culture
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My Little Pony: The Trump Campaign Is Magic … and Lazy
Donald Trump’s run for president might be the most bootleg, shoestring, lazy effort by any candidate in the history of the presidency. Maybe it’s because of the racist, xenophobic stink that permeates everything he touches and, in turn, pushes any self-respecting Republican far away from his candidacy. At this point, he might as well be…
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Nikki Giovanni on Her Friend Nina Simone: If She Were Here, She’d Be Wearing a 'Black Lives Matter' T-Shirt
The documentary The Amazing Nina Simone, by filmmaker Jeff L. Lieberman, provides an intimate look at the life of singer Nina Simone, who combined art with activism. Often called the voice of the civil rights movement, Simone made songs, including “Mississippi Goddam,” that spoke to the turbulence of the time and the brutal fight for civil…
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For Colored People … When the Republican Convention Gets to Be Too Much: A Drinking Game
Stephen Colbert has a bingo card to play during the Republican National Convention. But for women and people of color watching this year’s RNC, it’s going to be a long, hard slog with more than a few cringe-inducing and drink-worthy moments. Ways to survive the madness: Take a sip … every time anyone says, “Barack…
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Angry, Paranoid and Trained to Kill: How America Made the Baton Rouge, La., and Dallas Shooters
In the past two weeks, cops in Texas and Louisiana have been ambushed, shot and killed by black men who reportedly were tired of the senseless killings of unarmed black men, women and children by police. I say “reportedly” because we won’t ever know. Both men in question—Micah Xavier Johnson, 25, and Gavin Long, 29—were killed…
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1 Mother Had Enough of Being Afraid for Her Sons, so She Did Something About It
Last August, as I picked up a strawberry birthday cake and Batman-themed decorations for my son’s seventh birthday party, I began to cry. It was a familiar scenario. I cry on all of my two sons’ birthdays. They are 7 and 4. Mine are not tears of joy but, rather, tears of fear. Fear for…
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Basketball Wives LA: The Thrill Is Gone
When I got a press email announcing a new season of Basketball Wives LA, I was legitimately surprised. I’d assumed that VH1 decided to take this show out back, shoot it and put it out of its misery to make room for new blood on its programming slate. You know, the humane thing to do.…
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Want to Pull a #Blaxit? Becoming a Black Expat Is Harder Than You Think
#Blaxit was last week’s Twitter reality check as folks explained the realities of what American culture would lose if African Americans, indeed, returned to “Africa.” (In quotes because most of us wouldn’t really know to which part of Africa to go.) But, beyond that, the conversation about moving out of the U.S. has surged over…
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America, Bye: Why Black America Is Leaving While Staying Put
I was a grad student at the UCLA film school, getting my MFA in screenwriting, when a consumer-trends company asked me to work for them. Why did they want me? Well, they advised major corporations on how to best situate their products for the African-American consumer market, and in order to do that effectively, the…
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8 Times Diana Ross Reminded Us She Was Magic
Diana Ross blessed the world with her immensely successful self-titled album in 1976. The iconic project (which was her seventh studio album) included two No. 1 pop smashes—“Theme From Mahogany (Do You Know Where You’re Going To)” and “Love Hangover”—among other chart-topping singles, like “I Thought It Took a Little Time (but Today I Fell…
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A User’s Guide to Dating While Black During Revolutionary Times
“Do you ever get scared driving around out here?” We were somewhere between Colorado and Nebraska, nothing to be seen for miles but fields, cows and the occasional Trump billboard. It was our first road trip in a newly minted “vacationship,” and after enjoying an extended Fourth of July weekend out West, my gentleman friend…