Satellite constellations: the new, bright lights in the night sky Since the moon landing, outer space hasn’t been an untouched frontier. So how bad can adding a few shiny objects be? In less than a year, Elon Musk’s SpaceX Starlink satellite constellation project has added 240 luminous objects to the 200 visible items that already orbit the earth. Thousands more are planned. Without interference from pesky legislation, we can expect the number of satellites from commercial companies to grow rapidly. The night skies would be changed forever. That really bothers me. Surely most of us take it for granted that it’s stars we see when we perceive the twinkling white-yellow lights that have fuelled humanity’s collective poetic imagination since we’ve existed? Would romance even exist without all those stolen kisses under star-lit skies? And who hasn’t felt consolingly small and insignificant when faced with the star-sprinkled heavens? Clearly, I’m getting carried away. If neighbours fight over home extensions, won’t we fight for our stars? I don’t know how to argue about the value of something invaluable, but I hope someone does. (Carmen, member support manager) The Atlantic: ‘The night sky will never be the same’ (reading time: 12 minutes)
Domestic violence exists in queer relationships too There is an extraordinary short story from US writer Carmen Maria Machado’s first collection of writing, Her Body and Other Parties. Dealing with the loneliness of remembering past relationships at a time when the population is under threat from a sinister virus, Machado’s character moves to a house far removed from the world. I remember feeling so puzzled by the strength and beauty of the tale. I still see the blue, green, warm yellow colours and smell the salt when I think of her story, which is surely the mark of a powerful writer. So I have had this extract from her memoir bookmarked for a very long time. It’s Machado’s account of the domestic violence she experienced in a queer relationship – something she admits herself she never thought could be a thing. It’s been open as a tab in my digital consciousness for the last two months, but I hope that by sharing the piece with you now, I’ll finally get around to reading something that mixes beauty and horror. (Nabeelah, conversation editor) The Cut: ‘The night she almost killed you’ (reading time: eight minutes)
The flute player who stole a million dollars’ worth of bird feathers This podcast is an outlandish, riveting journey into the competitive, clandestine world of ... salmon fly-fishing. In 2009, Edwin Rist, a US music student aged just 20 at the time, broke into a branch of the British Natural History Museum and stole 299 bird skins. His heist was mostly birds that had been collected by the 19th-century naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace, a colleague of Charles Darwin. The collection was worth over a million dollars, but the real value of the feathers was that they may hold significant information for solving problems such as climate change and extinction. Kirk Wallace Johnson guides the listener through the fly-fishing underground while tackling bigger questions of justice, competitiveness, and what we value and why. I promised myself I wouldn’t make a cheesy bird pun, but I just can’t resist: listen, and let your imagination take flight. (Shaun, copy editor) This American Life: The feather heist (listening time: 54 minutes)

The best of The Correspondent

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