Tricia Starks
@tricia-starks.bsky.social
Historian of Russian/Soviet Health and Med. Pushkin House Prize nominee for Cigarettes and Soviets. Shortlisted for Smoking under the Tsars. Now researching Russian male health. Opinions my own.
Reposted by Tricia Starks
What is the quintessential Onion headline? The strong contender that just randomly popped in my mind is "Hank Williams Jr. Honored by Institute For Football Preparedness"
May 19, 2024 at 12:26 PM
What is the quintessential Onion headline? The strong contender that just randomly popped in my mind is "Hank Williams Jr. Honored by Institute For Football Preparedness"
Reposted by Tricia Starks
Rare set of varied factors triggered Black Death, starting with a cluster of volcanic eruptions. arstechnica.com/science/2025...
Rare set of varied factors triggered Black Death
Volcanic eruptions in the mid-1340s triggered a chain of events that brought the Black Death to Europe.
arstechnica.com
December 6, 2025 at 3:26 AM
Rare set of varied factors triggered Black Death, starting with a cluster of volcanic eruptions. arstechnica.com/science/2025...
Fabergé is in the news for sale of one of the imperial eggs - the Winter egg - which sold for $23M. You may know about the design house because of the eggs or jewelry or what not - but I want to talk about possibly the most frequently sold objects from the design house - cigarette cases. (1/6)
A Prized Fabergé Egg Is Sold at Auction for More Than $30 Million
www.nytimes.com
December 3, 2025 at 2:51 PM
Fabergé is in the news for sale of one of the imperial eggs - the Winter egg - which sold for $23M. You may know about the design house because of the eggs or jewelry or what not - but I want to talk about possibly the most frequently sold objects from the design house - cigarette cases. (1/6)
Russia’s demographic crisis deepens, and, yet again, the answer is to regulate women’s behaviors rather than further incentivize not just birth, but parenthood, focus on the male behaviors that have been leading to their early death, or most pressingly, end the war. (1/4)
Matviyenko Urges Russians to Rethink Their Views on Early Parenthood as Demographic Crisis Deepens - The Moscow Times
Federation Council speaker Valentina Matviyenko said in an interview published Tuesday that Russians need to rethink their attitudes toward early parenthood, reframing it as the “norm” amid government...
www.themoscowtimes.com
November 26, 2025 at 11:54 AM
Russia’s demographic crisis deepens, and, yet again, the answer is to regulate women’s behaviors rather than further incentivize not just birth, but parenthood, focus on the male behaviors that have been leading to their early death, or most pressingly, end the war. (1/4)
Fabulous FREE read on the history of climate and health from the always brilliant but never social media savvy Matthew P Romaniello. Access it from @cornellupress.bsky.social here:
cornellpress.manifoldapp.org/projects/eur...
cornellpress.manifoldapp.org/projects/eur...
Europe's Laboratory | Cornell University Press
<b><i>Europe's Laboratory</i> is a history of eighteenth-century naturalists and physicians who were involved in the creation of a classification system for the people of the Russian Empire.</b> These...
cornellpress.manifoldapp.org
November 20, 2025 at 4:23 PM
Fabulous FREE read on the history of climate and health from the always brilliant but never social media savvy Matthew P Romaniello. Access it from @cornellupress.bsky.social here:
cornellpress.manifoldapp.org/projects/eur...
cornellpress.manifoldapp.org/projects/eur...
An overview of NEH leadership staffing, operations, and awards since the spring — after the cancellation of many competitions and revoking of other awards, the allocation of many direct “Chairman’s grants” without any review and lacking even transparency of recipients in some cases. Gift Link.
Fired Scholars and Big Grants to Favored Projects: Inside Trump’s N.E.H.
www.nytimes.com
November 15, 2025 at 12:07 PM
An overview of NEH leadership staffing, operations, and awards since the spring — after the cancellation of many competitions and revoking of other awards, the allocation of many direct “Chairman’s grants” without any review and lacking even transparency of recipients in some cases. Gift Link.
Join up! The AAUP fights for academic freedom and protects your rights to teach difficult and challenging material.
BREAKING: In AAUP et al v. Trump (wall-to-wall union lawsuit challenging the administration’s unlawful use of TItle VI to reshape the University of California system), the faculty and staff of the UC system WON!!!
We were granted our preliminary injunction! @aaup.org
We were granted our preliminary injunction! @aaup.org
November 15, 2025 at 3:05 AM
Join up! The AAUP fights for academic freedom and protects your rights to teach difficult and challenging material.
@cornellupress.bsky.social issued Ciggy in paperback. Use the code 09WINTER and get a copy for under TWENY BUCKS! Me being campy is just a free gift with, or without, purchase.
Cornell University Press (@cornellupress.bsky.social)
📖 @tricia-starks.bsky.social has a book announcement 📣
Enriched by color reproductions of tobacco advertisements, packs, and antismoking propaganda, CIGARETTES AND SOVIETS provides a comprehensive stu...
nam11.safelinks.protection.outlook.com
November 14, 2025 at 12:12 PM
@cornellupress.bsky.social issued Ciggy in paperback. Use the code 09WINTER and get a copy for under TWENY BUCKS! Me being campy is just a free gift with, or without, purchase.
Today's research fun fact - in the late USSR the MiG25 fighter was called a "Flying Restaurant" because the distilled alcohol used as a coolant could be consumed. Training flights were often cancelled because coolant had been drunk or sold. Feshbach and Friendly, Ecocide, 165.
November 12, 2025 at 4:58 PM
Today's research fun fact - in the late USSR the MiG25 fighter was called a "Flying Restaurant" because the distilled alcohol used as a coolant could be consumed. Training flights were often cancelled because coolant had been drunk or sold. Feshbach and Friendly, Ecocide, 165.
History is all over this. The Soviets had one of the highest rates of doctors per capita in the world but struggled to get docs to serve outside major urban centers. Such moves will not ease a legacy of poor pay and prestige in medicine.
www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/11/11/s...
www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/11/11/s...
State Duma Passes Bill Reviving Soviet-Era Mandatory Work Placements for Young Doctors - The Moscow Times
Russia’s lower-house State Duma on Tuesday passed a bill requiring new medical school graduates to work in state-run hospitals and clinics for up to three years, a proposed measure aimed at easing chr...
www.themoscowtimes.com
November 12, 2025 at 11:04 AM
History is all over this. The Soviets had one of the highest rates of doctors per capita in the world but struggled to get docs to serve outside major urban centers. Such moves will not ease a legacy of poor pay and prestige in medicine.
www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/11/11/s...
www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/11/11/s...
AYFKM
Kremlin Envoy Floats U.S.-Russia ‘Putin-Trump Tunnel’ Using Elon Musk Tech - The Moscow Times
A Russian presidential economic envoy and key negotiator in Ukraine peace talks has proposed building an $8 billion undersea tunnel linking Alaska and Russia using Elon Musk’s tunnel construction comp...
www.themoscowtimes.com
October 17, 2025 at 10:43 AM
AYFKM
Reposted by Tricia Starks
My next book has a cover! I Will Not Abandon You is a new history of queer women under Nazism that calls for us to rethink how we understand fascist persecution as well as the very foundations of progressive politics today. You can preorder it anywhere you buy books
bookshop.org/p/books/i-wi...
bookshop.org/p/books/i-wi...
October 15, 2025 at 1:45 PM
My next book has a cover! I Will Not Abandon You is a new history of queer women under Nazism that calls for us to rethink how we understand fascist persecution as well as the very foundations of progressive politics today. You can preorder it anywhere you buy books
bookshop.org/p/books/i-wi...
bookshop.org/p/books/i-wi...
Reposted by Tricia Starks
About 1 in 3 US Nobel prize winners are immigrants.
About 1 in 4 were government employees at some point.
About 44% of all Nobel prize winners were educated in US higher education.
As Trump demands a Nobel prize, he is destroying the means by which America came to dominate the prizes.
Sources below
About 1 in 4 were government employees at some point.
About 44% of all Nobel prize winners were educated in US higher education.
As Trump demands a Nobel prize, he is destroying the means by which America came to dominate the prizes.
Sources below
Two things of note in today's announcement of the 2025 Nobel physics prize (besides the work being honored).
1: The US institutional dominance of the prize continues.
2: 2 of the three laureates are immigrants, drawn here decades ago by the then-unmatched opportunities for science here...
1/
1: The US institutional dominance of the prize continues.
2: 2 of the three laureates are immigrants, drawn here decades ago by the then-unmatched opportunities for science here...
1/
Nobel Prize in Physics Is Awarded for Work in Quantum Mechanics
www.nytimes.com
October 7, 2025 at 3:29 PM
About 1 in 3 US Nobel prize winners are immigrants.
About 1 in 4 were government employees at some point.
About 44% of all Nobel prize winners were educated in US higher education.
As Trump demands a Nobel prize, he is destroying the means by which America came to dominate the prizes.
Sources below
About 1 in 4 were government employees at some point.
About 44% of all Nobel prize winners were educated in US higher education.
As Trump demands a Nobel prize, he is destroying the means by which America came to dominate the prizes.
Sources below
Reposted by Tricia Starks
The idea that the combined MMR is dangerous but separately the vaccines are fine was created out of whole cloth by Andrew Wakefield, a disgraced former doctor who had a patent on a non-combined version of the MMR. We've known his research was bunk for almost 30 years.
We are ruled by malicious conspiracy theorists
September 18, 2025 at 10:44 PM
The idea that the combined MMR is dangerous but separately the vaccines are fine was created out of whole cloth by Andrew Wakefield, a disgraced former doctor who had a patent on a non-combined version of the MMR. We've known his research was bunk for almost 30 years.
Reposted by Tricia Starks
August 23, 2025 at 11:49 PM
Russia’s body-intensive assaults part of est. 1m in losses —
first a tank, then a sacrificial vehicle to draw fire and reveal defensive positions, and “Lastly, small groups of infantry are sent on one-way missions to infiltrate forest belts. ‘They clear minefields with their own bodies.’”
first a tank, then a sacrificial vehicle to draw fire and reveal defensive positions, and “Lastly, small groups of infantry are sent on one-way missions to infiltrate forest belts. ‘They clear minefields with their own bodies.’”
‘That idiot Putin wants to take it all’: Russia’s kamikaze tactics fuel a slow advance in Ukraine
Latest wave of displaced citizens curse ‘imperial ambition’ that has led to an estimated one million Russian casualties
www.theguardian.com
July 27, 2025 at 11:47 AM
Russia’s body-intensive assaults part of est. 1m in losses —
first a tank, then a sacrificial vehicle to draw fire and reveal defensive positions, and “Lastly, small groups of infantry are sent on one-way missions to infiltrate forest belts. ‘They clear minefields with their own bodies.’”
first a tank, then a sacrificial vehicle to draw fire and reveal defensive positions, and “Lastly, small groups of infantry are sent on one-way missions to infiltrate forest belts. ‘They clear minefields with their own bodies.’”
Hmmm.
Russia Cancels Annual Navy Parade in St. Petersburg - The Moscow Times
St.
www.themoscowtimes.com
July 27, 2025 at 11:36 AM
Hmmm.
@themoscowtimes.com put together a list of reasons not to stand too close to windows in Russia.
Death by Falling: A Timeline of Cases Across Russia and Abroad - The Moscow Times
A growing number of Russian officials, business executives and public figures have died under strange or violent circumstances since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Many were said to have fallen from windows and balconies.
www.themoscowtimes.com
July 24, 2025 at 12:00 PM
@themoscowtimes.com put together a list of reasons not to stand too close to windows in Russia.
Reposted by Tricia Starks
The @aaup.org Center for the Defense
of Academic Freedom has curated
practical resources for those facing
threats to their academic freedom,
including how to find organizations
that offer legal support.
Please feel free to reach out to
CDAF@aaup.org with questions or concerns
of Academic Freedom has curated
practical resources for those facing
threats to their academic freedom,
including how to find organizations
that offer legal support.
Please feel free to reach out to
CDAF@aaup.org with questions or concerns
www.aaup.org
July 23, 2025 at 4:57 PM
The @aaup.org Center for the Defense
of Academic Freedom has curated
practical resources for those facing
threats to their academic freedom,
including how to find organizations
that offer legal support.
Please feel free to reach out to
CDAF@aaup.org with questions or concerns
of Academic Freedom has curated
practical resources for those facing
threats to their academic freedom,
including how to find organizations
that offer legal support.
Please feel free to reach out to
CDAF@aaup.org with questions or concerns
Reposted by Tricia Starks
“They’re very clear about what they want and what they thought was missing in 2024: They want leaders who will fight for everyone. … They’re very health care-oriented. … They have a clear economic agenda around affordability and making the wealthy pay what they owe in taxes.”
Democrat voters who sat out last election want candidates further to the left: poll
‘The conventional wisdom is really wrong on these voters,’ one pollster found
www.independent.co.uk
July 19, 2025 at 12:17 PM
“They’re very clear about what they want and what they thought was missing in 2024: They want leaders who will fight for everyone. … They’re very health care-oriented. … They have a clear economic agenda around affordability and making the wealthy pay what they owe in taxes.”
Reposted by Tricia Starks
Just look at this school - called "The Frog" (!) in the Netherlands. That green facade generates electricity. Those are solar panels!
(Photo: Solarix.)
(Photo: Solarix.)
July 17, 2025 at 9:01 AM
Just look at this school - called "The Frog" (!) in the Netherlands. That green facade generates electricity. Those are solar panels!
(Photo: Solarix.)
(Photo: Solarix.)
Reposted by Tricia Starks
headline: "democrats lost voters on transgender rights."
the article:
the article:
July 13, 2025 at 4:18 PM
headline: "democrats lost voters on transgender rights."
the article:
the article:
New research on the dangers of vaping - “common sense tells you — your mom would tell you — that a superheated chemical inhaling right into your lungs isn’t going to be good”
Just How Harmful Is Vaping? More Evidence Is Emerging.
www.nytimes.com
July 9, 2025 at 12:01 PM
New research on the dangers of vaping - “common sense tells you — your mom would tell you — that a superheated chemical inhaling right into your lungs isn’t going to be good”
According to demographer Alexei Raksha, data from one region showed “life expectancy for men dropping from 66 years in 2024 to 61 in mid-2025, while life expectancy for women held steady at 75.”
Rosstat Stops Publishing Monthly Population Data Amid War Deaths, Demographic Crisis - The Moscow Times
Russia’s state statistics agency Rosstat has stopped publishing monthly data on births and deaths, a move that comes amid a deepening demographic crisis and ongoing troop losses in the war against Ukr...
www.themoscowtimes.com
July 7, 2025 at 11:29 AM
According to demographer Alexei Raksha, data from one region showed “life expectancy for men dropping from 66 years in 2024 to 61 in mid-2025, while life expectancy for women held steady at 75.”
“There is further evidence of increased activation of the prefrontal cortex and the inferior frontal gyrus when interacting with cats, which is speculated to be linked to the characteristic, hard-to-predict temperament of the animal.”
Owning dog or cat could preserve some brain functions as we age, study says
Fish or bird ownership showed no significant link to slower cognitive decline in study with implications for ageing societies
www.theguardian.com
July 5, 2025 at 11:04 AM
“There is further evidence of increased activation of the prefrontal cortex and the inferior frontal gyrus when interacting with cats, which is speculated to be linked to the characteristic, hard-to-predict temperament of the animal.”