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Yeezus Returns: Kanye West Brings His Sunday Service Home to the Chi
If you blinked, you would have missed it; but if you didn’t, oh what a revelation! On Sunday, Kanye West brought his young, soaring choir back home, where his heart is, and it was chuuuuch, children. Black church, to be specific, complete with organs, synthesizer, horns, and, uh, Chance the Rapper, who blessed the crowd…
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Lizzo Gets Real About Her Blues in ‘I’m Listening,’ Kicking Off Suicide Prevention Week
In June, “Truth Hurts” singer Lizzo went on social media to share that she was going through a rough time, ending her Instagram post, “Life hurts.” The IG post, which has garnered more than two million views noted, “I’m depressed and there’s no one I can talk to because there’s nothing anyone can do about…
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A Black Woman Takes Us Into the Swirl of Bipolar Disorder in New Memoir, I’m Telling the Truth, But I’m Lying
Bassey Ikpi’s I’m Telling The Truth, But I’m Lying, the 43-year-old’s journey into her mental health struggle, is not a traditionally written memoir—neither in its structure nor in its nonchronological narrative. It is poetic, it is revelatory, it is distressing; it is, at times, exhausting. It is a literal entree into the mind of someone…
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Eddie Murphy Will Host SNL After 35 Years Away From the Stage That Spawned Him
After years, maybe decades, of family fare by the way of The Klumps, or Shrek’s donkey, genius comedian Eddie Murphy will be bringing that heat, and on the stage where he began as a 19-year-old, on a little show called Saturday Night Live. Murphy, who spent about four seasons on SNL in the early 1980s…
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Galveston Asks Texas AG to Block Release of Officers’ Body Cam Footage From Day Mentally Ill Black Man Paraded Through Streets
In the latest development in the deeply disturbing incident where Donald Neely was arrested on Aug. 3 for misdemeanor trespassing, the city of Galveston has asked the Texas attorney general’s office if it can stop the release of the officers’ body camera recordings. Also, the so-called “mounted patrol policy” that the city said the two…
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Suicides in Jails Are Preventable: How a Unique Approach May Help Curb Self-Harm in Confinement
Conspiracy theories aside, Jeffrey Epstein is one of the latest and most prominent of the hundreds that die by suicide yearly in America’s jails. His untimely death saw the Bureau of Prisons chief fired and caused heads to roll at the federal Metropolitan Correctional Center: the warden of the jail was reassigned, and two staffers…
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Body-Cam Footage Shows 19-Year-Old De’Von Bailey Running Away as He Was Shot by Police; Autopsy Rules Death a Homicide
Once again, something that started so innocuously, with the words, “Hey guys” spoken by a police officer, has left bullets in the back of a dead black teen. Nineteen-year-old De’Von Bailey, of Colorado Springs, Colo., was shot and killed by a Colorado Springs police officer on Aug. 3. Recently released body-camera footage from that day…
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Texas Rangers Decline to Criminally Investigate Officers Who Paraded Black Man in Street Like Runaway Slave
No surprise here. If police are barely investigated, hardly charged, and scarcely convicted for killing black people—on video—why would they face any sort of consequence for parading a black man through the streets tied to a rope while on horseback? And so it goes. The Texas Rangers announced on Friday that the actions of two…
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Jay-Z Reportedly to Get Majority Ownership in NFL Team; Eric Reid Calls Move ‘Despicable’
With at least half of his 30 pieces of silver, Shawn “Jay-Z” Carter will soon acquire a “significant ownership interest” in an NFL team, reports TMZ, making him the first black person to be an owner in the league’s history. The team itself was not disclosed, but a source told the site that the deal…
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Pediatricians: Black Children Suffer Significantly From Racism
Surprise! Racism—that “thing” white people say doesn’t exist—has dire long-term effects on the health of black children and adolescents, according to a report released by the country’s largest group of pediatricians. The report, crafted into a first-of-its-kind policy statement from the American Academy of Pediatrics, calls racism “a socially transmitted disease passed down through generations,…
