culture
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Innocent Brooklyn Man to Walk Free After Almost Completing 25-Year Sentence
He is soon to be free, but for 51-year-old Jonathan Fleming, freedom may be bittersweet. Fleming had already served 24 years of a 25-to-life sentence for a murder he did not commit. He was accused of gunning down Darryl Rush, 22, outside an apartment in his hometown of Brooklyn, N.Y., in 1989, the New York Post…
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Learning to Love Tax Season: Watch The Root Live Today at 11am
In many African-American families, when we have an important issue to discuss, we gather in the kitchen and bring it to the table. That’s especially true of financial discussions, whether about how to pay the bills, how to send Junior to college or where to start looking for a new job. For the next two…
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Sharpton Was FBI Mob Informant, Report Says
Al Sharpton has been called many names. Add CI-7 to that list. According to a lengthy report published by the Smoking Gun news website, Sharpton was a confidential FBI informant—code named CI-7—for several years in the mid-1980s. On Monday, the Smoking Gun published documents that purport to show that the current host of PoliticsNation on…
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Rap Goes to Court: When Lyrics Become Evidence In a Trial
This week the Supreme Court of New Jersey is scheduled to hear final arguments in State v. Skinner, a case that could have a far-reaching impact on the criminal justice system. The case reflects an alarming new trend in which lyrics by amateur rappers are used against them as evidence in criminal prosecutions. Vonte Skinner, an…
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The Friendly Cold War Between 'Regular Blacks' and 'Ethnic Blacks' at the Nation's Elite Colleges
I’ll never forget the expression on my friend’s face during one of our African-American-studies classes at Duke University, when she was asked to clarify her response—for what seemed like the umpteenth time—to the question, “Where are you from?” after having answered, “America.” “Look, I’m just regular black,” she said, with an air of frustration plainly…
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Hank Aaron’s Home Run Record Meant Everything 40 Years Ago. It Still Does
April 8 marks the 40th anniversary of Henry Aaron passing Babe Ruth as the major league’s career leader in home runs. It was one of the most significant sports feats of the 20th century, and like many others—heavyweight Joe Louis’ defeat of Max Schmeling in 1938 and Jesse Owens’ four gold medals at the 1936 Olympics in…
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White Army Vet Viciously Beaten and Called a ‘N–ger Lover’
Westland, Mich., police have arrested three suspects for the assault of white Army veteran Adam Wagner, WJBK Fox 2 reports. On April 3, Wagner was outside a 7-Eleven when the group of men noticed his military ID and started making offensive comments about him and the military. “They were saying, ‘How can you be in…
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Jay Z Sparks Controversy With ‘5 Percent Nation’ Medallion
Jay Z frequents basketball games, accompanied by wife, Beyoncé, but last week the award-winning rapper drew extra attention when he wore a chain blinged out with a medallion associated with the Five Percent Nation, the New York Post reports. While at a Brooklyn Nets game at the Barclays Center in his hometown, the rapper was…
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White House May Be Done With Selfies
Thanks to Boston Red Sox slugger David Ortiz, looks like selfies with the president may be shut down for good. During the Red Sox’s official visit to the White House the designated hitter took what appeared to be an impromptu photo with the POTUS holding up an Obama baseball jersey. Turns out that Big Papi…
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Honey Maid Sticks It to the Haters With Love
In early March, Honey Maid launched an adorable commercial celebrating “wholesome” families of every kind that included a two-dad family, a rocker family, a single-dad family, a military family and an interracial family—homage to the types of families that are usually unnoticed (or at least underappreciated) in the mainstream media. “No matter how things change,…