Last month was a big month for the civil rights community as the Supreme Court finally recognized same-sex marriage, but this wasn’t the only win. The Supreme Court also preserved the legal doctrine of disparate impact in a fair-housing case (pdf). While it doesn’t have the same direct, emotional impact as the gay-marriage case, the court’s decision regarding…

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Voting Rights Act. The anniversary follows the release of Ava DuVernay’s film Selma, which documents the movement that gave birth to the VRA. In scene after scene, the film reminds us just how vehemently whites openly opposed equal voting rights for all. Today, however, thanks…

Last week the Supreme Court issued a decision upholding a ban on the use of affirmative action by public universities in Michigan. Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented strongly and, in addition to reviewing the legal basis for the use of affirmative action, issued a personal challenge: to speak candidly about race. Conversations about affirmative action…

While I applaud Lean In’s recent launch of their Ban Bossy campaign—some like it, some don’t—I encourage them to do more. It’s not, of course, that there’s a problem with the word “bossy”; it’s that societally, we hold different expectations about bossiness for girls and women. And just as we need to work to change how…

In his remarks regarding the George Zimmerman verdict last summer, President Obama challenged Americans to “wring as much bias” from themselves as possible. We need to do “some soul-searching,” Obama advised the nation. Amid all the media coverage of the Zimmerman and now the Michael Dunn verdicts, I’m left wondering if we aren’t forgetting to…