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10 Thoughts About Soulja Boy's Awesome and Entertaining Appearance on The Breakfast Club
If you live under a (non-cocaine) rock, there’s a better than 100 percent chance that you were confused as to why Soulja Boy (is it still Soulja Boy Tell ‘Em?) was all over your social media timelines on Wednesday. It is the year of our lord 2019—why in West Hell would that lil “Superman dat…
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America. In Black.: A VSB Essay Series About the Unique and Individual Experiences of Black People in America
One of the best parts about VSB over the course of our existence—which is going on 11 years(!!!!!) come March—is that we’ve had the opportunity to write about and share many different aspects of blackness in America. Some of it has been serious and some of it has been fun, but the vast majority of…
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Middle School Teachers Are Saints
When I was younger, say 7 or 8 years old, I wanted to be an astronaut/pediatric neurosurgeon/inventor/NBA player. Though my life has been successful, it’s safe to say I’ve stopped just short of being the most awesome multi-hyphenate careerist of all time. By the time I hit my teen years, I wanted to be some…
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11 Thoughts About Surviving R. Kelly Now That I’ve Had a Chance to Process It All
Like what I can only presume was the vast majority of black America, I spent a significant portion of the past weekend either watching the dream hampton produced/directed Lifetime docuseries, Surviving R. Kelly or talking about it. The discussions dominated social media and actual face-to-face interactions with people. Nothing in recent memory did such a…
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I Don't Ever Want to Try Whatever Kool-Aid Kanye West Keeps Drinking
Radical acceptance. The Serenity Prayer. “It is what it is.” That’s just a few of the myriad methods many of us employ when trying to come to grips with shit we don’t like. You didn’t get that Chrimmuh bonus you just knew you deserved? It sucks, but being unwilling to accept it isn’t going to…
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I #StandWithBennett. Hopefully, It’s for the Long Haul
Attending an HBCU tends to unlock one’s awareness about the other hundred or so HBCUs that you’re not attending. Some of us get to school and know the big name ones, but our football and basketball schedules put schools like Benedict College, Paine College, Lane College and Lemoyne-Owen College (to name a few) on the…
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I’d Pay Good Money to See a Bone Thugs-N-Harmony Vs. Migos Rap Battle
Since the dawn of time, there has always been tension between “old school” and “new school.” Nowhere is this shit more common than in the world of hip-hop, though it’s been happening in R&B, too. Where’s the love? Despite the nostalgia we are all coked up on, half the groups we swear to love—just because…
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And Here's Why You Shouldn't Pick a Dentist Based On A Radio Ad
I don’t try to make bad choices. Really, I don’t. In fact, I don’t think most people set out to do make them either. I think we all end up in a place we hoped not to be and in retrospect say, well, that was probably a bad idea. Such was my life this past week…
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A Review of Jacquees’ 4275 Album Because He Called Himself ‘The King of R&B’
OK, Jacquees might be an idiot. Perhaps a brilliant idiot since before last week’s “King of R&B” (of his generation) moment, I couldn’t point him out in a lineup, much less tell you the name of a single, solitary song he sang. But now? That pendulum has swung the entire other way. Again, as much…
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Is It Sneakerhead Sacrilege to Not Like Jordan IIIs?
I’m not sure if I qualify as a sneakerhead or not. Most people that come into my home and see my shoe collection would probably say that I am, but I follow several people on social media whose collection of shoes would look at mine, call it a bitch and then give it a wedgie.…
