Explorer posts, overseen by the Boy Scouts, are supposed to foster an interest in policing. They have faced nearly 200 allegations of misconduct: Reporters found abuse allegations in big and small departments spanning much of the country. In Connecticut, an officer first tried to ply a 17-year-old Explorer with compliments and a silver bracelet....

This story was funded by our members. Join Longreads and help us to support more writers. Sarah Stankorb | Longreads | May 9, 2024 | 2,874 words My mother hadn’t made sense on the phone, muttering about a blinking light and a duck. She’d entered respite care while my father healed from a broken hip. Plucked from the routines...

Did you know that the average American consumes an average of eight pounds of avocados per person, per year? Indeed the time has come for the fruit, which is rich in the fats we need for brain health, digestion, and more. Restaurants have also struggled with consistent quality when it comes to avocados. While working in retail banking, Miguel...

In this excerpt from her book, Alien Earths: The New Science of Planet Hunting in the Cosmos, Lisa Kaltenegger makes science accessible—and exciting. Recounting the day she learned of a new discovery, her enthusiasm is infectious, and you will devour every word. That cold day in Vienna with terrible coffee turned into one of the most exciting...

People are increasingly trading their privacy for a sense of security. Becoming a parent showed writer Jia Tolentino how tempting, and how dangerous, that exchange can be: Shortly after I became pregnant with my second child, in the fall of 2022, I decided to try a modest experiment. I wanted to see whether I could hide my pregnancy from my...

In this well-reported, entertaining, yet depressing story, Adam Iscoe reports on how hard it is to snag a table at a trendy restaurant in NYC. The city’s restaurant reservation ecosystem is far from democratic, and services like Appointment Trader (an online marketplace for people to buy and sell reservations) and memberships like Dorsia (an exclusive...