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Why People Are Upset That Zoe Saldana Is Playing Nina Simone, Explained
Who is Zoe Saldana? Zoe Saldana is a star actress who’s been in numerous science fiction and fantasy blockbusters, most notably Avatar, Star Trek, The Guardians of the Galaxy and Drumline. Wait, Drumline was fantasy? Of course! In it, she was the baddest senior on campus and she fell in love with a freshman. A…
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Zoe Saldana As Nina Simone Is What Happens When Diversity Doesn't
When news first broke a few years ago that Zoe Saldana would be cast in Nina — the yet-to-be-released biopic about the iconic artist and activist — I wasn’t as put off about the aesthetic dissimilarity between Saldana and Simone as many of us seemed to be. Mainly because I generally don’t believe an actor needs to…
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Louis Farrakhan Admires…Donald Trump (And Yes, This Is A Real Thing That Really, Actually Happened)
When I first saw the news about Minister Louis Farrakhan praising and complimenting Donald Trump circulating my newsfeeds and timelines, I assumed it was a story from The Onion. “Haha!” I initially thought, “Those jokers at The Onion really tickle my knickers!” Okay, that’s a lie. I knew it wasn’t from The Onion. It would…
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Chris Rock Was Really Bad Last Night, And The #OscarsSoWhite Skits Were Even Worse
I’ve started and stopped writing this three times already; scribbling a few sentences out and deleting them as soon as I was finished typing them. Because, as the title suggests, I am going to talk about how bad Chris Rock was at the Oscars last night, and how bad the #OscarsSoWhite skits were — skits…
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Why You Need To Care About What's Happening To Melissa Harris-Perry
The cover photo from my Facebook profile is a screenshot of my appearance on Melissa Harris-Perry last August. I don’t get anxious much when meeting new people; at least not anymore. But I was anxious then. Partially because it was my first time on national television, and I hoped my dad and my aunts in…
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Donald Trump Proves You Can Do Anything You Put Your Mind to … if You’re a Rich White Man
The concept of the American dream has been an essential—perhaps the most essential—aspect of our country’s mythos since its inception. Yet the phrase itself didn’t become standard until 1931, when James Truslow Adams articulated and popularized it in the book Epic of America: But there has been also the American dream, that dream of a…
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How To Be Unapologetically Black
On Tuesday, I was at Google’s New York City office for a panel titled “Breaking Through The Noise: Making Our Voices Visible, Scalable And Impactful.” For roughly 90 minutes, David Wilson (founder of The Grio), Tiffany Warren (Senior VP, Chief Diversity Officer at Omnicom Group/Founder & President, ADCOLOR®), Lilly Workneh (Black Voices Editor at Huffington Post)…
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Five Ways Babies Are Basically Tiny Hoteps
1. They always #staywoke…like, literally Pictured above is my three month old daughter. That photo was taken by my cousin while she was visiting us last weekend, and I’m certain she took it some time between 7pm and 10pm. Because that’s when she was visiting us. But, if my cousin happened to visit us at 3am or…
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Want To "Make America Great Again!" But Don't Know How? Easy. Legalize White Slavery
“Make America Great Again!” has been an unquestionably effective, shrewd, and admittedly genius campaign strategy for Donald Trump. Sequencing those four words in that order is a brilliantly succinct way of communicating two separate and equally powerful messages: 1. America was once great, is no longer great, but can be great again 2. America was…
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Exclusive: A Leaked Email Exchange Between Drake And Kanye West From This Afternoon
Months ago, our sources were able to find multiple leaked email conversations between celebrities such as Drake, Kanye, Meek Mill, and President Obama. After taking an extended break, our sources were able to find another exchange. This time, between Drake and Kanye after the “Work” video was released today. A condensed version of the conversation is…
