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Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles

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250 S. Grand Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90012 United States

December 2016

Zócalo Public Square Presents: Has Political Correctness Really Killed Humor?

December 6, 2016 • 7:30 pm PST
Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, 250 S. Grand Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90012 United States

Chris Rock and Jerry Seinfeld say they won’t perform on college campuses because politically correct students are too easily offended. Monty Python’s John Cleese writes that oversensitivity is killing comedy and threatening free expression, and that “all comedy is critical” and involves judging other people. But how does that reconcile with the notion that political correctness is at heart a call for greater decency? Have we really gone too far? And what is the right balance between freedom of speech,…

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Zócalo Public Square: What’s So Bad About GMO’s?

December 14, 2016 • 7:30 pm PST
Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, 250 S. Grand Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90012 United States

For centuries, farmers and governments have hailed genetic modifications of our food as advances that helped combat drought and disease and improve nutritional value or flavor. But in recent years, a global movement has challenged the safety for people and for the environment of modifying the DNA of what we eat. How should we weigh the risks of GMOs against other concerns they are meant to address, like preventing famine or adapting crops to changing climates? Does labeling GMO foods…

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April 2017

Does the Expansion of Presidential Power Threaten the Constitution?

April 25, 2017 • 7:30 pm PDT
Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, 250 S. Grand Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90012 United States
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Moderated by Ronald Brownstein, The Atlantic Senior Editor and CNN Senior Political Analyst   Fundamental to the U.S. Constitution is its system of “checks and balances” designed to limit the reach of all three branches of the federal government and their officials. But has the American presidency become too powerful to be checked or balanced? Since the New Deal, presidents have been amassing new authority, commanding ever-larger bureaucracies, and holding sway over expanding federal regulations affecting every aspect of American…

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May 2017

Will We Ever Eliminate Ghettos?

May 12, 2017 • 7:30 pm PDT
Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, 250 S. Grand Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90012 United States
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The Seventh Annual Zócalo Book Prize Lecture On March 29, 1516, the city council of Venice, Italy issued a decree forcing Jews to live in il geto—a closed quarter named for the copper foundry that once occupied the area. The term stuck, and 500 years later the ghetto—both the term and the reality to which it refers—is still with us. How did the ghetto go from being a word associated mainly with the segregation of European Jews to a concept used to…

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