criticism Archives

A Masterclass In Stereotyping

As an aging townie, a handful of figures have been fixtures in Boston journalism since I was a teenager. Howie Carr, who is a good deal older than me, is one of them. An early example of the “angry white guy” type of conservative commentator, he’s unusual among adepts of

JASON PRAMAS September 11, 2026

Elite Socialists Don’t Get It

In a recent Jacobin article, Noah Suárez-Sikes, “an organizer with the Los Angeles chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America,” criticized mainstream news outlets for gleefully outing DSA leaders who hail from backgrounds that range from upper-middle class to upper class. Dubbed “Class traitors are welcome in the socialist movement,”

JASON PRAMAS August 28, 2026

Opinion: Democratic Civil War Has Working Class Casualties

There is a civil war within the Democratic Party. The establishment is fighting off an insurgency for the soul of the party. As with any war, the victims are everyday working people, caught between factions who claim to fight for them but are in fact causing the suffering. This is

MATT MCLAUGHLIN August 13, 2026

Yellow Skies Are Not Pretty

BOSTON – Many older environmentalists, myself included, have been trying to warn our fellow human beings about the danger of global warming since the 1980s. Back then, there were fewer signs that what the vast majority of climate scientists were already saying about the then-looming crisis would come true. Over

JASON PRAMAS July 17, 2026

Opinion: The Black Response On The Matter Of ShotSpotter In Cambridge

Note: The following op-ed was submitted to the Boston Globe for publication on May 28, 2026 but never published. Two years ago, our organization, The Black Response, initiated a campaign to stop use of ShotSpotter in our community. We are an immigrant-, Black-, and brown-led grassroots organization based in Cambridge.

THE BLACK RESPONSE July 2, 2026

Remarks For The Alternative Press Panel At Izzy Fest 2026: Press Freedom Forum

On Tuesday, Chris Faraone and I were asked to join our colleague Brian Zayatz of the Shoestring as speakers on a panel about the alternative press by Project Censored and the Society of Professional Journalists. The text of my talk follows. It is odd to be called upon to put

JASON PRAMAS April 24, 2026

Controversial Cookbooks: From Duncan Hines To Mario Batali

Since current events have been uglier than ever, I thought I’d give myself a break this week and write about my second-favorite activity next to journalism: cooking. Nothing heavy, right? I mean it’s cooking. But no. You see, one of the fun things about cooking—certainly from my perspective as a

JASON PRAMAS April 3, 2026

Gov. Healey Should Bet On Beneficial Tech, Not So-Called ‘AI’

Perhaps I’d be less concerned about Gov. Maura Healey’s recent cheerleading for so-called “AI” if she would join a growing camp of experts in dropping the PR misnomer “artificial intelligence” when describing evolutionary improvements in dozens of areas of computing technology. Tech which does many discrete things—some very well, some

JASON PRAMAS February 27, 2026

Grokipedia And Me

Like many journalists, I have alerts set up on major search engines watching for any mention of my name on the Internet—to keep track of who might be trying to sue me or have me fed to sharks at any particular moment. A system that used to work better when

JASON PRAMAS January 15, 2026

Collage by Jason Pramas. Downloaded from BINJ's paid Canva account on August 21, 2025.

Editorial: Why Left Unions, Nonprofits, And Foundations Don’t Fund Left Journalism

And why they need to stop dumping millions on PR firms and start funding left news organizations before we all collapse

JASON PRAMAS August 21, 2025