Very Smart Brothas
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The Near-Perfect Insecure Season Finale and Issa’s, Molly’s and Lawrence’s Baby Steps to Adulthood
When I was 24 years old, a co-worker of mine felt like giving me her opinion of people my age. “I never date 24-year-olds,” she said. “They think they know everything.” At the time, the observation offended me because I almost certainly thought she was throwing shade my way. As a matter of fact, I…
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Online Dating Apps, Rated for Your Black Ass
When I broke up with my college sweetheart in 2005, I was living and working as a newspaper reporter in God’s crustiest dingleberry, Rockford, Ill. Rockford is one of those cities where people get married and start families at an age when they still need a co-signer to rent an Enterprise vehicle—not exactly fertile dating…
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Is ‘Anything’ From Kingdom Come Really Jay-Z’s Worst Song?
Recently, Vulture dropped an article that’s been making the rounds among hip-hop heads, enthusiasts, regular joes and coffee shop denizens alike. Vulture writer John Kennedy did the Lord’s work and ranked Jay-Z’s songs from worst to best. Of course, most people scrolled right to the bottom—the longest scroll ever; it was like a Ta-Nehisi Coates-article…
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Darth Maria Becky Sharapova Is the 2nd-Whitest Woman on Earth
Imagine, if you will, the level of raw and uncut caucasity necessary to be most famous for … losing to your fiercest rival so many consecutive times that said rival got so bored that she went out and had a freakin’ baby just so that the baby could eventually beat your ass, too, and injecting…
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Why Do So Many White People Want to Bone the American Flag?
Two weeks ago, Insecure was criticized for airing a scene where the women on the show discussed the sexual and racial politics of blow jobs. Namely, that fellatio was the reason niggas either date white women or marry the few black women willing to give it. For a show that’s usually—and sometimes painstakingly—relevant, it felt…
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Stuff That Scares Black People, Ranked
Stuff That Scares Black People, Ranked From Ford Crown Victorias to Roaches
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7 Truisms Creatives Will Appreciate
Are you a creative? Do you create shit for a living? If you answered “yes” to either of those questions, you are a creative. If you are a creative (you answered “yes” to either of the two aforementioned questions), then I’d bet you a plum nickel that while people are happy for you and your…
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Whiteness Is Useless Without the Nigger
“What would white people do without the nigger?” It’s a question that courses and bleeds through Ta-Nehisi Coates’ “The First White President.” It’s never asked explicitly, but it lurks beneath each point, ensconced in the piece’s premise: a fundamental and connective marrow. And it’s been with me since Sunday afternoon after I visited the National…
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I’m Black, Middle-Class and Surrounded by Crime
For somebody with multiple degrees, I’ve been pretty crime adjacent for a significant portion of my adulthood. I’ve also had several petty crimes perpetrated against me or those in close proximity to me more times than you can shake a stick at. For instance, one summer day, I got home to my apartment (the apartments…
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10 Signs You’re One of Those Wack-Ass People Who Don’t Like ‘Bodak Yellow’
Because I’m a weird and curmudgeonly fuck who doesn’t go to clubs and while driving listens only to Waze and Spotify playlists mostly consisting of Kanye and the Inception soundtrack, before last weekend, I’d heard about Cardi B’s “Bodak Yellow” more times than I had actually heard it. By a pretty significant margin, too. While…