BLACK HEALTH MATTERS
Does dark skin need protection from UV rays? Let’s unpack this.
Every summer, families, friends, and couples hit the beach hoping to catch some rays and have some fun. While spending some time in the sun boosts Vitamin D in the body, people who stay out too long risk damaging their skin. In America, all of us — Black, White and other — are guilty of embracing strange or downright harmful myths about sun exposure and the darker toning that comes with it. Some are racist, and others are self-harming.
In 1929, Coco Channel declared, “A girl simply has to be tanned.” White people went from valuing lighter skin as a…
Forever trying to escape the racist tropes of Black people being viewed as scary and menacing
I’ve heard it all. And if the past designs the future, I expect to hear it all again:
“We need someone to stand by the door.”
“You’ve done time, right?”
“Hey, we’re having trouble with this guy. You can take him.”
“Don’t hurt me; I don’t have any money.”
“Man, you’re big. People must be scared of you.”
Being the recipient of such discrimination is taxing.
Black people have tried tirelessly to counter negative stereotypes while witnessing the threads of racism continuing to infect future generations.
Nice to meet you
I recall many instances when someone used my size and skin color to satisfy…
A Florida officer getting 12 years in prison for planting drugs on suspects triggered me and probably you too.
Being pulled over by the police scares me to death. Long before Philando Castille, Sandra Bland, and Walter Scott — all Black people who wound up dying after a traffic stop-— became national news, a cop switching lanes to drive behind me used to make my heart skip a beat. But being stopped is just the tip of the iceberg. Black folks often get framed during these stops. And as I was reading the recent story of a cop that, this past July, was sentenced to 12 years in prison for planting drugs on motorists, I was triggered. …
It turns out I wasn’t nearly as woke as I thought
When I was single and new to Toronto, my main activities consisted of swiping on dating apps and complaining about how frustrated I was with dating apps.
I went through the familiar cycle of obsessing over photos, bios, matches, and openers, then getting frustrated and deleting every dating app on my phone, then getting bored and downloading them all again.
At the height of my swiping days, a friend told me about a disturbing study from OkCupid. It showed that people of color experience extreme bias on dating apps, receiving substantially fewer right swipes and matches than white folks. …
ACROSS THE POND
Renaming J’Ouvert rum doesn’t change the fact that Killmonger woulda beat his ass
The popular African American phrase coined by Zora Neale Hurston “All my skinfolk ain’t kinfolk” was dramatically expressed in the behavior of actor Micheal B. Jordan when he launched his Caribbean rum brand J’Ouvert. Yes, he did an about-turn and apologized when Trinidad-and-Tobago-born Nicki Minaj suggested he change the name of the rum, but the revelation of Jordan’s mindset is clear.
Jordan is a Black capitalist, and for millions of Caribbean people in the islands and the diaspora, he’s the worst kind — a colonizer.
Jordan wanted to bottle and gift-wrap African Caribbean culture characterized by exclusion, enslavement, rebellion, extermination…
#StopAsianHate is our fight too because the fight is against White supremacy.
We gathered in the living room of our Airbnb, eyes fixed on the screen. It’s a 2021 graduation and while his school is in Florida, we were in Kentucky, with the rest of his peers scattered around the country. The speakers all donned masks with varied levels of outward disdain or pride. It’s Florida. You never know with them. One White face after another graced the stage, and made some generic remarks about success, the future, and how honored they were to usher in another class of leaders…
Let’s Unpack This
It’s strange to witness politicians support Cuban protests while railing against Black Lives Matter.
As an anti-racism writer, it’s striking to purview how often people push back against the cold, hard facts of how Black people are treated in this country. It’s becoming even harder to ignore as Cubans, both foreign and domestic, fight against mistreatment from Cuba’s government. Politicians like Sen. Marco Rubio and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis openly supported those protestors in a way they don’t and generally aren’t expected to do for Black people.
For those who don’t know, Cuba has been dealing with civil unrest for more than a week. Jorge Felipe Gonzalez, writing for The Atlantic, said the country’s…
Momentum
A blog from Medium about the fight against anti-Black racism.
