racism
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Racial Slur Written on Dorm-Room Door of Black Students at Mass. University
Two Framingham State University students are terrified after a racial slur was found scrawled with permanent marker on their dorm-room door over the weekend. “When I saw it this morning, I was pretty hurt. I didn’t feel safe going back to my room and I felt like I was a target especially since it was…
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When America Makes You Hate Your Skin So Much You Shoplift Bottles of Ambi Fade Cream to Get Lighter
I was 13 years old the first time I shoplifted. My sister, at 15, was my lookout. We were at the tiny pharmacy in tiny Newton Falls, Ohio, in the “ethnic” section. There was, as there is now, an array of products. Products for making your hair wet and curly—not so “coarse.” There were products…
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‘You Are My Slave’: Ga. Mom Furious After White Student Targets Son During School’s Civil War Day
A Kennesaw, Ga., mother is demanding answers after a white student called her son a slave during the school’s Civil War Day last month. According to the Associated Press, Big Shanty Intermediate School—which is near Kennesaw Mountain, where Confederate soldiers once fired their cannons at Union troops—encouraged fifth-graders to dress up as characters from the…
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Judge of Characters: When Racism Is Trained Behavior
This week, racism reared its ugly head the same way it’s been doing since Donald Trump became president. In New York City, the greatest melting pot on earth, we still have to deal with bigotry, but the city that never sleeps has a special way of banding together to combat racism that is sure to…
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The Root’s Clapback Mailbag: The Whitest Email of All Time
I’m sorry, y’all, but this week we’re featuring only one piece of email. It’s not that we didn’t receive a lot of hate mail this week. (Don’t worry; we won’t ever run out of shitty comments from disgruntled readers of The Root—ever). It’s just that answering more than one piece of email this week would…
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Chinese Museum Removes Photography Exhibit That Compared Black People to Animals
Apparently China is high-key tripping this week. First WeChat, the country’s most popular chat app, had to apologize after its software translated “black foreigner” to the word “nigger.” Now it seems a museum in China is only just realizing that it’s a bad idea to juxtapose images of wild African animals with black people. According…
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Parents Sue Miss. School District After White Teacher Allegedly Makes Comment About Hanging Black Child
Local parents have filed a lawsuit against a central-Mississippi school district after they say a white substitute teacher made a horrific, threatening racist comment about their black son being hanged. According to the Associated Press, Tony and Kayla Lindsey say that their son, who has since graduated, got into an argument in April and threatened…
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Jesse Williams Stars in New 7-Minute Protest Film Available Exclusively on Tidal
Is love the answer to all of America’s problems? That is the question the producers of a new short documentary film want us to consider. Gerard Bush and Christopher Renz of Bush Renz (“Kill Jay-Z,” “17”) have teamed up with Sankofa.org (founded by Harry Belafonte) and Tidal to bring us the seven-minute protest film Versus,…
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#SoupOnRacists Needs to Be a Movement Because We Need to Throw More Soup on Racists
One of the most frustrating things about existing while black in America and dealing with white supremacy, white privilege, white tears and white people’s awkward casseroles is the process of determining exactly how to react to racism when faced with it. Should you address microaggressions immediately, or should you wait until a particularly egregious racist…