Race Matters
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Separate, but Equally Dangerous: How the Jussie Smollett and Liam Neeson Controversies Reinforce Racist Narratives About Black Men
As the survivor of a violent crime, I can attest that the aftermath is, in some ways, the hardest part. That’s when the physical pain, perhaps previously dulled by adrenaline, really kicks in—along with regrets, doubts, fears about the future, and that lingering beast known as PTSD. Twelve years ago, after I was robbed and…
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Kurtis Blow Responds to Va. Attorney General's Apology for 80's Blackface Photo
While the Commonwealth of Virginia awaits the resolution of a series of scandals involving its Governor and Lieutenant Governor, there remains the matter of Attorney General Mark R. Herring, who apologized for wearing blackface styled after rap legend Kurtis Blow at a costume party in 1980, while he was 19. While national Democrats push for…
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Liam Neeson Explains Why There’s No Such Thing as Racism
Before we begin, let me assure you that no one is outraged. Contrary to the assumptions of many, most people who have lived their entire existence under a system of white supremacy are rarely outraged by racism. Whether it is hearing one’s governor confess to using shoe polish as a foundation or watching the president…
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On Well-Intended White Folks: Thoughts on Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam and the Making of a Public Image
Less than eight months ago, after delivering a speech to a room full of educators about teaching strategies to help educators acknowledge and heal from a history of racism in education, I took a seat to hear the Gov. Ralph Northam speak. After expressing his commitment to educational justice, he held my book, For White…
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Police Pocketing Innocent People’s Money: Report Shows Huge Racial Gap in South Carolina Civil Forfeitures
A new investigative project from the Greenville News and Anderson Independent Mail analyzing civil forfeitures in South Carolina reveals that police departments across the state have netted millions of dollars from state residents—the vast majority of them being black men. Despite accounting for just 13 percent of South Carolina’s population, black men composed 65 percent…
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‘It’s Okay to Be White’: Charlottesville Police Not Investigating Zeta Phi Beta Mural Defaced by White Supremacists [Updated]
Charlottesville Police say they will not be investigating an incident in which a popular white supremacist slogan, “It’s Okay to Be White” was tagged over a Zeta Phi Beta mural at the University of Virginia. According to the historically black sorority, members of the UVA chapter of Zeta Phi Beta painted the mural on Beta…
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It Was Always Going to End Like This
There comes a point after you’ve consumed enough movies to be consciously cognizant of the rhythms and cadences of them that you’re able to recognize certain cinematic tells and predict outcomes based on them. A character randomly coughs in the first 15 minutes? He has cancer—or, if it’s a Tyler Perry movie, AIDS—and he’s probably…
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An Open Apology to the Covington Catholic MAGA Hat Harassment Team
Dear White Boys, In the past few days, you have endured ridicule, scorn and public outrage over your actions at the combination of a pro-life rally and an Indigenous Peoples March in Washington, DC. After a “longer video” surfaced, critics of your tactics were forced to retract their previous accusations that you were a mob…
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You Don't Say? Joe Biden Preaches to the Choir About White America's Systemic Racism
At a breakfast Monday morning in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, former Vice President Joe Biden stood in front of a crowd of black people and told them “white America has to admit there is systemic racism.” The breakfast was hosted by Al Sharpton’s National Action Network, HuffPost reports, and it was attended…
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Martin Luther King Jr. and the White Delusion of a 'Non-Racist' America
There are two MLKs. There once was a man named Martin Luther King Jr. who actually lived and breathed. He was a radical who believed in the redistribution of wealth, argued for slave reparations and that wrote that moderate whites who didn’t speak out on racism were just as bad as the Ku Klux Klan.…