Very Smart Brothas
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5 Black-Ass Culinary ‘Delights’ That Black People Can Keep
You can’t outdo black people in most everyday activities. Especially cooking. Food has always been a source of comfort and therapy for us. It brings us closer together during life’s worst, grandest and most lit moments. I’m a foodie and a kick-ass cook, if I can boast for a minute. Technically, I should call myself…
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Why ‘Ultralight Beam’ Is the Official Song of Christians Who Love Jesus but Curse a Little
I’m not good at being a Christian … at least not the kind of Christian I was raised to be. At my home church, they take Romans 12:12 seriously, wherein Paul says, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds … ” For them, that meant there…
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Pittsburgh-Area Fire Chief Resigns After Calling Mike Tomlin the N-Word on Facebook, Blames His Racism on … the Media?
If reincarnation is real, I hope that I come back as a cheetah or a jaguar or some other fast and sexy jungle cat after I die. I already enjoy yawning, taking long naps and watching Animal Planet, so I imagine the transition wouldn’t be too stark. If I cannot be one of those things,…
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A Prayer for My Emotions as This Is Us Embarks on Its 2nd Season
Let us bow our heads in prayer. Dear Heavenly Father, so luminescent and full of zinc and other elements available only in theory via the periodic table of elements, I come to you in supplication, oh Lord. Tonight, Father God, the second season of This Is Us begins on your network, NBC, as all network…
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My Battle With Depression (and the Pills and Therapy Necessary to Defeat It): A Coming-Out Story
A recent Facebook post is the reason for this story. Someone I don’t know well posted some difficulties he’s been having. He danced around what sounded to me like depression. Without actually using the D-word, he talked about having a hard time getting out of bed, feeling sad for no reason and just wondering if…
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Threatening Black Phrases, Ranked
Threat level: Minor This is probably the most benign threat among the black population because it’s also a means of clarifying a misunderstanding. It’s sort of like an out for both the person using it as well as the individual being addressed to say: “I’m not here to fuck you up. I’m not sure what…
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Ask Agatha: Her Friends and Family Hate Me (but I Kinda See Why), Superhero Sex and More
Austin from Pittsburgh asks: Why do people, so often, take an instant dislike to me? I assume it saves time. Kafui from Stone Mountain, Ga., asks: What are the biggest mistakes guys make on dates? They show up 5-feet-8 with a beard and have the audacity not to have a personality. No, seriously, the biggest…
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It’s Funny How 1 Title Can Fuck Up the Game: Thoughts on the Response to Damon’s Piece About Black Men
1. I didn’t love the title, either. The substance of the piece itself was perfectly fine—to argue and debate that would be stupid (more on this later). It’s no different from conversations many of us have in any number of spaces we congregate when sober, perhaps not wrapped up in as neat a bow as…
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How the NFL Turned Colin Kaepernick’s Protest Into #AllLivesMatter
There’s a lot of things that need to change. One specifically is police brutality. There’s people being murdered unjustly and not being held accountable. Cops are getting paid leave for killing people. That’s not right by anyone’s standards. That was Colin Kaepernick’s response in 2016 when asked what specifically would need to change in order…
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W.Va. High School Taunts Inner-City Pittsburgh High School Football Team With ‘Trump Perry’ Sign
Perry Traditional Academy is a predominantly black high school, located on Pittsburgh’s North Side and a five- to seven-minute drive away from my house. My brother-in-law graduated from there last year. (He was also a first-team All-City basketball player. He can’t beat me yet, but he is pretty good.) On Friday, Perry traveled to Wellsburg,…