culture
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#MeToo Creator Tarana Burke Will Kick Off New Year’s Eve Countdown in NYC’s Times Square
Sixty seconds before the clock strikes midnight on New Year’s Eve this year, #MeToo founder Tarana Burke will push the Waterford crystal button that signals the ball drop in New York City’s Times Square and starts the official countdown leading us into 2018. Burke announced the appearance on her personal Twitter account Monday morning. “Welp!…
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Single Means Alone, Not Lonely
On Friday morning, Ann Coulter sent out a tweet about single people living empty, quiet lives of desperation and dying alone. Without looking for more context, I responded and said that as a single person, I lead a very fulfilling life. Of course, people were quick to jump in my mentions and correct me on…
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Who’s the Greatest: Kobe No. 8 or Kobe No. 24?
In a ceremony Monday night, the Los Angeles Lakers will retire Kobe Bryant’s two jerseys—both No. 8 and No. 24—an honor that has never been received by any other player in the NBA, not even Michael Jordan. To coincide with that history-making event, Nike has brought back the Kobe and LeBron puppet campaign it first…
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Growing Up Without the ‘Christ’ in Christmas: What It’s Like Being Raised by a Christmas-Loving Atheist
Ever since I can remember, two constants have been in my life: My mother was never religious. She went all out for Christmas. Each year she attacked the holidays with an ever increasing fervor. She has lived in the same mostly white neighborhood for 23 years, where all the homes are as homogeneous and drab…
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For the Love of God? Evangelical Drug Traffickers Are Terrorizing Practitioners of Afro-Brazilian Religions
Candomblé priestess Carmen Flores was leaving her house three months ago when seven armed men confronted her. They demanded that she destroy the sacred contents of her house, a spiritual home for more than 125 followers of the Candomblé Afro-Brazilian religion. “Since my orisha is Oxum, our house was all about love,” said Flores, 66,…
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If Mark Ruffalo’s ‘God Is a Black Woman’ Tweet Were a Marvel Movie
In “America must be in sweeps season” news, Doug Jones won the Alabama Senate seat in a special election over a homophobic alleged pedophile. Woop-woop, decency for the win! It was readily apparent that, similar to what happened in the election that brought the circus peanut in chief to the presidential seat, black women did…
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Black Women and Sexuality: Damned if You Do, Damned if You Don’t
On Thursday night, I was looking at the Facebook post that linked to my column on raunchy twerk anthems. As I do on our main site, I like to engage with the readers in the comments. As I read through what people were saying, I noticed a disturbing pattern: A great number of men were…
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Mind Your Plate, Not My Stomach: Surviving the Holidays With Judgmental Loved Ones
Some of us are looking forward to burying our faces in Christmas dinner with friends and family in a brief 10 days. Hopefully, your dinner will be blessed with someone who has gifted culinary hands when it comes to baked macaroni and cheese—and I’m not talking about the disrespectful and disgusting remakes making the rounds…
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In Star Wars: The Last Jedi, John Boyega, People of Color Get to Shine in a Galaxy Far, Far Away
“You can judge a nation, and how successful it will be, by how it treats its women and its girls.” —President Barack Obama, Jan. 23, 2014 There goes Obama again tapping into one of life’s basic principles. You can always tell how good or successful something is going to be by how it treats the…
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Little Black Girls Are Killing Themselves. Does Anyone Care Enough to Figure Out Why?
When I was 4 years old, I told my mother that my nursery school teacher told me to “stop acting like a baby” because I had gotten a boo-boo on my knee. According to my mother, she asked me what reception other little kids received when they got boo-boos. I told her that a little…