Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

Whenever a week is dominated by things like UN opening sessions, G20 meetings, senate markup sessions, and the like — well, you just know that’s going to be a slow week.  When was the last time something genuinely interesting happened at a UN opening session, after all?  Thirty years ago when Yasser Arafat demonstrated his revolutionary cred by giving a speech with a gun holster at his hip?  (They made him leave the gun itself at the door.)

Meh. So let’s pass some time talking instead about James Fallows’ great obsession: boiling frogs.  To start, here’s an excerpt from a piece Paul Krugman wrote a couple of months ago:

I’m referring, of course, to the proverbial frog that, placed in a pot of cold water that is gradually heated, never realizes the danger it’s in and is boiled alive. Real frogs will, in fact, jump out of the pot — but never mind. The hypothetical boiled frog is a useful metaphor for a very real problem: the difficulty of responding to disasters that creep up on you a bit at a time.

Italics mine.  And Krugman is right: even though it’s untrue that frogs will mindlessly poach themselves to death if you’re careful to turn up the temperature on them slowly, it’s a useful metaphor.  Still, it’s not true.  So we should find another one.

But here’s the thing: Fallows issued a worldwide call for good substitute metaphors two years ago.  Four days later he promised that winners would be announced in a couple of days.  And then….nothing.

So here’s what I’m interested in.  The boiling frog cliche is untrue.  But it stays alive because, as Krugman says, it’s a useful metaphor.  So why aren’t there any good substitutes?

This is very strange.  Most useful adages and metaphors not only have substitutes, they have multiple substitutes.  “Look before you leap” and “Curiosity killed the cat.”  “Fast as lightning” and “Faster than a speeding bullet.”  Etc.  Usually you have lots of choices.

But in this case we don’t seem to have a single one aside from the boiling frog.  Why?  Is it because it’s not really all that useful a metaphor after all?  Because the frog has ruthlessly killed off every competitor?  Because it’s not actually true in any circumstance, let alone with frogs in pots of water?  What accounts for this linguistic failure?

UPDATE: Hoo boy.  If Glenn Beck wasn’t on Jim’s shit list before, he sure is now.  He’s also an idiot, of course.

WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

payment methods

WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate