By Julianne Malveaux — Basketball fans were looking forward to March Madness, those weeks when the best college teams face off against each other. Madness is replete this March, but…
Kobe had a singular impact on his game and the world. By Sean Gregory, TIMES — Kobe Bryant was the fair heir to Michael Jordan, a scoring assassin who could…
By Ernest DiStefano — Ernest DiStefano has written a stirring appeal for reparations for Negro League ballplayers and their descendants. This appeal in the form of a letter to Major…
Fans believe she can fly! By S.E. Williams, Black Voice News — Simone Biles thrilled gymnastic enthusiasts on Friday, August 15 as she secured her sixth national gymnastics title with…
By Gary M. Pomerantz, Signature — Today’s intersection of race, politics and sports harks back to the 1960’s. That time’s images live in our imagination: Muhammad Ali, loudly defiant, and sprinters…
Fifty years ago this week, two proud Olympians raised their fists to call attention to social injustices. Their gesture made my heart swell with pride. By Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, The Guardian…
By Earl Ofari Hutchinson, The Hutchinson Report — Trump could care less about LeBron James’s new I Promise public school. He could care even less about his IQ. What he…
Could it trigger a long-awaited “Jock Spring”? By Robert Lipsyte, The Nation — Snatching immigrant babies may have scored some points for President Trump with his base, but it was never going to light up the scoreboard like tackling black jocks. That one really played to the grandstands. The complicated combination of adoration and resentment so many white males feel for those rich, accomplished über-men is a significant but rarely…
By Patrisse Cullors, HuffPost — Right after the acquittal of Trayvon Martin’s killer in July 2013, Alicia Garza, Opal Tometi and I were devastated. We’d been following the proceedings closely. We’d watched the media criminalize 17-year-old Trayvon and humiliate his family to justify his cold-blooded murder presumably because his assailant was white-presenting. Still, we were sucker-punched by the acquittal. We stood perplexed; hadn’t we elected our first black president? Yet it was clear;…
By Mohammed Girma, The Conversation — In this age of globalisation few events draw more attention than sport as the World Cup in Russia illustrates with billions of people across the globe glued to their screens. At this time in football crazy Africa, specialists and ordinary fans are watching, discussing and analysing the World Cup. But the excitement and euphoria come with a unique challenge to the continent’s religions. Africa remains firmly devout across…
Ever since his “It’s not like I’m black, you know?” comment, Neymar has served as a focal point in Brazil’s cultural reckoning with racism, whitening, identity and public policy. By Cleuci de Oliveira, New York Times — Years before he became the most expensive player in the world; before his Olympic gold medal; before the Eiffel Tower lit up with his name to greet his professional move from Barcelona to…
By Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Sports Illustrated — I have never been prouder to be an American. That might seem like a strange confession in these dark times, when there is so much divisiveness in the country. Every day we are faced with cringe-worthy behavior by our country’s leaders: sexual harassment, enabling hate groups by publicly echoing their messages, the enactment of policies that curtail the constitutionally guaranteed civil rights of the…