Opinion
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You're Working From Home, Stressed, and Want to Defeat the Coronavirus? Masturbate!
In just the past 24 hours, the NBA suspended its season, the NCAA suspended most conference tournaments (and, by the time you read this, might have already postponed the NCAA tournament), countless schools and universities have shuttered their campuses, Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson revealed that they have the coronavirus, and we were collectively reminded,…
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Donald Trump Will NOT Catch the Coronavirus, So Don't Pray For It to Happen or Try to Speak It Into Existence
I’m not quite sure when exactly it happened, but at some point in the past week my coronavirus-related anxiety shifted from “this is a thing I should think about, I guess” to “this is a thing I should actively worry about.” Even if we’re able to effectively contain the spread of it, it now seems…
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The Root's Clapback Mailbag: Black-on-Black Clapback
Y’all won. Every week, as I prepare for the Mailbag, there’s always at least one very angry white person asking why I blame racists instead of calling out my own people. So this week, I decided to do that. This week, I decided to highlight anti-black black people who are so enamored with whiteness that…
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Space Is the Place: Nona Hendryx Takes NYC Out of This World With the Disciples of Sun Ra
When I was a child watching reruns of Star Trek, one of the things I always wondered was … where did all the black people go? Sure, there was actress Nichelle Nichols’ Uhura and she was amazing. And later, on series like Star Trek: Next Generation there was Geordi La Forge and, even later, Benjamin…
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The Root's Clapback Mailbag: Our Formal Endorsement for President of White America
The Root hates Bernie Sanders. The Root loves Bernie Sanders. Neither one of those things is true but, depending on which candidate you support, you either think The Root is actively trying to sabotage your candidate by painting them as a racist or we are selling out for Joe Biden. Or maybe it’s Elizabeth Warren.…
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The Root's Clapback Mailbag: The Last Refuge of the Scoundrel
A wise man (I think it was Rakim…or maybe my cousin Geet) once said: “Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.” Whoever said this was obviously not a regular reader of the Friday mailbag. If they were, they’d know that scoundrels have a variety of refuges, including: “Yo’ Mama”: The last refuge of child…
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The Root's Clapback Mailbag: Valentine's Day Edition
Every Friday, we clap back at hateful emails, tweets, DMs and comments from our readers. But, since today is the day when we celebrate romance, I thought we should respond to some of our emails that were about love. Unfortunately, there were none. So, we’ll just do what we usually do. Our first letter is…
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I Only Appreciated Kobe in His Totality After His Death
It has been two whole weeks since Kobe Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter, Gianna, and seven others perished in a helicopter crash near Los Angeles. I have spent the entire time trying to put my thoughts on his death together in a sensible way. So many of my friends and colleagues have said it much more…
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Which One of Y’all Called Heidi Klum a ‘White Woman’?
I don’t know who you are. I don’t know what you want. I can tell you that I don’t have money. But what I do have is a very particular set of skills. Skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. So, if you…