Washington, D.C
Being human in a digitally disembodied world – Washington Examiner
Clubbing on a Monday night — that’s the image that came into my mind as I was reading the great new book by Christine Rosen, The Extinction of Experience: Being Human in a Disembodied World. Rosen is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a columnist for Commentary magazine. She is one of America’s best writers and thinkers.
The Extinction of Experience explores the way the digital revolution and the rise of the internet, the smartphone, and AI have altered our lives. Rosen appreciates the miracles of modern technology, which are useful and “fun.” She defines “technology” as “computers, smartphones, smart speakers, wearable sensors, and, in our likely future, implantable objects, as well as software, algorithms, etc.”
However, the bigger picture is that our gadgets have become obstacles to the spiritual, mental, and psychological flourishing of human beings.
“Many of our current technologies seem to view people as the problem to which devices and platforms and algorithms provide a necessary solution,” Rosen writes. “If earlier technologies were an extension of our senses, today’s technologies train us to mistrust our own senses and rely instead on technology.”
The results of this are bad, as we can no longer tolerate boredom or contemplation. We can’t experience a concert, conversation, or romantic pleasure without digital mediation.
“The extinction of fundamental human experiences creates a world where our sense of shared reality and purpose is further frayed, and where a growing distrust of human judgment will further polarize our culture and politics,” she writes. “Technological change of the sort we have experienced in the last 20 years has not ushered in either greater social stability or moral evolution. In fact, many of our sophisticated technological inventions and platforms have been engineered to bring out the worst of human nature.”
The contrast to this is the image that came into my mind as I was reading her book: dancing in a club on a Monday night in the pre-digital world. When I was in my 20s, back in the 1980s and before the digital revolution, I would sometimes go out clubbing and bar-hopping on weeknights. I worked at a restaurant in Georgetown in Washington, D.C., and for many of us in that business, our weekends were Mondays and Tuesdays.
On Monday, I would go out and hit a few favorite night spots. The crowds were small and the city quiet. You could have time with bartenders and DJs you knew to share some conversation. It was contemplative, friendly, sometimes even boring. You’d think about your life, your loves, your goals. You would talk to God. You’d dance with someone you had just met, and actually see the smile on their face. It was like an urban nightlife version of Huck Finn and Jim drifting down the Mississippi River.
That experience came to me while reading The Extinction of Experience because it touched on so many things that Rosen argues are necessary for human flourishing.
She writes, “Certain types of experience — some rooted deeply in our evolutionary history, such as face-to-face interaction and various forms of pleasure-seeking; others more recent and reflective of cultural norms, such as patience and our sense of public space and place — are fading from our lives. Many of these experiences are what, historically, have helped us form and nurture a shared reality as human beings. Mediating technologies have been a significant force behind these changes.”
Rosen devotes the entire first chapter of her book to the importance of the human face. For thousands of years, we have used our subtle and complex reading of the human face to make friends and discover a spouse, to detect danger, to lift our spirits, to laugh and cry. That primal ability is being lost as faces are now glued to cellphones. Just as young people are forgetting how to write cursive, they are losing the ability to read the human face.
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I can still remember in detail the faces of all the bartenders, DJs, and a few girls I danced with 40 years ago. Today’s young digital addicts can’t remember who they met an hour ago. As Rosen notes, we marvel at “the rarity of finding someone in public space who is not immersed in a smartphone.” We suffer from a “waning ability to experience human pleasure without mediation.”
Spending a quiet Monday night in the clubs of Washington, D.C., all those decades ago gave me something I remember to this day. It gave me a fully human experience.
Mark Judge is an award-winning journalist and the author of The Devil’s Triangle: Mark Judge vs. the New American Stasi. He is also the author of God and Man at Georgetown Prep, Damn Senators, and A Tremor of Bliss.
WASHINGTON (7News) — An ice cream truck caught fire in Southeast D.C. on Thursday, the D.C. Fire and EMS Department said.
The commercial vehicle was reported fully engulfed when crews arrived in the 1700 block of Tobias Drive SE.
SEE ALSO | Man, woman injured in Southeast DC double shooting
Firefighters quickly put out the flames and prevented the fire from spreading to nearby buildings.
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No injuries were reported.
WASHINGTON (7News) — The Catholic archbishop of Washington, D.C., Cardinal Robert McElroy, on Wednesday removed a well-known priest as an exorcist of the archdiocese after he made public comments suggesting that UFO sightings were the work of demons.
McElroy said the archdiocese also was cutting ties with the St. Michael Center for Spiritual Renewal, a Washington-based nonprofit headed by the priest, Monsignor Stephen Rossetti.
The archbishop said Rossetti’s statements “linking UFOs to demonic presence and the Center’s recent use of social media gravely undermine the Church’s very precise teaching on the devil, demons and exorcism.”
“There’s a danger here,” Rossetti said in a May 29 video posted on his Facebook page addressing UFO sightings and the existence of aliens. “As an exorcist I wanted to raise that danger. And that is that demons like to hide. … They don’t want us to know what they’re doing because they’re more effective when we don’t realize it.”
“They can kind of get into your head, you know, and manipulate things in the world to influence us to do evil.”
“It’s my personal belief that probably many if not most of these UFO sightings are in fact demons,” Rossetti added.
Rossetti also said that people can be good Catholics and believe there’s life on other planets, though he does not personally believe life exists elsewhere.
In a statement posted on the St. Michael Center website, Rossetti said he was saddened by the action of the archdiocese.
“I ask forgiveness for any ways that I have not been faithful to the teachings of the Church’s Magisterium, particularly in the cited video on ‘aliens and the demonic,’” he said. “I believe it is of the utmost importance to be obedient to the Church and I will continue to endeavor to subject all that I do and the Center to be thus obedient.”
Rossetti, who has over 148,000 followers on Instagram, is a prominent psychologist as well as an exorcist. His center has specialized in offering spiritual healing for priests troubled by various difficulties.
In 2023, he told The Associated Press there was increasing and renewed appetite for information about demonic possession and exorcism.
Washington, D.C
Nurses at Washington D.C.’s largest hospital call on leadership to reverse planned cuts to maternal health
RNs at MedStar Washington Hospital Center say closure of postpartum unit will disproportionately harm marginalized and underserved communities
Union nurses at MedStar Washington Hospital Center (MWHC) in Washington, D.C. are demanding that management stop the planned closure of an entire postpartum unit, announced National Nurses Organizing Committee/National Nurses United (NNOC/NNU). The hospital notified the union on May 26, 2026 of its intention to eliminate 11 maternal health beds and displace eight nurses by July 26, 2026, leaving MWHC with one postpartum unit.
In a follow-up town hall with staff nurses, Chief Nursing Officer Ariam Yitbarek confirmed the closure. Other leaders have additionally informed staff that the hospital will strictly limit scheduled C-sections and inductions for patients from numerous D.C. maternal health organizations. The list of organizations includes many that primarily serve low-income patients, immigrants, and patients of color, all communities with significantly higher risks of maternal mortality. Additionally, staff were informed that Kaiser Permanente, which notably insures a large number of DC city employees and even many of MWHC’s own workers, will see a strict limit on scheduling inductions and C-sections for their patients as well.
“Closing postpartum unit 5F will gravely impact those most affected by health disparities,” said Stephanie Sims-Coates, RN in the neonatal intensive care unit. “Our low-income families and families of color will be most affected by this closure. Families trust the medical staff at MWHC and plan to come to us for their care. In a city where Black women make up 90 percent of pregnancy-related deaths despite being only half the population, the hospital’s decision to close this unit is a significant mistake.”
Community leaders and healthcare workers are joining the call for MedStar to put patients before profits and keep the unit open. This past weekend, nurses met with D.C. mayoral candidate and Ward 4 councilwoman Janeese Lewis George about the planned closure and the impact it would have on DC’s most vulnerable residents.
“Maternal mortality is a crisis for Washington, DC, and our healthcare system needs to address the crisis immediately, rather than exacerbate the challenges that birthing parents face,” said Councilwoman Janeese Lewis George. “Now is the time to invest in health care, rather than make cuts. I want to work with the hospital to identify solutions that work for patients and the provider.”
“In my time at Washington Hospital Center, I’ve seen the hospital tout its Safe Moms, Safe Babies program and host a community baby shower specifically designed to call attention to the maternal mortality crisis,” said Marcqueata “Tiya” Butler, RN in the Mother/Baby unit. “Their current plan to shut down 11 postpartum beds betrays the hospital’s stated commitments. They are aware of persistent inequities in access to care. We are calling on the hospital to consider the impacts on the community, safeguard the mothers and infants of DC and commit to addressing the maternal mortality rate.”
In 2024, MedStar Health, a registered non-profit, reported $9 billion in operating revenue.
NNOC/NNU represents more than 2,200 registered nurses at Washington Hospital Center.
National Nurses United is the largest and fastest-growing union and professional association of registered nurses in the United States with more than 225,000 members nationwide. NNU affiliates include California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, DC Nurses Association, Michigan Nurses Association, Minnesota Nurses Association, and New York State Nurses Association.
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