culture
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It Looks Like the Ferguson Grand Jury Decision Will Be Announced Monday
According to sources familiar with a Wednesday conference call that included key elected officials, the St. Louis County grand jury’s decision in the case of Ferguson, Mo., police Officer Darren Wilson is expected to be announced publicly Monday. And sources close to the investigation state that they are not expecting Wilson to be indicted. A number of key…
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Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: College Athletes Should Be Paid
NBA icon Kareem Abdul-Jabbar put pen to paper and made a case for why college athletes should be paid. In a 1,300-word essay published in Jacobin magazine, Abdul-Jabbar spoke firsthand about his experiences as a basketball player at UCLA and described how he could barely rub two pennies together on most days. “Despite the hours…
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Even George Clinton Gets Old—but the Atomic Dog Still Has a Lot of Funk Left in Him
George Clinton is an old man now. He is 73, and gone are the days when he used to hop on the table of some dinner theater’s guest, midperformance, and pour wine over his head. He doesn’t wear a diaper made out of hotel towels anymore; and he’s traded in his colorful hair extensions for…
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America’s ‘Black Borat’ Attempts to Explain Russia’s Love-Hate Relationship With Obama
A few insults, an illegal invasion—throw in a visual jab involving bananas and a spanking—and the relationship between Russia and the United States has seen better days. At first glance, many Russians seem to delight in attacking President Barack Obama personally and racially in a way that is shocking even for a people known for…
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Beyond the Lights Review: A Love Story With a Deeper Message
Beyond the Lights, opening in theaters Friday, is the third feature film from writer-director Gina Prince-Bythewood, whose other works include The Secret Life of Bees (2008), the TV movie Disappearing Acts (2000) and the classic love story Love and Basketball (2000). If the success of Love and Basketball helped propel Prince-Bythewood into the Hollywood stratosphere, along…
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The Other Thing the Lincoln University President Got Wrong About Women Who Have Sex
Lincoln University President Robert R. Jennings stirred up a lot of trouble for himself when remarks he made in September to female students insinuating that women lied about rape went viral this week. After much public outrage, he apologized on Tuesday. “My message was intended to emphasize personal responsibility and mutual respect,” Jennings wrote. “I…
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Thomas Eric Duncan’s Family Settles With Dallas Hospital
The family of U.S. Ebola patient zero Thomas Eric Duncan, who was the first—and so far the only—person to die in America from the disease, has settled with the Dallas hospital that cared for Duncan, Reuters reports. The family will not have to pay for the care that Duncan received while he was being treated…
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Father of Los Angeles Lakers Player Killed in Philadelphia
Los Angeles Lakers guard Wayne Ellington Jr. is on an indefinite leave of absence after the team confirmed that a man shot and killed in Philadelphia on Sunday was his father, the Associated Press reports. According to the report, police said that they found Wayne Ellington Sr., 57, in the driver’s seat of a car…
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Study: Brazilian Police Kill 6 People a Day
Excessive use of force by police in Brazil has left more 11,000 people dead over approximately five years, averaging six deaths a day, a public-safety nongovernmental organization reported on Tuesday, according to CBS and the Associated Press. A study by the Brazilian Forum on Public Safety pointed out that the total number of deaths in…
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Lincoln University President Apologizes for Comment About Rape
Lincoln University President Robert R. Jennings sent out an apology on Tuesday for remarks he made insinuating that women lied about rape, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports. “My message was intended to emphasize personal responsibility and mutual respect,” Jennings wrote in his apology, according to the Inquirer. “I apologize for my choice of words. I certainly did…