By allowing her wedding to be more than a pageant of tradition, Markle has started as I hope she means to go on. By Afua Hirsch, The Guardian — Prince…
Private prisons have for years enriched themselves by exploiting detained immigrant labor. They must be held accountable. By Azadeh Shahshahani, The Guardian — In 2017, officials at the Stewart immigration detention…
The latest from the legendary filmmaker, which made its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, features a David Duke character who sounds awfully familiar to Donald Trump. By Richard Porton, The…
Tian Chen, The Pathfinder International — On Chinese New Year’s Eve, a group of Chinese friends and I were feasting on dumplings in Cape Town while watching the CCTV Chinese…
By Rochaun Meadows-Fernandez, Truthout — Institutional racism caused me to have a medical emergency a month after giving birth to my son. The emergency was entirely preventable. Following the birth,…
Angry young white men, the “incel rebellion” and an age of worldwide reaction. By Conor Lynch, Salon — If there is one thing that seems to unite the most extreme political…
Marijuana reform can help black communities. That doesn’t make it “reparations.” By P.R. Lockhart — New York gubernatorial candidate Cynthia Nixon is facing criticism after suggesting that giving black people access to marijuana licenses could serve as a “form of reparations” for black communities. The controversy started after Nixon, who is challenging current Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the state’s upcoming Democratic primary, appeared at the NYC Cannabis Parade on May…
After the success of the Moral Monday protests, the pastor is attempting to revive Martin Luther King, Jr.,’s final—and most radical—campaign. By Jelani Cobb — At first glance, the crowds of people congregating on a block of Mulberry Street, a stretch of squat brick buildings near downtown Memphis, on the morning of April 4th, might have been there for a variety of reasons. The street venders selling T-shirts and posters…
What does it take to succeed as a young black entrepreneur in a sector largely dominated by white men seen as daring trailblazers? By Rose Hackman — Three years ago,…
How Kanye’s ignorant comments fortify the most pernicious lies of white supremacy. By Clint Smith — This past week, in an interview with TMZ, Kanye West claimed that slavery was a choice. “When you hear about slavery for 400 years … 400 years? That sounds like a choice,” he said. Much has already been written about West’s recent exploits on and off Twitter. In the past week, he has publicly embraced…
Kanye West wants freedom—white freedom. By Ta-Nehisi Coates — I could only have seen it there, on the waxed hardwood floor of my elementary-school auditorium, because I was young then, barely 7 years old, and cable had not yet come to the city, and if it had, my father would not have believed in it. Yes, it had to have happened like this, like folk wisdom, because when I think of that…
Bill Otis believes America must maintain draconian policies to be tough on crime. No wonder Trump picked him for a key administration post. By Matt Ford — Bill Otis doesn’t think too highly of the criminal justice reform movement in America today. Last year, the Georgetown University law professor told NPR that mandatory-minimum sentences were a “big success,” citing the drop-off in crime since the 1980s. In blog posts, he’s even more blunt: “Q:…