Hero
Mattia Bernasconi, an Italian priest who brought religion out of the church and into the sea. The frolicking father is being investigated for a mass he conducted in the water off a beach in southern Italy, wearing nothing but swimming trunks, using a lilo as an altar. Bernasconi, who was supervising a student summer camp at the time, protests that there was no appropriately shady spot on land.
Villain
Glenn Thompson, a Republican congressman who voted against a law supporting same-sex marriage three days before attending the same-sex marriage of his son. “We’re just blessed, and we just want to say thank you to everyone here,” Thompson declared at the wedding, which he presumably also wanted to see stripped of legal protections.
Villains
Straight white men, according to a billboard that’s popped up in south London which reads: “Hey straight white men, pass the power!” I wonder who exactly I should be passing this “power” on to, says Douglas Murray in The Spectator. “Should I just hand it to anyone who is not white, or not straight? Kemi Badenoch, say? Or Lord Mandelson?”
Heroes
Beavers, which are handy in a heatwave, says Vox. The dams they build can deepen streams, which makes them colder. Their industrious activities also give off a lot of water vapour, which acts as a natural air conditioning system and cools the surrounding air. And by flooding the land, they make surrounding plants less likely to catch fire.