Article Club

About Article Club

Book clubs are stressful. Join Article Club, a community of kind readers. We discuss one great article every month on race, education, or culture. articleclub.substack.com (https://articleclub.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast)

Publisher

Mark Isero

Category

education · society & culture

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

6 Jul 2017

Latest episode

16 Oct 2025

Latest episodes

147 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   16 Oct 2025

   #516: What would you do if your kid stopped eating?

   Hi Loyal Readers. Thank you for opening this week’s issue of Article Club. Today’s issue is dedicated to a great conversation I had with Caitlin Moscatello (https://caitlinmoscatello.com/), author of this month’s featured article, “The Monster at the Dinner Table (https://www.thecut.com/article/what-is-arfid-eating-disorder-kids-diagnosis-rising.html).” In case you hit a paywall, here’s a gift link (https://readwise.io/reader/shared/01k5kmzay5b73cznz2x3ckbafk/). About the article This is an article about a newish and very scary disorder that is affecting kids. It’s called ARFID, which is short for Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder. Kids with ARFID lose their interest in eating. Sometimes it’s mild — maybe your kid eats only one type of food, like chicken nuggets. But in some cases, it’s extreme — as in, your kid doesn’t eat at all. About the author Ms. Moscatello is a features contributor to New York Magazine, and has also written for the New York Times, Vanity Fair, TIME, and Harper’s Bazaar, among other outlets. She’s a National Magazine Award finalist, and also the recipient of a Front Page Award. Her book SEE JANE WIN (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/566480/see-jane-win-by-caitlin-moscatello/): (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/566480/see-jane-win-by-caitlin-moscatello/)The Inspiring Story of the Women Changing American Politics (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/566480/see-jane-win-by-caitlin-moscatello/) (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/566480/see-jane-win-by-caitlin-moscatello/)(Dutton) is a New York Times Editor’s Choice selection, and has been called “a profoundly inspiring work of journalism” by Apple Books. Caitlin is co-executive producer of the three-part HBO docuseries “An Update on Our Family (https://www.hbo.com/an-update-on-our-family), (https://www.hbo.com/an-update-on-our-family)” which premiered at the 2024 Tribeca Film festival. The series is inspired by her 2020 New York Magazine feature Un-Adopted. About the interview I deeply appreciated speaking with Ms. Moscatello. We talked about a number of topics, including: * how this piece originated * how being a parent affected her reporting * how she built trust with her sources * how she balanced demonstrating compassion for the parents, while also making sure to be accurate about how ARFID manifests In addition, Ms. Moscatello shared how she approaches the writing process, including how she organizes her longform articles. For example, she knew that this piece couldn’t begin with a medical examination of ARFID’s causes and impact on families. That would be too much dense information too soon. That’s why Ms. Moscatello decided to introduce Laura, Mark, and Amelia first. (Very effective, I thought.) I also liked hearing that Ms. Moscatello is a “top-to-bottom writer,” meaning she begins at the beginning and ends at the end, rather than writing different sections out of order. You can listen to her elaborate on that idea here: The way my brain works, I need to start at the top and go in in order. So it’s really, I spend so much time on an opening paragraph. It is not abnormal for me to spend four days or five days on an opening paragraph. And the first part of a piece is always the densest and most difficult for me to get going. I hope you enjoy the interview. Once again, huge appreciation to Ms. Moscatello for generously saying yes to Article Club. An invitation to our discussion on October 26 I warmly invite you to participate in our discussion on Sunday, October 26, 2:00 - 3:30 pm PT. We’ll meet on Zoom. You can sign up below, it’s free. Thank you for reading and listening to this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀 To our 12 new subscribers — including Sam, Matt, Mila, Dominique, Yasmine, Serda, Ali, Rory, and Promit — I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. Welcome to Article Club. Make yourself at home. 🏠 If you appreciate the articles, value our discussions, and have come to trust that reading Article Club is better for your mind and soul than your current habit of scrolling the Internet for hours on end (or avoiding reading altogether, hoping the world will vanish), please consider a paid subscription. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year. Big thanks to Kenyanna, our latest paid subscriber — huge appreciation! If you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe below. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit articleclub.substack.com/subscribe (https://articleclub.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2)

2. 

   2 Oct 2025

   #514: Too Afraid To Eat

   Dear Article Clubbers, We had a great discussion last Sunday. Thank you to everyone who made it so! At Article Club, we do two main things: * Every week, we read great articles on race, education, and culture. * Every month, we do a deep dive on one article.This means reading and annotating the article, interviewing the author, and gathering together for a discussion on Zoom on the last Sunday of the month. This week’s issue has both components. Let’s dive in. First, I’m pleased to announce October’s article of the month. It is “The Monster at the Dinner Table (https://www.thecut.com/article/what-is-arfid-eating-disorder-kids-diagnosis-rising.html),” by Caitlin Moscatello. New York Magazine’s cover story in July, the piece explores ARFID, or avoidant / restrictive food intake disorder. A relatively new phenomenon, the condition is affecting young children, shutting off their instinct to eat. And it’s incredibly shocking and scary. We’re not talking picky eating here, or when your kid goes through a only-chicken-nugget phase. This is something altogether different. You’ll find more info below. If you’re already intrigued, feel free to sign up for our discussion on October 26. Second, I’m including an article about fruitarians (https://www.thecut.com/article/karolina-krzyzak-raw-vegan-bali-death-eating-disorder.html?ueid=53d635e6377637ee3c7e1d676fa2140b&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=OGS+-+Sept+25%2C+2025&utm_term=Subscription+List+-+One+Great+Story&__readwiseLocation=), whose diet relies entirely on eating fruit. If you’ve been a longtime subscriber, you know I’ve included tongue-in-cheek articles that warn about the health hazards of consuming fruit smoothies and fruit juice. Well, this piece is decidedly not funny. But it’s a wake-up call for anyone seeking the promise of “clean eating” or finding the essence of truth via an Internet influencer in Bali. I hope you’ll consider reading it. 1️⃣ The Monster At The Dinner Table (https://www.thecut.com/article/what-is-arfid-eating-disorder-kids-diagnosis-rising.html) Caitlin Moscatello, on ARFID, yet another reason to freak out about raising children: Previously, Amelia ate a wide-ranging diet, but after the chicken-nugget incident, she began to refuse solid foods. Within a week, she would consume only yogurt and liquids. “We would buy every drink that she could possibly want — chocolate milk, juice. We were desperate,” said Laura. “And it got worse every single day.” Amelia cut out the yogurt, convinced she would choke on it. A couple of weeks later, she rejected liquids, too. She began spitting into a napkin, unable to swallow her own saliva. It felt like something was stuck in her throat, Amelia said. She believed if she did try to swallow, she would choke, suffocate, and die. Dinner turned into a nightly standoff: Amelia on one side of the table, growing thinner and frailer, Mark and Laura on the other, their panic mounting. Sometimes, they tried coaxing her. Other times, they couldn’t help but yell. “We didn’t know how to deal with it. Like, ‘Why can’t you eat?’” said Laura. It felt like a failure. They tried to quiet their terror by leaning on what one may believe to be a biological fact — that humans are wired for survival and, eventually, a child will get hungry and want food. “I kept thinking, Mother Nature’s going to kick in here,” said Mark. Instead, Amelia’s hunger response seemed to have shut off. If they tried to feed her, she would spit out the food. By Caitlin Moscatello (https://caitlinmoscatello.com/) • New York Magazine • 26 min • Gift Link (https://readwise.io/reader/shared/01k5kmzay5b73cznz2x3ckbafk) ➕ We’re discussing this article on Zoom on Sunday, October 26, 2:00 - 3:30 pm PT. It’s free and easy to sign up. All you need to do is click the button below. 2️⃣ The Woman Who Ate Only Fruit (https://www.thecut.com/article/karolina-krzyzak-raw-vegan-bali-death-eating-disorder.html?ueid=53d635e6377637ee3c7e1d676fa2140b&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=OGS+-+Sept+25%2C+2025&utm_term=Subscription+List+-+One+Great+Story&__readwiseLocation=) Ej Dickson, on people who believe that eating fruit is the pathway toward nirvana: Fruitarians make up a smaller, even more fringe part of the raw-vegan community and subsist almost exclusively on uncooked fruit. Many followers believe that fruit is nutritionally complete and contains the most prana, the Sanskrit word for “life force,” of any food on the planet. As Karolina wasted away, her loyal followers cheered her on. “I truly believe that you have the right answers. You know what’s good for you even if right now seems like chaos,” one wrote on a selfie she posted in 2023. “Nice neck and collarbones,” a fan wrote on a photo she posted where her clavicle juts out of her skin. “It is so nice to see you so happy,” another posted on a video of an Instagram Live she did last September. She would be dead less than three months later. By Ej Dickson (https://www.ejdickson.com/) • The Cut • 10 min • Gift Link (https://drive.google.com/file/d/17_yhRTeXmPCy0pbqIDVomui2lBizakiQ/view?usp=sharing) Thank you for reading and listening to this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀 To our 18 new subscribers — including Rob, Sujan, Julia, Lily, Charul, Sean, Ben, Lakshita, Russell, Gail, JR, and Jeferson — I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. Welcome to Article Club. Make yourself at home. 🏠 If you appreciate the articles, value our discussions, and have come to trust that reading Article Club is better for your mind and soul than your current habit of scrolling the Internet for hours on end (or avoiding reading altogether, hoping the world will vanish), please consider a paid subscription. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year. If subscribing is not your thing, don’t despair: There are other ways you can support this newsletter. Share the newsletter with a friend or buy me a coffee for $3 (https://buymeacoffee.com/highlightercc) (so I can read more articles). On the other hand, if you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe below. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit articleclub.substack.com/subscribe (https://articleclub.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2)

3. 

   18 Sept 2025

   #512: “We’re moving on from using it as a crutch and more so as a wheelchair.”

   Hi Loyal Readers. Thank you for opening this week’s issue of Article Club. Today’s issue is dedicated to a great conversation I had with Piers Gelly (https://piersgelly.com/info/), author of this month’s featured article, “What Happened When I Tried to Replace Myself with ChatGPT in My English Classroom (https://lithub.com/what-happened-when-i-tried-to-replace-myself-with-chatgpt-in-my-english-classroom/).” The conversation was triply great because Prof. Gelly, who teaches at the University of Virginia, invited two of his students featured in the essay — Camille Villalobos and Max Goldberg — to join us. The result is a thought-provoking discussion about college students’ perspectives on artificial intelligence, particularly when a curious professor engages them genuinely (rather than complaining, banning the use of AI, sticking their head in the sand, and secretly wishing we could turn back time to the Golden Age of Bluebooks). I hope that you’ll read the article, listen to the interview, and join our discussion on Sunday, Sept. 28, 2:00 - 3:30 pm PT. We’ll meet on Zoom, say hi, and then dive deep into the article. You can sign up below; it’d be great to have you there. I don’t want to give too much away, because I want you to listen to the conversation, but I must share what I appreciated most. It was how thoughtfully Cam and Max talked about their experiences taking Prof. Gelly’s class, as well as how their points of view on artificial intelligence changed along the way. Not only are Cam and Max brilliant, but what’s also abundantly clear is that Prof. Gelly cares deeply about his students. They’re at the center of his essay. You’ll get a similar sense when you listen to the interview. Rather than making grandiose philosophical conclusions about the state of artificial intelligence in education, Prof. Gelly is curious, vulnerable, and dedicated to listening to his students’ views, as well as pushing them. When you engage your students — as Prof. Gelly does — you gain nuance. For example, at the beginning of the class, Cam had been a liberal user of ChatGPT. By the end, she maligned AI as a “crutch” and vowed never to use it again. And her thinking has shifted even more, as you’ll hear in the interview. On the other hand, Max did not leave the class with the same perspective as Cam. He sees valid uses for ChatGPT. But his experience shifted his sentiments as well. Here he shares what worries him: I would say the thing that concerns me most is people who use [AI] for everything. And I don’t just mean like coursework, but things like planning their schedules and asking it questions and having it do, like, basic, basic problems. I think that people need to be able to do some of that on their own. I hope you enjoy the interview. Once again, huge appreciation to Prof. Gelly, Cam, and Max for generously saying yes to Article Club. An invitation to our discussion on September 28 I warmly invite you to participate in our discussion on Sunday, September 28, 2:00 - 3:30 pm PT. We’ll meet on Zoom. You can sign up below, it’s free. Thank you for reading and listening to this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀 To our 24 new subscribers — including Ikechukwu, Amelia, Linda, Abigail, Matalyn, Anna, Inna, JB, Barry, Mohammed, Obaxbila, Damon, Janet, David, Shelly, Raj, Anna, Erfan, Belle, Samuel, and Sarah — I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. Welcome to Article Club. Make yourself at home. 🏠 If you appreciate the articles, value our discussions, and have come to trust that reading Article Club is better for your mind and soul than your current habit of scrolling the Internet for hours on end (or avoiding reading altogether, hoping the world will vanish), please consider a paid subscription. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year. Big thanks to Janet, our latest paid subscriber — huge appreciation! If you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe below. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit articleclub.substack.com/subscribe (https://articleclub.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2)

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

4.9 / 5

24 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 59 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

85

Social presence

0

YouTube

0

Engagement

82

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Guest appearances

Books guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.