The Republican attack machine has been in full force this election season and their number one target is Barack Obama, but pulling a close second are poor people. The GOP has been attacking poor people for some time now in their policies but now the poor are attacked almost daily by their rhetoric. Wednesday at the Republican National Convention, GOP operatives hammered the President and the poor relentlessly.… [Read more]
I’m teaching a Black Politics course this summer, and I’m using Toure’s “Who’s Afraid of Post-Blackness?: What It Means to Be Black Now“ as the primary textbook. Initially, I planned to take the traditional route – lecturing from works by the usual suspects: Manning Marable, Michael Dawson, Cornel West. But I decided in the end that I wanted to discuss race in a contemporary way, and Toure’s work allows me that freedom.… [Read more]
I can’t help being fascinated by the Trayvon Martin case – by the way the events are unfolding and the ways in which narratives are being constructed and white supremacy is being exposed. It’s interesting to hear the many “takes” on the situation, including the following gems of cognition:
In the summer of 1969 I was 18 and a mere week or two away from going off to college. On the night of August 8, 1969 I was shot and killed because I was running and I was black. I can remember it like it was yesterday. It was 11:30 PM on a beautiful star-studded Saturday night in Park Slope.… [Read more]
Allow me to present the facts:
Unarmed 17-year-old male walks home from a 7-Eleven in the rain in Sanford, Florida. He carries a bag of skittles and a can of iced tea. He’s wearing jeans and a hoodie.
A volunteer neighborhood watch captain calls the police, telling the operator that he spied a “real suspicious guy” who “looks like he’s up to no good, on drugs or something.… [Read more]
After I came across this pathetic Brigham Young University (BYU) video, I felt compelled to offer, as a Black History Month gift to y’all, a little perspective.
Black history month? Why? What for? There’s no white history month?
I trust that you’re not the one saying this right now. But if this happens to be your first line of reasoning with regard to Black history, then the answer to “why” is “because of people like you.”… [Read more]
I purchased my ticket to see Red Tails yesterday! It’s the story of the first Black pilots to fly under the banner of the U.S. armed forces. They were the 332nd Fighter Group and the 477 Bombardment Group of the U.S. Army Air Corps, and they served in a segregated U.S. Army during World War II.… [Read more]
