culture
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SNL Spoofs Al Sharpton
Saturday Night Live’s Kenan Thompson last night portrayed Al Sharpton, the civil rights leader-turned-MSNBC talk host, as he fumbled his way through a broadcast about the Secret Service lapses, among other issues, Mediaite reports. When asked what’s going on with the Secret Service, he said, “It’s a secret.” Thompson joked that the White House intruder…
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Chicago Man Charged in Death of Beloved Elderly Barber
A 29-year-old Chicago man with a long felony rap sheet has been charged in the death of a popular 88-year-old barber, who was known as a “pillar” of his South Side community, the Chicago Tribune reports. Samuel Higgins was looking to score some money fast, or “hit a lick,” when he and a friend spotted…
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Dallas Ebola Patient in Critical Condition
The condition of a man diagnosed with the Ebola virus in Dallas has turned critical, officials at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital said Saturday, according to the New York Daily News. The man, Thomas Duncan, 42, who arrived at the hospital on Sept. 28, was previously listed in serious but stable condition. The report about his…
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What Martin Taught Us About Relationships
In the 1990s, Fox’s Thursday-night lineup featured a young, black couple for the hip-hop generation attempting to make their relationship work amid a changing world. In the comedy Martin, Martin Payne (played by comedy icon Martin Lawrence) is the loudmouthed brother following his passion at a local radio station. The college-educated Gina Waters (played by Tisha…
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Haiti’s ‘Baby Doc’ Dies at 63
Former Haitian dictator Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier died of a heart attack Saturday at his home in Port-au-Prince, the New York Times reports. He was 63. Michel J. Martelly, the president of Haiti, announced the death in a post on Twitter. He was the son of François Duvalier, known as Papa Doc, the feared dictator,…
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CDC: What You Need to Know About Ebola
On Tuesday the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed that the first case of Ebola diagnosed in the United States was that of a man who traveled from the West African country of Liberia to Dallas in September. And on Friday a person with Ebola-like symptoms was admitted to Howard University Hospital in Washington,…
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Police: Bali Slaying Linked to N-Word Slur
A 21-year-old man became enraged after his girlfriend’s mother used the n-word against him, the girl told Indonesian police investigating the death at a hotel in Bali in August, where the three were guests, according to the Associated Press. Heather Mack, 19, and her boyfriend Tommy Schaefer, 21, are being held as suspects in the…
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Dallas Workers Race to Contain Ebola
In an effort to contain the spread of the deadly Ebola virus, a hazardous-materials crew Friday decontaminated the Dallas apartment where a visitor from Liberia was staying when he fell ill, the Associated Press reports. Residents of the apartment unit where Thomas Eric Duncan had stayed were moved to a private residence in a gated…
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Jahi McMath Moves on Command in Video
Just days after the family of a 13-year-old Oakland, Calif., girl petitioned the courts to have an Alameda County judge declare the teen alive, the family’s lawyer released a video clip showing her responding to verbal commands. In video released Friday, Nailah Winkfield, the mother of Jahi McMath, asks her daughter to move her hand,…
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How the W.K. Kellogg Foundation Hopes to Heal America’s Race Problem
America has a race problem, and one of the best ways to deal with it is to acknowledge the systemic and structural manifestations that help reinforce the country’s contentious racial history. This is what the vice president for policy and senior adviser at the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Gail Christopher, says is the focus of the…