When was the last time you played? Took part in an enjoyable activity for the sake of it, with no particular outcome? A moment where you laughed, felt awe, curiosity, creativity? Where time flew by? If you’re over the age of, say, 7, your answer is probably not recently.

According to Mia Sundstrom, CEO of the National Institute for Play, an organization that studies play and champions research-backed playful policies, American society is in a bit of a play drought. Attention spans are shrinking, the country is more polarized than ever, and some people might be more comfortable communicating with AI than other humans. “Our world is really overwhelming, and what we’re starting to see is these almost spontaneous bursts of playfulness infiltrate back into our society almost as a rebellion against the things that feel really hard and scary right now,” Sundstrom told Vox.

That desire for levity might explain the proliferation of “whimsical” online content and unconventional workout classes and events, Sundstrom said. In other words, play, which she defined as both a state (marked by experimentation and risk-taking) and a disposition (a curious, creative, and optimistic way of moving throughout the world). 

Playfulness benefits us all, not just kids. Playful people perceive less stress and have higher well-being, and life satisfaction. It also just feels good to partake in an activity that takes you out of the difficulties of life, if just for a little while. To help push back against the forces of seriousness, Sundstrom outlines three easy ways to imbue your life with more play. 

1. Figure out your “play style”

Play is highly subjective: What one person considers enjoyable might be another’s personal hell. And just because an activity brings you a moderate amount of enjoyment doesn’t mean it’s necessarily good for you. (Take mindlessly scrolling on your phone, for instance.) To be a more playful person, you need to consider — or remember — what makes you feel a little silly. The National Institute for Play developed six “play styles” to help people determine what activities light them up. For example, “creators” play through art, music, design, and performance while “competitors” like playing games or sports.

If you struggle to even pinpoint your play style, Sundstrom suggests recalling past memories of play. When was the last time you truly lost track of time or laughed so hard you cried with people you loved? What were you doing?

“Try and recall that vividly, because play is who we are before the world tells us who we have to be,” she said. “Whatever you loved to do early on, there’s a good chance somewhere inside of you that is still in there and is a great little spark for you to re-access play.” It’s likely you gradually stopped these playful hobbies, perhaps due to the demands of adult life, and picking them back up with no expectation can put you in touch with your younger self. 

2. Make your environment more conducive to play

Based on your play style, you might consider low- or no-cost upgrades to your physical space to make play easier. “In physical spaces, the fastest and easiest things you can do are how can you add bright colors or something that feels inspiring to you, whether that’s a picture of your favorite place or a memory that jogs back play, something that is a visual cue to you that brings you back to a play state,” Sundstrom said. You might keep some scrap paper handy to doodle while you’re on the phone, use brightly colored files to organize your important documents, or use a colorful keyboard instead of a standard one. 

Kids can make any space more playful. If you have children in your life, try to adopt their mindset: the curiosity, the wonder. And if you don’t have little ones, take inspiration from a childlike version of yourself and make decisions from their point of view, Sundstrom said.

Many adults, especially moms, feel pressure to curate a high-octane play experience for kids, Sundstrom said. But a more playful environment can simply incorporate an inside joke, a wink whenever you leave the room, or a silly way of greeting each other.

3. Find some bite-sized versions of play that you can add to your daily routine

Once you’ve figured out, say, adventuring and new experiences are what make you feel alive (also known as the “explorer” play style), what tiny measures can you take to regularly engage in play? 

“Even 30 seconds of a dance break or belting your favorite song or creating a handshake with somebody as you enter or exit a room, that is enough to create that play spark and to start those brain activations that do foster the deeper creativity and adaptability and resilience that build the play mindset,” Sundstrom said. 

The best places to infuse play are during moments of boredom, Sundstrom said. To allow yourself space to be bored, put your phone in another room during any downtime and when you would ordinarily feel the urge to pick up your device, do something playful instead. Anything from practicing an accent or turning on a random radio station and imagining what the musical artist looks like.

The world may be serious, but individuals can take ownership over how much whimsy and levity they bring to it. Who knows? You might make someone else’s day more playful, too.

Earlier this summer, Vox set up two big bug traps in New York City — like, literal traps that catch bugs. Our goal was to try to discover a new insect species right in the middle of the city because the bulk of them are still unknown to science. 

We now have some exciting, albeit preliminary, results to share. 

During the month of June — the only month we’ve analyzed so far — our traps captured an estimated 12,000 insect specimens, which we sent to a lab at the University of Guelph in Canada for analysis. The lab, known as the Centre for Biodiversity Genomics, pulled out specimens across three groups: scuttle flies and two kinds of wasps known as parasitoids, which lay their eggs in other insects. We’re focusing on these groups, because they’re considered “dark taxa,” meaning that most species within them are likely still undiscovered. 

That left us with just under 1,000 specimens from June to investigate further.

From there, the lab sequenced a short section of DNA from each specimen, known as a barcode. Those DNA barcodes are unique identifiers for individual organisms, and scientists use them to sort specimens. When individuals have very similar barcodes, that often means they are the same species.

Most of the barcodes from our specimens appear to be similar to barcodes of insects that scientists have already collected and sequenced. There’s a slim chance that these are members of undiscovered species. 

But there were striking exceptions: Our wasps and flies yielded more than two dozen barcode groups that are, according to a preliminary review, quite different. They are unlike anything that exists in the big genetic database, known as BOLD, which is essentially a massive library of biodiversity. That means that they may represent new species.

Now, following further analysis by taxonomists, we have a strong indication that at least a few of those barcode groups may, indeed, be new species. And this was after just one month of looking!

Before we know if we have a true discovery to announce, we want to be certain that these species are actually new. That takes hard work, for which we are leaning on Emily Hartop, an entomologist at Norway’s NTNU University Museum, and University of Guelph researchers Ranjith AP and Paul Hebert. They will verify that no one has already described the organisms matching these specimens and then publish a formal description, along with a name, in a peer-reviewed scientific journal. At that point, we’ll be able to say with more certainty that the bugs we caught here in New York City are, in fact, new to science. 

In the meantime, the traps remain open, and the freezer in my apartment will continue — to my husband’s disgust — filling up with ethanol-soaked bugs. 

You can find more information about Vox’s quest to discover a new species here.

There’s a lot of discussion about Jewish voters in politics this cycle.

With Democrats embroiled in loud arguments over Israel and Gaza, Republicans have been hoping to capture more of the Jewish vote by linking criticism of Israel to antisemitism. “How a Jewish person can vote for a Democrat is beyond me,” President Donald Trump said last month. His administration has made cracking down on anti-Israel campus activists — a top early priority — and has called Democrats “Palestinian” or “jihadists.”

Meanwhile, Democrats have pointed to the rise of openly antisemitic influencers within the conservative movement, which has become a divisive topic on the right that also runs into debates over Israel, as a pressing threat to Jews. 

But what do Jewish voters themselves actually want? That’s a nuanced question, and one that we have fresh polling and voting data on to help us dissect this cycle. 

American Jews aren’t a large voting bloc — just over 2 percent of the population — but there are also significant communities in some key swing states and competitive districts. As a matter of partisan politics, Jews have historically voted Democratic by wide margins, but Republicans have long hoped to peel them off, often by emphasizing their support for Israel. Though it’s been a common refrain from pro-Israel and Republican activists for decades that a GOP realignment was just around the corner, it wasn’t until the 2024 presidential election that these voices got a firm boost. Nationally, and in local communities, Jewish support for the Democratic Party seemed to drop slightly.  

Elections since then have been difficult to parse. In last year’s New York City mayoral election, for example, Zohran Mamdani won about 33 percent of Jewish voters, compared to the 63 percent that went for Andrew Cuomo in a race where divisions over Israel and antisemitism featured strongly. In the primary, many Cuomo voters also backed Mamdani ally Brad Lander, a Jewish progressive who was sharply critical of Israel — and who went on to easily defeat Rep. Dan Goldman in a congressional primary in a heavily Jewish district this year while running to his left on Israel issues. Meanwhile, in New Jersey, left-wing Democrat Analilia Mejia won a special election for a House seat while harshly criticizing Israel. But her candidacy led some Jewish strongholds to swing massively toward Republicans.

So, what happens to the Jewish vote in the 2026 midterms? This segment of voters is no monolith, experts say, and finding the “right” way to talk about Israel is no guarantor of electoral success. Polls show Jewish voters hold competing priorities in their minds: They’re increasingly concerned about antisemitism and their personal safety in America, and they hold complex and divergent views on Israel, which often is not a defining voting issue, even as it seems to be the dominant way strategists and pundits talk about this electorate. 

Here’s what the latest data has to say about what Jewish voters want and how their politics are changing this cycle.   

The remarkable consistency of the Jewish electorate

Aside from Black voters, there have traditionally been no more loyal Democratic voters than Jewish Americans. Since 2008, between 60 and 80 percent of these voters picked the Democratic candidate, while about 60 percent have consistently identified with the party over the last two decades.

That changed slightly after 2024, when exit polls suggested a six-point swing toward Donald Trump compared to 2020. Jewish communities in New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania, meanwhile, shifted more dramatically — which analysts for the election data site Split Ticket argued last year represented a 5 to 10 percentage-point swing against Democrats.

There are plenty of arguments over how and why this happened — pollsters and experts I spoke with told me that, despite the majority of Jewish American voters still siding with Democrats, the voting group mirrored other traditionally Democratic voting groups’ swing against the incumbent.

“Biden won the election, Harris lost the election,” Tali deGroot, the national political director of J Street, told Vox. “That means that every single community likely saw shifts with fewer people voting for the Democrat.”

Others argue it was a return to more of a baseline of voter behavior. 2020 was the aberration, with remarkably high support for Biden because of pandemic conditions.

But what still stands out beyond these trendlines is the steady support Democrats receive from these voters — whether because of the high level of college education among these constituents (a blue-coded trait in the Trump era), the geographic location of these voters (primarily in Democratic states like New York and California), or the socially liberal beliefs many of these voters hold (Jews historically support abortion rights, for example).

Even heading into 2026, Democrats still hold overwhelmingly strong support from these voters, Jim Gerstein, a founding partner of the polling firm GBAO, told me.

“What’s remarkable is actually how consistent Jewish voting behavior and political beliefs and values have been for years and still through today,” Gerstein said. “You have these massive developments in domestic, international, political events, actual things that happen in the real world, and the Jewish vote is just remarkably stable.”

Entering 2026, Gerstein argues, two dynamics remain at play that are preserving their Democratic lean. The long-held liberal ideological bent of Jewish Americans, along with the issues they prioritize, broadly align with the Democratic Party. And, on the other end, their antipathy to Trump and the Republican Party is “intense,” a force that pushes these voters away from the GOP, even if there were broader reasons to realign.

“Not only do they identify with the Democrats, they share positions on the major issues, shared values,” Gerstein said. “And they also have a strong opposition to the Republican Party and leading Republican figures.”

These dynamics also reveal themselves when looking at various denominations within the Jewish electorate. The largest segments — nondenominational, Reform, and Conservative Jews — lean heavily Democratic and have remained more or less steadily Democratic over the last few years. A smaller segment, Orthodox Jews — who make up about a tenth of the Jewish population but are growing — lean toward Republicans, are more strongly supportive of Trump and Israel, and have been shifting right over the last five years.

“The Orthodox population is in its own political world relative to the rest of the Jewish population,” Gerstein said. “To the extent there’s any shifting [broadly], there’s been some shifting among Orthodox to make them even more Republican. That is offset by the fact that the Reform population is much larger. They are extraordinarily Democratic, and if anything, are moving a little bit more Democratic.”

How Jewish American voters are feeling about 2026

Polls of Jewish voters this year suggests these dynamics are largely baked into the electorate at this point. A national AP-NORC survey of voters, with an oversampling of Jewish Americans, in June found that Jewish adults’ approval of how Trump is handling his job is nearly 10 points lower than among all American adults generally.

“We see that same pattern on most of the issues that we asked about, such as the economy, immigration, and Iran,” Emily Alvarez, a senior research scientist at NORC, told me. “But when it comes to his handling of Israel, they’re actually slightly more likely than the general public to approve. It’s a very small difference, but it is a difference, and it’s kind of a reversal of that trend that we saw with the other issues.”

NORC’s polling also suggests that domestic, kitchen table issues continue to be the dominant priorities of these voters generally. More than 80 percent of Jewish adults say the economy and healthcare are top priorities for them this year. About 56 and 66 percent say Israel or foreign policy are important concerns. 

This June finding roughly matches the priorities that two other pollsters identified this year. The Mellman Group’s polling for the Jewish Electorate Institute from March found that Jewish voters largely say Democrats are better aligned with their views on abortion rights, healthcare, fair elections, and supporting the middle class.

And polling from GBAO on behalf of the Jewish Voters Resource Center in the spring found that the future of democracy (37 percent) and the cost of living/affordability (32 percent) are the top two issue priorities of Jewish voters, broadly speaking. Concerns over antisemitism round out the top three (25 percent).

Fear of discrimination and antisemitism is the biggest unifying concern for Jewish adults. When GBAO asked respondents about dealbreaker issues, 20 percent cited antisemitism as being their red line for supporting a candidate. And AP-NORC’s polling found that 62 percent of Jewish adults feel they are less safe than before October 7.

And while Jewish voters tend to be more aligned with Democrats on issues, the polling also found they remain wary of partisan politics — a common trait among many demographics in recent cycles. 

“Jewish Americans really feel a sense of political dissatisfaction. They don’t feel particularly well supported by either political party. Very few say Democrats or Republicans support them well,” Alvarez said. “Republicans tend to feel a lot better supported by Republicans, and then they feel really supported by President Trump, but then far fewer Democrats feel the same way about their own party or about the president.”

The Israel factor

It’s hard to disentangle the effect of the Israel-Gaza war from the current political environment for Jewish voters.

Sam Markstein, the political director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, told me that October 7 was a defining moment for many Jewish voters who had preexisting misgivings about the Democratic Party. Changing political and public opinion on Israel and acts of violence against Jewish people and at places of worship, as well as shifts among Democrats and the left’s broader tension with AIPAC, suddenly made safety and antisemitism more pressing issues.

“After October 7, American Jews focused a lot more on their safety,” Markstein told me. “The main questions we heard, time and time, was who would best keep us safe, who would stand up for our students on the college campus quad, who would make us feel better about walking with our young kids to shul on Saturday morning, who would actually stand with the Jewish community and empower us to wear our Stars of David in public and not have to hide it.”

While concerns about antisemitism are widespread, views on Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict itself are nuanced, particularly among Jewish Democrats, various pollsters told me. 

AP-NORC’s polling, for example, found that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was broadly disliked by American Jews, with six-in-10 adults expressing unfavorable views. By contrast, Mamdani, the New York City mayor who recently explored arresting Netanyahu, was viewed favorably by 44 percent of Jews, with 39 percent expressing an unfavorable view. 30 percent of Jews said they believed Israel had committed genocide in its war in Gaza, while 49 percent said it had not. 

One important wrinkle that’s often divided Israel critics is the context of that criticism. Many Jews are concerned about Israel’s security and direction and hope to see a new government with a stronger commitment to forging peace with Palestinians and neighboring states. Michael Bloomfield, a lead pollster and managing director for the Mellman Group, told me that “what often gets forgotten is that almost all American Jews, 86 percent, consider themselves pro-Israel,” including a similar share of Jewish Democrats.

But a rising segment of the left — including candidates like Abdul El-Sayed — often describe Israel’s founding vision of a homeland for Jews as inherently oppressive and sometimes calls for replacing the country with a secular and binational Arab-Jewish state. By contrast, New York’s Brad Lander, also on the left, describes himself as a “liberal Zionist” who wants a peaceful two-state solution that preserves Israel’s existence.

Polling this year, sponsored by the Jewish Electorate Institute, found that, while many Jewish Democrats are critical of Israeli government policies and the US partnership with Israel in the war in Iran, they are still strongly supportive of Israel as a state.

Overall, nearly nine in 10 American Jews describe themselves as pro-Israel, they found, but only about a quarter, 23 percent, consider themselves both pro-Israel and supportive of Israeli government policies. Six in 10 are pro-Israel and critical, half of whom are critical of “some” and another half who are critical of “many” policies. That broadly aligns with partisan identification. While 84 perfect of Jewish Democrats are “pro-Israel,” 73 percent of them are critical of Israeli policies. Republicans, a smaller share overall, are less likely to be critical.

There are also differences based on religious and cultural identity within the Jewish electorate, apparent in the NORC polling. Jews with a religious affiliation or strong attachment to Israel as part of their religious identity tend to be more supportive of Israel’s actions than secular Jews. About half of those with religious affiliation say the Gaza military campaign is justified, while a quarter believe Israel has committed genocide, compared to about two in 10 secular Jews who say the Gaza campaign is justified, and 4 in 10 who agree with the genocide charge. Three-quarters of that cohort say they are “not too” or “not at all” emotionally attached to Israel.

While concerns about antisemitism are rising, there’s room for nuance, Bloomfield told me.

“There is a policy debate about how much aid Israel should get, there’s a policy debate about where our relationship should be,” Bloomfield told me. “That is different than the worry when it gets to antisemitism and feeling uncomfortable in the Democratic Party.” The Mellman poll for JEI found that a majority of American Jews agree with the statement that “too many supporters of Israel claim any criticism of Israel is antisemitism as a way to avoid legitimate debate over Israeli policy.” 

Nearly half of Jewish Republicans (47 percent) agree with that, along with 59 percent of Democrats. At the same time, 83 percent of Jewish Americans agree that “too many critics of Israel use tropes and generalizations about Jews to play into antisemitism, whether they mean to or not.”

Those nuanced views speak to the moment of uncertainty that many Jewish Democrats feel right now, he said. Israel, and the US relationship with it, does not dominate their vote choice or decision-making, but the way the party’s rising leaders, activist class, and press talk about it may become a bigger pressure point later this cycle. In the latest Mellman/JEI polling, few Jews say they’ve been following the discourse and debate over AIPAC and other pro-Israel groups’ spending in primary contests. Some 62 percent of all Jews say they have not heard much — including a majority of Jewish Democrats.

That number has likely gone up since then, given high-profile contests like Michigan’s Senate primary this month, which featured extensive arguments about pro-Israel spending and whether criticizing them shaded into antisemitism. And the salience of these debates may change in either direction depending on the news. Democrats could pursue a more aggressive policy to pressure Israel if they win the House, for example, or Israel might find room for a reset if Netanyahu loses his premiership later this year. 

 “There are cross currents and Jews can feel both ways at the same time,” Bloomfield said. “We ourselves can be concerned where people use antisemitism as cries as a way to get out of legitimate debate. On the other hand, there’s even more of us concerned that a lot of what is being debated by Israel often does veer too quickly into something that’s antisemitism. We can have both feelings at the same time.”

This story appeared in The Logoff, a daily newsletter that helps you stay informed about the Trump administration without letting political news take over your life. Subscribe here.

Welcome to The Logoff: The cracks are starting to show in President Donald Trump’s Iran campaign.

What’s happening? Conditions on a US warship deployed in the Middle East have grown so dire, multiple sailors have reportedly tried to go overboard (at least one did so but was rescued safely, according to CNN). 

The attempts to jump overboard comes as family members of sailors are raising concerns with Democratic lawmakers about deteriorating mental health on the ship amid sanitation issues and shortages of food and basic supplies. 

The USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier has been deployed for more than 250 days, starting last November, including a stretch of more than 200 days at sea — a modern record. Its deployment was supposed to end months ago, in May, but has continued as Trump’s Iran war stretches on. 

How is the administration responding? Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Thursday that reports about conditions on the Lincoln are “completely misrepresented.” Help is on the way for the Lincoln, though, with another US aircraft carrier en route to the area to replace it (according to the Wall Street Journal, the replacement was already planned, and not in response to deteriorating conditions on the Lincoln).

Why does this matter? Conditions on the Lincoln are not the only recent stumbling block for the US war with Iran. Earlier this month, we learned more about the US’s increasingly serious shortages of key offensive and defensive missiles, including THAAD and Patriot interceptors used to protect US troops and allies. On top of that, the Washington Post reported Thursday that the US has run through around a quarter of its Reaper drones, which cost tens of millions of dollars apiece. 

It’s the latest example of how the math of the war is starting to slant against the US: Reaper drones and Patriot missiles are incredibly expensive, while Iran has figured out how to mass-produce attack drones on the cheap. And with no end in sight, shortages and situations like the Lincoln will only become a larger problem.

And with that, it’s time to log off…

Here’s some good news from my colleague Adam Clark Estes: As wrecked as your attention span may feel, it’s not permanently degraded. He talked with attention experts to figure out how to repair his, and how we can all do the same. You can read his full story here with a gift link — and then, for all of our brains’ sake, let’s log off. We’ll see you back here tomorrow.