This is One Good Thing, a weekly column where we tell you about one of the few nice things that happened this week.

Lady Gaga is a woman of many talents, obviously. She’s a singer, a performer, a songwriter, an actor — a bonafide star in pretty much every sense of the word.

Also, she is so good at folding things.

SEE ALSO: Bradley Cooper’s ‘A Star is Born’ left critics with stars in their eyes

I first realized Gaga’s incredible folding prowess during the press conference for A Star Is Born at the Toronto International Film Festival last weekend. Before asking a question, one reporter handed Gaga a t-shirt from his outlet, The Queer Network. Gaga accepted the offering gracefully, because she is a movie star. Then, before she continued to speak into her microphone (also gracefully), she folded the shirt with such precision and skill, I gasped. Gasped!

Look at the precise way she tucks the sleeves under; the swift double fold. She doesn’t even look at the shirt while she is folding it, and yet the shirt is perfect. Any J.Crew location across the United States (including Alaska and Hawaii) would be proud to feature that shirt on their precariously-arranged shelving displays.

I watched the video of Lady Gaga folding the shirt many times — so many times, in fact, that I began to hunger for even more video footage of Lady Gaga folding something. Luckily, as BuzzFeed points out, that footage is available. Turns out, Lady Gaga folded a Pride flag with equal dexterity during a stop on her Joanne world tour. (In the background, you can hear someone screaming “Queen of folding,” which is true.)

Be sure you’ve eaten a hearty meal before watching this one, because the crispness of those corners nearly made me pass out at my desk.

Anyway, if anyone sees Lady Gaga folding any more stuff, please let me know. Yes, it’s the one good thing I’ve seen on the internet during this particular week, but our journey doesn’t have to stop here!

Since Apple first gave me the option to use my physical human body as a key, I’ve felt uncomfortable about it. When I got my beloved iPhone 6s, I declined to enable Touch ID, though I didn’t exactly know why. Then Face ID came along on the iPhone X, and I looked on skeptically as my clearly foolhardy friends followed the examples of Apple’s smiling models. 

SEE ALSO: I’ll never use Apple’s Face ID

My uninformed but generally mistrustful feelings about biometric security only intensified on Wednesday as Apple went all in with Face ID, touting one’s face as the preferred and secure way to lock away your darkest digital secrets. With Face ID now available on all three new models of the iPhone, it’s about to be a Face ID-secured world, people. And we’re just livin’ in it.

Judging by the Apple product unveiling event, Apple and its adherents are stoked about Face ID. It is the future! It is so easy! So very secure! You don’t have to remember anything! 

Still, there are plenty of criticisms about this new technology. No one asked for this future! It is glitchy as hell! Your password is way, way too public! Face ID normalizes surveillance via widespread facial recognition, which is a tool of oppression, y’all!

However, as I sized up the arguments for and against, I’ve begrudgingly come to the conclusion that my fear of Face ID is just the teensiest bit irrational.

…But no way in hell does that mean I’m going to use it.

If you’re a normal person, Face ID is basically safe. 

It was a hard thing to admit, but at least some percentage of my fear of Face ID has been formed by Face/Off. You know, the Nicolas Cage and John Travolta thriller in which enemy cop Travolta vs. criminal Cage swap, erm, faces. Great film, really couldn’t recommend it enough.

But anyway, not that I thought someone was going to full on Face/Off me, but even making a 3D image of my face seemed inherently unwise. How did I know that Cage wasn’t going to come looking to steal my life and family vis-a-vis my face?

Digging into Face ID I realized that even if a maniacal criminal with a plastic surgery unit at his disposal was intent on stealing my identity — or, say, a financial criminal, or a security firm or government agency looking to create a database of faces — they wouldn’t be able to do it using Face ID. 

Apple doesn’t actually have any record of your face; using Face ID does not mean that you’re “giving Apple your face” like I thought it did. Instead, it only stores a mathematical representation of your face locally, on your personal device. Your face doesn’t go into any database, it doesn’t leave your hardware, and it’s only a mathematical representation, not even an actual 3D image.

I was forced to conclude that using Face ID did not mean I was handing a key to my phone (and LIFE) to Apple, or any governments, corporations, or criminals unhappy with their own visages.

Still, with Face ID, my face IS my passcode. There is absolutely nothing secret about it! Maybe nefarious entities didn’t need an image from Apple to penetrate my digital secrets. They could always make their own 3D scan of my face, and make a Charlie’s Angels-esque silicone mask. Nice try, Apple! But the truth is that… I am a middle class journalist who likes yoga, dogs, and a good pair of Swedish clogs. No one is going to the effort to steal my phone and make a flawless mask in order to access the SEVERAL thousands of dollars in my bank account. If you’re an international spy or President Obama, though, Face ID is probably unwise. (Security firms agree with this assessment). 

But what about law enforcement, I thought! I had heard that police did not need warrants to open phones that could unlock with biometrics. But did need warrants to unlock phones with passcodes.

It turns out that the law is slightly better than that. Law enforcement cannot legally obtain permission to open your phone with a passcode at ALL, because it’s considered a form of self-incrimination. However, cops can actually get warrants for you to produce your fingerprint or your face. Which is a pretty dumb loophole.

But if I’m being honest, I have to ask, how risky is this for me, really? I’m a law-abiding citizen. I would submit to a search warrant if it were produced. How does this legal difference actually impact my life in reality? Up to this point, and in the foreseeable future, it doesn’t. 

The other big concern about Face ID is that it can be tricked. Twins can open each other’s phones. I even have a pair of cousins who are not twins, but look similar enough that Apple doesn’t recognize the difference. 

But I don’t have a twin. And my sister and I don’t look startlingly similar. So… there’s really no issue for me there, either.

Combing through this information, I realized that Face ID is basically safe for me to use. It might even be nice, and convenient, and perhaps more secure than my probably-too-obvious passcode! 

But even if Face ID’s defenses rebuffed my attacks, I’m still not capitulating to the Face ID dogma. 

Mostly, because safety with Face ID will always depend on Apple’s word. 

Face ID/Off

Despite facing the facts that Face ID is probably safe for me to use, I still will not use the technology. I will instead let the irrational fear (and more rational arguments) defend me from the dark technological future Apple has created, the future that I did not ask to live in.

Let’s start with the irrationals: I just. don’t. want. to. give. a. DAMN. computer. my. FACE!!

Listen, the machines are going to rise. It’s not a question of if, it’s a WHEN, amirite?! I don’t need to give the tech industry, let alone our future tech overlords, a blueprint into becoming Rachel Kraus. Some things are just sacred, ok!? Faces are one of them.

Second irrational fear: maybe a criminal or an enemy will make a copy of my face using a 3D printer (they’re more affordable than ever before, guys!) Maybe this will become a hot new crime wave: look for friendly drunk girl. Take hi-res photo. Steal phone. Print her face. Steal EVERYTHING. Minority Report is not that far from reality, I’m just saying.

Much less irrational: just because I do not have any reason to fear a law enforcement search of my phone now doesn’t mean I won’t in the future. I have sources to protect and an identity that has been persecuted in the past. Plus, my country is run by a bloated authoritarian regime that’s hostile to protesters. If I can easily protect my data from government entities by using a slightly more involved passcode for my phone, there’s no reason I shouldn’t do it. Having “nothing to hide” is no reason to not demand the highest levels of privacy.

Bordering on rational: Strong passcodes are still the most secure way to protect your data. Face ID does not improve upon this technology. There is no reason to downgrade my security for the sake of a new gadget.

Rational as the number “2”: Apple is a trillion dollar corporation. It is way too rich and powerful for me to blindly trust that the largely privacy protecting policy it maintains today will remain its agenda down the line. The security of my identity depends on the priorities and business strategy of a corporation. If I am wary about a corporation collecting an image of my face at all, I should not let the assurances of said corporation assuage those misgivings.  

Face ID may be convenient, and is probably safe, as long as your nickname isn’t 007. The majority of us probably have nothing to hide, probably don’t have much that would motivate a very technologically intense crime, PROBABLY won’t get on the wrong side of the government. But when it comes to protecting the our phones, our identities, and our lives, probably just isn’t good enough. 

BoJack Horseman is a show that’s so prescient in its satirization of our culture that it often feels like it’s predicting the future.

Think back to the Oscars screw-up of 2017, which basically happened to BoJack a year before in Season 3, when Mr. Peanutbutter mistakenly awarded him Best Actor. Comparisons between the show’s Season 4 Episode “Thoughts and Prayers” always come up after a mass shooting, too. Most recently after the Parkland school shooting, an Alabama lawmaker said that the problem with some Republicans’ proposal to arm teachers is that some teachers are (hold your gasps) women! 

And, you know, women can’t be trusted with guns. Which was totally a BoJack thing first.

SEE ALSO: Everything coming to Netflix in September

Much like the classic “Simpsons Already Did It” joke, BoJack Horseman has become like the canary in the cole mine for some of our biggest social issues (in only a fraction of seasons as The Simpsons to boot). 

So it should come as no surprise, then, that the Season 5 episode “BoJack the Feminist” feels like a prophetic depiction of how easily we’re starting to forgive the abusive men called out by the #MeToo movement. It’s also no surprise that the original idea for the episode came long before the movement became popular, and much earlier than the inevitable comebacks now being attempted by Louis C.K. and others.

According to show creator Raphael Bob-Waksberg, the inspiration for the episode — or specifically the character of Vance Waggoner — was from one of his real-life Hollywood experiences. 

“The spark of the idea came from when my own agency CAA signed Mel Gibson on as a client. And I was really upset about that,” said Waksberg. “I feel uneasy with the idea that part of my paycheck or my show’s budget goes to a company that’s working to help the career of this guy that has screamed racial epithets at people and abused women.”

Waksberg even complained about it to the talent agency. He recounted how he was then, “very politely but firmly told that, ‘While we value you and your input and love that you care so deeply about this, we’re going to keep this man as our client. Because we believe this is the right thing to do for us.’”

(Mashable reached out to both Gibson and Waksberg’s CAA representatives for comment, but did not receive a reply. Gibson’s publicist gave the following statement: “We have no knowledge of this matter.”)

So that was that. He considered leaving CAA, but realized there really aren’t other talent agencies that would be better, or that wouldn’t sign Gibson, or someone else he objects to.

And this widespread, systemic complacency with letting bad men back into the industry became a focal point of the entire season.

“It’s emblematic of us as a larger society, and the industry as a whole.”

Both Waksberg and series art director Lisa Hanawalt were clear that, despite the inspiration, Vance Waggoner is not a one-to-one representation of Gibson. And the episode is not just about Waksberg airing his personal grievance against Gibson.

“But I do think it’s emblematic of us as a larger society, and the industry as a whole,” he said. 

Instead, Waggoner is more like this monstrous mutation of all the bad behavior we’ve let famous men get away with.

The opening scene surely recalls Gibson’s infamous arrest video. But Waggoner’s also later accused of physically abusing a sex worker, choking his wife, sexting underage girls, and drunkenly calling his daughter a slut.

Just off the top of our head, the long list of men accused of that kind of behavior includes David Hasselhoff, Johnny Depp, Alec Baldwin, James Franco, Gary Oldman, and countless others.

When Hanawalt set about designing Waggoner’s look, she worked hard to create a composite of multiple men. She thought to herself, “Ok, he’s gotta be kind of handsome, but kind of a bad boy, but also kind of look like all these dudes mashed up together,” she said. “And I think I nailed it.”

Did she ever. Waggoner’s appearance and dialogue is triggeringly recognizable to all who’ve paid attention to the commonalities in the stories about abusive men in Hollywood over the years.

But like the episode and overall season’s approach to these issues, Waksberg’s thinking is not black and white when it comes to forgiving people in the industry who’ve acted badly in the past. 

“I don’t want to be saying that, as a society, we shouldn’t forgive people. I think forgiveness is very important,” he said. Aside from being very personally significant to him, he also noted how forgiveness and redemption is a major theme in the show itself. 

“But I also think some people are largely being forgiven too easily.”

“Some people are largely being forgiven too easily.”

To Waksberg, what’s needed is nuance in the difference between forgiving a public figure like Gibson on a personal vs. professional level. 

“I want to believe he can do the work on himself and can be forgiven, but at least publicly, I have not seen evidence of that. And I don’t think I personally forgive him.”

Exploring the most difficult conversations around #MeToo and Time’s Up in Season 5 feels like a natural evolution for the show.

The issues surrounding sexism and racism in Hollywood have been a huge concern of the show and its creators, almost since the very beginning. Waksberg said that’s because harassment, assault, and inequity unavoidably come up in a writers’ room full of industry people talking about how to satirize the industry.

“We didn’t necessarily anticipate what would happen this year when we set about to write this story,” he said. “But a lot of what’s come to light [during #MeToo] we knew about before.” The specifics or extent of the abuse might’ve been news to even the biggest insiders of entertainment, “but the general behavior is not news.”

For art director Hanawalt, the show’s prescience on those topics comes back to who they hire to work on BoJack, and ensuring they welcome people to speak up. While both she and Waksberg own up to the fact that they can and need to do better as far as diversity on their staff, there are still a lot more women in creative roles than most shows.

And the rawness of how the season tackles #MeToo and Time’s Up makes it clear that those people — particularly the women — are indeed being heard. It’s probably what gives it that extra edge.

“I just feel like when a show is written and created by all white, straight men, it doesn’t tend to have the sharpest insight anymore,” Hanawalt said. “The status quo isn’t always going to be the most exciting thing. That’s why you hire people who have the most interesting things to say, not the people who make you the most comfortable with what you’re already saying.”

“When a show is written and created by all white, straight men, it doesn’t tend to have the sharpest insight anymore.”

That’s also perhaps one of the reasons why BoJack Horseman‘s tackling of #MeToo doesn’t feel new and fresh, but devastatingly true. Like, for example, when Dianne is hired to be the woman writer on BoJack’s new show Phillbert — then is told to be quiet, sit in the corner, and not chew gum loudly.

“This episode is the most exaggerated version of it, but it’s surprisingly realistic to many people’s experiences on the staff: Being hired, then expected to just be a beard for diversity as a woman or person of color or whatever else,” she said.

What Season 5 has shown is that — as we near the comeback portion of the #MeToo movement — a series like BoJack Horseman has something uniquely important to contribute to this conversation.

“Bojack has done bad things, and it’s interesting to — in this season — see those chickens come home to roost, as it were,” said Hanawalt.

In the writers’ room, Waksberg said they kept asking themselves this question of, why do we keep giving these kinds of guys more and more chances? “And then that turned into, well, do we think BoJack deserves other chances?”

The character of BoJack creates an interesting, important challenge for both its creators and fans. As an audience, we’ve come to know and invest in him personally. And now that we as a culture have finally started to question whether awful men like him deserve to be forgiven, the show gives us a glimpse into the turmoil of how one deals with realizing their friend is one of those men.

“Quite accidentally, we’ve come at a time where there’s one more story to tell about that kind of person — which is a story a lot of people have not told about these privileged, heterosexual, damaged men that really grapples with investigating the toxicity,” said Waksberg. “We’re in the twilight of stories. So I’d like to think we are finding the last interesting ground.”

“Real life is too absurd. it’s crazier than a cartoon out there.”

BoJack Season 5 doesn’t present easy answers for the hard question of what to do with the people in the entertainment industry who abused their power to do horrible things. More than anything, it asks us to wrestle with those uncomfortable questions.

“What is the difference between forgiveness and encouraging someone to be better, versus letting someone off the hook?” Waksberg asked. 

Ultimately, as a successful straight white guy himself, he says his role in the larger conversation about equality is to listen, then “learning how to navigate and use my privilege as a stepping stone or microphone for others,” he said. “It’s been a process. I’m still in the process.” 

For Hanawalt, like so many other people from marginalized groups in the entertainment industry, the injustices explored on the show this season always border on being almost too real.

Because, she said, “Real life is too absurd. it’s crazier than a cartoon out there.”

In 1969, researchers spotted a black and white sooty tern in Michigan. This hardy seabird, however, had little business visiting the Midwest. The saltwater species usually spends its life in the tropics, more than 1,000 miles away. 

Hurricane Camille — one of the most powerful storms in U.S. history — had trapped and carried the foreign creature to this distant land. Now similarly, tropical storm Florence, which made landfall Friday morning in North Carolina as a hurricane, has also ensnared birds deep inside the cyclone. 

SEE ALSO: The Atlantic Ocean is packed with storms. What’s going on?

Using radar, several meteorologists have spotted the birds flying inside Florence’s eye. But why are they there? 

Simply put, the eye of the storm, just outside the violent winds of the hurricane’s eyewall, is the best place to be. 

“Sometimes these flocks are huge,” Ryan Huang, who researches the effects of storms on bird populations at Duke University, said in an interview. “It appears as if they’re clouds.”

Hurricane and bird researchers alike aren’t actually seeing individual birds on radar. Rather, they’re observing masses of objects that clearly aren’t little spherical raindrops. 

They’re something else, something much wider than they are tall, “like winged objects,” Falko Judt, a research meteorologist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, said via email.

“One way to make sense of this signal is assuming that what the radar sees is birds,” said Judt. 

It almost certainly is. 

“People say that it’s ridiculous that you’d be able to see birds on radar,” Kenn Kaufman, a bird expert and naturalist, said in an interview. “But it’s standard. You can see insects on radar.” 

Traveling to the storm’s center

It’s little surprise that hurricanes trap birds as the storms churn over the ocean.

“There are a good numbers of birds out at sea all the time,” said Kaufman. “There are true seabirds that live out there.”

In addition, land birds also commonly migrate over the ocean. And come mid-September — the peak of the Atlantic hurricane season — the fall migration is in swing, noted Kaufman.

“They can’t fight it”

“By the second week of September, on a lot of days and nights there will be hundreds of thousands of small birds migrating over the open waters of the Atlantic,” he said. 

When a storm brews nearby, spinning counterclockwise in spiraling bands, flocks of birds can fly in. 

The wind is rushing toward the center, and grows increasingly stronger. It can be over 50 mph some 100 miles out from the core, like Florence — or raging 150 mph or greater in the core.

“They can’t fight it,” said Kaufman. “They have to fly downwind.”

Eventually, “they wind up in the eye and stay with it,” said Kaufman. “That’s obviously going to be preferable for them.”

A hellish ride

The eye of the storm might be a relatively tranquil retreat to ride out the screaming winds, but it’s still a harsh, if not deadly, experience for birds.

The animals are steering through the most extreme winds on the planet as they barrel through the storm, flying involuntarily downwind. 

“Once they’re in the eye, they’re exhausted,” said Huang.

And to begin with, there’s a good chance the birds are running low on fuel

“Migrating is already a taxing process,” noted Huang. 

Once the storm makes landfall, the land birds will likely swoop down out of the storm and take refuge, said Kaufman. Seabirds, like sooty terns, may still ride it out.

“Assuming you survive,” added Huang.

In the aftermath of hurricanes, Huang has found “wrecked birds washing up on seashores” and measured decreases in colony populations. 

It’s a rough journey, any way you cut it. 

“It’s got to be a little unnerving,” said Kaufman.