Warning: This post contains images and descriptions that you will not be able to mentally unsee. Please continue with caution…or not at all. I had the ‘opportunity’ to watch a rerun of the 2015 BET Awards this week. It would be more accurate to say I was obliged to watch it, since my cousin provided […]
I have lived a pretty good life, by most accounts. In fact, i wouldn’t have known (or thought) I was “poor” if I hadn’t gone to school with or lived in close proximity to so many people who were “rich”. Because of those factors, I have been labelled a dadaba (literal translation: Daddy’s girl; or […]
I have to confess, where African and diaspora relations are concerned, I thought that it would be simpler to frame my thoughts and present them than the task has proven to be. I have been – in a word – naïve. There is nothing simple about the factors that separate or, conversely, bind people of […]
In September, 2014, a New York Times report highlighted how the influx of African immigrants is shifting the demographics of New York and the USA at large. The article’s author, Sam Roberts wrote: “Between 2000 and 2010, the number of legal black African immigrants in the United States about doubled, to around one million. During […]
On Feb. 29, 1940, Hattie McDaniel took a long, solitary walk from a segregated table in the back of the Coconut Grove Hotel to accept her Oscar award for the Best Supporting Actress category for her role as Mammy in ‘Gone With the Wind’. She was the first Black actor in history to receive the […]
On January 23, 1963, Malcolm X gave a speech at Michigan State University in which he described two camps of Negro: the house Negro and the field Negro. In that speech, he goes on to lay out the differences in the characteristics of the two. The house Negro presumably loves and adores his master. They […]
On Saturday morning I decided to take a break from my social media networks because I felt overwhelmed by all the news and opinions that were being flung from all angles. Mary, Kareem and Joseph, were there ONLY two issues going on in the world? Gayness and racism, gayness and racism. Ahmba! As one user […]
On Friday, June 26, 2015, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled 5-4 in favor of same sex marriage and many people are in their feelings about it. The media would have you believe that the only people who have a problem with this ruling are backwater, semi-literate, Bible thumping, snake wielding traditionalists sweating […]
I have officially reached the breaking point. I knew I had gotten there when I told a Swedish woman that white people just need to leave us the f*** alone if they can’t find it within themselves to treat Black people humanely and with some common, human decency. There was no imploring for discourse, no […]