By Sen. Hank Sanders — It’s a crying shame. No. It’s a damn shame. It’s a damn shame what the Mayor of Montgomery and its police did to two Black women leaders. More broadly speaking, it’s a damn shame what these same forces did to four African American leaders and one White leader of Jewish background. All were fighting heroically to save hundreds of lives in Alabama per year. It’s…
By Earl Ofari Hutchinson — Since George Floyd was slain there have been ten national live voter polls taken. The polls predictably show that Biden has a whopping lead over Trump among Black voters. But they also show that a lot of Blacks still aren’t buying Biden. They’re buying Trump. There are just enough of them to raise the question why and to raise the worry that they could cause…
By Dr. Maulana Karenga — The recent passing of Rev. Joseph Lowery (October 6, 1921 – March 27, 2020), Rev. Cordy Tindell (C.T.) Vivian (July 30, 1924 – July 17, 2020, and Rep. John Lewis (February 21, 1940 – July 17, 2020), three major leaders of the civil rights phase of the Black Freedom Movement, rightfully causes and encourages us to lift them up and to recount and reflect on…
“We don’t need someone in the Senate or House to try to build their political career off of this moment.” By Laura Barrón-López — In 2015, thousands of Black activists gathered in Ohio for the first national Black Lives Matter convention to consider where the movement would direct its energy. Attendees in the crowd held up red construction paper to signal “no” to a handful of narrow options, like focusing…
By Earl Ofari Hutchinson — The instant the news flashed that Congressman John Lewis died the expected and much deserved avalanche of tributes poured in from all corners. Trump’s tribute was in that avalanche. The tributes all pretty much followed the same pattern. Lewis was praised as a civil rights icon, courageous, unremitting, and a historic example of how a life devoted to civil rights can result in monumental changes…
By Dr. Julianne Malveaux — Nero, the Roman Emperor who legendarily fiddled while Rome burned is a symbol for an irresponsible, ineffective, and callous leader who shows indifference to people in crisis. The great Rome fire took place in the first century AD. The fiddle wasn’t invented until the eleventh century, so it is unlikely that the hedonistic emperor played the fiddle while his city was burning. More likely, he…
The roots of modern policing are steeped in a white supremacy from which none are immune. By Audrey Farley, The New Republic — On August 10, 2016, Tony Timpa, a 32-year-old white businessman, called the police, claiming he needed help. As Timpa told the dispatcher, he had recently stopped taking his medication for schizophrenia and depression, had consumed drugs, and was afraid for his safety. Officers arrived on the scene outside a…
By Dr. Maulana Karenga — This is a revisiting of an ongoing conversation beginning in 2015 about taking down symbols of oppression, especially Confederate flags, but also statues, murals and all public signs, symbols and celebrations of our domination, deprivation and degradation as a people and other people of color. My argument here, as then, is that these acts are necessary, but not sufficient, an important start, but not the end of the long, difficult and…
By Ajamu Brown — The international outcry over police brutality and racial injustice towards Black Americans have amplified a myriad of underlying issues, from the lingering effects of slavery and Jim Crow laws to modern mass-incarceration and high unemployment. The severity of the financial impact on the entire nation is still unknown. But with each economic shock millions of workers of color, particularly Black people, will have little bargaining power…
If you ask Palestinians in the Jordan Valley how they feel about annexation, many will say that they were already annexed long ago. By Salem Barahmeh, +972 Magazine — The view from my grandparents’ house in Jericho, the city where I grew up, looks on to the mountain ridges of the Jordan Valley that thunder down into the Dead Sea. Over the horizon of those mountains, from a Mediterranean Sea…
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