I am a black man, and will always be so. Therefore, when I move about in the United States people first see my blackness and not my education. This means ongoing vulnerability because my blackness still is interpreted as criminal through a racialized lens.
police brutality
The president’s speech in Dallas this week was an excellent performance of a difficult task. There was just one point where I thought he missed it.
No charges were filed against the police officer who killed Tamir Rice. But others are being held responsible: taxpayers.
In recent years, debates over the appropriateness of public monuments celebrating Confederate figures have become increasingly common. Along with exposing deep racial divides, these debates have brought to light historical attitudes and structures built on enduring notions of white supremacy. While generally taking place in local contexts, they have ramifications that concern all Americans.
Between the World and Me, by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Ta-Nehisi Coates is an atheist. But perhaps his atheism is precisely the kind that Christians in America need.
I’m a white parent, and I want my white kids to be like Brandon Brooks when they get older. He’s the teenager who filmed the pool party incident in suburban Dallas, at which a police officer violently restrained 15-year-old Dajerria Becton and pulled his gun on others. That was smart of Brooks, and bold. His remarks to the press since then have been pretty perceptive, too.
In the midst of all the unarmed black people dying at the hands of police and the even larger problem of anti-black ideology that has normed our society, I thought it fitting to share Moe's song. Let me know what you think about his song entitled Brown Skin.
By the time of Freddie Gray's arrest, his part of town was already awash in legitimate grievances against the police.
For more than a week I’ve been reciting Habakkuk in my mind.
In the last six weeks police officers have killed at least five unarmed African American men: Eric Garner, John Crawford, Ezell Ford, Dante Parker, and Michael Brown. This does not include Kajieme Powell, who was carrying a steak knife when two officers gunned him down just a few miles away from the site of Brown’s death. As much as some commentators might want to dismiss the protests as the cynical work of “screamers” and “race hustlers,” there is no doubt that the unrest sprung in large part from a righteous indignation at this nation’s long and persistent record of state violence against black men.