culture
-
Texas Man Who Overpaid Child Support Is Released From Prison
Clifford Hall, the Texas man who went to jail even after overpaying child support debt that was caused by a clerical error, has been released from prison, his lawyer, Tyesha Elam, confirmed to The Root. Hall was released on July 2 after an associate judge suspended the sentence during a routine jail review hearing. He…
-
Stephen A. Smith Apologizes for Domestic Violence Remarks
It only took a weekend for cooler heads to prevail and for Stephen A. Smith to back away from Twitter. On Monday the normally brash and cocky Smith issued a heartfelt two-minute apology for his controversial statements regarding domestic violence and Ray Rice on ESPN2’s First Take. During the discussion on last Friday’s show about…
-
Formerly Homeless Student Selling Handwritten Letter From Obama for Tuition
The president of the United States wrote to him advising that he finish his education. Jesse Grainger is indeed taking President Barack Obama’s handwritten advice, selling the letter he received for $9,500 to use for tuition, the New York Post reports. Formerly homeless, the young man wrote to Obama some years ago to tell his…
-
Boko Haram Abducts Wife of Cameroon’s Vice Prime Minister
The terrorist group Boko Haram reportedly abducted the wife of Cameroon’s vice prime minister in an attack Sunday that left at least three people dead in the town of Kolofata, Reuters reports. In addition, Kolofata’s mayor, Seini Boukar Lamine—who is also the lamido, or local religious leader—was kidnapped, along with five members of his family,…
-
Call for Submissions: The Root Wants Your Story
We know there’s endless diversity within the black experience and endless stories that are best told by the people who live them. For My Thing Is, a personal-essay franchise featuring members of The Root’s community, we want yours. Do you have a complicated identity or an unusual background? A fascinating career or an inspirational path…
-
Times Square Spider-Man in Web of Trouble
Spider-Man is in prison, and while he has superhuman powers, he doesn’t have $3,500 to post bail. According to the New York Daily News, Junior Bishop, 25, who dresses up as the web-slinging superhero and panhandles photos with tourists in New York City’s Times Square, reportedly punched a cop, breaking his glasses. Bishop was charged…
-
No ‘Rainbow Families’: Canadian Fertility Clinic Refuses to Match White Patients With Nonwhite Donors
A Canadian fertility clinic doesn’t want to create “rainbow families,” so it refuses to match clients with donors of different ethnicities, claiming that children should be able to easily identify their “ethnic roots.” A 38-year-old white woman named Catherine (she didn’t want to give her last name) told the Calgary Herald that she was looking…
-
Let’s Stop Describing Ourselves as ‘Minorities’
It’s already been two years since May 2012, when we learned that for the first time, U.S. babies born to parents who didn’t identify as white outnumbered those born to parents who did. What this means, according to demographers, is that by the year 2030 or thereabout, there will be no majority racial group in…
-
How Media Missed That Black Women Do ‘Have It All’
The only thing I have grown to hate more than the term “having it all” is the debate about whether or not women can have it all. To be clear, I have been roped into this debate myself on more than one occasion, but I usually find myself doing what I just did: critiquing how pointless it…
-
Watch: Ex-Fla. School Bus Driver Hurls Racist Rant at Neighbor and Kids
Tired of her racist tirades, a neighbor struck back at a former Sarasota, Fla., school bus driver by sharing a video of one of her stunning outbursts on social media, according to a report at ABC affiliate WWSB. The video allegedly captures Pamela Michener spewing racial slurs at a neighbor. She retired from a job…