Borrowed from @EthicalAmerican: I owe my Trump-supporting friends an apology. I’ve been critical of the Trump presidency these last four years and am still exhausted from the experience. But to be fair President Trump wasn’t that bad other than…. – when he incited an insurrection against the government – mismanaged a pandemic that killed nearly half a million Americans – separated children from their families – lost those children in…
As a white person, how can YOU help?
A few nights ago, I got a DM from a friend asking what she can do to help in the current climate. Now, this isn’t new…I’ve been both heartened and heartbroken by the white friends in my life who have reached out in this way. Heartened, because, it seems like we, as black people, are finally being seen. Heartbroken, because, I’ve lost a lot of friends over this. Some…
When did I know my blackness was a target?
Andreas Hale, a writer and senior editor at @sportingnews & @DAZN_USA among others, asked a question on Twitter the other day: “I want to see something: Black people, when was the exact moment you realized that your skin color was the reason you were treated different and your innocence was ripped away? How confused and hurt were you?” As I started to think about this, I realized it needed…
Just to be clear: You can’t have PERMISSION to say the N word
If you go to your friends house, and he says, “Make yourself at home! Grab a beer from the fridge!”, you know that doesnt mean you can go in ALL houses and grab beers from ALL fridges. You know that this permission extends just to that one fridge. In fact, in many cases it extends to just that one night…this isn’t forever permission. This is something we all understand, I…
Trump, the GOP and the violence of words
In a digital age filled with memes, DMs and quick hits from trolls, its easy to forget that words actually MEAN THINGS. We get so caught up in what was once called l33tspeak, with our LOLs and J/Ks and IDFWNWFWNIDFW, that we lose sight of paying attention to what people are actually saying, the words they use and the meaning behind them. Our news feeds these past few weeks…
Funny how history and logic escapes these people
Yesterday, a good friend posted the following meme on Facebook with the words, “Fight me on this. I dare you.“. He’s a good friend, whom I care about, so I was tempted to just move along. We sit on opposite sides of the political spectrum, he and I, but, we share a lot of commonalities: A love of heavy metal, a passion for beer in damn near all it’s forms,…
Once more for the cheap seats: Donald Trump IS a racist
Tom Arnold, the actor from “True Lies” and “Roseanne”, is on a mission to find what he is calling the “Trump Tapes”, so much so that he has created a tv show about his search. The idea is that someone somewhere has outtakes from “The Apprentice”, in which Trump can be heard saying the word “nigger”. I can’t speak to what Arnold’s motivation is, be it truth or publicity, but,…
Lester: bless your little inbred heart
I held off really diving back into this blogging thing. I knew it would eat up time, probably cause me to spew more than a little anger, and lead to idiots arguing with me who hadn’t taken the time to actually research the facts. Instead, they would simply parrot whatever Faux News or Orangina 45 said most recently. Then “Lester” came along, bless his racist little heart, and gave…
I’m done blacksplaining to you people
Wiktionary.com defines “blacksplain” as a slang term meaning, “Of a black person in a group with non-black people: to explain some concept which is very common in black culture but unknown to non-black members of the group.” It is a blend of the words “black” and “explain”. For people of color, we find ourselves blacksplaining all the time if we travel mainly in white circles in society. At work, with…
Laura Ingraham is racist trash
I had fully intended to come back into this blogging thing with more essay like material. I even have a piece in the works. But then, Faux News host Laura Ingraham opened her mouth, blew her racist little dog whistle and made the decision for me. LeBron James should “Shut up and dribble”, she says. She says this after taking a jab at his “grammar” and “barely intelligible” diction. Which…