Very Smart Brothas
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10 Thoughts About Beyoncé and Her “Lemonade”
Unless you literally live under a rock – there’s a good chance that those who live in caves are up on game, MetroPCS is out here winning – you are either aware, have seen, or have had at least two lengthy conversations about Beyonce’s visual album, Lemonade, that debuted on HBO on Saturday night, complete…
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Dear White People Who Write Things: Here's How To Write About Beyonce's Lemonade
Yesterday, to culminate one of the two or three Blackest weeks of my lifetime, Beyonce debuted Lemonade, a beautiful, haunting, brilliant, and Black as all the fucks hour-long visual rendering of her new album. The album, also titled Lemonade, was made available on Tidal (sigh) when the film concluded. Naturally, this film and the album dominated pop culture last…
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Prince Was Unapologetically Black Before It Was Cool To Be So
Thursday night, I attended a screening of the Roots reboot at the Tribeca Film Festival. While in the van on the way to the post-screening reception, I met Alondra Nelson — Dean of Social Sciences at Columbia University — and a conversation about Roots segued into a conversation about her work in genealogy, which then…
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RIP Prince.
There are three times when I find myself truly concerned into fear. One of those times is super early morning phone calls from home. Those are almost never good news. The last time I got a super early phone call from a 256 area code, I found out my brother had passed away. The two…
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How and Why I Forgave the Father I Never Had
“Kids have a hole in their soul in the shape of their dad. And if a father is unwilling or unable to fill that hole, it can leave a wound that is not easily healed.” – Ronald Warren My life is the result of the bargaining between two consenting adults; only one held up their…
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Harriet Tubman On The $20 Just Might Be The Most Elaborate Troll For White Tears Ever
The list of “things that tickle the fuck out of me” is a living and breathing one. Which is necessary because I occasionally find more things to tickle me. And, occasionally, things that tickled me before no longer do. Included on this list are things such as my daughter’s laugh, the last hour of Akeelah…
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Harriet Tubman On The $20 Is, Officially, The Blackest Thing That Will Ever Happen
I was going to create of a list of things Blacker than the face of Harriet Tubman — perhaps the fiercest and baddest person to ever plant a foot on American soil — replacing Andrew Jackson’s on the 20. This list would have included things like a spades game between Nat Turner, Shirley Chisholm, Nikki Giovanni, and…
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Love & Hip Hop Atlanta Season 5, Episode 3 Recap
Even a broken clock is right twice a day. And even our favorite bogus “reality” show accidentally touches the truth once in a while, as Love and Hip Hop Atlanta Season 5 proved Monday night with an episode brought to us by the letter #frfr. This week’s journey into black shame shed light on some…
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The Napa Valley Wine Train Settlement Is The Blackest Thing That Ever Happened This Week
I’ve already touched on the multiple levels of Blackness involved in the story of Sistahs on the Reading Edge; the California book club thrown off a wine train for being too rowdy. Exactly how many levels were there? Good question. Let’s review! 1. A group of Black women in a book club. (Because the only thing Black…