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Emily Bazelon

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Emily Bazelon
Bazelon sits at a microphone
Bazelon recording the Slate Political Gabfest in 2009
Born (1971-03-04) March 4, 1971 (age 53)
EducationYale University (BA, JD)
OccupationJournalist
Notable credit(s)Slate
The New York Times Magazine
SpousePaul Sabin
Children2
RelativesLara Bazelon (sister)
David L. Bazelon (grandfather)

Emily Bazelon (born March 4, 1971) is an American journalist. She is a staff writer for The New York Times Magazine, a senior research fellow at Yale Law School, and co-host of the Slate podcast Political Gabfest. She is a former senior editor of Slate. Her work as a writer focuses on law, women, and family issues. She has written two national bestsellers published by Penguin Random House: Sticks and Stones: Defeating the Culture of Bullying and Rediscovering the Power of Character and Empathy (2013) and Charged: The New Movement to Transform American Prosecution and End Mass Incarceration (2019).[1][2] Charged won the 2020 Los Angeles Times Book Prize in the Current Interest category, and the 2020 Silver Gavel Award from the American Bar Association.[3][4] It was also the runner up for the J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize from Columbia University and the Nieman Foundation, and a finalist for the Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism from the New York Public Library.[5][6]

Early life and education

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Bazelon was born on March 4, 1971[7][8] and grew up in Philadelphia. Her father was an attorney and her mother was a psychiatrist.[9] She attended Germantown Friends School,[10] where she was on the tennis team.[11] She has three sisters: Jill Bazelon, who founded an organization that provides financial literacy classes free of charge to low-income high school students and individuals in several cities; Lara Bazelon, an associate professor at the University of San Francisco School of Law and prominent advocate for overturning wrongful convictions; and Dana Bazelon, senior policy counsel to Philadelphia district attorney Larry Krasner.[12][13][14][15] Her family is Jewish but not especially religious; she said in an interview, "I was raised to see Judaism in terms of ethical precepts."[9][16]

Bazelon is the granddaughter of David L. Bazelon, formerly a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit,[17] and second cousin twice removed of feminist Betty Friedan.[18]

Bazelon graduated from Yale College in 1993, where she was managing editor of The New Journal. She received her J.D. from Yale Law School in 2000 and was an editor of the Yale Law Journal.[19] In 2004, she was made a Soros Justice Media Fellow by Open Society Foundations.[20] She held the Dorot Fellowship in Israel from 1993 to 1994.[21] After law school she worked as a law clerk for Judge Kermit Lipez of the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.

Journalism career

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Bazelon is a writer for The New York Times Magazine and former senior editor of Slate.[22][19] She has written on subjects such as voting rights,[23] the Hamdan v. Rumsfeld Guantanamo detainee due process trial[24] and the alleged post-abortion syndrome.[25] Her work as a writer focuses on law, women, and family issues.[19][26]

Before joining Slate, Bazelon was a senior editor of Legal Affairs.[27] Her writing has also appeared in The Atlantic, Mother Jones, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, The New Republic, and other publications.[27]

Bazelon is also a senior research scholar in Law and Truman Capote Fellow for Creative Writing and Law at Yale Law School.[19] Bazelon is affiliated with the Law and Media Program of Yale Law School.[28]

Between 2012 and 2014, Bazelon made eight appearances on The Colbert Report on Comedy Central to discuss Supreme Court and anti-bullying issues.[29]

Writing on bullying

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Bazelon wrote a series on bullying and cyberbullying for Slate, called "Bull-E".[30] She was nominated for the 2011 Michael Kelly Award[31] for her story "What Really Happened to Phoebe Prince?"[32] The three-part article is about the suicide of Phoebe Prince, a 15-year-old girl who committed suicide in South Hadley, Massachusetts, in January 2010, and the decision by the local prosecutor to bring criminal charges against six teenagers in connection with this death. The Michael Kelly Award, sponsored by the Atlantic Media Co., "honors a writer or editor whose work exemplifies a quality that animated Michael Kelly's own career: the fearless pursuit and expression of truth."[33] Bazelon's series also sparked heated reaction[34] and a response from district attorney Elizabeth Scheibel,[35] who brought the charges against the six teenagers.

Bazelon authored a book about bullying and school climate published by Random House, titled Sticks and Stones: Defeating the Culture of Bullying and Rediscovering the Power of Character and Empathy.[36][37] It received a front page The New York Times Book Review review, which called the book "intelligent" and "rigorous", and described the author as "nonjudgmental in a generous rather than simply neutral way," and "a compassionate champion for justice in the domain of childhood’s essential unfairness."[38] In The Wall Street Journal, Meghan Cox Gurdon called Sticks and Stones a "humane and closely reported exploration of the way that hurtful power relationships play out in the contemporary public-school setting".[39]

Writing on abortion

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Bazelon has reported critically on the anti-abortion movement and opponents of legal abortion, including "pro-life feminists"[40] and proponents of the concept of post-abortion syndrome,[25] while being supportive of abortion providers[41] and abortion-rights federal judges.[42] She has described crisis pregnancy centers as being "all about bait-and-switch" and "falsely maligning" the abortion procedure.[43][44] Bazelon has discussed her support for legal abortion on the Double X blog.[45]

Writing on criminal justice

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In 2018 and 2019, Bazelon published a number of articles on criminal justice reform.[46][47] Her book Charged focuses on the role of prosecutors, the history of "tough on crime" politics in elections for that office, and the new generation of reformist prosecutors.[2] David Lat in the New York Times called it a "persuasive indictment of prosecutorial excess".[48]

Ruth Bader Ginsburg interview controversy

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In July 2009, the New York Times Magazine published Bazelon's interview with U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Discussing her view of Roe v. Wade in 1973, Ginsburg commented, "Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don't want to have too many of. So that Roe was going to be then set up for Medicaid funding for abortion."[49]

Bazelon did not ask any follow-up question to what some interpreted as Ginsburg endorsing a eugenics-based rationale for legalized abortion, i.e., as a remedy for "populations that we don't want to have too many of."[50] Bazelon was criticized by some conservative commentators for not doing so.[51][52] Bazelon responded to the criticism, stating that she is "imperfect" and did not ask a follow-up question because she believed that Ginsburg's use of "we" had referred to "some people at the time, not [Ginsburg] herself or a group that she feels a part of."[52]

The interview was cited in the United States House of Representatives' Committee Report in support of the Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act of 2012.[53]

Transgender article controversy

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In June 2022, Bazelon published an article in The New York Times on gender affirming healthcare, titled "The Battle Over Gender Therapy".[54] Bazelon interviewed parents from gender-critical organization Genspect who defined the rise in transgender-identified children as a "gender cult" and mass craze, "suggesting that exposure to transgender kids, education about trans people, and trans ideas on the internet could spread transness to others". Some parents from Genspect stated transgender people should not be able to transition until the age of 25.[55] The article also referenced a Substack newsletter by an anonymous Genspect parent titled "It's Strategy People!" about how the organisation gets its perspective into the media by purposefully not referring to transgender children as "mentally ill" or "deluded".[54]

PinkNews accused the article of "uncritically platformed gender-critical group Genspect" and of spreading "vile rhetoric".[56]

The article was covered on The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC as part of "a debate from within the medical community that provides care for trans teenagers who seek to transition"[57] and on Press Play on KCRW, which pointed out that "a growing right-wing backlash to gender-affirming care further complicates the debate."[58]

The article was also used in legal cases involving transgender healthcare. In February, 2022, Texas Governor Greg Abbott directed state agencies to investigate and limit gender-affirming healthcare for transgender minors.[59] In a subsequent lawsuit challenging this directive, the state of Texas hired controversial sexologist James Cantor as an expert witness.[60] In his report, Cantor cited Bazelon's article as supporting evidence.[61] The article was also cited approvingly by seventeen Republican state Attorneys General supporting the State of Florida's move to bar gender therapy or transitional treatment from being reimbursed with federal Medicaid Funds; these states are Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Utah.[62]

In 2023, the Missouri Attorney General cited the article in an emergency order to implement a de facto ban on trans healthcare for all ages.[63]

Personal life

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Bazelon lives in New Haven, Connecticut, with her husband, Paul Sabin, a professor of history and American studies at Yale.[64][65] They are members of a Reform synagogue.[9]

Honors and awards

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Bazelon was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2019.[66]

In 2020, Bazelon's book Charged won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in the current interest category[67] and the Silver Gavel Award from the American Bar Association.[68] It was also a finalist for the J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize[69] and the Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism from the New York Public Library.[70]

References

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  1. ^ Bazelon, Emily (2014). Sticks and stones : defeating the culture of bullying and rediscovering the power of character and empathy (Random House Trade paperback ed.). New York. ISBN 978-0-8129-8263-3. LCCN 2012022773. OCLC 855848064. OL 25355894M.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  2. ^ a b Bazelon, Emily. "Charged: The New Movement to Transform American Prosecution and End Mass Incarceration". Charged: The New Movement to Transform American Prosecution and End Mass Incarceration. Penguin Random House. Retrieved February 25, 2020.
  3. ^ Pineda, Dorany (April 17, 2020). "2020 Silver Gavel Award from the American Bar Association". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  4. ^ "American Bar Association names 2020 Silver Gavel Awards for Media and the Arts (press release, May 20, 2020)". American Bar Association. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  5. ^ "Winners and finalists of the 2020 Lukas Prize Project Awards announced". The Nieman Foundation. The President and Fellows of Harvard College. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  6. ^ Fowler, Ian. "2020 Bernstein Awards Finalist Spotlight: 'Charged' by Emily Bazelon". New York Public Library. The New York Public Library. Retrieved May 28, 2020.
  7. ^ Bazelon, Emily (April 12, 2012). "What's Your Earliest Memory?". Slate. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  8. ^ Politico Staff (March 4, 2019). "BIRTHDAY OF THE DAY: Emily Bazelon, staff writer for the NYT Magazine, co-host of the 'Slate Political Gabfest' and Truman Capote fellow at Yale Law School". POLITICO. Retrieved April 19, 2019.
  9. ^ a b c Wilensky, Sheila (September 12, 2013). "Social, legal facets of bullying topic for author, Yale law grad". Arizona Jewish Post. Retrieved August 22, 2017.
  10. ^ "Germantown Friends: News » The Ninny State: The Danger of Overprotecting Your Kids from Technology". germantownfriends.org. Archived from the original on February 24, 2014. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  11. ^ Wartenberg, Steve (November 1, 1988). "Stenstrom wins PIAA District 1 championship". The Philadelphia Inquirer. Retrieved August 22, 2017.
  12. ^ Hill, Miriam (February 28, 2013). "Let's talk about bullies". Philly.com. Retrieved August 22, 2017.
  13. ^ Heller, Karen (April 11, 2012). "Classes in financial literacy open eyes, doors". The Philadelphia Inquirer. p. A02. Retrieved August 22, 2017.
  14. ^ "Lara Bazelon - Associate Professor of Law and Director of the Criminal Juvenile Justice Clinic and the Racial Justice Clinic". May 26, 2016. Retrieved January 14, 2019.
  15. ^ D'Onofrio, Michael (May 4, 2018). "D.A. makes way for people to clear records". The Philadelphia Tribune. Retrieved January 14, 2019.
  16. ^ "Emily Bazelon". Jewish Women's Archive.
  17. ^ In Brief Archived November 28, 2008, at the Wayback Machine, Summer 2003, Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law.
  18. ^ Bazelon, Emily (February 5, 2006). "Shopping With Betty". Slate. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  19. ^ a b c d "Emily Bazelon".
  20. ^ "OSI Awards More Than $1.5 Million Nationwide to Winners of 2004 Soros Justice Fellowships" (Press release). Open Society Foundations. January 19, 2004. Retrieved October 20, 2019.
  21. ^ "Dorot Fellows". dorot.org. Archived from the original on July 10, 2014. Retrieved June 15, 2015.
  22. ^ New York Times Press Release (September 2, 2014). "Emily Bazelon joins New York Times". The New York Times. Retrieved May 19, 2017.
  23. ^ The Big Kozinski, Legal Affairs, Emily Bazelon, February 2005. Retrieved August 5, 2018.
  24. ^ Bazelon, Emily (March 27, 2006). "Invisible Men : Did Lindsey Graham and Jon Kyl mislead the Supreme Court?". Slate. Archived from the original on August 11, 2011. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  25. ^ a b Bazelon, Emily (January 21, 2007). "Is There a Post-Abortion Syndrome?". The New York Times. Archived from the original on April 24, 2009. Retrieved January 17, 2009.
  26. ^ Gold, Hades. "N.Y. Times Magazine hires Emily Bazelon". POLITICO. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  27. ^ a b List of Slate contributors Archived June 23, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
  28. ^ "Spotlight on LAMP". Yale Law School. November 18, 2008. Archived from the original on January 25, 2009. Retrieved January 18, 2009.
  29. ^ "Emily Bazelon: Reforming Health-Care Reform". The Colbert Report. Comedy Central. November 13, 2014. Archived from the original on August 23, 2017. Retrieved August 22, 2017.
  30. ^ Bazelon, Emily (January 26, 2010). "Bull-E: The new world of online cruelty". Slate. Archived from the original on January 19, 2011. Retrieved April 13, 2011.
  31. ^ Romenesko, Jim (April 7, 2011). "Michael Kelly Award finalists named". The Poynter Institute. Archived from the original on April 14, 2011. Retrieved April 13, 2011.
  32. ^ Bazelon, Emily (July 20, 2010). "What Really Happened to Phoebe Prince?". Slate. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  33. ^ "The Michael Kelly Award". The Atlantic Media Co. Archived from the original on July 3, 2017. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  34. ^ Lohr, David (July 23, 2010). "Revelations Stir New Debate Over Phoebe Prince Suicide". AOL News. archive.is. Archived from the original on July 22, 2012. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  35. ^ Bazelon, Emily (July 22, 2010). "Blaming the Victim". Slate. Archived from the original on April 14, 2011. Retrieved April 13, 2011.
  36. ^ Boog, Jason (November 10, 2010). "Emily Bazelon Lands Book Deal for Bullying Investigation". Media Bistro GalleyCat Blog. Archived from the original on November 14, 2010. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  37. ^ Schwartz, John (March 10, 2013). "Words That Hurt and Kill: Lessons for Society From Bullying and Its Psychic Toll". The New York Times. Retrieved August 22, 2017.
  38. ^ Solomon, Andrew (February 28, 2013). "The Brutal Years". The New York Times. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  39. ^ Gurdon, Meghan Cox (February 22, 2013). "The Cruelty of Youth". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved October 2, 2018.
  40. ^ "Suffragette City" Archived September 18, 2009, at the Wayback Machine, E. Bazelon, Mother Jones, Jan.-Feb. 2007.
  41. ^ Bazelon, Emily (July 14, 2010). "The New Abortion Providers". The New York Times Magazine. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  42. ^ Bazelon, Emily (April 13, 2010). "Defining Radical Down". Slate. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  43. ^ "Sign Them Up", E. Bazelon, Slate, November 25, 2009.
  44. ^ "The Politics of Pregnancy Counseling", R. Douthat, New York Times Opinion blog, December 3, 2009.
  45. ^ Bazelon, Emily (August 19, 2010). "The Feminist Establishment Rejects the Mama Grizzlies". Double X. Archived from the original on September 9, 2010. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  46. ^ Bazelon, Emily (September 26, 2018). "Will Florida's Ex-Felons Finally Regain the Right to Vote?". The New York Times Magazine. Archived from the original on January 4, 2020. Retrieved January 14, 2019.
  47. ^ Bazelon, Emily; Krinsky, Miriam (December 11, 2018). "There's a Wave of New Prosecutors. And They Mean Justice". The New York Times. Retrieved January 14, 2019.
  48. ^ Lat, David (April 8, 2019). "How Tough-on-Crime Prosecutors Contribute to Mass Incarceration". The New York Times.
  49. ^ Bazelon, Emily (July 7, 2009). "The Place of Women on the Court". The New York Times Magazine. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  50. ^ Gerson, Michael (July 17, 2009). "Ruth Bader Ginsburg's Comments on Abortion in the New York Times". Washington Post. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  51. ^ Goldberg, Jonah (July 15, 2009). "Ruth Bader Ginsburg and a Question of Eugenics". Jewish World Review. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  52. ^ a b Henneberger, Melinda (July 17, 2009). "Why Emily Bazelon Didn't Follow Up on Ginsburg's Abortion Comment". Politics Daily. archive.is. Archived from the original on February 1, 2013. Retrieved May 20, 2017.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  53. ^ "H. Rept. 112-496 - PRENATAL NONDISCRIMINATION ACT (PRENDA) OF 2012". www.congress.gov. Retrieved March 4, 2020. \123\Emily Bazelon, The Place of Women on the Court, New York Times Magazine
  54. ^ a b Bazelon, Emily (June 15, 2022). "The Battle Over Gender Therapy". The New York Times. Archived from the original on June 16, 2022.
  55. ^ O'Connell, Kit (July 22, 2022). "There Is No Legitimate 'Debate' Over Gender-Affirming Healthcare".
  56. ^ Baska, Maggie (June 16, 2022). "New York Times faces searing backlash for publishing 'harmful' anti-trans 'propaganda': 'Do better'". Archived from the original on June 16, 2022.
  57. ^ Lehrer, Brian (June 15, 2022). "How Politics is Intruding on Medical Gender Therapy". The Brian Lehrer Show. No. June 15, 2022. WNYC. Retrieved July 8, 2022.
  58. ^ Brand, Madeleine (June 15, 2022). "Why are doctors pulling away from gender-affirming health care?". Press Play with Madeleine Brand. No. June 15, 2022. KCRW. Retrieved July 8, 2022.
  59. ^ Mark, Julian (February 23, 2022). "Texas governor directs state agencies to investigate gender-affirming care for trans youths as 'child abuse'". The Washington Post. Retrieved April 3, 2023.
  60. ^ Goldenstein, Taylor (July 9, 2022). "Texas judge blocks two CPS investigations of transgender health care for kids". Houston Chronicle. Retrieved April 3, 2023.
  61. ^ "Expert Report Of Dr. James Cantor," NO.D-1-GN-22-002569, District Travis County 459th Judicial District, Pflag, Inc., et al. v. Greg Abbott, et al.
  62. ^ "Brief of (States) as Amici Curiae in support of Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment," Dekker v. Weida, Case. No. 4:22-cv-00325, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida.
  63. ^ "Missouri AG Directly Cites the New York Times' Anti-Trans Coverage To Justify Horrific New Ban". The Mary Sue.
  64. ^ Paul Sabin, Yale Department of History. Retrieved May 20, 2017.
  65. ^ Keller, Emma G. (May 6, 2013). "Emily Bazelon's fair-minded feminism: 'I don't think there's anything missing'". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved August 11, 2017.
  66. ^ "2019 Fellows and International Honorary Members with their affiliations at the time of election". members.amacad.org. Archived from the original on March 2, 2020. Retrieved March 4, 2020.
  67. ^ "Los Angeles Times Book Prizes Winners Announced". The Los Angeles Times. No. April 17, 2020. April 17, 2020. Retrieved July 8, 2022.
  68. ^ "2020 Gavel Award Winners". American Bar Association. Retrieved July 8, 2022.
  69. ^ "Winners and finalists of the 2020 Lukas Prize Project Awards announced". Nieman Reports. The President and Fellows of Harvard College. Retrieved July 8, 2022.
  70. ^ Fowler, Ian. "2020 Bernstein Awards Finalist Spotlight: 'Charged' by Emily Bazelon". New York Public Library. The New York Public Library. Retrieved July 8, 2022.
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