Opinion
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It's Fine to Just Cry, Too
I keep coming back to resilience. And how I hate how we consider it to be an essential and inherent and invaluable characteristic of Blackness. I hate it because it’s dehumanizing. Being born Black don’t make us any more resilient than anyone else. We ain’t stronger. We ain’t tougher. We’ve just been given more shit to…
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The Root's Clapback Mailbag: The More Things Change
On August 25, 2017, The Root changed the world when it began a feature called the Clapback Mailbag. Back then I thought white people would NEVER stop being racist but I must admit I was wrong. We’re really proud of the part we played in changing the national zeitgeist. Thanks to us, you get to…
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VAN JONES IS AARON BURR!
It finally dawned on me yesterday, after reading that Van Jones said Jared Kushner has “the dopest job in the world.” Which is such a Van Jones-ass thing to do and say—and not just because he’s praising the effete criminal dickwad who’s what would happen if every Jared ever and every 28-year-old MBA ever were…
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Abolish All These Damn Zoom Work Calls So I Can Be Naked While Working at Home Again
So it’s not so much that working while naked is a thing I need to do. I’m anemic, so I get cold easily. (I am the person who, immediately after checking into a hotel room, turns the thermostat to 80, leaves and doesn’t come back until the room is sufficiently toasty.) And it doesn’t feel…
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20 Years of Bringing It: What Bring It On Did for the Culture and the Conversation Around Cultural Theft
“Every time we get some, y’all come trying to steal it, putting some blonde hair on it, and calling it something different,” Isis (Gabrielle Union), captain of the fictional East Compton Clovers cheer squad, tells Rancho Carne Toros leader Torrance (Kirsten Dunst) in a confrontational scene during the cult classic film Bring It On. The…
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New York City Is Dead, Because I Killed It When I Left and Went Back Home to Pittsburgh: An Essay About Murder
“The city is dead,” I said, aloud, to no one, while each step I took crashed the same cement I’d fallen in love with. The pizza box I lugged with me—filled, just 32 minutes earlier, with a New York City pizza slice—was empty, except for crumbs. Heh. A metaphor, for the dead city. “A metaphor,…
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The Complete Guide to Defeating Voter Suppression
If you’re reading this, they don’t want to count your vote. If you, like many of our readers, are under the age of 40, progressive, live around non-white people or don’t have anyone in your circle of friends and family who owns a pair of wraparound sunglasses, Republicans are doing everything in their power to…
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Abolish MAGA Parody Hats
Conceding even the tiniest thing to a hateful and violent twerp like our president feels like a total defeat. Unfortunately, I must admit that there are (at least) three zeitgeist-related places that he has “won”—where his influence has been total and, possibly, irreversible. I’ve never been a kumbaya-ass nigga who gave any proper shits about…
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The Root's Clapback Mailbag: Children's Stories
Once upon a time, not long agoWhen you didn’t have to wear a mask to the grocery storeBefore an orange Klansman became presidentCaucasians were behaving like they had some sense.There were some white people who were misledto believe we gave a fuck when they just said:“I don’t understand why you’re so madBecause we sold your…