Officers in Sean Bell shooting acquitted

I don’t want to detract from the Seal Press debate, but I guess we’ll just have lots of things to discuss this weekend. Just saw this: the officers who shot Sean Bell and his friends more than 50 times have been acquitted.

Is it still an insult if it’s true?

I’ve been observing the furor over Obama’s comments about the “bitterness” of small-town/rural blue collar folks. And I’m honestly confused.

Do you know we can see you?

I’m tired of talking about racism. In feminism. In politics. In literature. In the media. In my daily life. But you know what? I don’t get the luxury of ignoring that it exists. No one of color gets to pretend that their skin color doesn’t affect how they are perceived. So why exactly are we [...]

Co-opting pain for profit

I’m usually a political blogger in this space, but something has happened that aggravates me to no end and so I feel the need to share my anger with a wider audience. So, this woman writes a memoir about her life as a poor, half white, half NDN foster kid running drugs for the Bloods [...]

Carnival time in old Mobile

In the wake of Super Tuesday, had been contemplating a long angsty post about media coverage of Latino/a and Asian voters and their supposed unwillingness to vote for a black man. (Except it’s only the older ones, and only those of a certain socioeconomic status, and only women, and only… wait, you mean there isn’t [...]

Those who forget the lessons of history

A meditation on what governments get up to during war time.
Most American adults are aware that, back during World War 2, our government rounded up Japanese immigrants and Japanese-Americans and put them in internment camps.  But were you aware of who the government chose to round up during the first Great War?  I wasn’t until [...]

The anti-immigration movement vs. US soldiers: Round one — FIGHT!!

Guest blogger Nora here, having a WTF moment.
It’s times like this when the irrationality of the anti-immigration movement becomes really obvious. I use “anti-immigration” rather than anti-illegal-immigration because, quite frankly, the two are one and the same in the eyes of the most rabid people in this camp. The case mentioned in this [...]

9/11 Didn’t Change A Thing

This is the same post I wrote for 9/11 last year. This year I find I have not much more to say, so I’m reposting it.
There’s a 9/11 story that I heard once and never forgot. It’s anecdotal and may even be completely made up. I’m not sure. I can’t even remember the context [...]

The Jena Six

Six young black men are headed for 20+ year prison sentences in a clear case of Jim Crow “justice.”

Their families are fighting but need our support. Will you stand with them?

A lot of bloggers in the Black Blogosphere have posted about the Jena 6, young black men charged with attempted murder and conspiracy [...]

So let’s just go back to segregation, then.

[Guest blogger Nora here. This is an adaptation of something I posted in my personal blog back in June, in reaction to the Supreme Court's recent school desegregation decision. Occurred to me it might be of interest to folks here, too.]
After hearing about the latest blow to desegregation, I’m feeling something different from my usual [...]