially after the Trump era. Unfortunately, that was the net result of the CDC’s badly handled mask announcement.

Jonathan Bush
Workers in Qatar load 300 tonnes of medical aid to be flown in a three-flight cargo aircraft convoy directly to destinations in India.
Every one of us needs to help India
Our response in the coming days is essential to the 1.4 billion people who live there.

Megha Desai
A laborer works at a brick kiln on the outskirts of Amritsar, India, on March 7.
In India, the pandemic may turn back the clock on women’s empowerment
Women and girls worry that they will be forced to return to a time before their voices were heard, their potential was recognized, and their contributions to society were valued.

Navjot Singh and Pooja Kumar
A family member offers prayers during cremation of his loved one who died of COVID-19 at a cremation ground in Allahabad on May 8.
India’s tragedy reverberates around the world
The crisis is a stark reminder that what’s happening in India could happen elsewhere.

More Opinion Columns

MARCELA GARCÍA
Roxbury resident Francell Simmons receives the COVID-19 vaccine from EMT Alex Honrado at the Reggie Lewis Center, in Boston in February.

Why vaccine equity still matters

Vaccination rates are significantly lower in communities of color in Massachusetts. The primary reason for this wide gap is that people are still not being met where they are.

Katherine Gergen Barnett

Why we should wear masks post-pandemic

They are protecting us from deadly diseases besides COVID-19.

Alex Beam

California, mon amour (still)

I just can’t stay away from California. It reminds me of Boston’s legendary honky-tonk Scollay Square, a place where ‘there was always something doing.’

SCOT LEHIGH
House minority leader Kevin McCarthy said that “raising taxes would be the biggest mistake we can make."

As the Gipper might say, there they go again

Warning: Be skeptical of GOP predictions that calamity will come if taxes go up.

RENÉE GRAHAM
Rep. Liz Cheney on Wednesday, after her fellow Republicans voted to remove her rom a leadership position in the House.

Does Liz Cheney really care about democracy?

Renouncing Trump’s Big Lie isn’t enough. She should condemn the voter fraud falsehoods it has spawned.

Kimberly Atkins

In bid to end COVID-19 unemployment boost, GOP misses the she-cession

All of the economy’s 140,000 lost jobs in December were held by women.

ABDALLAH FAYYAD
On Nov. 16, a woman is silhouetted as she takes in the faces in the photographs that make up the "Say Their Names" memorial on Boston Common. According to its website, "The Say Their Names Memorial is a nationwide initiative to honor Black lives lost to racial injustice, police brutality, and racism."

We actually know very little about police brutality

Despite having militarized police departments across the country, the federal government does not collect comprehensive data that encompasses all kinds police violence.

Mary Ann D'Urso
Cashier Diana Rivero stands behind a partial protective plastic screen and wears a mask and gloves at the Presidente Supermarket in Miami in April, 2020.

The Grocery Stories: Transactional work relationships

There are many good people working at my store, and we get on well. In many ways, though, we are strangers commuting on the same train.