culture
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Ken Burns Wipes Away the Myths to Reveal the Real Jackie Robinson in His New Documentary
It’s never too late to make amends, even 69 years after the fact. The Philadelphia City Council proved as much on March 31, when it unanimously passed a resolution honoring Jackie Robinson and officially apologizing for the treatment he endured while visiting in 1947, the year he broke Major League Baseball’s color line. “Unfortunately in…
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There Is No Justice Without Ending Money Bail
On any given day, roughly half a million unconvicted people sit in jail, at a cost to taxpayers of about $14 billion a year. Incarcerated defendants are more likely to be convicted and sentenced to jail or prison compared with those who are released—and for longer times. Pretrial detention can also cause defendants devastating personal…
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By Using Tech to Solve Social Issues, Black Innovators Have a Shot at Closing the Funding Gap
Fred Hutson isn’t one to miss an opportunity. Back in 2007, at age 24, he saw an opportunity to improve the distribution of marijuana to Florida by shipping it through FedEx, UPS and DHL from his mail store in Las Vegas. Unfortunately, that knocking sound he heard in October of that year wasn’t opportunity but…
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The Carmichael Show: Smart, Funny and Real
If you watched The Carmichael Show when it premiered this past summer, you know it doesn’t play it safe. Still, many who are now enjoying the show’s second season were surprised to see the comedy loosely based on comedian Jerrod Carmichael’s own life tackling charged issues like allegations of sexual assault against Bill Cosby and…
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Atlanta Entrepreneur Paul Judge Raises $12,500,000 From Amazon.com for New Home Wi-Fi Device
Paul Judge is something of a phenomenon in Atlanta’s bustling tech scene. As a serial entrepreneur, investor and adviser, Judge lives by the challenge of solving hard problems and building companies to make the world better. Twenty years ago, the Louisiana native ventured to Morehouse to attend college; there he earned a degree in computer…
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Schools Spend More Money Policing Students Than Helping Them
On Wednesday night, we saw a video of yet another student being physically brutalized and criminalized by an armed school police officer, this time in San Antonio. The 12-year-old girl, Janissa Valdez, was body-slammed, face-first, on the concrete before being handcuffed and taken away. The scene was reminiscent of another horrific incident involving an officer…
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Why Bill Clinton Is the Least-Deserving Honorary Black Person, Explained
Who is Bill Clinton? Bill Clinton is a white man. Why is Bill Clinton in the news today? Bill Clinton is a white man who happened to be president of the United States from 1992 to 2000. His wife, Hillary Clinton, a white woman, is running for president now. Bill Clinton was a popular president…
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Scandal Recap: Olivia Goes All the Way Over to the Dark Side
Remember last season when Olivia Pope was kidnapped and put up for sale on a global auction block (during Black History Month, no less)? President Fitz Grant had selected his old friend, Andrew Nichols, to be his vice president, but as it turned out, Andrew had designs on Fitz’s wife and his job. So Andrew had Olivia…
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Watch: How Chi Ali Went From Convicted Rapper to Human Rights Activist
In 2001, rapper Chi Ali was arrested for the shooting death of his girlfriend’s brother, Sean Raymond. He spent a year evading police and even appeared on an episode of America’s Most Wanted. He ended up doing 12 years in prison for the violent crime and has turned his life around. He earned a bachelor’s…
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Empire Recap: Well, That Escalated Quickly
At some point I’m going to have to accept that my relationship with Empire is like Charlie Brown and the football. Against my better judgment, I’m always ready to get invested in a storyline, and then the writers resolve it before the commercial break. In this episode, “A Rose by Any Other Name,” Lee Daniels…