Michael Hobbes

A blog for my work researching moral panics

Debunking the junk science behind health fads.

Retelling the stories of people and events that were miscast in the public imagination.

I spent a year investigating why America doesn't prosecute white-collar crime like it used to.

As the face of homelessness changes, politicians cling to limited policy ideas and quick fixes.

How America's institution of public health are ruining fat people's lives.

It's not the avocados: Millennials really do have it harder than their parents

Despite years of social progress, gay men have the same sky-high rates of suicide, mental illness and substance abuse they've had for decades

As self-driving cars recede further into the future, cities are asking whether they're really worth waiting for.

States are quietly expanding sex offender registries despite no evidence that they achieve anything worthwhile

I spent two weeks at my old high school to report on how we keep making the same mistakes in education reform.

How corporations, activists, and politicians turned the language of human rights into meaningless babble

Personal essay about the breakup that made me, briefly, a crazy person.

Solving an epidemiological mystery

"If we really want to fix development, we need to stop chasing after ideas the way we go on fad diets."