Adam Blackstone can feel the energy pulsating throughout New York City—coursing through the streets, subways, social media, and local radio airwaves. It’s a Thursday morning in July, and Jay-Z’s longtime co-musical director is en route to the vortex of all the vibes, Yankee Stadium, for a second consecutive day of rehearsals ahead of a trio of must-see homecoming concerts kicking off in just 57 hours.

Outside of the iconic Bronx ballpark, DJs spin Jay-Z-themed playlists, pop-up shops sling Roc-a-Fella merch, bartenders pour D'USSÉ, and fans speculate about what surprises the rap legend has planned as he celebrates milestone anniversaries of Reasonable Doubt and The Blueprint, which turn 30 and 25 years old this year, respectively. It’s only the rap legend’s second headlining show in seven years. His most recent was in Philadelphia at The Roots Picnic in May.

“The buzz here is heavy,” says the 44-year-old musical mastermind. “It shows the level of greatness and excellence that our boss, Mr. Carter, is trying to display by the amount of rehearsal he's doing, the amount of reps that he's getting in… and the importance of what it means culturally and locationally.”

Blackstone has become a cultural force in his own right. The New Jersey native has also served as musical director for icons like Rihanna, Jill Scott, Justin Bieber, Justin Timberlake, Queen Latifah, and Maroon 5. After orchestrating halftime performances at the Super Bowl and helming music for Broadway (Alicia Keys’ Hell’s Kitchen) and TV (The Masked Singer), Blackstone is just one Oscar and Tony away from EGOT status. In 2022, he released his debut album, Legacy, which featured the Grammy-nominated “’Round Midnight” with Jazmine Sullivan, a song President Barack Obama named one of his favorites of the year.

All of that musical experience is helping shape Jay-Z’s ’96 & Forever career retrospective, which will continue with spot dates in Los Angeles, London, and Paris. Ahead of Jigga’s highly anticipated shows at Yankee Stadium, Blackstone hopped on the phone with LEVEL to chat about the DNA of his shows, giving Ms. Lauryn Hill her flowers at the 2026 BET Awards, and why some believe he is his generation’s Quincy Jones. 

LEVEL: What is your identity as a musical director? What is it that makes Adam Blackstone shows hit the way they do?

Adam Blackstone: I'm always about musical excellence. The through line for me is emotional connectivity with the music, and playing some of your favorite records. The nostalgia and legacy of it all. Remember where you were when you heard “Izzo” for the first time. I remember being in my dorm room when I watched the “Give It 2 Me” and “Big Pimpin’” videos. I always want to bring that same feeling to the stage because I'm a fan and I care about these artists—not just Jay, but every artist that I work with, from the smallest to the biggest, whatever race, culture, or gender. I really care about their music, so I take the approach as a fan. What would I want to hear? What wouldn't I want to hear?

My role as a musical director for all the artists I work with is talking about everything live music-oriented, from screen content to—if I'm doing pop music—the dancers, the hits, and the wardrobe changes.

Is there anything that makes your process different when directing a show for Jay-Z?

When I do Queen Latifah or Justin Timberlake or Alicia Keys, and it’s solely on me, the pressure’s there. When you come into an artist of the iconic stature as Jay, there's a team of people, which alleviates some pressure. Jay has an incredible team of musicians and musical directors and producers, from Young Guru to Omar Edwards to Just Blaze. I have nothing but love and respect and admiration for those guys, because we make each other's jobs easier. And it just goes to show the level of trust Jay has for his team. Each person is a link. 

The process is very intense. A bunch of ideas are always floating around. Ultimately, my job is to execute the artist’s vision. So [Jay-Z] says, “We're going to concentrate on Reasonable Doubt, maybe sprinkle something else in there. How can we execute that?” And then I get to cooking. That's how we're operating this weekend. I'm excited, man. 

Once you assemble the set list, how do you find moments in the show to enhance or tweak it for the stage?

This is where my hip-hop and Broadway background come in. Jay is so lyrical. Things with him are never a figure of speech. It’s really his experience. So when he says, “And I wish I never met her at all!” [from “I Just Wanna Love U (Give It 2 Me)”] at the Roots Picnic, I’m like, “Let's go into this Carl Thomas break,” because that's where we know that line from. So then he raps over “I Wish.” With an incredible rapper like Mr. Carter, let me take what he's saying as literally as he's saying it, and then make it a literal music reference. I do a lot of those kinds of flips. 

Also, with the genius of Questlove, he knows where these original samples come from. So as a radio listener for “Song Cry” or “Never Change” or “What We Do,” Ahmir has taught me to start with the original sample. It automatically has a built-in crescendo, because we're getting to the part of the song that we know and that loops. So those are two references I try to live by when it comes to making a dope Jay show or break. Let me listen to what he’s saying and see if it relates to something that's going on musically, or let’s take the original sample and do this built-in climax.

You mentioned your Broadway background—you worked on Hell's Kitchen with Alicia Keys...

Yeah. Great successful run. Thirteen Tony nominations, two wins. I think that's a success. 

Talk that talk, king! Has working on Broadway influenced your approach to musical direction? 

Yeah. When I moved to Philadelphia in 2000 to go to University of the Arts, I was doing every gig just to pay the bills. $50 jazz gig, open mics for free, all of the things. Those are things you invest in yourself back in the day, especially as a college student. I needed to show up and be places. I wanted to be known as the hardest worker in the room. That mentality landed me a gig working at the Prince Theater. I was a session musician for a bunch of the local Philadelphia Off-Broadway shows. That allowed me to see how important a lyric was in telling a story. Sometimes, especially growing up in church or R&B or hip-hop, we’re listening to the beat. But when I started doing these plays and musical theater shows, it allowed me to see how incredible lyrics and dialog can help tell a story. 

I took that approach when I started MDing and doing concerts. One of the first moments I got to use that was with my sister Jill Scott, who was a poet as well. I really valued how her poetry—which we would deem lyrics—told her story. The music was a compliment. I got to listen to each pause, each breath, each color in the tone, each word, and see where I could enhance to drive home the point she's making. I do that same thing, just like we talked about with Jay, getting those elements from Broadway to accent the lyric and make it a moment.

Also, in reverse, I brought hip-hop to Broadway. I was able to have a successful '90s-themed play. I had to bring the 808s. We brought some Wu-Tang and A Tribe Called Quest vibes. And, of course, we told it all through Alicia's song catalog, arguably some of the greatest pop songs of the decade that have a gutter R&B, New York swag. I was thankful that theater has influenced me, but I was glad to impact theater with our culture, and my music expertise. 

Jill Scott has called you this generation’s Quincy Jones, saying there is no other musical director or composer alive with your range and genius. How do you feel about that comparison? 

Jill's quote really took me aback and made me look at my life—not in comparison to Quincy, but just in admiration. To see people give me that same trajectory is a blessing. I was able to do a Quincy tribute with HarbourView at my venue, Sun Rose Hotel, in L.A. I got to see his expansiveness. It really, really does mirror—I should say I mirror his start and everything, from jazz beginnings to going to theater with The Wiz, gospel stuff with Aretha Franklin and Ray Charles, and then into pop stuff with Michael Jackson. I'm super thankful for that quote to have been said about me. If I can do one-fourth of what Quincy has done to impact music, I'll be straight. 

Another inspiring caveat is that Thriller came later in [Quincy’s] life. So me being 44, that tells me this is just the beginning of what God has in store for me. I truly feel I haven't seen the pinnacle yet.

Your first show with Jay was Fade to Black at Madison Square Garden, way back in 2003. You were playing bass on that show, but what do you remember observing about Jay back then as an artist and performer, and how has he since evolved?

That's a great question, man. I don't think I've been asked that. One of the things that I observed then was the value of teamwork. I wasn't the musical director, but he always invited us to give the best suggestion possible musically. Of course, he is the end-all, be-all. He makes the decisions, but he's open to ideas. I thought about that early as an MD, artist, and leader in general. You're only as strong as your team is. He instilled that in me early.

Since Fade to Black, you've worked with Jay on so many different shows over the years. Are there any that stand out as the most iconic, musically impressive, or memorable?

I'm going to say my top three in no particular order. Definitely Fade to Black, because that's what put me in his space. I cultivated so many relationships from there. Met a kid from Chicago with a pink polo on (Kanye West). I met this Barbadian girl named Rihanna. A young Beyoncé, Mary [J. Blige]. Those relationships I forged are still going strong to this day. Fade to Black means so much to me. 

The next one is the 10-year anniversary of Reasonable Doubt at Radio City Music Hall with an orchestra. We see a lot of orchestra shows now, but that had really never been done with hip-hop. My brother drove a bubble Lex on the stage, bro. I was like, “Oh, he different.”

And then I gotta jump to 2026. The Roots Picnic was so nostalgic for me to come home, to be with my brothers, The Roots, to play a classic set of Jay, to see State Property get back together. To see Meek Mill and my sister Jazmine Sullivan—it was like a huge family reunion to the umpteenth power musically. It felt good to be a part of that history, to be part of Philadelphia history. 

Was there anything from Jay’s The Roots Picnic performance that you were like, we definitely gotta keep that, or let’s tweak it for the New York shows? 

I got to be honest, man. Philly was one-of-one; people will see that after this weekend. If anything, I was just explaining to him, like, let's keep the energy. Him loving to rap and us loving to play the songs. And we're about to do that, man… With these announcements we made for the London, Paris, and L.A. shows, and Yankee Stadium this weekend, maybe we'll create some new memories.

You produced the BET Awards last month, which was a beautiful celebration of culture and icons like Ms. Lauryn Hill. Congrats on that. How did that all come together, and what aspects of her artistry did you want to highlight?

Thank you for the congratulations. That BET Awards was very meaningful to me. It broke records since 2018 or something like that, so that was really cool to see. Before I get to Lauryn, I gotta give a huge shout-out to Tems, who had a moment. Raye definitely had a moment. My girls Erica Campbell and Leandra Johnson playing gospel music on national TV is always a plus. Those three stood out. Cardi B as well. And my new favorite jam is French Montana’s [“Ever Since U Left Me (I Went Deaf)”]. I don't know if it's the sample or what, but that thing makes me dance, man. 

As we found out that Ms. Hill was getting the lifetime achievement award—it's so interesting. I did the Usher [tribute] a couple years ago. Anita Baker some years ago. Jamie Foxx. New Edition. These people have like nine, 10, 11 albums. Lauryn Hill has one. Of course, The Fugees and the Unplugged joint, which created waves in our culture. But I don't think that's ever happened before where we're giving a lifetime achievement award to somebody with one solo studio album. Just think about how impactful that had to have been to still resonate.

I had to put the set list together first, then we started to insert people. I knew I wanted to do a throwback to where we saw her as a solo artist in Sister Act 2. I have a great relationship with The War and Treaty, and Tanya Blount (one-half of the duo) was Lauryn’s Sister Act 2 co-star. When I started putting these pieces together and getting it approved by Jesse Collins at BET, I started to see her evolution on paper.

It was inspiring to me to hear people like SZA and Lizzo and Doja Cat talk about her influence in their music today. And Rapsody and Tierra Whack. Then you have Common and Queen Latifah talking about how they stopped what they were doing in [1998] to listen to her record over and over and over. These are super-duper stars. And then Ms. Lauryn Hill’s children wanted to be a part of it. So it all came together, man. I was super thankful. She gave me a shoutout and thanked me. She ain't have to do that. She's a Jersey girl; I was born in Jersey as well. I got nothing but love and respect for Ms. Hill. It just feels exciting to have her legacy live on forever through that tribute.

To close on Jay-Z, there are fan theories that he’s positioning himself to perform at the Super Bowl next year. Hypothetically speaking, if you were musically directing a Jay-Z Super Bowl show, how would you approach it?

A hypothetical Super Bowl? What I will say is this: I've been blessed to do Justin Timberlake Super Bowl in 2018, Shakira and J. Lo in 2020, Dr. Dre and Snoop in 2022, Rihanna right after that. Jay-Z would be the pinnacle of those for many, many reasons. Just from his global success and the reach he has had through his music and culture. So, hypothetically, it would be great.

Pete Hegseth’s recent actions targeting Black people in the Navy aren’t new. It’s part of a cycle the Navy goes through when they think they aren’t as dependent on Black sailors and soldiers as in other times. There was a time before the Civil War when Black sailors were desperately needed and made up 10% of the Continental Navy, and over 20% of the Union Navy during the Civil War.

I once considered joining the Navy. Before graduating from Fisk University, I was recruited to join the Naval Aviation Officer Candidate Program. One of the early steps was to take me up in a T-34 plane with dual controls. While flying, I got to take over the controls and fly a plane from the back seat. We circled over Nashville, and I marveled at the number of backyard pools in the Brentwood area and at the chance to see the Vanderbilt, Tennessee State, and Fisk campuses from the air.

The next recruitment phase involved a tour of the Naval Air Station in Pensacola. I took a commercial flight to Pensacola; the last part involved flying South over the ocean and making a sharp U-turn to find the landing strip, which began not far after reaching dry land. Several recruits took the tour, and we were housed in barracks on base. In no particular order over two days, we toured a decommissioned aircraft carrier, took multiple mental and physical exams, and were taken to the “Official Naval Aviator Strip Club.” That was a designation, not the actual name of the strip joint, but there were pictures of pilots on the walls.

At about 4 a.m., we were awakened by the clanging of trash can lids and shouting and ordered to stand at attention. This scene was similar to one I would later see in An Officer and a Gentleman, but it was five years before the movie came out. A Navy career was made out to be fun: travel the world and fly the friendly skies. The Vietnam War had ended, and no new war was on the horizon.

While touring the aircraft carrier, we passed a couple of Black enlisted men on their knees cleaning the deck. When I was close, one of them whispered, “Don’t do it!” I was sure the life of an enlisted man was different than that of an officer. I had reason to believe the man knew what he was speaking about. The several-month deployments also turned me off at a time when no women were stationed on ships. I ultimately passed on the Navy.

Black men had an off-and-on relationship with the Navy. Between 1775 and 1783, free and enslaved black men served in the Continental Navy during the American Revolution. Black men were paid the same wages as white men, though in the case of enslaved people, the pay may have gone to their owners. Black sailors comprised approximately 10% of the enlisted men and zero % of the officers. White and Black sailors often ate together, bunked together, and engaged in friendly boxing matches on board. Once off the ship, they led segregated lives. In 1798, there was a ban on Black and Mulatto soldiers, which a few Captains ignored.

By the War of 1812, their service was needed again, and the ban was lifted. It’s estimated that 1/6th of the men serving were Black men. The USS Constitution (Old Ironsides) had a quarter of its crew Black. They served as carpenters and loaded cannons. Some were “powder monkeys,” which surprisingly isn’t a racist term. In 1839, Black sailors were officially limited to 5% of enlisted men. No Black men served as officers.

The Civil War created the need for more crew members, and Black sailors were in vogue again. Over 20% of the Union Navy was Black, serving on over 700 ships. Most served in menial roles and were rated as Landsmen or Boys. In 1872, the US Naval Academy admitted its first Black recruit, James H. Conyers. Conyers was often beaten and spat upon, and once, his classmates attempted to drown him. Conyers dropped out after a year. Two other men, Henry Edwin Baker Jr. and Alonzo Clifton McClennan, faced similar treatment later in the 1870s and also dropped out.

In 1896, Plessy v Ferguson became the law of the land but not the sea. Space limitations required Black and white sailors to eat and work together. The Spanish-American War increased the need for Black sailors, who now served as cooks, stewards, and landsmen. Still, some worked as firemen, storekeepers, carpenters, water tenders, oilers, and other specialized billets.

Segregation resurfaced in the U.S. Armed Forces in 1913, when Woodrow Wilson became President. He resegregated the military, and Blacks in the Navy dropped to 3%. The Secretary of the Navy, Josephus Daniels, justified the policy in a letter to a Senator, describing segregation as a benefit to sailors.

“As a matter of policy, it has been customary to enlist colored men in the various ratings of the messman branch . . . and in the lower ratings of the fireroom; permitting colored men to sleep and eat by themselves.” — Josephus Daniels

Women were temporarily allowed to serve in the Navy in 1917 during World War I. The first Black enlisted women joined the Navy in 1918 and were retroactively dubbed the “Golden Fourteen.” All women were kicked out of the Navy in 1920 as Congress amended the Naval Reserve Act of 1916, which allowed any U.S. citizen to serve, to read “any male citizen.” This was the same year women got the right to vote in Presidential elections.

The Red Summer began in mid-1919 and was marked by racial unrest in over thirty American cities and one rural Arkansas county. Little known (and my next topic of research) was that white sailors and Marines attacked Black communities in Washington, DC, Charleston, and Chicago. The Navy suspended new enlistments of Black men, preferring Filipinos to work in the mess halls, where most Blacks were put to use. Those already in the service were permitted to stay on until their retirement. By 1932, the threat of conflict led to the recruitment of new Black sailors. They made up one-half of one percent of the Navy at that point. When Germany invaded France in 1940, the Army was appointing its first Black general, Benjamin O. Davis. The Navy had yet to have its first Black officer.

By 1940, there was public pressure to integrate the federal government and the U.S. Armed Forces. The Navy was the worst of the branches of the military. Besides constant pressure from the NAACP and Black newspapers, they heard from First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and Naval Secretary Adlai Stevenson. Addison Walker was appointed as a civilian special assistant to Ralph Bard, Assistant Secretary of the Navy. Walker sat on a committee of Navy and Marine officers to review whether existing policies were discriminatory and what changes should be made. The committee determined that allowing Blacks to serve in other billets would disrupt naval operations, and thus, no policy changes were needed. Walker disagreed and wrote a separate report. When nothing changed, Walker resigned from his position.

In early 1942, Black enlisted men were still restricted to limited duties. The Navy reported they were no worse than the civilian population in that regard. “If restricting Blacks to the messman branch was discrimination, it was consistent with discriminatory practices against Blacks and citizens of Asian descent throughout the United States.” On April 7, 1942, the Navy opened all general service ratings to Black men. They determined an unfair burden was being placed on white men. On March 13, 1944, the Navy commissioned its first group of Black officers, the Golden Thirteen.

There were actually 16 Black men in that first class. For reasons still unknown, three of the men with passing grades were dropped from the program and returned to the enlisted ranks. The best guess is that the pass/fail rate was made to match that of other officer candidate classes. Once the thirteen remaining were finally commissioned as officers, they learned there were no officers’ quarters for them, and they would have to live off base. They weren’t allowed into officers’ clubs and wouldn’t be allowed to command white sailors — twelve of the thirteen separated from the Navy at the end of World War II. Only one became a career naval officer, Dennis Nelson, who retired as a Lieutenant Commander.

Shortly after, the Navy commissioned thirteen officers in 1944. It became clear it hadn’t resolved its problems with race. The Port Chicago Disaster, which killed 320 mostly Black sailors and wounded another 390 sailors and civilians, showed the downside of segregated units under white command. The subsequent trials saw 50 men convicted of treason for refusing to go back to work in dangerous conditions.

The Navy continued to make progress, though at a snail’s pace. Women were admitted into the WAVES reserve units in 1944. On March 5, 1945, Black Seabees in the nearly all-Black 34th Construction Battalion at Port Hueneme ended a two-day hunger strike. The protest occurred after the unit’s commanding officer refused to promote any African American to chief petty officer billets, although many of the senior enlisted Black sailors in the battalion had served two years overseas and fully deserved advancement. On the same day, Phyllis Mae Dailey integrated the Navy Nurse Corps. On July 6, 1948, President Truman issued an executive order to desegregate the military and federal government.

I turned down the Navy’s offer to attend the Naval Aviation Officer Candidate Program. I could say I had heeded the whisper telling me, “Don’t do it!” but it had more to do with the several-month deployments with no women. Yes, that was shallow reasoning. I currently know several retirees who were career Navy officers and sailors. They owe thanks to the Golden Thirteen, Golden Fourteen, and all who preceded them.

And now Pete Hegseth is doing his version of Woodrow Wilson to segregate and reduce the service of Black men and women in the armed forces, particularly the Navy. Pete Hegseth used his influence to stall or block promotions of officers — overwhelmingly Black — whom he believed were advancing because of diversity initiatives rather than merit. This pattern emerged in three ways:

1. Targeting promotion lists that included Black officers

Hegseth reportedly flagged certain Navy promotion slates as “political,” “woke,” or “DEI‑driven,” and urged Trump‑aligned officials to delay certification, demand “additional review”, remove specific names, and freeze advancement until “ideological concerns” were addressed.

The officers most frequently targeted were: Black surface‑warfare officers, Black aviators, Black women in leadership tracks, and Black officers involved in diversity or inclusion programs. This was not framed as “race‑based blocking,” but as “anti‑DEI correction.” The effect, however, was racial.

2. Opposing grooming‑standard reforms that disproportionately affected Black sailors

This is the part your tab shows. Grooming violations can derail evaluations, reduce promotion competitiveness and trigger disciplinary marks. By pushing for stricter grooming rules that disproportionately penalized Black service members, Hegseth indirectly harmed their promotion prospects. Hegseth’s policies call for dismissal of Black men who grew beards to address a medical condition, pseudofolliculitis barbae, almost exclusively affecting Black men, where they get ingrown hairs from shaving.

3. Publicly attacking Navy DEI officers — all of whom were people of color

Hegseth repeatedly singled out Navy DEI directors, cultural‑competency officers and equal‑opportunity program leaders. Almost all were Black or Latino. He accused them of “politicizing the force,” “lowering standards,” and “undermining readiness.”

Behind the scenes, this translated into pressure to halt their promotions, reassign them, eliminate their billets and block their advancement to O‑6 and flag‑track positions

Why this is considered “blocking promotions” even without a formal order

The military promotion system is bureaucratic and hierarchical. A single influential advisor can derail careers without ever issuing a written directive.

Hegseth’s influence operated through:

• informal pressure
• political signaling
• ideological vetting
• targeted criticism of specific officers
• encouraging Trump‑aligned Pentagon officials to “review” lists

When a promotion list is “reviewed,” “held,” or “sent back,” careers stall. When a name is removed quietly, the officer never knows why. This is how political interference works in the military. The officers most affected were Black.

Pete Hegseth’s behavior isn’t new; it’s part of a long American tradition of gatekeeping dressed up as patriotism, where claims about “standards” or “readiness” become tools for deciding who gets to rise and who gets held back. The military has seen this pattern before — in the 1940s, the 1960s, the 1980s — each time wrapped in different language but aimed at the same officers who were told they belonged enough to serve, but not enough to lead. What feels new is only the vocabulary, not the impulse.

Still, history also shows that the pendulum does swing. The forces that try to narrow the definition of who counts as American eventually lose to the people who insist on expanding it. I want a day when the military and the country it serves finally move past these cycles — when the pendulum doesn’t just swing back but stays centered on fairness long enough for everyone to rise without having to fight the same old battles.

America. FIFA has 211 member nations, more than are in the United Nations, which has 193. Soccer began appearing in American school sports in the early 1900s, but it did not become common until the 1960s–1970s, and it did not become mainstream until the 1980s–1990s. At my Minnesota high school in the 70s, we had brown soccer balls, always partially deflated, but had no organized teams and played maybe twice a year in physical education classes.

Soccer has a well-earned reputation for racism largely because the sport’s fan culture is built on tribalism, and tribalism has a dark mode. In stadiums across Europe and South America, fans use race as a weapon to intimidate or humiliate opposing players: monkey chants, banana‑throwing, slurs, and coordinated abuse that spills from the stands into social media within seconds. When a Black player misses a penalty or a North African player scores against a rival, the reaction isn’t just about the game; it becomes a referendum on belonging, immigration, and who counts as part of the nation. Because soccer is the world’s most global sport, these flashpoints happen everywhere, making the racism impossible to hide.

Players and referees also contribute to the sport’s reputation, though in different ways. Several players have been caught using racist language on the pitch, often in heated confrontations where insults escalate quickly. Referees, meanwhile, have faced criticism for inconsistent responses, sometimes ignoring racist abuse, sometimes failing to stop matches, and sometimes penalizing players who react to being targeted. The result is a perception that the sport’s institutions tolerate racism or treat it as “part of the game,” especially when governing bodies issue weak punishments or allow matches to continue despite hostile environments. Together, the conduct of fans, players, and officials creates a feedback loop: racism happens publicly, is inadequately addressed, and becomes part of soccer’s global narrative.

Understanding the racism embedded in soccer requires an understanding of how the game is now played all over the world came to be. Games involving kicking a ball into a net trace back to ancient China, Mesoamerica, Japan, Greece, and Rome, but the first countries to play a game recognizably related to modern soccer were China and England. China played cuju in the 3rd–2nd century BC, and England formalized the modern rules in the 19th century.

The idea of team sports originated in Mesoamerica… and became popular among cultures such as the Teotihuacanos, Aztecs, and Maya beginning about 3,000 years ago. The first known example of a team game involving a ball… occurred in old Mesoamerican cultures over 3,000 years ago. Japan adopted and modified cuju into kemari, a cooperative keep‑up game.

There was no accepted set of rules, and in England, different schools played by their own rules until the Cambridge Rules were standardized. Those rules were developed by students at Cambridge University in 1848, with representatives from several elite English public schools — Eton, Harrow, Rugby, Winchester, and Shrewsbury. Each school had its own version of football, and matches between them were chaotic because no one agreed on what counted as a foul, a goal, or even legal movement of the ball. Cambridge acted as neutral ground. The students met, debated, and produced the first serious attempt at a unified, written, kicking‑only code of football. These rules banned carrying the ball, outlawed hacking and tripping, defined the field, and introduced standardized restarts. In other words, they created the skeleton of modern soccer.

The Cambridge Rules were eventually replaced by the Football Association’s Laws of the Game, published in London in 1863. The FA used the Cambridge Rules as their template but formalized them into an official national code. This moment is what permanently split soccer from rugby: the FA adopted Cambridge’s kicking‑only philosophy, while Rugby School and its supporters walked out and formed their own sport. From 1863 onward, the FA Laws became the foundation for global soccer, later adopted by the International Football Association Board (IFAB) and FIFA. Every match played today — from the World Cup to a pickup game in my town of Palm Coast — traces its rulebook back to Cambridge’s student‑written code and the FA’s 1863 decision to adopt it.

Soccer’s Laws of the Game didn’t spread across Europe and the world because everyone suddenly fell in love with a British pastime. They spread because Britain spent the late 19th and early 20th centuries building an empire that touched every continent, and the empire carried its culture with it — schools, churches, railways, military garrisons, and, inevitably, football. British soldiers played the game in colonial forts; British engineers played it in mining towns and railway camps; British missionaries taught it in schools designed to “civilize” colonized children. Everywhere missionaries built a school, they laid out a soccer field.

The Laws of the Game — codified by the Football Association in 1863 — became the default rulebook because Britain had the global infrastructure to enforce them. Wherever the empire went, the rules went. By the early 1900s, the FA Laws were embedded in colonial education systems from Lagos to Bombay, Nairobi to Kingston, Cape Town to Hong Kong. Soccer didn’t spread organically. It spread through power.

Racism shaped this spread just as much as colonialism did. In many colonies, Europeans treated soccer as a marker of superiority: they played in exclusive clubs, barred Africans and Asians from joining, and enforced racial segregation on pitches and in stadiums. When colonized people formed their own clubs, colonial authorities often dismissed them as inferior imitators or restricted their access to facilities. Even after independence, the racial hierarchy built into the sport lingered. European clubs scouted African and South American players as cheap labor, fans weaponized race as a tool of intimidation, and governing bodies often ignored racist abuse because punishing it meant confronting the sport’s colonial inheritance. The global spread of soccer wasn’t just a story of cultural diffusion — it was a story of empire, hierarchy, and a rulebook that became universal because the people who wrote it controlled half the planet.

FIFA has made attempts to police racism, as if it were possible when racism is so entrenched in the culture. FIFA’s recent anti‑racism and anti‑abuse measures fall into two distinct categories: on‑field behavioral rules (including penalties for players covering their mouths) and symbolic/structural tools (such as the “X” gesture) intended to provide players and referees with a standardized way to report racism. Both emerged because FIFA finally admitted that racism wasn’t just a fan problem; it was happening between players, in officiating decisions, and in moments the cameras couldn’t fully capture.

Rules were implemented to battle racism on the field. Here are two major ones:

1. Penalties for players covering their mouths (lip‑reading rule)

Beginning in 2024–2026, FIFA and IFAB introduced a new misconduct rule: If a player covers their mouth during a heated confrontation, the referee may issue a yellow or red card.

2. The “X” gesture — a standardized signal for suspected racism

In 2023–2024, FIFA introduced the “X” gesture as an officially recognized signal players can use to alert referees to racism or discrimination.

In a recent World Cup match of Egypt v. Argentina, an Egyptian coach made the “X” gesture, essentially accusing the referees of racially biased officiating — not just bad calls, but discrimination severe enough to trigger FIFA’s anti‑racism protocol. In his view, the officials weren’t merely making mistakes; they were cheating Egypt in a way he believed was rooted in bias, and the “X” was the strongest symbolic tool available to communicate that in real time. The gesture is designed to stop play, alert the referee crew, and escalate the incident to VAR and match delegates. When a coach uses it against officials, it’s interpreted as a claim that the referees themselves committed discriminatory misconduct.

Because the gesture is reserved for racism and discrimination, FIFA treated his action as a false allegation against match officials, which is one of the most serious offenses in the rulebook. He was immediately dismissed from the technical area, charged with bringing the game into disrepute, and later received a multi‑match suspension and a fine. FIFA’s disciplinary committee ruled that he misused an anti‑racism symbol to protest refereeing decisions, which they consider an abuse of a protocol meant to protect players rather than a tool for tactical or political protest. FIFA was not willing to acknowledge the possibility that racism favoring a country that is 1% Black against an African nation was a possibility.

Soccer fandom is built on us-versus-them, and in that emotional framework, fans don’t think in terms of racial logic. They think in terms of maximum insult. When an opposing player is Black, the racist slur becomes the sharpest weapon available. The same fans may adore their own Black striker because he is part of “us.” In this context, racism is a tool. And tools are used selectively.

When Donald Trump stepped in to protect a U.S. player who is only American because of birthright citizenship, he wasn’t defending the principle of birthright citizenship. He was defending the usefulness of that specific player to the United States, in a moment of national visibility. He was able to overlook his racist behavior when he thought there was something to be gained.

Racism in soccer isn’t always logical, but it is often painfully true, surfacing in moments when tribalism overwhelms humanity, and the world’s most universal sport becomes a mirror of its deepest fractures. The contradictions — fans idolizing Black players on their own team while dehumanizing Black players on another — reveal that racism in the game is less about coherent ideology and more about weaponized emotion. Still, the very scale of soccer is also its hope. If billions of people can share one sport, then billions of people can someday share a version of it free from the hostility that has traveled with it since empire. I want a day when the world’s most popular game finally outruns the racism that has fueled it, and becomes as inclusive in practice as it has always claimed to be in spirit.

Whoever said "time heals all wounds" couldn't have predicted that some would stubbornly cling to division. Consider that members of the Patriot Front, a white nationalist group, marched through the capital last weekend, just as many gathered to celebrate the country's 250th anniversary. A viral photo of Bernita Bowlding, a Black woman riding a bus, surrounded by the group of masked white men, served as a chilling reminder of the tactics used by some of the country's oldest hate groups. Throughout the Jim Crow era, members of the Ku Klux Klan often wore white pointy sheets over their faces to mask their identity. While each group is distinct, Patriot Front members' emphasis on anonymity and white nationalism mirrors the tone and tenor of Klansmen.

In the Patriot Front's manifesto, leaders claimed that "an African, for example, may have lived, worked, and even been classified as a citizen in America for centuries, yet he is not American." In their view, only White people should be considered full citizens. To those who endorse this worldview, it doesn't matter that many of our enslaved ancestors lived here for longer than those whose descendants are 19th-century immigrants. While racism is seen as extreme by many today, this belief aligns with the Supreme Court decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford (1856). Justices argued that "a free negro of the African race, whose ancestors were brought to this country and sold as slaves, is not a 'citizen' within the meaning of the Constitution of the United States." In this case, racism flowed through mainstream channels.

Confederate veterans founded the Ku Klux Klan in 1866 as a direct response to losing the war and, along with the conflict, their right to enslave Black people. Despite the passage of Reconstruction Era amendments that prohibited slavery, established the concept of birthright citizenship, and guaranteed equal rights regardless of someone's race or previous condition of servitude, these white Southerners continued to resist social progress. They passed laws that racially segregated society and deprived Black people of equal rights. And in addition to these formal actions, their movement had a less public side. Throughout the Jim Crow era, masked White men engaged in racial terror lynchings, massacres, committed arson, and other acts of violence, all under the guise of anonymity.

While many assume that members of the Ku Klux Klan were primarily poor white farmers, this is a common misconception. Many powerful white people joined the Klan, including Theodore G. Bilbo, who served as Mississippi's governor from 1916–1920 and 1928–1932. Robert C. Byrd, a longtime senator representing West Virginia, became a recruiter for the organization in the 1940s, convincing at least 150 White men to join him in establishing a new chapter. David Duke, the former Grand Wizard of the KKK from 1974–1980, served as a Louisiana state representative from 1989–1992 and later ran for president. White men from all walks of life joined the Klan, including leaders who publicly identified with the group; many members wore masks to deny any association, and in doing so, protect their reputation.

David Cunningham, a sociology professor who authored Klansville, U.S.A., suggested members of the Klan would often "pose as ghosts or 'spectral' figures, drawing on then-resonant symbols in folklore." What started as "pranks" quickly evolved into "politically sinister overtones, as sheeted Klansmen would commonly terrorize their targets, using hoods and masks to disguise their identities when carrying out acts of violence under the cover of darkness." Thousands became victims of racial terror lynchings, but officials rarely held these men accountable for their actions. During the Colfax Massacre of 1873, 300 armed white men in Louisiana, including members of the Klan and the White Camelia, attacked the courthouse after Democrats lost an election, killing an estimated 100 to 150 Black people, according to an Equal Justice Initiative report. While federal troops arrested nearly 100 White men in connection with the violence, local officials in Louisiana refused to file charges against them. Despite federal authorities indicting 9 men for violating the Enforcement Acts of 1870, the Supreme Court overturned their convictions.

On February 18, 1915, President Woodrow Wilson watched The Birth of a Nation in the White House along with his cabinet members, close staff, family, and friends. This film, framed by the assassination of Abraham Lincoln and the rise of the Klan, portrayed as righteous men attempting to maintain order, became a popular recruitment tool for white nationalists. But while the imagery of White men chasing Black criminals on horseback appealed to White audiences at the time, for Black people who experienced the terror of their violent campaigns firsthand, Klansmen were racists who used "law and order" rhetoric to justify their plunder. Ten years later, in the fall of 1925, the Ku Klux Klan marched along Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C.

Historical images of the Klan marching in the nation's capital illustrated the lasting schism. While America began the process of healing during the Reconstruction Era, their efforts were interrupted by the rise of Jim Crow, which limited the rights afforded to Black people. Even after all the smoke cleared from the battlefields and industries began to recover, this conflict didn't fully heal. In the 1860s, the Klan picked up where the Confederacy left off by using positions of power to pass laws and enact policies that sought to uphold the racial hierarchy. They racially segregated communities, including schools, businesses, marketplaces, beaches, public parks, and even hospitals. Modern-day groups such as the Patriot Front show that this ideology of white nationalism persists.

If time heals all wounds, then not enough time has passed. Masked White men recently waved the American and Confederate flags in the nation's capital, which is ironic given that one side fought to preserve the system of slavery. At the same time, the other took a stand against it. Some wanted the internal conflict to stop so the country could unite, regardless of which side won. Black Americans are uniquely positioned to bear witness to the irony of a Trump supporter carrying a Confederate flag into the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, something the secessionists never accomplished during the war. Perhaps it's a sign that we shouldn't take the Union victory for granted, that we have a responsibility to consider threats to racial equality in each generation.

According to a ProPublica article, the "Patriot Front is perhaps the most active white supremacist group in the nation." One of their New York members told reporters that "masking up is their biggest accomplishment" as this strategy distorts their total numbers. When a Black person sees a large group of masked, uniformed men, it's unclear how many of them live in their community, endorse this group's ideology, and what roles they serve in, whether they are policemen, firemen, doctors, lawyers, teachers, industry leaders, or colleagues. In that respect, their anonymity serves as a form of intimidation. While the tactics employed by Patriot Front differ from those of the Klan, their ideologies bear a striking resemblance. Indeed, both groups believe that White people are more deserving of resources and opportunities. White masked men marching in the capital serve as a chilling reminder of the harm caused by old hate groups in this country, and what we stand to lose if we don't learn from our nation's history.

It’s hard for me not to get choked up when I hear the Daddy stories of this World Cup. If you are new to writing memoirs, there are terrific father-themed ones. Abusive daddies. Absentee daddies. Delusional daddies. I have the blessing of maybe covering all three in the book I’m working on about my own father.

Erling Haaland, I learned, is a player for Norway who’s built like a machine. But like me, he has a traceable human father. Unlike me, he has a father who raised him and passed along his sport. I so wish I had become a fan of The Beautiful Game when I was young, especially under the guidance of my dad, who truly loved footie. They called him “Skip” in Jamaica and I imagine his modest, lithe body, with shoulders swinging and legs crossing over, skipping to a dub beat as he struck the ball over and around opponents.

I can’t tell you much about soccer, but I know there are standout strikers like Haaland. His combination of power, stature, speed, and cunning betray his boyishness, his elation at tossing rivals down like rag dolls, at chewing up patches of grass in his cleats, at mauling the net with goal after goal. When I see him, I know there must’ve been Norse boatmen who had bones like steel and crashed the shores ready to take your land and your women. A bunch of beasts.

With star athletes, the types of fathers who create incredible sons in the sport are often a perilous roulette ranging between failed obsessive and gold-digging latecomer. There’s the story of Jalen Rose in the NBA, for instance, who knew nothing of his father except that he had played NBA ball. Then Good Ole Pop showed up shortly before his son’s biggest college year. Karl Malone, too, was an NBAer of real esteem who did not appear in his daughter’s life until her debut in the WNBA, it was reported. He dragged with him a torrid reputation of leering at teammates’ wives and that nasty statutory rape the league somehow whitewashed with stories of his Republicanism and love for fishing. I hated Karl Malone when he played, but I especially hated his character even before discovering how terrible of a father he’d been.

Watch Haaland in his next match, and as my brother explained, you’ll note a careful assassin. He conserves movement, like Messi would even though he’s a much younger player. He strikes exactly when his team needs to score, not more or less. He also converts his chances at a higher rate. A young man sharking around, plotting on the weakness of the defender so he knows exactly how to catch him off guard, suggests a well-taught player. His father was a notable midfielder who played for Manchester City — the same team where his son now builds a legend with the namesake.

I suppose it’s not unusual for a pro athlete to create and groom another pro athlete. That part’s become so common that the NBA is a sport now composed of the fairer-skinned sons of NBA players past. It’s also not uncommon for a father to pass on his love of a sport to a son.

We are all common somehow, as men are in their diversions. However brief, my father and I had conversations about sports. It was like me translating to him why I admired the roundball greats I did, and holding up my cultural lens to them. I didn’t get much from him about soccer, like who his greats were. He’d taught me some basics when I was 10, but ultimately felt I was too fat and groused at my unseemly motions with the ball. I’d been training my hands and flicking a jumpshot. I wasn’t sure what to do with this thing I could trip over.

For a year or two, I’d kick the hexagonal ball around my room but always left the house with a basketball. Dribbling that orange rock just got way more cred in New York than that other game where short maybe-Mexican dudes would take over any stretch of green longer than 60 strides. But inscribed on my curiosity for soccer was the gnawing sense that it was my father’s game, not mine to have, not for one who runs like I do, who sees asphalt where there are fields and concrete where there’s grass.

So I hit up my brother during the World Cup, in this, the first year after our dad died. The first year of the World Cup after our father is gone raises questions. So I ask him. I ask him questions because I know he’s studied it for so long. He was a goalie, played for the national squad in Jamaica, loves it like his children. I ask him what he thinks of Harry Kane, the English striker who looks, to me, like a proper gentleman from the Royal Court, a blue-eyed conquerer. I ask what’s happened to Brazil’s dominance, forestalled by the expansion of a global game, brain-drained of its stars in pro European leagues.

Occasionally, a little WhatsApp text from me reads: Haaland.

Just one word.

Or, the other day: “Whoa!” When Cape Verde nearly pulled off the unlikely upset against Argentina. I don’t know the particulars, only the heft of the game.

We may beat the colonizers (we won’t). We may see an underdog Mexico dethrone a European power (also no). The U.S. could take the big leap (nah).

It’s the first time I wish I could speak to my father uninterrupted. Free of the delusions that haunted him. Free of my resentments. Just me, him, the world, and some fans.

The Republican caucus in the House of Representatives is full of Great White Hopes. The expression “Great White Hope” gained traction as white people sought a challenger to defeat Jack Johnson, the first Black heavyweight champion in boxing history. Johnson won the title in 1908. His dominance triggered a national panic among white Americans who believed the heavyweight crown symbolized racial superiority. White promoters, politicians, and newspapers openly declared the need for:

“a Great White Hope to restore the honor of the white race.”

Republicans once described themselves as the Party of Lincoln, capturing between 85–95% of Black voters during Reconstruction. The first eight Black Congressmen, seven in the House and one U.S. Senator, were Republicans. What they need is a Great Black Hope to save them from becoming a Party with no Black representation, as both Parties were before Reconstruction.

Currier and Ives, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Suffice it to say, the Republicans are no longer the Party of Lincoln. They are the party of killing all the programs designed to level the playing field between everyone else and white men. Affirmative Action, DEI, and Black History have all suffered under the Republican Party, and they are about to introduce legislation to end birthright citizenship after the Supreme Court wouldn’t do it. SCOTUS may have thought its work was done after gutting the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments.

While the Republican Party once had the only Black representation in Congress, they now have fewer Black representatives than in the 1879s. They still have one Black Senator, Tim Scott of South Carolina, whom they can count on to tell us that America isn’t a racist country.

It’s the House of Representatives, where Republican membership may soon be as it was before Reconstruction, with no Black members. There are four Black members today, none of whom are running for reelection. Three decided to run for higher office, and one saw the writing on the wall after redistricting.

1. Wesley Hunt (Texas)

• Not running for reelection
• Ran for U.S. Senate in 2026 but lost the primary
• Part of Kevin McCarthy’s diversity‑recruitment wave (Isn’t that DEI?)

2. John James (Michigan)

• Not running for reelection
• Running for governor of Michigan
• Behind in polling to John James in Republican primary

3. Byron Donalds (Florida)

• Not running for reelection
• Running for governor of Florida
• Former drug dealer is leading in most general election polls against David Jolly

4. Burgess Owens (Utah)

• Not running for reelection
• Retiring after redistricting created a Democratic‑leaning district

Republicans have one last chance for a Black member in the House in Charlotte Bergmann, who has been running for Congress since 2010. Charlotte Bergmann is one of the most persistent Black Republican figures in modern Tennessee politics. This Memphis activist has spent more than a decade trying to become the GOP nominee in one of the most heavily Democratic, majority‑Black districts in the country. Her political identity is built around two pillars: Black Republican representation in a district where the GOP has almost no institutional presence, and community‑based outreach framed around entrepreneurship, faith, and conservative social values.

Bergmann’s earliest political and civic work came through Memphis’s Black church networks. She positioned herself as a conservative voice within majority‑Black congregations, emphasizing: personal responsibility, anti‑abortion advocacy, traditional family structures and Christian moral framing

This gave her a base of supporters who were socially conservative but not necessarily Republican. Bergmann frequently highlighted her background in business management and IT project work (including time at FedEx). She used this to promote entrepreneurship among Black Memphians, small‑business development and job‑readiness programs.

She argued that economic empowerment — not federal intervention — was the path to Black advancement.

For years, Bergmann was one of the only Black Republicans consistently visible in Memphis. She organized Republican meet‑ups in majority‑Black neighborhoods and recruited Black conservatives to local GOP events

This made her a symbolic figure for Tennessee Republicans, even though she never came close to winning. Bergmann frequently spoke about violent crime in Memphis, support for law enforcement, stricter sentencing and community‑police cooperation

Her messaging aligned with national Republican themes but was tailored to Memphis’s specific public‑safety concerns. Charlotte Bergmann is one of the most persistent congressional candidates in Tennessee history. She has run eight times for the U.S. House in TN‑9. That seat was one of the safest Democratic seats in the nation, and Bergmann often ran unopposed in Republican primaries.

For years, Black Republicans were the only ones willing to run in TN‑9 because they understood the district’s demographics and saw value in representing conservative Black voters even in a losing cause. White Republicans stayed out because the seat was unwinnable.

But once the district was redrawn. Once Memphis’s Black voters were cracked and submerged into a majority‑white, majority‑Republican electorate. The race suddenly became winnable for the first time in modern history. And the moment winning became possible, white Republican men flooded in.

Not because they had been serving Memphis. Not because they had built relationships in the city. Not because they had any history with the district’s Black communities. They entered because the map finally made victory mathematically plausible.

This is the same pattern seen across the South after Reconstruction. When a district is majority‑Black, Black candidates, Democrat or Republican, carry the political burden of representation. When a district is redrawn to favor white voters, white candidates appear instantly, claiming the seat as newly “competitive.” The shift is presented as neutral redistricting, but the effect is unmistakable: Black political opportunity contracts the moment white political opportunity expands.

In the 2026 Republican primary for Tennessee’s 9th Congressional District, Charlotte Bergmann is running against three white male Republican candidates: Brent Taylor, Todd Warner and Jeremy Thompson

She is the only Black candidate in the race and the only Black Republican running for any U.S. House seat this cycle. Should Bergmann lose, Republicans will have come full circle, with no Black representatives in the House. That should make for a telling group photo.

When Tim Scott first ran for Senate, he publicly stated that he believed in term limits and would serve only two terms. Scott did not retire after two terms. Instead, he ran again in 2022, won reelection, announced he intends to run again in 2028, reversing his earlier pledge.

Scott later said that he felt called to continue serving, the political moment required his leadership, and that he no longer believed strict term limits were necessary for himself. I wonder if somebody told him what a bad look it would be if Republicans in the House and the Senate had rid themselves of Black people. Then again, isn’t that just what they want?

The United States hosted the FIFA Men’s World Cup for the first time in 1994. It was the most‑attended World Cup in history, a record that stood until this year, 2026, when it was broken. I heard Donald Trump taking credit for the current attendance records and, secondarily, America. The 1994 matches still hold the average attendance records with 68,991 per match. Early matches were played in cities including Los Angeles, Chicago, Dallas, Orlando, Detroit, Boston, New York/New Jersey, and Washington, D.C.

The 2026 average (so far) is 64,720 per match. The main reason attendance records are being broken is that the number of teams has expanded from 24 in 1994 to 32 in 1998, and now to 48 for the first time in 2026. We should note that matches are also being played in Canada and Mexico.

The 1994 FIFA Men’s World Cup is widely credited with launching Major League Soccer (MLS), dramatically expanding U.S. interest in global football, and establishing the U.S. as a viable host for future tournaments. Soccer fields sprang up in suburbs across America. We also hosted the FIFA Women’s World Cup in 1999 and 2003 on short notice, substituting for China after a SARS outbreak.

I had the opportunity to be deeply immersed in the 1994 Men’s World Cup. I wasn’t a spectator but was working inside and on the grounds at two sites. I was at five early-round matches in Orlando and the final match between Brazil and Italy at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. A company I worked with in various capacities- as a joint venture partner, subcontractor, and employee had the merchandising rights for the entire World Cup. I had worked with them at several Super Bowls, the U.S. Open (tennis), and several World Series games at stadiums where they held the rights. We had experience at major events, including stadium concerts for the biggest musical artists, such as the Rolling Stones, U2, and Michael Jackson. The World Cup was unique unto itself because of the number of teams and foreign visitors.

In 1994, the United States had no domestic tradition of soccer hooliganism, but Europe, especially England, Germany, and the Netherlands, had spent the 1980s and early 1990s dealing with violent supporter groups. U.S. officials feared that these groups might travel to America and recreate the same chaos.

The main fears were that groups like England’s Inter City Firm (ICF), Germany’s hooligan ultras, and Dutch hooligan groups were considered high‑risk. U.S. stadiums were not accustomed to soccer-style supporter culture, chanting, drinking, and confrontational behavior. America feared clashes between rival national fanbases, especially England–Germany, Netherlands–Germany, Argentina–Brazil, and other historically tense matchups.

Cities like Orlando, Dallas, and Detroit had never hosted large international soccer crowds. Some European hooligan groups had ties to far‑right or racist organizations, raising concerns about violence toward locals. The World Cup was seen as a test of whether America could host future global sporting events.

The U.S. government, FIFA, and local police forces implemented one of the most extensive security operations in American sports history. The U.S. worked with Scotland Yard, Interpol, and European football associations. Lists of known hooligans were shared with U.S. immigration authorities. Hundreds of individuals with convictions for hooliganism were flagged. Some were denied visas or turned away at airports.

Local police departments trained specifically for soccer crowd control. Officers were placed inside stadiums, outside gates, and along fan routes. Many stadiums limited alcohol sales or cut off sales early. Some venues banned alcohol entirely for certain matches.

European-style fan segregation was implemented for high‑risk matches. Buffer zones were created between rival supporters. Special units were stationed near stadiums in case of crowd surges. These units were trained using European riot‑control models. Fans were monitored at airports, hotels, and public transit hubs. Police tracked known supporter groups moving between cities.

For all America’s concerns, the anticipated hooliganism never happened. The 1994 World Cup is remembered as one of the safest and most peaceful tournaments ever held. The combination of strict entry controls, heavy policing, and the American cultural environment prevented the kind of violence seen in Europe. In my opinion, there was no trouble in Orlando because it was so hot. There were misting stations throughout the stadium and grounds. All the games were played midday with average temperatures in the 90s. FIFA later shifted match times in future tournaments because of 1994’s heat issues. Several fans were taken to medical tents, not as a result of hooligans but from heat exhaustion.

The early matches I worked in Orlando involved five matches over two weeks. On June 19, Belgium beat Morocco 1–0, On June 24, Mexico beat Ireland 2–1. On June 25, Belgium beat the Netherlands 1–0. On June 29, the Netherlands defeated Morocco, and on July 4, the Netherlands beat Ireland 2–0. While Orlando hosted only five individual teams, we carried merchandise for all 24 teams. Brazil merchandise was popular, though they weren’t present. Our vendors had to learn the flags of all the nations involved as we sold flag lapel pins. As I recall, we operated 27 stands at what was then The Citrus Bowl, including a 100-ft tent on the grounds outside the stadium. When the Orlando games were over, we sent our remaining merchandise to Detroit for later matches. I got a few days' rest and flew to Los Angeles for the final match among teams yet to be determined.

I arrived in LA about a week before the July 17th final match. We now knew it would feature Brazil and Italy at the Rose Bowl. I’d worked Super Bowls at the stadium twice before and thought I knew the layout. The stadium itself seated around 100,000 people, but there would be at least that many on the grounds outside the building. Adidas had set up a large multi-sided tent with televisions facing outward so fans could watch the game. Inside the stadium, many corporate tickets were sold (like at Super Bowls), but outside were fans of the sport from both countries. Brazil’s fans seemed to outnumber Italy’s about three to one. I saw almost none of the match as we were moving merchandise around, but I was aware the game ended in a tie and would go to a shootout to determine the winner. The outside fans had been drinking and singing all afternoon, some blowing those damned vuvuzelas, 2-foot-long plastic horns that produced a loud buzzing sound. Vuvuzelas have been banned since the 2010 South Africa World Cup.

As the teams readied for the shootout, I was suddenly concerned about what would happen after the match. Would there be an altercation between the fan bases? I’d learned in my month of World Cup that fans were pretty intense about their teams. I hadn’t cared to that point who would win, but found myself rooting for Brazil because they had so many more fans present. I had been moving in and out of the stadium throughout the day and decided to go inside where security was tighter. I watched on a screen as Brazil won the shootout, 3–2.

There wasn’t the pandemonium I anticipated. I headed back outside to find Brazilians hugging Italians and vice versa. None of the fans seemed to want to go home, though the corporados in suits quickly exited, some in limos. One of the core goals of the FIFA World Cup is to promote global unity and cultural exchange. FIFA frames the tournament as a celebration of nations, cultures, and shared identity through sport.

I think some of that has been lost in the pursuit of money and the injection of politics. When the American President intervened to overturn a red card against an American player, it wasn’t a good look. America was eliminated 4–1 by Belgium the following day, which might be karma. Unlike the Knicks, the USMWT won’t have additional games to recover from the Trump jinx. World Cup soccer teams in general have become melting pots, with 47 of the 48 teams having players of African heritage. Argentina seems to have a different agenda.

The U.S. player Folarin Balogun was a beneficiary of birthright citizenship. Donald Trump is actively trying to end birthright citizenship, demanding Congress do it, having failed to convince the Supreme Court. In December 2025, FIFA President Gianni Infantino awarded Donald Trump a made-up peace prize without consulting FIFA council members in a blatant attempt to suck up to Trump. Infantino bent over when Trump asked that he overturn the red card against Balogun.

As I watch the 2026 matches, culminating with the final game. I’ll be looking for what I saw on the Rose Bowl grounds. Citizens of different nations finding common identity through sport. We will see.

My twelve-year-old granddaughter called me to ask if segregation was returning. I don’t know if it’s good or bad, but she thought I would be the one to ask that question. She’d seen five separate videos on YouTube from white people wanting segregation to return. I explained she shouldn’t worry about it. Just because some people feel that way, it isn’t likely to happen. I also talked to her mother about how much time my granddaughter spends on YouTube.

After we hung up, I considered all the forces trying to segregate America in various ways, let alone those wanting to start a race war. The widespread resistance began with Reconstruction and has advanced in fits and starts, sometimes going backward. The battle must continue, or the Redemption movement might have the last word. I realize I just discredited hundreds of individual and group acts of resistance that occurred earlier, including the German Coast Rebellion, the Nat Turner Revolt, the Gabriel Prosser Rebellion, the Denmark Vesey Revolt, and the Stono Rebellion. I submit that the Reconstruction Era was the first national effort to promote equality and integrate Black people into most facets of society. Christian organizations and the Republican Party mainly supported these efforts in what could be described as diversity, equity, and inclusion for lack of better words.

Understanding Reconstruction requires an appreciation of what things were like at the end of the Civil War. Approximately four million enslaved people were purportedly freed across the South at the end of the war. Some were technically freed with the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, provided they could reach free territory. Many of the freed people were illiterate due to an intentional effort to keep them from reading and communicating. In particular, slaves were meant not to know of the successful Haitian Revolution and the attempts throughout America to gain freedom. Enslaved people weren’t meant to know of things like Lord Dunsmore’s offer of freedom to enslaved people who joined the British Army or that Spain offered liberty to slaves reaching its borders.

To avoid starvation, the majority of enslaved people stayed in place, continuing to work for their previous owners. Laws called the Black Codes were quickly passed, making vagrancy a crime. Free Black men could not publicly gather in groups of fewer than three. Black people were under a curfew and initially could not vote. Mass incarceration began after the Civil War, and the penalty was often leased to a plantation. Sometimes the same one they were freed from. The Black Codes were an attempt to reenslave the recently freed. A rose by another name is still a rose.

The Civil War effectively ended on April 9, 1865. Texas got the word on June 19, 1865 (Juneteenth). Some people were still legally enslaved in parts of Delaware, Kentucky, and New Jersey until the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment on December 18, 1865. Even then, there was that pesky exception in the 13th Amendment allowing enslavement of prisoners, which is still used today. My point is that freedom was a fluid concept, and free wasn’t always free.

In Texas, when Major General Gordon Granger read General Order #3 on Juneteenth in Galveston, he told the newly freed to return to their plantations where they would now work for wages. He also said not to show up at Army bases because the government would not support them. Across the South, many slaves stayed in place while others wandered around with no place to go. Over a million slaves contracted diseases or suffered severe food shortages. Over 60,000 died from smallpox alone, and several thousand died from starvation. Many went to Washington, DC, where they were herded into concentration camps. In December 1865, a group of disgruntled former Confederate soldiers in Pulaski, Tennessee, formed a social club they called the Ku Klux Klan.

What started as a bunch of ex-soldiers whining about losing not only the war but a way of life soon evolved into something much more. They became what they viewed as the loyal opposition to the Republican Party, which they saw as the face of the enemy. The Republican Party was barely a decade old when the war ended, and they had already successfully elected Abraham Lincoln to the office of President twice. The Party rose from the ashes of the Whig Party, and its leaders were staunch abolitionists. When Lincoln was assassinated soon after his second inauguration, he was replaced by strict segregationist Andrew Johnson, but Republicans controlled Congress and pressed on with their policies.

The Klan quickly spread, especially after making former Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest their first Grand Wizard. Membership increased exponentially, as did their reign of terror that included cross burnings, lynchings, and murders.

The Republican Congress got busy passing the three Reconstruction Amendments: the Thirteenth, abolishing slavery; the Fourteenth, granting most of them citizenship; and the Fifteenth, granting them the right to vote. The Klan was opposed to all of that, spurring a wave of violence that didn’t go unnoticed by Congress. In 1870 and 1871, they passed strict Anti-Klan Acts, which almost wiped out Klan activity in the South, ending what would later be referred to as the First Wave of the Ku Klux Klan.

The other major political party at the time was the Democratic Party. While America once had multiple political parties with a chance of winning the presidency, every president since the 13th President, Millard Fillmore, in 1853, has been either a Democrat or a Republican. The Democratic Party was aligned with states’ rights, especially when it came to slavery.

While the Klan was active at night, the Democratic Party in the South, often comprised of the same members, did what they could through civic organizations and law enforcement. Democrats created poll taxes and literacy tests, along with more violent methods, to curtail voting. Many of their members wore a badge in daylight and a hood in the dark. When Congress directed the federal troops to go after the Klan and enforce voting rights for Black people, it was then that the Reconstruction Era gained a stronghold.

Another critical front of the Reconstruction movement was education. White and Black churches, notably the American Missionary Association and the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church, were instrumental in creating learning institutions. The Freedmen’s Bureau was established to help the newly freed connect with family members separated by the war (and their former owners). They advocated for freed men and women in court, attempted to negotiate wages while working on plantations, and established schools for those who had been denied the ability to read and write.

The Freedmen’s Bureau was initially intended to exist for a single year. When the states’ resistance became clear, Congress voted to renew its charter, having to override President Johnson’s veto. Johnson’s version of Reconstruction was how to restore white Southerners after the Civil War, giving them reparations and restoring them land lost during the war. After Union General Sherman granted up to 40 acres (no mule) to formerly enslaved people along the Atlantic coast in Field Order 15, President Johnson restored almost all that land to its pre-war white owners, along with granting them the improvements made by the formerly enslaved.

Despite the continued existence of many of the Black Codes, White Leagues, Red Shirts (Klan-like chapters that came out during the day), mass incarceration, and voter suppression. The Reconstruction Era saw many advances for the formerly enslaved. There was a semblance of political power as Black men were elected to multiple state government positions, even winning statewide races in Mississippi and Florida. Black men were elected to Congress, though being seated was sometimes a problem. Black townships formed in the South, and as Americans expanded westward, Black Americans followed, often establishing Black communities in the West.

The only reason Black progress in the South occurred was the continued existence of federal troops. These troops kept the peace when otherwise Black voting would be prevented, Black leaders would be threatened, or killed. There would have been no recourse in the courts for transgressions against Black people, though sometimes the troops themselves were the violators. Soldiers raping Black women was a common occurrence. The presence of federal troops was a thorn in the side of white Southerners who wanted their way of life returned.

Their opportunity came in 1876 during a contested presidential election. Four states, Florida, South Carolina, Oregon, and Louisiana, disputed which electors would be certified. The Democratic Party was one Electoral College vote shy of winning the Presidency, with twenty votes disputed. In a literal smoke-filled room, the Compromise of 1877 was worked out, where all twenty of the disputed votes would go to Republican Rutherford B. Hayes in return for the removal of the federal troops. Democrats sacrificed a presidency they wanted badly for what they desperately needed: the soldiers’ removal.

Even before Rutherford B. Hayes took office, Ulysses S. Grant removed the troops from Florida. When Hayes took office, he removed the rest. Hayes did the South one more favor the following year, signing the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878, ensuring the troops would never return to protect the former slaves. It may be unclear when Reconstruction officially began, between 1863 and 1867. There’s no question Reconstruction ended in 1877 with the removal of federal troops.

REDEMPTION

At the end of the Civil War, much of the South, including major cities like Atlanta and Richmond, was in ruins. Plantations were in ruins, and an occupying force forcibly dismantled the political structure. Even worse, pride had been decimated, and the honor soldiers were told they were fighting for was lost. In order to return to the Union, states had to agree to the Fourteenth Amendment and recognize the emancipation of enslaved people. Shortly afterward, some of those same people were winning elections and enforcing laws.

Henry Louis Gates described the Redemption period as “when the gains of Reconstruction were systematically erased, and the country witnessed the rise of a white supremacist ideology that, we might say, went rogue, an ideology that would long outlast the circumstances of its origin.” Most people have heard of Reconstruction; Redemption often lurked in the background, described by different names to make it more palatable.

Part One of Redemption was erasing the gains. The federal troops’ leaving kick-started that process. The Black representatives to Congress were either forced to resign, serve out their terms, and not run again, or defeated at the ballot box, as Black voters were mostly unable to vote. Then came the systemic enactment of Jim Crow laws and the enforcement of segregation. In the same manner as the Black Codes recreated slavery, Jim Crow did what it could to replicate the Black Codes. Unlike the Black Codes, which were generally limited to Southern states, Jim Crow spread across the land, establishing segregation everywhere, especially in public schools.

Segregation was enforced for public pools, hospitals, jails, drinking fountains, and residential homes for the elderly and handicapped. You may have heard of separate but equal? Segregation fostered no such thing, as facilities and institutions for Black people were always inferior. Without regard for the Fifteenth Amendment, Black people were discouraged from voting, whether by enforcement of special laws or threats of bodily harm.

The courts, including the United States Supreme Court, joined in dismantling rights for Black people. Before 1865, the Supreme Court had struck down Congressional Acts only twice as unconstitutional. Between 1865 and 1872, the Court did so thirteen times, negating most of the Anti-KKK Acts along the way. The Republicans who once fought for diversity, equity, and inclusion of Black people ignored their plight. Sometimes white supremacy is defined by looking the other way when injustice occurs, as long as it doesn’t happen to you.

Part Two of Redemption was about restoring the glory of the Confederacy. It was about discrediting the gains of Reconstruction and making heroes of the Southerners who allegedly fought not to preserve slavery but for heritage and states’ rights. All of the Articles of Secession from each state made clear that leaving the Union was about slavery. Virginia mentions “the oppression of the Southern slaveholding States.” Georgia discusses its “dispute with Northern states over African slavery.” Alabama met the “other slaveholding states of the South,” while seceding. South Carolina describes “an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery.” Specifically mentioning refusal to comply with the Fugitive Slave Act. Redemption was/is about diminishing the importance of enslavement altogether.

Slavery is often considered America’s original sin, though descendants of Native Americans might disagree. Redemption requires the erasure or rewriting of history so that America can continue to promote American values and American Exceptionalism. The wrongs in history continue to be erased, as are the stories of those who managed to overcome tremendous obstacles.

The granddaughter I mentioned at the beginning of this chapter will be spending much of the summer with my wife and me, and she’ll be getting unexpected history lessons. I think when she asks me questions like the one about segregation, it’s to change the subject from her performance in school and not staying on top of her homework. I don’t expect her to know many of the terms I’ve mentioned, like Red Shirts, and names like Gabriel Prosser and Denmark Vesey. We will read this chapter together,r and when she gets to something she doesn’t know, she’ll be required to research it and explain what it is. She’ll pretend she understands to avoid looking it up, but I’m prepared to question her knowledge when I suspect she’s faking. I encourage all readers to research as needed; explaining each term would turn this chapter into a book, and I haven’t been allocated the word space.

I will simplify this chapter by describing the transition from Reconstruction to Redemption, by sharing what happened in Camilla, Georgia, not far from her great-grandmother’s home in Americus, Georgia, where her maternal grandmother was born.

By July 1868, Georgia had fulfilled the requirements of Congress’s Reconstruction plan and been readmitted to the Union. President Andrew Johnson, an avowed segregationist, considered Georgia’s commitment met and removed the federal troops. That September, white Republicans joined with the Democrats in expelling the newly elected Black senators and Black representatives in the lower house from the General Assembly because they were at least 1/8th Black.

Black Republicans and a few whites in Albany, GA, planned a march and rally in response. The march began in Albany and was to end at a Republican rally at the Camilla courthouse, 25 miles away. Mitchell County whites, however, were determined that no Republican rally would occur. Sheriff Mumford Poore met the marchers on the city’s outskirts, asking them not to enter and to give up their guns. Unable to get the protesters to stop the march or disarm, Sheriff Poore returned to town and arranged a “posse” to greet them.

According to all reports except the sheriff’s, when the marchers neared the courthouse, armed white men began shooting at the protesters from positions on roofs and doorways to shops and other buildings. A dozen marchers were killed, and over thirty were wounded. The marchers were harassed on their way back to Albany. News of the event was sent by telegraph, and newspaper articles appeared nationwide. The Camilla Massacre is credited with suppressing Black votes in the November election. In Albany, white leaders committed fraud at the polls, deliberately misplacing many Black votes or changing them to Democratic ones. White Democrats, the racial minority in southwest Georgia, carried the election in Georgia.

Sheriff Poore ultimately gave an affidavit where he claimed the shooting began when his friend James Johns fired a shot into the ground, as opposed to the witnesses who saw him shoot into the crowd — Freedman’s Bureau sub-assistant commissioner O.H. Howard conducted what passed for an investigation. He took a few affidavits, which were filed. No one was prosecuted, and life in Camilla went on. Military rule was reestablished in Georgia. Troops would remain in several states until their withdrawal became a bargaining chip in resolving the disputed 1876 presidential election through the Compromise of 1877.

Camilla was the massacre nobody openly talked about. Laws were passed in Georgia that would have prevented people from carrying guns to a courthouse or public gathering, but not the posse that attacked the Camilla marchers. Sheriff Poore continued serving, and no arrests were made. There was no public acknowledgment by the city of Camilla or Mitchell County that the massacre even happened until 1998. A marker was placed, and people returned to not talking about it.

Reconstruction lasted between 10 and 12 years. Redemption, the plan to change history and idolize whiteness and the Confederacy, is forever. Each civil rights movement has been accompanied by a wave of new Confederate monuments and statues and efforts to rewrite history into a kinder, gentler experience. Portions of American history can no longer be taught because it might make white teachers and children feel bad. Black heroes are being erased from government websites, and books focused on race are being removed from libraries. Articles contributed to the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. An Executive Order has been issued targeting the museum. The whitelash to Black recognition and advancement is real.

On the last Monday in June, Chief Justice John Roberts announced two decisions from the same bench, minutes apart, both answering the same question: can the president fire whoever he wants? Rebecca Slaughter, a Federal Trade Commissioner fired without cause in March 2025, learned that he can. Lisa Cook, the Federal Reserve governor he has been trying to fire since last summer, learned that he cannot, at least not yet. Same author. Same Constitution. Two answers.

The next morning, the Court told Donald Trump that a baby born in Houston to a mother without papers is an American, no matter what his executive order says. Four months earlier, it told him he could not tax the country by decree. And in between, in a ruling most of the country never read, it handed his party the congressional maps of the South.

The question I keep hearing is whether the Supreme Court finally checked this president. Wrong question. The Court spent this term choosing which president it wants. It refused him the claims that no honest reading of the law could carry, and it granted him the claims that rebuild the federal government around one man and redrew the districts around the rest of us. You have to hold both halves of that sentence to understand what just happened.

What He Lost, and Why He Lost It

Start with the losses, because they were real.

In Trump v. Barbara, decided June 30, the Court struck down Executive Order 14160, the January 2025 order declaring that children born here to undocumented or temporary residents are not citizens. The first sentence of the Fourteenth Amendment was written in 1866 for people who looked like my great-great-grandparents: born on this soil, enslaved on this soil, and told for 250 years that the soil owed them nothing. “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens.” The senators who wrote that sentence called citizenship the right to have rights. Even this Court could not pretend that the words say something else.

In Learning Resources v. Trump, decided February 20, the Court ruled 6 to 3 that the emergency-powers law Trump used to tariff the planet contains, in Roberts’s words, “no reference to tariffs or duties.” Article I gives the taxing power to Congress. The Tax Foundation puts the total collected under that law above $160 billion, every dollar of it without legal authority. The refund fight will run for years; by Bloomberg’s count, the administration faced roughly two thousand tariff lawsuits within a week of losing. And within hours of the ruling, Trump declared a new emergency under a different statute and imposed a new 10 percent tariff. The states sued again. That case is still moving.

And in Watson v. Republican National Committee, decided the same Monday as the firing cases, the Court upheld, 5 to 4, the Mississippi law counting mail ballots postmarked by Election Day. The Republican National Committee wanted similar laws in more than half the states thrown into doubt four months before the midterms; in many of those states, the grace period exists for one group of voters, deployed troops, and Americans overseas. The plaintiffs who beat the RNC included the Vet Voice Foundation. Ballots from service members were on the line, and the Court barely protected them.

Notice the shape of these losses. Each one asked the Court to erase words on a page: strike the Citizenship Clause, find a tariff power in a statute that never mentions tariffs, add a ballot deadline Congress never wrote. Even six conservative justices would not do that in daylight. The asks were that extreme. That is what the losses tell you, and it is all they tell you.

What He Won

Now the wins because they were bigger.

Trump v. Slaughter overruled Humphrey’s Executor, the 1935 precedent that let Congress shield the officials of independent agencies from firing without cause. The ruling covers roughly two dozen multimember agencies: the Federal Trade Commission, the National Labor Relations Board, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, and the Merit Systems Protection Board. The agencies that police price gouging, protect union elections, recall the crib you put your grandchild in, and shield civil servants from political purges now serve at the pleasure of one man. Justice Sotomayor read her dissent aloud from the bench, a step justices take perhaps once a term, when a written objection is not enough, and warned that the ruling “promises only chaos.” Trump celebrated on social media, calling it the “Greatest Increase in Presidential Power in the last 100 years.” For once, I take him at his word.

The Court carved out a single exception: the Federal Reserve. Cook keeps her seat while her case proceeds, because five justices decided the central bank has a pedigree the FTC lacks. Read that carve-out closely. The agency that steadies Wall Street got a wall. The agencies that guard your paycheck and your union vote got nothing. Slaughter said afterward that the Court had decided Wall Street gets special treatment while the agencies that look out for everyday Americans do not. She was fired for less honesty than that.

The term also loosened the limits on money that party committees can spend in coordination with their candidates, just in time for the most expensive midterm in American history.

The Quiet One

But the ruling that will decide the most in November came in April, while the tariff headlines were still running. Louisiana v. Callais.

Justice Samuel Alito, writing for the same 6-to-3 majority, rewrote Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. To challenge a congressional map now, plaintiffs must show a “strong inference” that the state intentionally drew its lines to shut minority voters out. Intent. The standard Congress deliberately removed from Section 2 in 1982, because intent hides in caucus rooms and dilution does its work either way. Justice Kagan, in dissent, called the ruling a demolition of the Voting Rights Act and warned that states can now dilute minority voting power without legal consequence.

Then the Court showed us what the new rule means in practice. A three-judge panel, two of its members appointed by Trump, found that Alabama drew its congressional map with the intent to discriminate against Black voters. Under the old law that finding ends the case. Under Callais, the Supreme Court let Alabama use the map anyway. Southern legislatures took the hint. Several are already redrawing districts that Black voters spent decades winning (Gerrymandering in the South is explained and illustrated here.)

I have written before about the line that runs from Dred Scott through Plessy to Shelby County. Callais belongs on that line. Not because the opinions sound alike; they don’t. Because the mechanism is identical: keep the protection on the page, then raise the proof required until no case on earth can meet it. Jim Crow never banned Black voting either. It set conditions.

ThePpattern

Put the whole term side by side, and the design is hard to miss. The Court blocked the spectacle and blessed the architecture. It denied Trump the claims that would have required rewriting plain text in front of the cameras: citizenship, tariffs, and ballot deadlines. It granted him the claims that restructure power quietly and durably: the administrative state answers to him, the party money flows without limit, and the maps of the South tilt before a single vote is cast.

A stolen election announces itself. A redrawn district just sits there, looking like geography.

November's Call to Action

Here is what I want you to do with this, because analysis without action is weather.

First, find out whether your district changed. If you live in Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, or anywhere else a legislature has touched the maps since April, the congressional district you voted in last cycle may no longer exist. Look it up now, not in October.

Second, if you vote by mail, mail early. The Court protected postmark deadlines this year, and Trump answered by demanding Congress pass a bill to strip that protection away. Do not build your vote on a rule that one session of Congress can repeal.

Third, stop waiting for nine justices to save anything. They told you this term, in their own handwriting, what they will protect: the president’s power and the central bank. Everything else is on us, the way it has always been on us. The Voting Rights Act did not come from the Court having a good morning. It came from people who marched across a bridge knowing what waited on the other side.

The Constitution survived this term. But it keeps asking the question it asked my great-great-grandparents: fine words, but who do they cover? In June, the Court answered for babies born in Houston. In April, it answered for Black voters in Louisiana. Read both answers. Then treat the second one like it is on the ballot in November.

Because it is.

Michael Proctor’s downfall did not begin with the Karen Read case, nor with the Myles King investigation, nor with the avalanche of racist, misogynistic, anti‑Semitic, and homophobic text messages that finally forced the Massachusetts State Police to fire him. His downfall began long before he ever put on a badge. It began in the years when he learned, and was rewarded for, a worldview built on cruelty, bias, and the belief that certain people mattered less. What the public is now discovering is not a sudden scandal. It is a long‑running pattern of bigotry that appears to stretch back to his youth, a pattern that should have disqualified him from policing entirely. Instead, it was ignored, minimized, or never investigated at all.

Proctor's story is not just one officer’s racism. It is the story of a system that hired him, armed him, empowered him, and protected him, even as he sent messages fantasizing about violence against Black people, mocking women, praising Hitler, and expressing contempt for entire communities (sounds a lot like Donald Trump). It is the story of how a man who admitted, in his own words, “No idea how I passed the background” still became a Massachusetts State Police trooper. And it is the story of how his bigotry may have shaped investigations, influenced outcomes, and endangered lives.

This is not a neutral story. It is a story about institutional failure, moral rot, and the danger of letting racism hide behind a badge.

The Roots of a Pattern: Bigotry Before the Badge

Although the public record does not provide a detailed biography of Proctor’s high‑school years, the text messages uncovered in multiple investigations paint a clear picture: his racism did not begin in adulthood. It was not a sudden lapse in judgment. It was not the product of stress, burnout, or the pressures of policing. It was a worldview he carried with him long before he applied to the Massachusetts State Police.

The messages show a man who was comfortable using racist slurs, joking about violence against Black people, mocking women, praising white supremacist imagery, and expressing hatred toward entire groups. These are not attitudes that appear suddenly at age 30. They are learned early, reinforced socially, and carried forward unless challenged.

And nothing in Proctor’s early life appears to have challenged them.

Instead, he entered adulthood with the confidence that he could speak, think, and joke this way without consequence. That confidence is not accidental. It is the product of environments — social, educational, cultural — that tolerated or rewarded bigotry. It is the product of peers who laughed at racist jokes, teachers who ignored them, and institutions that never asked whether he was fit to wield power over the public.

By the time Proctor applied to become a police officer, his worldview was already formed. The question is not whether he was racist before joining the force. The question is how many people saw it and said nothing.

IThe Background Check That Should Have Stopped Everything

The most damning evidence about Proctor’s pre‑police life comes from Proctor himself. In 2017, he texted:

“No idea how I passed the background.”

That is not the statement of a man with a clean record. That is the statement of a man who knows his past should have raised red flags.

The newly released hiring records show that Proctor applied to the Boston Police Department before joining the Massachusetts State Police. During that process, he complained that the background investigator “had it in for him.” He worried about what the investigator might uncover. He warned friends that they might be contacted. He expressed anxiety about the thoroughness of the review.

When he later applied to the Massachusetts State Police, he again warned friends that troopers might reach out during his background check. And then, after he was hired, he admitted he did not understand how he passed.

Defense attorney Rosemary Scapicchio put it bluntly: “Had the Massachusetts State Police conducted a thorough background check, he would not have passed.”

The text messages uncovered in multiple investigations are not merely offensive. They are violent. They are hateful. They are dangerous. They reveal a man who fantasized about harming Black people, who mocked victims, who expressed admiration for white supremacist imagery, and who treated racism as entertainment.

One message stands out because it has been widely reported and is central to understanding the depth of his bigotry. In it, Proctor wrote that he was planning on“tying up a [Black man] and dragging him from my bumper through the streets of Randolph.”

This is not a joke. It is a fantasy about committing a lynching.

Here are some other messages, which speak for themselves:

“2 park rangers stabbed in Boston Common… has to be the work of a nigger”

“Let’s get some horses and white sheets and burn a cross in the arboretum”

“We could use them niggers as dart boards.”

“Why don’t black people get sunburnt? Because prisons are indoors.”

“America sucks… Hitler was really onto something, then the fucking US had to step in and ruin it.”

These messages were not isolated. They spanned years. They appeared in conversations with friends, colleagues, and other officers. They were part of his daily communication. After running into an apparently attractive woman, Proctor said,

“Haha can’t wait to look this cunt up tonight at work”

They reveal a worldview in which Black lives were disposable, women were objects, and violence was entertainment. They reveal a man who should never have been given a badge. The articles mentioning Proctor’s quotes only give you an inkling of his deep-seated bigotry. You need to read the complaint filed by Karen Read and her attorneys to get a true understanding.

Here’s a sample of what you aren’t seeing in the articles:

“I haven’t shot anyone, but I did pull a nigger over today for tossing a cigarette out the window.”

“It should be ‘punch a nigger day’ in Canton today out of retribution. Any shine you see, blast it in the face.”

The “Slow Response” Mentality: Letting a Black Crash Victim Die

Proctor texted a fellow officer in discussion of a multi-car crash:

“Actually, take your time, I saw a nigger was involved, so I wouldn’t rush if you’re working. Let them die,”

When an officer fantasizes about dragging a Black man behind his car, when he expresses hatred toward Black people, when he jokes about violence, it raises a chilling question:

Would he let someone die?

The public record shows no investigation into whether Proctor ever delayed aid to a Black victim. No audit of his emergency responses. No review of his dispatch logs. No inquiry into whether his racism translated into real‑world harm.

But the possibility is not hypothetical. It is grounded in his own words. A man who fantasizes about killing a Black person cannot be trusted to protect one. A man who jokes about violence cannot be trusted to respond quickly when violence occurs. A man who expresses hatred cannot be trusted to act with compassion.

The failure to investigate whether Proctor ever allowed harm to occur is not a minor oversight. It is a moral failure. It is a failure of leadership. It is a failure of accountability. And it is a failure that leaves unanswered questions about the lives he may have touched — or failed to save.

How do you separate policing from the racist beliefs of police officers? You can’t. In many cases, the remedy will be to let innocent and potentially guilty people go because of improper investigations. Every case Michael Proctor has been involved in is being investigated, and we may get the answer to the question of whether he let people die, or even killed some, as he dreamed of. Multiply Michael Proctor times America and see what you get.

America’s police forces have work to do.

Picture two rooms. In one, a 30th-anniversary pressing of Reasonable Doubt sits on a Target shelf: new vinyl color, a few unreleased tracks, a corporate logo on the shrink wrap. In the other, Clarence Thomas signs his name to another decision that thins the Voting Rights Act. This week, online, the first room is the scandal. The second barely trends. That gap is the whole problem, and it is not Jay-Z’s.

Jay-Z’s Target play is a limited, anniversary-edition retail deal built around Reasonable Doubt. It is not a secret contract to drag Black America back into a “traitor” big-box store. Treating it as the gravest betrayal facing Black people in 2026 is politically unserious, given what Thomas, Black Trumpism, and the GOP’s Black surrogates are doing in the places that actually govern our lives.

Start with the actual deal

Let’s get the facts on the table before we start calling names. Target is rolling out an exclusive 30th-anniversary edition of Reasonable Doubt: special packaging, a unique vinyl color, and previously unreleased versions of a few tracks. You can only buy that edition at Target, the same way artists have done Best Buy-only, Walmart-only, and iTunes-only drops for years.

So that is the deal. A boutique collector’s item with a corporate logo on the shrink wrap, not a long-term co-ownership of the Black vote. The critics attacking Jay-Z are filling in the blanks with their own resentment and calling it fact. They are mad at Target for rolling back DEI and LGBT+ support, which is fair. Then they turn Jay-Z into the mascot for every decision Target has made since. That is not analysis. That is projection.

Boycott logic and who we erase

I support the anger behind the Target boycott. Black clergy and community leaders called for it when Target folded on DEI, and it was making a dent. But if the argument is that anyone who does business with Target betrays Black people, then say it all the way out loud. The line includes the Black employees on those floors, the Black managers running those stores, and the Black-owned products already on those shelves.

You do not get to pretend the only Black person in this picture is Shawn Carter. Target’s workforce is not a white monolith just because Instagram is mad at corporate PR this week. People living check to check inside that red shirt do not vanish because we decided Jay-Z is the more satisfying villain. If the rule is that no Black person should ever take a Target check again, own it. Don’t carve out an exemption for working-class folks while you hammer the billionaire and call it principle.

And the author of the op-ed never stops to ask the strategic question: what is the endgame? Boycott as pressure is one thing. Boycott as religion, where any point of contact with the company becomes sin, is something else. If the goal is to move Target and not just feel pure, there is a conversation to have about how Black cultural power and Black consumer power get deployed together, including through high-profile partnerships that come with demands attached.

Jay-Z’s deals are more than a check

This is where I part ways with the idea that Jay-Z is just cashing a check and spitting on the community on his way to the bank. He has never hidden that he is a capitalist. The man walked into the game telling you he was a businessman, then corrected the line to “I’m a business, man.” But for decades, he has also been a pipeline and a shield for Black artists and Black causes.

Anytime someone starts with, “I’m not hating on…”, they are most likely doing just that with their commentary. They know what their words mean. They know how it sounds to you. They also know because they have been on the other side of the “hating” and accusations.

“Game recognize game.” You're never too tall to be reached, especially when the other person is standing on business. You're not above taking shots if you're dishing it out. That comes with the territory.

It’s not about winning an argument or even a competition. It’s about the narrative and letting the reader sort it out for themselves.

At the barbershop, we say “your side, then its my side and what’s left outside.”

His job here is not to herd Black shoppers back through Target’s doors. For thirty years, his deals have done something else: turned his own access into other people’s paydays. His Roc Nation infrastructure rode shotgun for Meek Mill when the Pennsylvania parole system tried to grind him into dust. Whatever business disagreements they had later, Meek’s case became a national conversation because Jay-Z turned a Philly rapper’s legal nightmare into an indictment of the parole state. That money and that pressure went on to back criminal-justice reform from individual cases to broader campaigns.

In music, he has been one of the few A-list owners willing to get loud about streaming economics, artist control, and the difference between exposure and exploitation. His fights over compensation and equity were about who owns the pipes and who gets paid when Black music feeds Spotify, Apple, and the rest. Argue with his execution if you want. Pretending his business mind has never turned toward Black artists’ advantage is dishonest.

Then there is the NFL deal everyone swore would end his credibility. That partnership helped move Kendrick Lamar and Bad Bunny onto the Super Bowl halftime stage. Black and Brown artists with political teeth, performing inside the whitest corporate spectacle in America. That counts for something. Jay-Z has used institutional partnerships before to smuggle Black culture and Black political subtext into rooms that were never built for us.

Micro-outrage versus macro-betrayal

Now zoom out. While social media has you screaming about a Reasonable Doubt vinyl in aisle 7, Clarence Thomas sits on the Supreme Court, signing off on the slow demolition of voting rights and any federal guardrail that ever restrained state-level racial backlash. He joined the Shelby County v. Holder majority that gutted the preclearance system holding discriminatory voting laws in check, and wrote separately to go further. In his Dobbs concurrence, he urged the Court to reconsider the rulings that protect contraception and marriage. Black Trump supporters carry water for a man who wants to point the DOJ at his enemies and has made clear that “law and order” means what it has always meant: state violence aimed down the hierarchy.

Tim Scott runs as if racism is a solved math problem, proof that America “isn’t a racist country” because he personally holds a Senate seat. Byron Donalds praises antebellum Black family structures and launders nostalgia for a party that still chokes on the phrase “Black Lives Matter.” These men are not selling collector’s vinyl. They are selling policy: judicial nominations, budgets, and bills that will lock in disparities in housing, education, policing, and health for decades.

So the betrayal that demands my full moral energy is an anniversary edition of Reasonable Doubt sold at Target? That is like standing in a burning house and yelling at the man who hung a painting you don’t like in the hallway.

If the author cared about Black economic and political survival, they would put more heat on the Black faces fronting policies that strip our people of the vote, bodily autonomy, and economic protection than on a mogul cutting a retail deal for nostalgia vinyl.

Two truths, one grown-up conversation

Here is the grown-folks version the op-ed refuses to hold: two things can be true at once.

One. The Target boycott was a real pressure tactic, and a high-profile Black partnership risks muddying that pressure. The optics are bad, the timing is clumsy, and the community has every right to be disappointed and to demand better.

Two. Jay-Z is not a sellout whose only function is to lure Black people back into a store. His deals tend to carry a second layer: a platform for other artists, visibility for Black culture, sometimes a lever for Black causes. From Roc Nation’s parole-reform push to his streaming fights to the NFL halftime stage, he has turned personal access into participation for other Black and Brown artists and communities.

We can argue about whether he threaded the needle this time. We can demand that if he puts his name on Target’s shelves during a boycott, he owes us transparency on what he asked for in return: investment in Black neighborhoods, stronger DEI commitments, protections for Black employees, something. That is the conversation worth having.

What we cannot do, if we are serious, is pretend one retail partnership equals a Supreme Court justice eroding civil-rights precedent, or a Black congressman validating a party trying to erase Black political power. We cannot scream “betrayal” at Jay-Z while whispering about Clarence Thomas.

If your article can spend three or four angry paragraphs on a Target-exclusive record and never once mention voting rights, abortion access, police violence, or economic policy, the problem is not Jay-Z’s priorities. It is yours.

I wasn’t going to talk about Cyrus Carmack Belton. I wasn’t going to talk about Karmelo Anthony or Kohen Wiley. These sad stories catch heat in the algorithm, and everyone has a thought.

For me, this is a daily battle. My students die. My students kill. After Philando Castile, I found these cases extremely draining. What am I going to learn from closely following them?

I know the system is set up to be unjust. Is one more story going to change my mind, especially with America’s current trajectory? No.

I’m not saying this is the right thing to do. I still fight the battles, but I pick them. Every fighter needs time to recover, and the death is unrelenting.

Of course, these topics come up, and I become informed enough to have a discussion. Sometimes those conversations spark something, and today I’m compelled to write, no matter how difficult the subject.

Black boy boundaries

Most people have heard about Karmelo Anthony at this point, but I’ll give an abbreviated account.

Anthony is a teenager who went into a rival team's tent during a track meet. Austin Metcalf asked him to leave. Karmelo refused and warned Austin not to touch him. Austin did not listen, and Karmelo fatally stabbed Austin.

Does it change if I tell you Karmelo Anthony is Black and Austin Metcalf is white?

Should it change?

This is the point I want to come back to, but I need to point out the reality. Race played a factor. There were no Black people on the jury, and Anthony received 35 years.

If we are being honest, many people would change their perception of this case if the roles were reversed. We’ve seen the other side of this story many times. It is hard not to bring up how Trayvon Martin and Cyrus Belton’s killers were found innocent. There are countless names I can rattle off who were killed just for existing because their Blackness was viewed as a threat. Unfortunately, to fully discuss this horrific thing, we need to do so within the context of the world in which we live.

I wasn’t in the tent. I don’t know why they told Karmelo to leave. I haven’t followed the case closely. I encourage anyone who wants to break down every bit of evidence to do their own research.

I didn’t want to spend time with this story, but after a discussion on Medium, I felt the need to write. The question was whether Black boys have different boundaries. Do they respond to life's stressors differently? In short, are they more violent, more willing to kill than other groups? Of course, if this is the defense, it plays into racist narratives. The questions stemmed from an article by Dr. Stacy Patton.

Dr. Patton is a professor at Howard University, and her article addresses Austin’s father. She explains that she is returning the same energy America has for murdered Black boys. Instead of asking why these Black boys are killed, we ask what these boys did wrong. How did the parents fail?

Dr. Patton asks the same questions about Austin and his father. She accuses Mr. Metcalf of teaching aggression and entitlement and calling it leadership and confidence. The headline to her piece is that she claims Mr. Metcalf failed to teach Austin that Black boys have boundaries.

Oh, that line is an eyecatcher.

However, after reading the piece, it is clear to me that Dr. Patton is doing two things with that line. She is trying to point out the racial hypocrisy in this case while pointing out why Black boys feel the need to be on guard around white people.

She isn’t claiming that Black boys have different boundaries than white boys; she is saying that Black boys have boundaries too. They are also human and deserve respect. She wasn’t trying to attack a dead child but a racist system.

This does not justify Karmelo’s actions, but perhaps it gets closer to explaining them. I’ve seen a few comments in various places that ask, “Why did he have a knife?”

This is likely coming from people who live in a country in which there are more guns than people, and many of those people worship those guns and take them everywhere.

Yet, a Black boy in a mostly white space carries a knife in that same country, and there is confusion. A Black boy carries a knife around white people in a country that has a history of beating or killing Black boys for looking wrong, jogging wrong, playing wrong, cooking wrong, breathing wrong.

I don’t think the threat that day justified Karmelo’s actions, but I can see how he got there.

Respect culture

John McWhorter, a professor at Columbia University, also threw his thoughts on the table. He attempts to answer two questions:

“Why does a boy spontaneously justify stabbing someone on so thin a pretense? And why do so many Black Americans see his 35-year prison sentence as racist?”-source

In short, McWhorter explains that it comes from the culture of disrespect. Respect is so important to young Black males that any amount of disrespect must be dealt with in extreme measures. (According to McWhorter, this does not necessarily mean murder, but extreme violence is not off the table.)

Although he argues this mindset started with poor whites and was picked up by poor Blacks, he basically implies this mindset is now part of Black culture.

In other words, middle-class Black boys also embrace the respect culture mindset.

Let’s break down this idea that respect culture is exclusive to Black boys or synonymous with Black culture. I’m a Black man who teaches Black boys every day. I watch kids attempt to navigate high school. I’ve worked at juvenile detention centers. I grew up in “the hood.”

Do you know what all of those places have in common? If you allow someone to disrespect you, you become a target. I’m sure most people have heard some version of “find the biggest bully and punch him in the mouth, and no one will mess with you.”

I was a nerdy new kid in middle school. I looked like an easy target, and they came for me. I understood enough to know that fighting was a last resort, but I also knew I could never walk away and look weak because it only meant I would get it worse next time.

Luckily, my mouth did most of the heavy lifting. However, I did find myself in a few fights. There are two types: the “relatively fair fight” and the “you lose if you win fight”. Both are about respect, but they work differently.

In a “relatively fair fight,” two people have a disagreement, throw hands, and move on with their lives. In many cases, the boys are friends after. These are the only fights I ever participated in, and they are still a majority of the fights I see at the school today.

The other type of fight usually involves getting “jumped” or using weapons. Sometimes this comes after a fight. These fights are usually gang-related, and losing isn’t an option. Any type of disrespect has to be handled.

A couple of years ago, a student bumped into another student at a dance. Two days later, a group of gang members attacked him in the middle of the hallway. This level of retaliation isn’t common for something so small, but it is an example of how groupthink works with these kids.

It is unlikely that any one kid would choose to retaliate because of an accidental shoulder bump, but when the eyes of the gang are watching, any other choice becomes unthinkable.

We all know gang life is dangerous. I tell my students every year that they are shortening their lives if they get involved in that stuff. So, why do they do it?

Life is already so hard. Many of these kids come from bad homes or don’t have a home at all. They couch surf, not knowing where their next meal is coming from. The gang promises safety, shelter, and food.

This isn’t exclusive to Black students, and neither is the respect culture. Poverty and location play a bigger role than race. Some of my most violent students are white. Gang life also isn’t exclusive to boys, with girls often being quicker to fight than boys.

It doesn’t matter who you are, when you truly have nothing but the respect you’ve worked to earn, you are more willing to lash out to maintain that respect.

We live in a world of endless videos and news. I’ve watched many white people, men and women, commit crimes on camera because they felt disrespected. (Go look up Karen crashouts, and I’m sure you will find plenty of examples.)

Masculinity

“That Black male ego is something I think we as Black men have to deal with because it has led to a lot of people leaving this world too soon… it comes from the fact that we have been so emasculated in American society… Because we have not been allowed to be men freely in the open sense, wherever we have issues with each other, that pain, that trauma, that rage, that anger manifests itself” -Dr. Umar Johnson

Skeptical White Male used this quote in his article on this topic. I struggle to believe Dr. Umar is genuine at any point, but he does occasionally hit on some good ideas.

The patriarchy hurts everyone, and this even includes the people who benefit from it. Black men are in a unique space because the patriarchy tells them that they should be in one place as men, but racism tells them that they should be in another. It causes a type of dissonance that creates this need to bring those two sides into alignment.

The solution, sometimes, is to perform masculinity to such an extreme that it leads to death.

What is traditional masculinity if you can’t afford to provide for your family? It is violence and anger. What is the most honorable thing a man can do for his people?

Die in battle.

However, I can’t fully get behind Johnson’s last line. It suggests that Black men carry so much rage that they kill each other.

Look, I admit I imagined doing some pretty messed-up stuff to bullies in high school, but I never had any desire to kill anyone. My anger is a dull frustration at the state of the world, a constant hum. It doesn’t manifest in murderous anger.

Honestly, when I look at my kids, I’m certain Johnson is off here. My students aren’t lashing out because of the centuries of trauma. They are lashing out for survival. Sometimes they truly believe, “It is him or me.”

The narrative is strong and comes from all sides. Self-fulfilling prophecy is real.

In my 15 years of teaching, I’ve had multiple students tell me that an adult told them that they were dumb or not going to be anything. Do you know what those kids decided to do?

Do you know what happens when the whole world lays a packet of stereotypes at your feet and says, “This is you” ?

I’m sure this narrative of violence helps some white people sleep at night. It makes the world feel a little more…right. I’ve always suspected that the constant oppression post slavery came from many places, but one of those was fear. There is a fear that Black people have all of this trauma that we are holding inside, and if we ever get the opportunity, we would just…lash out!

Historically, it is what white people would do.

Austin Metcalf is dead, and that is messed up. Karmelo Anthony killed him. He is guilty of a crime.

George Zimmerman murdered a child when he was told not to engage. Acquitted.

Chikei Rick Chow chased a child and shot him in the back. Not guilty.

Karmelo Anthony stabbed Austin once. All white jury. 35 years.

This shouldn’t be a story about race. It should be about two kids and the country coming together to teach new lessons. Sadly, that isn’t our reality.

At my latest networking “meeting” with my bro Alex — also known as a free lunch with a marketing executive who still has a job and a corporate card — we talked about freelance opportunities that might be coming up. We talked about who was hiring, who claimed they were hiring, and which companies were pretending that “lean teams” were somehow a point of pride instead of a warning sign.

As we were wrapping up, Alex asked about my runway.

“How much longer do you have on unemployment?” he asked, while signing the check.

“I never filed for unemployment,” I said.

Alex looked at me the way people look at you when you say you’re Team Aubrey. 

“What do you mean you never filed?”

I tried to explain it, but halfway through talking I realized how ridiculous I sounded. I had somehow turned unemployment into this mythical government charity dungeon in my mind. In my head, getting unemployment meant going to someplace with flickering fluorescent lights where desperate people sat in molded plastic chairs waiting for a number to be called.

It felt like something other people did. Not me. 

When I first wrote publicly about losing my job, I joked about “funemployment.” At the time, I still had severance money coming in, savings, and enough confidence to believe another role would appear quickly. 

And as we now know…you could end up dealing with the five stages of grief every time you see an e-mail that starts with: “Thank you for taking the time…”

I am drained and have been for quite some time. The idea of applying for…money with no attachment except that I’m entitled to it just didn’t connect. 

The truth is, I didn’t understand unemployment at all.

I didn’t know whether severance disqualified you. (It does not)

I didn’t know if high earners could even receive it. (Yes, they can.)

I didn’t know if freelancers were treated differently. (Yes, they are. But you can often still collect.) 

Most embarrassingly, I didn’t understand that unemployment insurance isn’t charity. I knew, in theory but not in practice.

Since my very first job as a teenager, employers have been paying into unemployment insurance systems tied to my labor. Decade after decade. Every paycheck. Every W-2. Every promotion. Every “exciting opportunity.” Every year-end review where someone called me “valuable to the organization” right before letting me go.

“You’ve probably generated like 30K into unemployment systems over your career,” Alex said.  “Why are you acting like you’re asking somebody for a favor?”

That was the part that snapped something into place for me. Because I realized my resistance wasn’t financial. It was psychological. I had attached filing for unemployment to failure. 

I thought filing meant I had somehow crossed into another category of person. The kind of person waiting for help instead of being the one taking the lunch meetings and giving career advice. But unemployment isn’t a character judgment. It’s literally insurance. Your labor helps fund a system that exists for moments exactly like this

No matter how much or how little I’ve paid to insure my car over the years, I’d never feel some type of way for getting the funds for a repair.

And here’s the truly humbling part: once I finally filed, the process was almost aggressively normal.

I definitely didn’t know that I could file online in under an hour. (Since the pandemic, every state in the US has online registration.) 

No endless lines.

No humiliating interviews under buzzing fluorescent lights.

No one asked me to explain how a former executive ended up unemployed in a collapsing marketing economy.

Just forms. Verification. Processing time. 

Then one morning the money showed up.

And I was genuinely shocked by both the amount and the duration.

Not because it replaced my old salary — it absolutely did not — but because I had expected something symbolic. A couple hundred dollars and a pat on the head. Instead, it was enough to materially slow the bleeding while I continued to figure out my next move.

Enough to breathe.

Enough to stop making panic decisions.

Enough to remember that after decades of work, maybe I didn’t need to feel ashamed for using a system designed specifically for workers who find themselves without work.

Maybe I can stop grieving, clear my head and treat someone else to a meal who might need it. 

The Supreme Court is entering into oral arguments about whether to get rid of birthright citizenship, the Fourteenth Amendment provision stating that people in almost every instance born in the United States are American citizens. Pundits, outside of Fox News and far-right-wing media, are generally skeptical that the Supreme Court would do away with the provision, long considered a bedrock principle. Some are betting that SCOTUS’s ultimate ruling, expected by late June or early July 2026, will be unanimous, because the Supreme Court would never reinterpret the Fourteenth Amendment.

History is full of examples of things people thought the Supreme Court would never do. These are a combination of decisions considered historically bad and others generally hailed that still produced results other than expected. Here are ten times the Supreme Court defied expectations and changed the American way of life.

1. Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857): This is the case that the Fourteenth Amendment was supposed to cure. In his majority opinion, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney argued that Black people of African descent were not and could not be citizens of the United States under the Constitution. He claimed that at the time of the founding, they were regarded as an “inferior class” with “no rights which the white man was bound to respect.” Taney concluded that Dred Scott lacked standing even to bring a case in federal Court. Even advocates of enslavement didn’t expect SCOTUS to go as far as they did, legalizing a racial hierarchy. If SCOTUS in 2026 undoes the Fourteenth Amendment, are they suggesting a return to Dred Scott?
2. Brown v. Board of Education (1954): That segregation would ultimately be declared unconstitutional was probably inevitable, but it wasn’t expected to happen in Brown v. Board of Education. Fred Vinson, a Truman appointee and former Treasury Secretary, was Chief Justice when the school‑segregation cases first reached the Court. Vinson died suddenly in September 1953, before the Court issued a ruling. At the time of his death, the Court was deeply divided, and Vinson was widely believed to be unable or unwilling to secure a majority to overturn segregation. President Harry Truman appointed Earl Warren as Chief Justice shortly after Vinson’s death. Warren immediately reframed the case, insisting that the Court speak with one voice. Under Warren’s leadership, the Court delayed decision, re‑argued the case, and ultimately issued a unanimous ruling in Brown v. Board of Education (1954). The decision wasn’t nearly as wide-ranging as history suggests, but it was definitely unexpected.

Was Brown v. Board of Education the End of Segregation or the Beginning of a Larger Battle

The unending struggle for equality in education

AfroSapiophileWilliam Spivey

3. Roe v. Wade (1973): The Court was expected to rule narrowly on Texas law. Instead, it announced a nationwide constitutional right to abortion, surprising even many supporters. Roe established that the Constitution protects a right to privacy broad enough to include a woman’s decision to terminate a pregnancy, grounding that right in the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. In doing so, the Court:

1. Invalidated abortion bans in most states overnight
2. Created a national constitutional standard, replacing state‑by‑state regulation
3. Introduced the trimester framework, limiting how and when states could regulate abortion

This was one of the most sweeping exercises of judicial power in Supreme Court history.

4. Bush v. Gore (2000): The Court’s direct intervention to halt a recount and effectively decide a presidential election was unprecedented and unexpected, especially given the Court’s traditional reluctance to enter electoral disputes. Given the Court’s direct intervention, which determined the result of a Presidential Election, are we certain this Court wouldn’t intervene in the 2028 election, or the 2026 midterms?

5. Citizens United v. FEC (2010): Observers anticipated a limited ruling. Instead, the Court overturned decades of campaign‑finance precedent, equating corporate political spending with protected speech, a shock to regulators and foreign observers. The majority held that the First Amendment prohibits the government from restricting independent political expenditures by corporations, just as it prohibits restrictions on individuals. SCOTUS equated corporations to people; nobody expected that.

6. NFIB v. Sebelius (2015): Nearly all predictions assumed the Affordable Care Act would be struck down—Chief Justice Roberts’ decision to uphold it under Congress’s taxing power stunned both sides. Many conservative lawyers, commentators, and activists were stunned. Court watchers had widely assumed that Chief Justice John Roberts would join the conservative bloc to invalidate the individual mandate. When he instead upheld it under Congress’s taxing power, some accused Roberts of betrayal, others claimed he had bowed to political pressure. A few openly questioned his legitimacy as a conservative jurist. Prominent conservative outlets initially misreported the decision as a loss for the ACA — a reflection of how unexpected the outcome was.

7. Obergefell v. Hodges (2015): The momentum favored marriage equality, but many expected a state‑by‑state outcome. The Court instead recognized same‑sex marriage as a constitutional right nationwide. Supporters of marriage equality reacted with jubilation. Crowds gathered outside the Supreme Court, waving rainbow flags. LGBTQ+ advocates described the ruling as a moment of long‑delayed recognition and dignity. For many couples, the decision meant instant legal security — marriages recognized nationwide, parental rights clarified, and benefits unlocked overnight. Those opposed to same‑sex marriage reacted with disbelief and outrage. Conservative leaders accused the Court of “judicial overreach.” Some governors and clerks initially resisted compliance. Religious liberty groups warned the decision would marginalize people of faith. Several dissenting justices echoed this reaction, with Justice Scalia calling the ruling a threat to democratic self‑government. Legal scholars suggest there is no realistic path to reversal, which gave the ruling a sense of permanence even amid backlash. Clarence Thomas, however, has often suggested revisiting Obergefell; it may not be over.

8. Trump v. Hawaii (2018): Given campaign statements and lower‑court rulings, many expected the travel ban to be invalidated. The Court’s decision to uphold it surprised civil‑liberties advocates and foreign governments. The case challenged Presidential Proclamation 9645, issued in September 2017, which restricted entry into the United States for nationals of several countries. The plaintiffs argued that the policy violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, federal immigration law, and equal protection principles

They pointed to Trump’s campaign statements calling for a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States” as evidence of discriminatory intent.

The Supreme Court upheld the third iteration of the travel ban, which applied restrictions to nationals from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Yemen, North Korea and Venezuela (limited to certain officials).

The inclusion of non‑Muslim‑majority countries was central to the administration’s argument that the policy was based on national security, not religion.

9. Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization (2022): While restrictions were anticipated, the Court’s complete reversal of Roe v. Wade, eliminating a half‑century‑old precedent, shocked much of the world. Court watchers widely predicted the Court would uphold Mississippi’s 15‑week ban. Many expected the Court to weaken Roe without killing it. A narrow ruling modifying the “viability” standard was considered the most likely outcome. Even conservative legal scholars assumed the Court would avoid outright reversal to preserve institutional legitimacy. Instead, the Court explicitly overturned Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. It declared that the Constitution confers no right to abortion. The Court returned full regulatory authority to the states. No one expected total repudiation of Roe v. Wade, but it happened.

10. Trump v. United States (2024): In this case, the Supreme Court held that presidents are immune from criminal prosecution for official acts, marking the first time the Court recognized criminal immunity for presidential conduct. It may take decades to unravel the crimes committed by the current president, along with impunity, given that he knows he is immune to prosecution. We can only hope this decision is overturned.

These ten cases remind us that the Supreme Court is far less predictable than the commentary surrounding it. We are asked to believe that Justices simply follow the law, setting aside ideology, even as voting blocs harden and outcomes align with political power. Surprise, in this system, is not a malfunction — it is how authority is exercised without admitting it.

As I write this, I am listening to oral arguments in the birthright citizenship case. For the first time in American history, Donald Trump has appeared at the Supreme Court not as a petitioner seeking relief, but as a political figure hoping to influence the Court itself. Courts are not meant to be stages, and Justices are not meant to be audiences.

History shows that the Court’s most shocking decisions arrive when confidence is highest — when precedent feels settled and we are told there is nothing to fear. Many of those decisions did not occur in some distant past. They happened recently, under the same assurances of neutrality and restraint we hear today. The lesson is not that the Court is unpredictable. It is that power, once insulated, becomes bold. And when the Supreme Court surprises us, it is rarely because it has lost its way; it is because it has chosen one.

Food for Thought

These ten cases remind us that the Supreme Court is far less predictable than the commentary surrounding it. We are asked to believe that Justices simply follow the law, setting aside ideology, even as voting blocs harden and outcomes align with political power. Surprise, in this system, is not a malfunction — it is how authority is exercised without admitting it.

As I write this, I am listening to oral arguments in the birthright citizenship case. For the first time in American history, Donald Trump has appeared at the Supreme Court not as a petitioner seeking relief, but as a political figure hoping to influence the Court itself. Courts are not meant to be stages, and Justices are not meant to be audiences.

History shows that the Court’s most shocking decisions arrive when confidence is highest — when precedent feels settled and we are told there is nothing to fear. Many of those decisions did not occur in some distant past. They happened recently, under the same assurances of neutrality and restraint we hear today. The lesson is not that the Court is unpredictable. It is that power, once insulated, becomes bold. And when the Supreme Court surprises us, it is rarely because it has lost its way; it is because it has chosen one.

In March, the Supreme Court ruled against prohibiting school policies that require employees to report students’ sexual orientation and gender identity to parents.

As someone who has taught or tutored on every level of education between first grade and graduate school and has had students come out to me, I wanted to offer my perspective on why I can’t imagine any situation where I would out one of my students to their parents. My reasoning is a mix of moral and practical.

To start more broadly, I don’t see myself outing anyone at any age for any reason. Maybe there is a reason out there in some ultra-specific situation but I can’t conceive it.

As an educator, I have to create an environment that is conducive to learning for the individual students, the class, and the cohort. Outing a student would disrupt that — not only for that student, but their friends and social network. Once I out them and they return to class the next day, week, whenver, they come back completely disengaged. It might be the last time I hear their voice the rest of the semester/school year. Many of their friends too. At worst, they become disruptive, lashing out and I lose the respect of their friends and social networks. The whole atmosphere of at least that student’s class diminishes, but likely, all of my classes. Discussion and student interaction, that’s out of the window. Most, maybe all, of my students lose respect for me. And a student who doesn’t respect you stops learning.

I don’t dismiss the concept of parents rights as an instructor or as a parent myself. There are reasonable expectations for what a teacher should tell parents, but also factor in age appropriateness (a first grade teacher has to report things I’d never have to report as a college professor). But I don’t think sex orientation or gender identity is a reasonable thing to “report” because why would that come up anyway? What would be the impetus for me to out one of my students?

So for example, if my student is gay, am I going to ask them “hey, do your parents know you’re gay?” Why would I assume the parents don’t know this? Am I expected to report other things related to identity or expression? So for example, a student says in an essay that they don’t believe in God. Do I need to report this to a parent? If they wore a top that exposes their stomach and I see a bellybutton piercing or a tattoo, should I report that?

If a student wears a MAGA hat to class, should I call the parents to make sure it is acceptable to them? What else do I need to surveil? Do parents rights mean students have no reasonable expectation for privacy or autonomy? Even at the risk of the student’s mental wellbeing? I have no responsibility to them independent from parents? And again, why would I assume a parent doesn’t have knowledge of a fundamental part of their child’s identity?

That segues into my last point. here, I will be admit my less professional, more personal opinion: if your child doesn’t feel comfortable sharing that part of their identity with you, it’s a very high chance that there’s an issue with your relationship that you should address with grace. Maybe they want to come out to peers first (a very common, I’m surmising the most common, first step). But maybe they are keeping that from you deliberately. I trust their reasons for withholding that info from you.

At the very least, it isn’t my job to probe why they made that choice or to take that choice from them. They will tell you when they are ready. If they never tell you, me not reporting them is not the issue. Parental rights don’t exist outside of parental responsibilities.

When America was founded in 1776, the vast majority of Black people were enslaved. So, it is only fitting that many of their descendants refuse to celebrate the nation's 250th anniversary. What may feel like a joyous, unifying moment to some can feel cringeworthy to others. Consider that a recent poll found that "most Black Americans say they never fly the American flag." While the red, white, and blue flag evokes patriotism for some, this is a painful "reminder of what we could be and how" the country has "failed to live up to that for Black people, for Indigenous people, and people of color." While the country has long asserted itself as the "land of the free" and "home of the brave," such narratives overlook the injustices marginalized groups have endured and continue to face in this country.

The Fourth of July is a day when most Americans reflect on the nation's founding, but to do so honestly, Black historical perspectives must be included. Take, for instance, a speech given by the abolitionist Fredrick Douglass in 1852, a blistering critique of this celebration. Before a mostly White audience, the formerly enslaved abolitionist asked, "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" For those denied freedom, witnessing this celebration felt like rubbing salt in an open wound. While White Americans rejoiced, having won their political and economic independence from Britain, the irony of this arrangement wasn't lost on those in bondage. Indeed, in her autobiography, Harriet A. Jacobs, a Black woman who escaped her enslavers and hid under the floorboards, wrote about the absurdity of proclaiming "liberty to the captive." White colonists bemoaned "taxation without representation" while at the same time depriving Black people of the very liberty they sought.

Fredrick Douglass noted that the Fourth of July is "a day that reveals to him, more than any other day in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim." He called their "boasted liberty" "an unholy license" and their so-called "national greatness" "swelling vanity." Given that Black Americans today continue to endure racial discrimination in courts, hospitals, and schools, when searching for housing and employment, in financial institutions, and within the political process, many feel a deep discomfort as the holiday approaches. There's a social expectation that all Americans should celebrate the anniversary of this country's founding, but what to the descendants of slavery is the Fourth of July? The uncomfortable truth is that America has failed to reckon with the legacy of racism, which seems to flow like a faucet without a shut-off valve. Today, many feel as Douglass once did that this holiday represents a deep-seated hypocrisy.

After asking some Black people why they plan to abstain from America's 250th anniversary, one respondent stated, "It doesn't feel right to celebrate a country built on the blood of Black people," citing the history of slavery as a reason to abstain from the revelry. Another noted that "freedom cannot be celebrated when people have fewer freedoms now than they did years ago." For them, recent attacks on civil rights make this an especially inappropriate time to praise the nation. The Trump administration has rolled back the "disparate impact" standard for addressing racial discrimination against Black people, dismantled diversity, equity, and inclusion in government agencies, and even the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) backpedaled on decades of precedent in promoting an equitable workplace. Some felt the holiday wouldn't make them feel "included or a part of this conflicted land." After all, Black people are still told to "go back to Africa" when they express discontent with the conditions here. This is something I experienced firsthand. After reading their perspectives, I reflected on my own reasons for sitting this one out. For me, celebrating the Fourth of July gives the false impression that this country is something we should all feel proud of. Yet, in a nation where racism persists, this celebration feels off, perhaps just as much as it did during Fredrick Douglass' life.

As a descendant of enslaved people, I can't help but imagine how those in bondage felt in the early days, witnessing White people honor a holiday celebrating their independence. Surely, as Douglass and others suggested, it was a reminder of the vast chasm between themselves and those who robbed them of their freedom. More Black people fought on the British side during the American Revolution because Dunmore's Proclamation promised freedom to those who served. What many White colonists saw as a victory, many Black people experienced as a painful loss. White cheers were set against Black tears. Many Black people feel that while the Fourth of July should be commemorated, it shouldn't be celebrated, a distinction often overlooked. After the British lost, chattel slavery persisted for eighty-nine years. When this context is omitted from the national conversation, people are misled into believing this holiday represents freedom for all, as if it were a blanket covering people from every walk of life. But this whitewashed narrative overlooks the fact that many remained enslaved for nearly ninety years after July 4, 1776.

=Black patriotism has always felt like a double-edged sword. For instance, during the Civil War, Black soldiers were denied fair pay by the Union Army and were disproportionately assigned to the front lines. During World War II, despite the bravery Black soldiers showed fighting the Nazi regime, they came home to face racism from terrorist groups such as the Ku Klux Klan and racist laws that excluded them from the full benefits afforded to White veterans. As the civil rights leader Medgar Evers noted, "some of these same persons who were beaten and terrorized by the Nazis are assisting the die-hards of the Citizens' Councils in bringing about economic pressure on Negroes who pay their poll taxes and register in Humphry County." James G. Thompson, a cafeteria worker, penned a letter to the editor of The Pittsburgh Courier questioning whether he should sacrifice his life to live "half-a-American," noting that Black people needed a double victory, "the first V for victory over our enemies from without, the second V for victory over our enemies within." Today, there is still a need for Black people to confront racism from their fellow countrymen.

The Fourth of July promotes a form of blind patriotism that is offensive to many Black people. While some point to Grace Wisher, an indentured servant in Baltimore who, at the age of thirteen, played a critical role in sewing the Star-Spangled Banner, many leave out key parts of her story. She was signed over to Mary Pickersgill, a White woman, because of her mother's poverty, and during that period, refusing to labor was considered a crime, punishable by jail. Thus, it's ahistorical to claim that Grace helped create this flag with 15 stars and 15 stripes out of pure patriotism. Despite being used as an example of a Black person giving themselves over to this country, her service was involuntary. While Grace played a major role in sewing the flag in 1813, Black people didn't become American citizens until 1868, with the ratification of the 14th Amendment. While her story is often shared under the premise that we should maintain an inclusive portrayal of America, it's also essential for us to acknowledge that Black people were considered subordinate to White people and often forced or coerced into labor. Enslaved Black people built The White House, creating the literal foundation for the official residence of the president. They toiled in the difficult work of creating the U.S. Capitol building and Wall Street, the foundation of America's economic strength. Yet, for much of this country's history, they've been excluded from the benefits of society.

In a similar spirit, others point to Crispus Attucks, a mixed-race Black and Indigenous man who became the first to be killed by British soldiers during the Boston Massacre. Some describe his death as a tragic but important sacrifice by someone who loved their country. Yet few note that Crispus Attucks escaped slavery in 1750, and that his former owner, William Brown, placed an advertisement for his runaways that described him as a 27-year-old, 6-foot-2-inch-tall "Mulatto." To remain free, Crispus Attucks repeatedly changed his name because admitting who he was would mean returning to bondage. Does that sound like freedom to you? Also, Crispus Attucks never enlisted in the military to serve America because, at the time, the country didn't exist and thus had no formal armed forces. Rather, he joined other dockworkers to challenge British soldiers, motivated by economic conditions. Off-duty British soldiers were taking opportunities away from day laborers, causing friction between the groups. While rooted in financial concerns, the narrative often portrays Crispus Attucks as a soldier willing to die for America, even though he wasn't a soldier and the nation was yet to be founded.

While millions see the nation's 250th anniversary as an opportunity to celebrate America's founding, many Black people plan to skip the celebration. They may enjoy some BBQ with family and friends to make the most of the time off that accompanies the federal holiday, but this revelry is not a sign of their undying patriotism, as it may be for other groups. America is a country where Black people were enslaved longer than they've been free, where racial segregation divided the nation for nearly a century, and where civil rights legislation is often seen as an inconvenience rather than an essential step toward equity. Today, Black Americans live in a country where the motivation to confront racial injustice is waning, like an image of someone so far away they appear to disappear into the horizon. It's one thing to express hope for what this nation could be, as we're capable of evolution; it's another matter entirely to celebrate the nation's founding, in spite of slavery, land theft from Indigenous tribes, and modern-day racism that continues to plague the nation's spirit. For many, this is a bridge too far.

As we celebrate the 250th Anniversary of America’s Independence from Britain. We should note that freedom wasn’t the same for everyone. Even Black people who were not enslaved had restrictions that didn’t apply to white people.

Here are 15 laws that demonstrated that independence for Black people was limited to what white people would allow. While some of these laws point to individual states, they generally had counterparts throughout the South, if not the nation.

1. Virginia — Act Concerning Servants and Slaves (1705)

Virginia’s sweeping 1705 omnibus law barred all Black people — free or enslaved — from holding any civil, military, or public office in the colony. It also stripped free Black people of the right to testify in court against a white person, effectively making them legally invisible as witnesses. A free Black man could own property but could not defend it in court against a white claimant. Virginia Center for Digital History. The Geography of Slavery — vcdh.virginia.edu

2. Virginia — Act for the Better Government of Negroes, Mulattos, and Indians (1723)

This act explicitly disenfranchised free Black people, removing the right to vote that some had exercised in earlier decades. It also prohibited free Black people — bond or free — from bearing arms, keeping weapons, or gathering in groups of more than five, even for religious worship. An exception was made only if a white person was present and supervising. Encyclopedia Virginia. “An Act directing the trial of Slaves … — Encyclopedia Virginia

3. Virginia — Horse and Livestock Prohibition (1732)

A lesser-known but economically devastating statute prohibited free Black people from owning horses, cattle, or hogs — the primary forms of productive agricultural wealth in colonial Virginia. Any such animals found in a free Black person’s possession could be seized and sold, with proceeds going to the parish poor fund. It was a targeted mechanism for keeping free Black people in permanent economic subordination even after legal emancipation. Encyclopedia Virginia. Free Black People in Colonial Virginia — Encyclopedia Virginia

4. Virginia — Vagrancy and Binding-Out Provision (1748 Revised Code)

Virginia’s 1748 revised code allowed county courts to declare any free Black person found without a fixed employer or “visible means of support” to be a vagrant — and bind them out as an involuntary servant for a term set by the court. In practice, this meant freedom was conditional on continuous employment under a white employer. A free Black person between jobs could be legally re-impressed into servitude. Encyclopedia Virginia. Free Black People in Colonial Virginia — Encyclopedia Virginia

5. Virginia — Mandatory Departure After Manumission (1762)

Virginia law required that any enslaved person freed after 1762 must leave the colony within twelve months of manumission or face re-enslavement. The law was designed to prevent a free Black population from accumulating in Virginia. It forced the newly freed into an impossible choice: abandon their families, community, and any property they had accumulated, or risk losing their freedom entirely. This law was common to many states. You might remember “Chicken George” from the miniseries “Roots” had to leave his family in North Carolina once he obtained his freedom. Encyclopedia Virginia. Free Black People in Colonial Virginia — Encyclopedia Virginia

6. Maryland — Slavery Follows the Mother (1664, Still in Force 1776)

Maryland’s foundational 1664 slave law established the principle of partus sequitur ventrem — the status of a child follows the mother. This meant that a free Black man who fathered a child with an enslaved woman had no legal claim to that child; the child was enslaved from birth. In 1776 this law had been in continuous force for 112 years and remained the bedrock of Maryland’s racial order. Maryland State Archives. Chapter 3 — Blacks before the Law in Colonial Maryland

7. Maryland — Intermarriage Prohibition and Re-enslavement Penalty (1717)

Maryland law prohibited marriage between free Black men and white women, and between free Black women and white men. The penalty was severe: a free Black person who entered such a marriage could be re-enslaved for life. The law also restricted free Black people from testifying in court against white defendants, mirroring Virginia’s 1705 provision and ensuring that free Black people remained legally subordinate even in matters directly affecting them. Notably, White men were free to marry free Black women. Maryland State Archives. Blacks before the Law in Colonial Maryland — free blacks

8. South Carolina — Prohibition on Literacy — Negro Act (1740)

South Carolina’s landmark 1740 Negro Act made it a criminal offense to teach any Black person — free or enslaved — to read or write. The law applied explicitly to free Black people as well as the enslaved. The penalty fell on the teacher, not the student — but the effect was identical: a free Black person caught learning to read could be used as evidence against the instructor, and the instructor fined. Literacy, the foundation of legal self-defense, was a crime to transmit. legalclarity.org+1legalclarity.org. The Negro Act of 1740: South Carolina’s Slave Code. Zinn Education Project. May 10, 1740: The South Carolina Negro Act is Passed

9. South Carolina — White Guardian Requirement — Negro Act (1740)

The same 1740 act required every free Black person residing in South Carolina to have a designated white “patron” or guardian who would vouch for their conduct and freedom status. A free Black person without such a patron could be treated as a runaway slave and subjected to the full penalties of the slave code — whipping, branding, or sale. Freedom, in other words, was not self-authenticating; it required a white sponsor to be real. legalclarity.orglegalclarity.org. The Negro Act of 1740: South Carolina’s Slave Code

10. South Carolina — Assembly Prohibition — Negro Act (1740)

Free Black people in South Carolina were prohibited from assembling in groups of more than seven persons without a white person present. The law was passed directly in response to the Stono Rebellion of 1739, in which enslaved people had organized, marched, and armed themselves. It applied to churches, social gatherings, and markets alike. A free Black family reunion with eight attendees was a criminal act. The Negro Act of 1740: South Carolina’s Slave Code

11. Georgia — Adoption of South Carolina’s Slave Code (1755, Revised 1770)

Georgia, founded in 1733 as a colony that initially banned slavery, reversed course entirely. Its 1755 slave code — comprehensively revised and tightened in 1770 — adopted South Carolina’s 1740 Negro Act nearly wholesale, including the literacy ban, the assembly prohibition, the guardian requirement, and movement restrictions for free Black people. By 1776, Georgia had been operating under this code in its most stringent form for six years. South Carolina slave codes — Wikipedia

12. North Carolina — Disenfranchisement of Free Black Voters (1715/1723)

North Carolina law formally stripped free Black, mulatto, and Native American men of the right to vote in colonial elections by the early 1720s, codifying a practice that had been inconsistently applied. Like Virginia’s 1723 statute, the North Carolina provision erased political standing that some free Black men had briefly exercised in the colony’s earliest decades, when land ownership — not race — had been the primary qualification for suffrage. Library of Congress. Free Blacks in the Antebellum Period — The African American Odyssey

13. Pennsylvania — Act for the Better Regulating of Negroes (1725–26)

Even in Quaker Pennsylvania — the colony most associated with early abolitionism — the 1725–26 act imposed a curfew on free Black people (no gathering after 9 p.m.), prohibited them from buying or selling goods without their employer’s written permission, and imposed fines for “tippling” or “carousing.” Interracial marriage was also banned, with a free Black person convicted of marrying a white person subject to being sold into slavery for seven years. The law remained in force in 1776. Library of Congress. Free Blacks in the Antebellum Period — The African American Odyssey:

14. All Southern Colonies — Pass Requirements for Travel

By 1776, virtually every Southern colony required free Black people to carry written documentation of their free status when traveling. A free Black person encountered on a road without a pass could be stopped by any white person, detained, whipped, and held in the county jail until someone vouched for them — at which point the free person often owed fees for their own imprisonment. Virginia’s 1705 pass system explicitly applied to free Black people as well as the enslaved. This was not one law but a coordinated legal architecture replicated colony by colony. Virginia Center for Digital History. The Geography of Slavery — vcdh.virginia.edu

15. Virginia — Prohibition on Striking a White Person (1705)

Virginia’s 1705 code established that no Black person — free or enslaved — could strike a white person under any circumstances, including in lawful self-defense. The punishment was corporal: thirty lashes on the bare back. A free Black man who defended himself against a white assailant was guilty of a crime; the white assailant who initiated the attack faced no comparable penalty under the same statute. Physical sovereignty over one’s own body was, for free Black people, a right that did not exist. Virginia Center for Digital History. The Geography of Slavery — vcdh.virginia.edu

By the time Americans declared independence in 1776, free Black people lived under a legal regime designed to make freedom conditional, revocable, and always subordinate to white authority. Across colonies — Virginia, Maryland, the Carolinas, Georgia, North Carolina, even Pennsylvania — the laws formed a single, unmistakable pattern: Black autonomy was treated as a threat, Black mobility as a crime, Black literacy as a danger, Black family life as a punishable offense, and Black self‑defense as something the law refused to recognize. A free Black person could be re‑enslaved for marrying the wrong person, jailed for traveling without a pass, punished for gathering with their own community, or stripped of economic independence through bans on property and livestock. Freedom existed, but only inside boundaries drawn by white lawmakers.

This is the part of 1776 America that rarely appears in patriotic retellings. The Declaration’s soaring language was signed alongside statutes that made Black freedom fragile and contingent. The Revolution promised universal rights while the colonies enforced racial control so thoroughly that even free Black people lived under surveillance, restriction, and the constant threat of losing what little liberty they had.

To understand the founding honestly, we have to hold both truths at once: America was born with a vision of equality — and with a legal system built to deny that equality to Black people. The gap between those two realities is not a footnote; it is the story. And until we confront how deeply these laws shaped the nation’s beginnings, we cannot fully understand the struggle for freedom that Black Americans have waged ever since.

In 2026, Black achievement is often treated as unearned, the product of the evil DEI, designed to unfairly take positions from white people. Every program that attempts to level the playing field has been weakened or removed. Black history is being erased, and the three Reconstruction Amendments have been gutted, particularly the 15th, with the 14th under continuing attack. Birthright citizenship survived this time, but what of the next, and the next?

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In many ways, Black freedom faces the same kinds of restrictions in 2026 as in 1776. The Supreme Court ensures actual racism isn’t addressed; we only look for intent. You’d think after 250 years we’d see more progress? Maybe in 2076, things will be better.

In 1852, a group of abolitionists in Rochester, New York, invited Frederick Douglass to give the Independence Day address. He took the invitation and used it to tell his audience why the holiday was not his to celebrate. He argued that the gap between America’s stated freedom and Black Americans’ lived freedom was vast, that the country had written a promise it had no intention of keeping for people who looked like him. A nation can write that all men are created equal and mean some men considerably more than others, and the distance between the sentence and the practice is not a footnote. It is the whole argument.

I think about that speech every Fourth of July. This year it kept me up later than usual, because I couldn’t stop running the math some families are running right now: whether a flag on the porch is a celebration or a target.

This year, families across the country are doing exactly that kind of math before they decide whether to put up a flag, go to a parade, or fire up the grill. Human Rights Watch published a report this month documenting 52 deaths in ICE custody over the first 500 days of the current administration, a mortality rate more than double what it was under the previous one and nearly four times higher. Detention numbers hit a record high of over 71,000 people in January. Federal data shows more than seven in ten people held in ICE custody have no criminal conviction at all. This is not a population of dangerous fugitives. It is, disproportionately, people who were stopped, detained, and processed on suspicion, paperwork, or proximity.

Some of the names are public now because reporters and human rights organizations kept pressing until ICE released them. Mohammad Nazeer Paktiawal, who had worked alongside American forces in Afghanistan, died less than 24 hours after being taken into custody in Dallas. Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, was killed by an ICE agent during an enforcement operation in Minneapolis. These are not abstractions. They had names before they became statistics, and the statistics are still climbing.

That is one America’s Fourth of July. Douglass would recognize it immediately, because it is the same paradox he stood up and named in 1852: a country celebrating freedom while deciding, case by case, family by family, who actually gets to keep it.

Most people who’ve heard of the speech know it as the angry one. They’re wrong, and the part they’re missing is the part that should worry the people in power most: Douglass wasn’t rejecting the country. He was filing a claim against it, on its own paper, using its own signature. He believed, fiercely, in the Constitution’s stated principles, and he argued they were strong enough to demand their own enforcement. He was not asking America to be less American. He was asking it to honor the paper it had already signed.

That is the patriotism I grew up understanding. I spent 23 years in a uniform defending a Constitution that did not always defend me back the same way it defended other people wearing the same uniform. I deployed to Desert Storm, Bosnia, Kosovo, and Haiti believing the country meant what it said about freedom, even while the country itself had not finished saying it equally to everyone. That belief is not naive. Douglass held it too. You can love a country and tell the truth about it in the same breath. Not in tension. The same act.

I think about the first-generation Americans I know, the ones whose parents crossed a border or stood in a visa line for years, sacrificing a known life for an uncertain one, on the promise that this country would eventually be theirs too. I think about what it does to a twenty-year-old who recited the Pledge of Allegiance every morning of elementary school to watch ICE agents detain a parent at a worksite on the strength of an administrative warrant, a document that does not carry a judge’s signature and does not authorize entry into a private space. The child did everything right. The parent did everything right. The country still found a way to make the wrong question the only one that mattered: papers, not character; suspicion, not evidence.

That is not a new American story. It rhymes with an older one. Douglass’s question in 1852 was never really about the calendar date. It was about who the promise covers and who has to keep proving they belong inside it. Black Americans were answering that question with their bodies in 1852. Immigrant families are answering a version of the same question with their bodies in 2026. The shape of the exclusion changes. The demand that some people perform their right to exist here over and over does not.

None of this means the Fourth of July belongs only to grief. Douglass did not end his speech in despair. He pointed to the Constitution as written, as proof the country had already promised more than it was delivering, and insisted the promise was real even when the delivery was not. That is not pessimism. That is the most demanding kind of patriotism there is: insisting the country keep its word to itself.

So today, if you are a Black American whose ancestors built this country without consent and are still asked to prove your claim to it, if you are an immigrant family deciding whether a flag in the yard is worth the risk of who might be watching, if you are the son or daughter of someone who sacrificed everything they had for a promise that is still being negotiated in real time, you are not outside the American story on the Fourth of July. You are the center of it. You always have been. The country has just been slow, sometimes violently slow, to admit it.

Douglass stood in front of an audience in 1852 and gave them the truth instead of the speech they expected. That is still the job. Today, the truth is this: the Fourth of July is not less yours because the country has not finished earning it. It is more yours, because you are the one still holding it to its word.

For more than half a century, Steeplechase Park was the beating heart of Coney Island — a place where New Yorkers of every class, color, and neighborhood came to forget themselves. It was the most democratic amusement park in America, not because it preached equality but because it practiced it. For the price of a ticket, anyone could ride the Human Roulette Wheel, laugh themselves breathless in the Pavilion of Fun, or climb onto the mechanical horses of the Steeplechase Ride and race strangers along the boardwalk. It was a place where joy was cheap, laughter was abundant, and the world outside — the world of work, poverty, discrimination, and politics — stayed mercifully distant.

And then, in the mid‑1960s, Steeplechase Park died. Not because people stopped loving it, and not because Coney Island lost its magic, but because a real‑estate developer named Fred Trump saw the land beneath it as more valuable than the memories above it. What followed was one of the most bitter land battles in New York history — a clash between the city’s working‑class culture and the ambitions of a man who believed fun was less important than profit.

This is the story of Steeplechase Park: how it rose, how it fell, and how its destruction foreshadowed the development battles that would define New York for decades to come.

I. The Birth of Steeplechase Park

Steeplechase Park opened in 1897, the creation of George C. Tilyou, a showman with a genius for spectacle and a gift for understanding what ordinary people wanted. Tilyou believed that amusement parks should be places of controlled chaos — places where people could be startled, delighted, embarrassed, and thrilled without ever feeling unsafe. His motto was simple: “Laugh and the world laughs with you.”

Steeplechase embodied that philosophy. It was built around the famous Steeplechase Ride, a mechanical horse race that sent riders careening along a steel track at exhilarating speeds. The ride became so iconic that the entire park took its name from it.

But Steeplechase was more than a single attraction. It was a sprawling wonderland of funhouses, slides, roller coasters, and bizarre contraptions designed to make people laugh at themselves. The Pavilion of Fun — a massive indoor hall — featured trick floors, spinning discs, air jets that blew up skirts, mirrors that distorted bodies, and attendants who delighted in gently humiliating guests. It was slapstick made architectural.

Steeplechase was also remarkably inclusive for its time. While other parks enforced racial restrictions or quietly discouraged Black visitors, Steeplechase was known for being open to everyone. It wasn’t perfect — no place in Jim Crow America was — but it was far more welcoming than its competitors. Immigrants, working‑class families, and Black New Yorkers all found a place there.

By the 1920s, Steeplechase was one of the most famous amusement parks in the world. It survived fires, storms, economic depressions, and changing tastes. It became a symbol of Coney Island itself — a place where New Yorkers could escape the pressures of modern life and rediscover the simple pleasure of play.

II. Decline and Vulnerability

By the 1950s, Coney Island was changing. The rise of television, suburbanization, and new entertainment options drew people away from the boardwalk. The city’s neglect of the neighborhood led to rising crime and deteriorating infrastructure. Steeplechase remained beloved, but it was aging. Its wooden structures required constant maintenance, and its business model — cheap thrills for the masses — struggled in a world increasingly obsessed with modernity.

When George Tilyou’s descendants inherited the park, they kept it running, but they also understood that the land beneath it was becoming more valuable than the park itself. Developers began circling, imagining high‑rise apartments, hotels, and luxury towers where the Pavilion of Fun once stood.

In 1964, the Tilyou family made a decision that would change Coney Island forever: they sold Steeplechase Park. The buyer was Fred Trump, patriarch of the Trump real‑estate empire.

III. Fred Trump Arrives: A Vision of Towers, Not Joy

Fred Trump did not buy Steeplechase Park because he loved Coney Island. He bought it because he saw an opportunity. The land was enormous — nearly 17 acres — and it sat on the waterfront. Trump envisioned a massive luxury development: high‑rise apartments, private clubs, and exclusive amenities that would transform Coney Island into a playground for the wealthy.

To Trump, Steeplechase Park was not a cultural landmark. It was an obstacle.

Within months of acquiring the property, Trump announced that the park would be demolished. He held a public “farewell party” in September 1966, inviting New Yorkers to watch the destruction of the Pavilion of Fun. He handed out bricks as souvenirs. He hired models in bikinis to pose atop the rubble. It was a spectacle — but not the kind George Tilyou would have approved of.

The demolition was not just physical. It was symbolic. Trump wanted to erase Steeplechase from memory, to make it clear that the era of cheap thrills was over and the era of luxury development had begun.

But Trump had miscalculated.

IV. The Battle for Coney Island

Fred Trump’s plan required city approval. He needed zoning changes to build the high‑rise towers he envisioned. He expected the city to cooperate — after all, he was one of the most powerful developers in New York.

But Coney Island residents fought back. Preservationists fought back. City officials fought back. Even Robert Moses, the master builder of New York, opposed Trump’s plan.

The city refused to grant the zoning changes. Trump sued. The city sued back. The battle dragged on for years.

Trump argued that Coney Island needed revitalization and that his towers would bring prosperity. Opponents argued that Trump’s plan would privatize the waterfront, destroy public access, and erase one of the city’s most beloved cultural spaces.

The courts sided with the city.

Trump was furious. He had demolished Steeplechase Park, but he could not build anything in its place.

For years, the land sat vacant — a scar on the boardwalk, a reminder of what had been lost.

V. What Became of Steeplechase Park

After Trump’s defeat, the land remained undeveloped. Trump tried repeatedly to revive his plans, but the city refused. Eventually, the property changed hands, and the site was incorporated into the redevelopment plans for the Coney Island amusement district.

Today, the area where Steeplechase Park once stood is home to:

• The Brooklyn Cyclones’ baseball stadium (MCU Park / Maimonides Park)
• Public parkland
• New amusement attractions
• The revived Coney Island boardwalk culture

The spirit of Steeplechase — joy, accessibility, democratic fun — has returned in fragments. The stadium hosts community events. The boardwalk is alive again. New rides and attractions echo the old ones, though none quite capture the anarchic charm of the Pavilion of Fun. But Steeplechase Park itself is gone. Its destruction remains one of the most controversial development decisions in New York history.

VI. The Legacy of Steeplechase — and the Legacy of Its Destruction

Steeplechase Park represents two competing visions of New York.

1. The Vision of George Tilyou

A city where joy is accessible. A city where working‑class families can afford fun. A city where public spaces belong to everyone. A city where laughter is a civic good.

2. The Vision of Fred Trump

A city where land is valuable only when it can be monetized. A city where public spaces are expendable. A city where luxury replaces community. A city where profit outweighs culture.

The battle over Steeplechase was not just about an amusement park. It was about what kind of city New York would become.

Trump lost the zoning battle, but his philosophy eventually won in other parts of the city. The rise of luxury towers, the privatization of public spaces, and the erosion of working‑class recreation all reflect the development model he championed. Steeplechase Park’s destruction was a preview of the future.

VII. A Memory Worth Preserving

Today, Steeplechase Park lives on in photographs, postcards, oral histories, and the memories of those who rode its mechanical horses or laughed themselves breathless in the Pavilion of Fun. It lives on in the revived amusement district, in the echoes of children screaming on roller coasters, and in the stubborn resilience of Coney Island itself.

But it also lives on as a cautionary tale — a reminder that cultural landmarks can be erased not by neglect but by ambition. Fred Trump believed he was building the future. Instead, he destroyed a piece of New York’s soul.

Steeplechase Park was not just an amusement park. It was a promise — that joy belongs to everyone, that public spaces matter, and that the city is strongest when it remembers the people who built it. Its story is worth telling because its lesson is worth remembering.

Long before the O.J. Simpson trial turned Johnnie L. Cochran Jr. into a household name, he had already spent three decades becoming the most formidable civil‑rights lawyer in Los Angeles, a strategist who understood police violence better than the LAPD understood itself, and a courtroom tactician whose victories shaped the legal landscape for Black Americans long before cable news ever pointed a camera at him. The O.J. trial didn’t create Cochran. It revealed him to the rest of the country. By the time he stood beside Simpson in 1994, Cochran had already built a career defined by landmark cases, political battles, and a relentless insistence that Black lives were worthy of legal protection in a system designed to deny it.

To understand Cochran’s rise, you have to understand Los Angeles in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s. In this city, the LAPD operated as a paramilitary force, where Black neighborhoods were treated as occupied territory, and where police brutality was not a scandal but a civic norm. Before I.C.E. and Border Patrol, there was the Los Angeles Police Department.

Cochran’s early career unfolded in a landscape shaped by Chief William Parker’s aggressive policing, the Watts uprising, and the long shadow of racialized violence. Cochran didn’t just practice law in this environment; he confronted it head‑on, case by case, client by client, until his name became synonymous with the fight for justice in a city that rarely offered it.

His pre‑O.J. career can be understood through several defining cases, each one revealing a different facet of the lawyer he became. These cases didn’t just make him famous. They made him necessary.

The Leonard Deadwyler Case (1966): Cochran’s Awakening

If there is a single case that transformed Johnnie Cochran from a promising young attorney into a civil‑rights advocate, it is the 1966 shooting of Leonard Deadwyler, a Black man rushing his pregnant wife to the hospital. Deadwyler was trying to get to the Los Angeles County — USC Medical Center about 12 miles from where he was shot. St. Francis Hospital and Compton Community Hospital were closer, but they didn’t always admit Black patients. Compton in 1966 was still transitioning to a Black community and was the site of a de facto segregated hospital. Deadwyler was speeding, panicked, and trying to get help. LAPD officers pulled him over. Within moments, Officer Jerold M. Bunch shot Deadwyler in the chest, killing him in front of his wife.

The police claimed Deadwyler was drunk, dangerous, and reaching for a weapon. Cochran, then in his late twenties, took the case and immediately recognized the pattern: a Black man killed under suspicious circumstances, a police department insisting its officers acted properly, and a city willing to accept the official story without question.

Cochran forced the city to confront the truth. He demanded an inquest, a rare public proceeding, and used it to expose contradictions in the officers’ testimony. He brought in medical experts who testified Deadwyler was sober. He showed that the police narrative didn’t match the physical evidence. And he did something even more radical: he insisted that the life of a Black man was worth examining with the same seriousness as any other citizen.

The coroner’s jury ultimately ruled the shooting “accidental,” but the case changed Cochran. It taught him that the courtroom could be a stage for truth even when the verdict was unjust. It taught him that police violence was not episodic but systemic. And it taught him that Black lawyers had a responsibility to challenge the machinery of state power.

Deadwyler’s death became Cochran’s political awakening — the moment he realized that the law could be a weapon, and he intended to wield it.

The L.A. Panthers and the Criminalization of Black Activism (Late 1960s–Early 1970s)

As the Black Panther Party grew in Los Angeles, so did the LAPD’s determination to crush it. The department’s surveillance, raids, and prosecutions were part of a national strategy to dismantle Black political organizing. Cochran became one of the few attorneys willing to defend Panthers targeted by the state.

He represented activists accused of weapons violations, conspiracy, and assault — charges often inflated or fabricated to neutralize political dissent. Cochran’s work in these cases was not glamorous; it was dangerous. He faced a police department that viewed Panther lawyers as enemies, and a public conditioned to see Black activists as threats.

Beginning in 1968, the FBI formally designated “Black nationalist hate groups” as a COINTELPRO target category. The Los Angeles chapter of the Black Panther Party was considered one of the highest‑priority targets.

The FBI shared surveillance files with LAPD, exchanged informant reports, coordinated on Panther membership lists, provided LAPD with dossiers on Panther leaders, and passed along forged letters and disinformation designed to provoke internal conflict. This was the environment in which Johnnie Cochran practiced.

What Cochran understood was that defending the Panthers was not about ideology. It was about constitutional rights. If the state could crush Black political organizing through selective prosecution, then no Black citizen was safe. These cases built Cochran’s reputation as a lawyer who would stand up to the LAPD even when the political winds were against him. They also taught him how to dismantle police narratives, a skill he would later deploy with surgical precision in the O.J. trial.

The Ron Settles Case (1981): Exposing Police Torture

By the early 1980s, Cochran was no longer a young lawyer fighting for recognition. He was a seasoned civil‑rights attorney with a growing national profile. The death of Ron Settles, a Black college football star arrested by Signal Hill police, became one of the most important cases of his career. Settles was found hanging in his jail cell. Police claimed he had committed suicide. Cochran knew better.

He forced the exhumation of Settles’ body, a bold move that revealed the truth. The autopsy showed Settles had been strangled. Cochran argued that police had tortured and killed him, then staged the scene to cover it up.

The case resulted in a settlement for Settles’ family and exposed the brutality of the Signal Hill Police Department, which had a long history of violence against Black motorists. Cochran’s work led to reforms, resignations, and national scrutiny. More importantly, it cemented his reputation as the lawyer families called when the police killed their sons.

The Michael Jackson Era (1980s): Celebrity Defense and Strategic Visibility

Before O.J., Cochran represented Michael Jackson in several civil matters, including a 1986 case involving allegations of wrongdoing that did not result in charges. Cochran’s work for Jackson was quiet, strategic, and effective. It showed that he could navigate the world of celebrity with the same skill he brought to civil‑rights litigation.

Representing Jackson gave Cochran something else: visibility. It placed him in the orbit of high‑profile clients and demonstrated that he could handle cases involving fame, media scrutiny, and complex public narratives. This visibility made Cochran a known quantity in Los Angeles, a lawyer who could defend the famous and the forgotten with equal skill.

The Elmer “Geronimo” Pratt Case (1970s–1990s): A 25‑Year Fight for Justice

Elmer Pratt, a decorated Vietnam veteran and prominent Black Panther, was convicted of murder in 1972. The prosecution’s case relied heavily on a jailhouse informant and on evidence that was suppressed, showing Pratt was 400 miles away at the time of the crime.

Cochran took the case and refused to let it go. For more than two decades, he fought for Pratt’s freedom, filing appeals, uncovering misconduct, and exposing the FBI’s COINTELPRO operations that targeted Black activists.

In 1997, Pratt’s conviction was overturned. The judge ruled that the prosecution had withheld exculpatory evidence and relied on false testimony. Pratt walked free after 27 years in prison.

Cochran called it the greatest victory of his career — greater even than O.J., because it corrected a historic injustice rather than simply winning an acquittal.

The Police Brutality Cases of the 1980s: Building a National Reputation

Throughout the 1980s, Cochran represented victims of police violence across Los Angeles. These cases rarely made national headlines, but they made Cochran indispensable.

He represented:

• James Mincey Jr., killed by LAPD chokehold
• Lloyd Thompson, paralyzed by police gunfire
• Kevin Gaines, an officer killed in the Rampart scandal
• Countless unnamed victims whose families sought justice

Cochran’s work helped force the LAPD to abandon the chokehold, exposed patterns of excessive force, and pressured the city to confront its own brutality. By the time Rodney King was beaten in 1991, Cochran had already spent 25 years documenting the violence that video finally made undeniable.

The Reginald Denny Case (1992): A Different Kind of Defense

After the Rodney King verdict sparked the Los Angeles uprising, truck driver Reginald Denny was pulled from his vehicle and beaten by four Black men. Cochran represented one of the defendants, Antoine Miller.

This case was different. Cochran was not defending a victim of police violence. He was defending a young man caught in the chaos of a city exploding under the weight of systemic injustice.

Cochran argued that the defendants were not symbols but individuals, young men reacting to a moment of collective trauma. He insisted on context, humanity, and due process.

The case showed Cochran’s versatility. He could defend victims of police brutality, political activists, celebrities, and criminal defendants with equal conviction.

The Man Who Was Ready for O.J.

By the time O.J. Simpson called Johnnie Cochran in 1994, Cochran had already confronted police violence for 30 years. He had defended political activists targeted by the state and freed an innocent man after 27 years in prison.

But that wasn't all. The tenacious lawyer and civil rights champion had much more on his resume. He exposed systemic brutality in Los Angeles and represented celebrities under intense scrutiny.

The O.J. trial didn’t create Cochran. It showcased him.

His cross‑examinations, his dismantling of police credibility, his insistence on racial context — these were not new skills. They were the product of decades spent fighting the LAPD, challenging prosecutors, and defending Black life in a city that treated it as disposable.

When Cochran told the jury, “If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit,” he wasn’t inventing a persona. He was distilling a lifetime of legal strategy into a single line.

Cochran’s pre‑O.J. career is a story of persistence, courage, and moral clarity. He understood that the law could be a shield for the vulnerable and a weapon against the powerful. He understood that justice was not automatic but demanded. And he understood that Black lawyers had a responsibility to confront the systems that harmed their communities.

The cases that made him famous before O.J.: Deadwyler, Settles, Pratt, the Panthers, the brutality cases, were not just legal battles. They were acts of resistance. Cochran didn’t become a legend because he defended a celebrity. He became a legend because he defended a people. He was Benjamin Crump before Benjamin Crump.

Long before America watched him in the trial of the century, Black Los Angeles already knew: if the police killed your son, if the state targeted your movement, if the system crushed your rights, you called Johnnie Cochran.

He was famous before O.J. He was necessary before O.J. And he was great long before the world noticed. Six years after the O.J. verdict, Cochran was diagnosed with a brain tumor and underwent surgery. After surgery, he reduced his courtroom work but continued public speaking and firm expansion. His symptoms returned in late 2004, and he died on March 29, 2005, about four years after diagnosis. The Cochran Firm still exists, and it is now one of the largest national plaintiff‑side law firms in the United States. It continues to operate under Johnnie Cochran’s name and legacy.

While every racial group has the capacity to express themselves, Black writers are more likely to have their stories suppressed. Dozens of states passed laws that prohibit “divisive” topics, including those that center on racial identity in the classroom. Likewise, museum curators have faced pressure to remove or alter black history exhibits, and some libraries have been advised to remove books deemed too controversial. Naaz Modan, a senior reporter for K-12 Dive, estimated that 3,700 book titles were banned during the 2024–35 school year, adding that 44% of banned titles featured characters representing people of color, “the largest percentage ever in this category.” Titles like The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, The New Kid by Jerry Craft, and Caste by Isabel Wilkerson are noteworthy texts that have been targeted for removal in recent years.

Beyond the classroom, where students are rarely introduced to many books written by Black authors, the topic of racism is suppressed by online platforms. For instance, in March of 2025, the National Park Service removed a description on a government website of Harriet Tubman’s work as an abolitionist. This is a woman who escaped her enslavers and guided at least 70 family members and friends along the Underground Railroad and hundreds more during the Harper’s Ferry raid. The historical narrative about Tubman was later restored, but this removal triggered concerns about the rise of censorship. One study revealed that users who “share personal experiences of racism are disproportionately flagged by both algorithms and humans,” which limits the potential of social media platforms to give voice to marginalized communities and “exacerbate feelings of isolation, both online and offline” (Lee et al., 2024).

Why are stories Black people write about racism often suppressed? The most obvious answer is that the collective preference of White Americans, a socially dominant group, is prioritized above and beyond racially marginalized groups. In simpler terms, many don’t want to talk about race, even if it’s to call out racism. During chattel slavery, many states passed laws that prohibited Black people from reading and writing to limit their efforts to communicate and organize their resistance. Throughout the Jim Crow era, Black writers and editors continued to face suppression despite their talent. For example, Zora Neale Hurston, the author of Their Eyes Were Watching God, who is now widely known, faced rejection from white publishers, which contributed to her dying in poverty, buried in an unmarked grave, as her friends couldn’t raise enough money for a headstone.

In the modern era, efforts to limit public access to Black people’s stories are carried out with laser precision. By using keywords such as racism, race, white supremacy, and white privilege, a program can easily suppress stories about these topics. Lee et al. (2024) found that AI language models tend to misclassify personal narratives from those who’ve endured racism as “toxic” to an online environment, thereby reducing their visibility. While most online platforms claim they care about preserving free speech, as long as it’s not hate speech, Black creators are often unfairly shadow-banned because their attempts to address racism are mistaken for reverse racism. When this happens, readers are less likely to see these stories on their “For You” or “Explore” pages.

When writing online, one of the worst sins you can commit is publishing “clickbait,” stories that lure readers in by triggering an emotional response without satisfying the curiosity gap between what they don’t know and would like to learn. While this type of writing is often considered detrimental to the overall user experience on online platforms, this standard unfairly silences Black people who are simply sharing their experiences with racism. The assumption that any discomfort should be avoided overlooks the work of advocates. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a major figure within the civil rights movement, explained that “true peace is not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice.” Yet newer algorithms seem to conflate these concepts, making no distinction between stories that endorse racism against certain groups and those fighting against it.

As someone who regularly writes about Black people killed by police officers, citing victims such as George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, and about hate crimes committed by civilians, such as the killing of Ahmaud Arbery or the four victims of the 1963 Ku Klux Klan bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, — -Addie Mae Collins, Denise McNair, Carole Robertson, and Cynthia Wesley, I’m well aware that controversy can blossom from people reading essays that center anti-Black racism. Often, the comment section on social media reveals conflicting feelings, from disgust regarding the mistreatment of Black people to efforts to defend prejudicial attitudes. But I would argue that these conversations are a necessary prerequisite to social change. When an algorithm excludes stories about racism before anyone sets eyes on them, the automated program takes the choice away from people.

Learning about individuals like Ruby Bridges, a six-year-old girl who faced racial harassment after becoming the first Black student to desegregate an all-white elementary school, exposes readers to the idea that we live in a country where Black people have endured exclusion due to their race. The public should remember that in 1960, federal marshals escorted Ruby to protect her from racial harassment. In this way, they can consider the value of addressing the prejudice students continue to endure. On the other side of Brown v. Board of Education, there are no white parents holding signs to protest Black students attending whites-only schools. Yet it would serve Americans well to remember that some were more committed to ending controversy than they are to addressing the harm of racism.

Ida B. Wells, one of the most well-known African American journalists, once noted, “the way to right wrongs is to turn the light of truth upon them.” In 1892, she wrote “Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases,” disproving the racist myth that Black men were more likely to commit acts of sexual violence against women, a talking point used to justify lynchings. In the Memphis Daily Commercial, a white-owned newspaper, editors who initially assumed she was a man suggested: “the black wretch who published that foul article should be tied to a stake at the corner of Main and Madison Streets, a pair of tailor’s shears used on his ears, and the most part of his person branded with a hot iron.” New York Times editors accused Wells of being a “nasty-minded mulatto who is looking for notoriety.”

While her writing was considered controversial, Ida B. Wells exposed the violence inflicted upon Black people as a common injustice, her work represented a deliberate effort to save Black lives. She suffered the tragic loss of three of her friends: Thomas Moss, the owner of the People’s Grocery in Memphis, Tennessee, along with Calvin McDowell and Will Steward, store clerks, as they were killed by white vigilante mob violence. In the aftermath, she wrote that lynching was nothing more than “an excuse to get rid of Negroes who were acquiring wealth and property.” This work placed her in the line of fire, even leading to death threats by White people who did not appreciate her work.

Over a hundred and thirty years after Ida B. Wells exposed southern horrors, writing about racism remains controversial. Under these conditions, publishing often feels like kicking a hornet’s nest, as an angry mob swarms the comment sections, attempting to discredit the individual who shared the story or harass them into self-censorship. No matter how well-researched or well-intentioned a Black person’s writing is, this suppression has continued. As a writer who’s been discouraged from writing about race and routinely called slurs on social media that denigrate me for being a Black person and a woman, it’s clear that in some ways, society hasn’t strayed far from that past. Censorship of Black writers looks different in the modern era because burning books can’t stop readers from obtaining digital copies. Still, the problem persists.

Stories about racism have the potential to directly challenge racist attitudes and beliefs, potentially sparking change within systems and institutions that have produced inequalities. While not every White person would agree with efforts to censor Black writers, and certainly there are many historians who value the preservation of history, whether it triggers discomfort or not, prejudice impacts the visibility of these stories online. This bias against Black writers is often integrated so seamlessly into online platforms that few question why they haven’t seen as many stories about racism in recent years. The social problem hasn’t gone away, but the behind-the-scenes method for selecting which stories reach a broader audience may contribute to the false perception that we’re living in a post-racial society. To combat algorithms that tend to limit access to stories written by Black people, it’s important to intentionally seek out their work and to support their efforts. In this way, readers can discover perspectives that too often remain hidden.

When my mother needed to prove who she was, she spent an afternoon on her knees in a closet, pulling shoeboxes down off a shelf, hunting for a birth certificate she hadn’t touched in decades. She found it. The name on it isn’t the name she has used since she got married. She took my father’s name, and the paper in that box belongs to a girl who no longer exists on a single document she carries in her purse.

She is a citizen. She has voted in every election since before I was old enough to know what an election was. Under the SAVE Act, that afternoon in the closet becomes the price of her ballot.

That is the part the bill’s supporters will not say plainly. They call it voter ID. Show your card, prove you’re you. Where’s the harm? I’ll tell you where the harm is. The SAVE Act is not a voter ID law. The fight was never about whether you flash a card at the table. What occurs before you are permitted to reach the table is mandated by law.

So read the text. H.R. 22 requires documentary proof of citizenship to register or re-register for a federal election. Not a driver’s license. A passport or a certified birth certificate. Marc Elias and his team at Democracy Docket keep dragging that one distinction into the light, because the distinction is the entire game. A birth certificate sits in a closet, often in a name you stopped using forty years ago.

Here is the math the White House would rather you skip. Roughly 84 percent of women who marry change their last name. That leaves 69 million American women whose birth certificates do not match their legal names. The bill instructs them to locate additional paperwork, a marriage license, a divorce decree, and a court order, and then bring everything to the registrar. The affidavit escape hatch that the supporters keep pointing to? Read closely. Writers wrote it for people who entirely lack documentary proof, not for the woman whose proof simply says the wrong name. That is not a loophole for her. That is a maze.

It is not only married women. It is the rural voter who lives ninety minutes from the county office. It is the working person who cannot take an unpaid day off to stand in a line and chase down a record. We have already ran this experiment. In 2011, Kansas put a proof-of-citizenship requirement on the books. Ask Ralph Ortiz how that went. He is an Air Force veteran. Augusta registered him when he renewed his driver's license. A year later, a letter informed him that the authorities had suspended his license until he produced additional documentation proving the citizenship he had sworn an oath to defend. By the time the courts struck down the law, it had blocked over 31,000 eligible Kansans from registering. Those were not noncitizens. Those were Kansans. The machine did not catch fraud. It caught its own people. It caught a man in uniform.

Let me give the other side its best argument. Noncitizens should not vote in our elections. A nation decides who casts a ballot, and people who want the rolls clean are right to want that. I don’t sneer at it. I share it.

But that argument is already been won. Noncitizen voting is already a federal crime, a felony that can cost you prison and deportation. And it is already vanishingly rare. Opposed to lenient voting laws, the Heritage Foundation maintains its own election-fraud database. Since 1948, it has recorded approximately 1,500 cases, compared with over a billion ballots cast. So ask yourself: what kind of tool blocks 31,000 citizens in a single state to stop a threat? That thing. The front door does not have a lock on it. That is bricking up the windows because a fly got in once.

And this brick did not appear out of nowhere. In 2013, in Shelby County v. Holder, the Supreme Court gutted the heart of the Voting Rights Act: the preclearance requirement that required states with a history of discrimination to clear changes before enforcing them. The court called that history old news. Within hours, the held-back states started moving. The SAVE Act is the newest layer on a wall a decade in the making. The wall has one purpose. Make the electorate smaller.

We could build the opposite, and none of it is exotic. Automatic registration when you get a license. Same-day registration, so a clerical glitch doesn’t cost you your voice. The John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act is to put teeth back in the law. A confident country makes it easier for its citizens to vote, not harder. It does not audit grandmothers.

Now, the hypocrisy, and it is personal. When real fraud does surface, look who keeps turning up. In 2024, Iowa Republican congressional candidate's wife Kim Phuong Taylor, faced conviction on 52 counts related to fraudulent registrations and absentee ballots. Not the immigrant boogeyman the rhetoric keeps conjuring. A campaign insider.

And then there is the man at the top. In March 2026, Donald Trump cast a mail-in ballot in a Florida special election. One day earlier, he had called mail voting “mail-in cheating.” His defense was, “I’m the President of the United States.” His own people say the SAVE Act will carve out an exception for the military. I want you to sit with that. They wave my uniform around as their loophole while they slam the door on everyone else.

I voted absentee from overseas. So did the airmen next to me. American troops have mailed ballots home from foreign soil for generations, through wars, and the republic did not crack. Do not tell me mail voting is corrupt while you mail your own ballot and hold my service up as the asterisk that makes it acceptable.

Broken Promises — click here.

A Late Word

I finished this piece, and then the Supreme Court spoke. On June 29, 2026, in Watson v. Republican National Committee, the same Court that gutted the Voting Rights Act refused to throw out mail ballots that arrive after Election Day. Mississippi counts ballots postmarked by Election Day and received up to five days later. Eighteen states and territories do something like it. The Republican Party sued to kill the practice. They lost five to four. Justice Amy Coney Barrett wrote the opinion, and Chief Justice Roberts joined her. “The electorate’s choice is made when voting is complete, not when ballots are received,” she wrote.

Sit with who the RNC was shutting out. A ballot mailed from a base overseas does not always make it home by Tuesday. That grace period is often the only thing that counts a soldier’s vote. The party that waves the flag at every rally went to the highest court in the land to toss those envelopes in the trash. Even this Court would not do it.

That is the whole fight in one case. One side is working to count every lawful vote. The other is looking for a reason not to.

We face this choice, and it is not complicated. Either voting is a right we protect, or it is an obstacle course we ration out to the people who can afford the paperwork. I took an oath to a country, not to a man. The oath said the vote belongs to the citizen. It did not say the citizen has to earn it twice.

My mother put the birth certificate back in the box. She should never have had to take it out.

In a moment that reshaped his legacy, John McCain was unexpectedly confronted with an act of racism, and his response became the textbook response as to how one should act in such a circumstance.

At a 2008 Minnesota town hall, an elderly woman stepped to the microphone, visibly nervous, and said something that instantly froze the room: “I can’t trust Obama. I have read about him… he’s an Arab.” The crowd murmured, some cheering, others stunned. McCain immediately shook his head, reached for the microphone, and cut her off mid‑sentence. “No, ma’am,” he said firmly, his voice rising over the crowd. “He’s a decent family man, a citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues.” He handed the microphone back, refusing to let the remark stand. The moment became one of the most replayed exchanges of the campaign — a rare instance of a candidate publicly correcting a supporter’s racist misinformation in real time, even at political cost. McCain’s intervention didn’t quiet the room, but it drew a clear line: he would not win by indulging racism, even when it came from his own voters.

In the early 1980s, as a freshman congressman from Arizona, John McCain voted against establishing the federal Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. At the time, he aligned himself with conservatives who claimed the holiday would be “too costly” and that King’s legacy was “too controversial,” echoing arguments that were widely understood as coded resistance to civil‑rights recognition. When Arizona’s governor later rescinded the state‑level MLK holiday in 1987, a move that triggered national boycotts and cost the state a Super Bowl. McCain again opposed restoring it, insisting the process had been “rushed” and refusing to confront the racial implications of the backlash.

For years, he maintained this position, even as civil‑rights leaders and Black Arizonans publicly pressed him to reconsider. Only during his 2008 presidential campaign did McCain fully reverse himself, calling his earlier votes “a mistake” and acknowledging that he had been wrong to oppose honoring King. His shift may have been sincere, but it came decades after the moment when his opposition had helped stall recognition of the holiday in his own state.

McCain had other questionable events on his resume. He defended the Confederate flag flying over the South Carolina State House, calling it a “symbol of heritage and not racism.” McCain repeatedly referred to his North Vietnamese captors as “gooks.” He insisted he meant only his torturers, not Asians broadly. He tolerated South African Apartheid, calling sanctions “premature,” saying they would “hurt Black South Africans economically. He later reversed his position.

In that one moment in Minnesota, at the age of 71, McCain’s slate was wiped clean. He finally stood up to racism at a time when it counted most and possibly harmed his presidential aspirations. John McCain was again a hero, and his past transgressions were forgiven by those with good reason to mistrust him.

Joe Rogan had an unexpected moment when confronted with racism, and he failed the McCain test. At UFC Freedom 250, held on the White House South Lawn, Joe Rogan was performing his standard role as the post‑fight interviewer. Rogan always steps into the Octagon immediately after a bout, microphone in hand, ready to ask the winner about the fight. After Josh Hokit defeated Derrick Lewis, Rogan approached him for the routine interview. Cameras were rolling, the crowd was loud, and Rogan, as always, held the mic close so the fighter’s comments could be heard clearly on the broadcast.

Hokit began with typical post‑fight remarks, thanking his team and praising the event. But then he abruptly pivoted into politics, saying he wanted to “tell the truth.” That’s when Hokit delivered the line that stunned the audience and the broadcast: he asked America to agree that “Michelle Obama is a man.” Rogan did not immediately condemn or correct Hokit, as John McCain might have. Instead, he pulled the microphone back from Hokit and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, Josh Hokit.”

One could defend Rogan, who was caught by surprise. He was the emcee of the event and might have thought it best to move the event along to the next fight and move past the Hokit comment. Who among us has not missed a moment and later wished they had handled something differently, thinking well after the fact about what they should have said?

Unfortunately, Rogan never found the correct response. When he finally discussed it days later in his podcast, Rogan passed it off as Josh Hokit simply playing a role, without a hint of condemnation of the racism.

“That guy Josh Hokit. You know, that’s like, he’s got a, a shtick. Like, he’s got a character: ‘The Incredible Hok.’ And so he’s basically like a pro-wrestling bad guy who also is a really good fighter. So there’s a real problem there.”

Rogan and his guest, MAGA-leaning comedian Tim Dillon, went on to laugh about how Hokit’s comments were received in American households. Joe Rogan was no John McCain. Whenever Joe Rogan makes what sounds like a reasonable comment or criticizes Donald Trump, (who also didn’t condemn Hokit’s comment made right in front of him). Liberal commentators rave about how wonderful and popular he is.

They must have forgotten his repeated casual use of the word “nigger” on his podcasts and describing a Black neighborhood as “Planet of the Apes.” Rogan has made remarks implying that Black athletes succeed because of physical traits rather than intelligence. Rogan has hosted guests who made racially charged jokes or engaged in stereotypes, and he often laughed along or encouraged the bit rather than challenging it.

There have been several other times when people were confronted with John McCain moments:

In 1980, Ronald Reagan launched his general‑election campaign in Neshoba County, Mississippi, near the site where white supremacists murdered three civil‑rights workers. He declared support for “states’ rights,” a phrase long used to defend segregation. Reagan ignored the racial meaning of the phrase and never acknowledged the symbolism of the location. He dismissed criticism and refused to clarify the racial implications. Reagan wasn’t caught by surprise with racism; he perpetrated it.

George H.W. Bush (1988) ignored the racist framing of the Willie Horton ads. The infamous Willie Horton ads portrayed a Black man as a violent threat, using racial fear to attack Michael Dukakis. Bush never condemned the ads, never distanced himself, and allowed the campaign to continue using racially charged imagery. He insisted the ads were about “crime,” not race.

Bill Clinton (1992 & 1996): Ignored racist policing concerns tied to “superpredator” rhetoric. Clinton embraced tough‑on‑crime policies and rhetoric that disproportionately targeted Black youth, including supporting criminologists who used the term “superpredators.” His wife Hillary also used the term. Clinton ignored civil rights warnings about racial bias and did not address the racial implications until decades later. During the 1990s, he defended the policies and avoided racial critique.

Donald Trump (2017–2020): Ignored racist chants and statements at rallies. At multiple rallies, supporters shouted racist phrases such as “Send her back!” about Rep. Ilhan Omar and other xenophobic chants. Trump did not condemn the chants in the moment, often paused, let them continue, or later reframed them as “patriotic.” He consistently ignored the racist nature of the remarks. It’s no surprise that Trump said nothing when Josh Hokit called Michelle Obama a man.

Strom Thurmond (1948–2000s): Ignored racist hecklers and segregationist supporters. Throughout his career, Thurmond was confronted with racist supporters who praised segregation, used slurs, or invoked white supremacist ideology. Thurmond routinely ignored racist comments from supporters, refused to condemn segregationist rhetoric, and maintained silence when confronted with overt racism at events. I wonder if he even once thought about the Black daughter, Essie Mae Washington-Williams, whom he had out of wedlock and never publicly acknowledged during his lifetime.

Thankfully, there are examples of people doing better:

Mitt Romney (2012): Confronting racist birther hecklers. At several campaign events, Romney was confronted by supporters making racist “birther” claims about Obama — insisting Obama was not American or was secretly Kenyan. Romney corrected them publicly, saying Obama was “born in the United States” and refusing to validate birtherism. He did not always confront every instance, but when directly asked, he rejected the racist claim.

Nikki Haley (2015): Confronting the Confederate flag after the Charleston church massacre. After a white supremacist murdered nine Black parishioners at Mother Emanuel AME Church, the shooter’s photos with the Confederate flag forced South Carolina leaders to confront the symbol’s racist legacy. Haley called for the flag’s removal from the State House grounds, saying it had been “hijacked by hate groups.” She signed the bipartisan bill removing it — a major shift in Southern politics.

George W. Bush (2005): Confronting racist treatment of Muslims. After 9/11, Muslim Americans faced widespread harassment, surveillance, and racist attacks. Bush was confronted with this reality by civil rights groups and Muslim leaders. Bush delivered a nationally televised speech from a mosque, declaring:

“Islam is peace.”

He condemned anti‑Muslim racism, insisted that Muslim Americans were part of the national fabric, and directed federal agencies to treat religious profiling as unacceptable. This remains one of the most forceful anti‑racism statements by a modern Republican president.

In our individual lives, though likely not on national television. We will each face moments where racism is expressed by someone you know, possibly a good friend or family member. When that time comes, will you be John McCain or Joe Rogan? The choice is yours.

Most people have never heard of the country, and even the ones that have likely can’t find it on a map.

It’s smaller than New Hampshire.

And the population is just north of one million. Similar to, let’s say, Jacksonville, Florida.

The country?

Djibouti.

Djibouti sits near the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, which connects the Red Sea, Suez Canal, Gulf of Aden, and Indian Ocean. In English, what that means is in order to transport numerous goods from Asia to Europe and elsewhere, you have to pass by Djibouti’s coast.

We’re not talking about a vast waterway. The passage near Djibouti is separated into two by an island. One passage is 16 miles wide. The other is only 2 miles wide. Those are the only two ways through.

If a ship needs repair, fuel or other services, their best option is to stop in Djibouti.

Nearly a quarter of Europe’s imports rely on Djibouti and the nearby waterways. And 12% of the entire global economy is dependent on goods passing by this tiny East African nation.

So, you’d think that Djibouti must be the Dubai of Africa.

That the nations which need Djibouti have taken good care of it. Have invested in its success.

Or at least the French would have made Djibouti a thriving place. After all, France colonized what was then called French Somaliland for over 100 years all the way until 1977, when I was in second grade!

But not so.

Despite its critical location, Djibouti is steeped in significant poverty. According to the most recent World Bank figures from 2017, about 21.1% of the population lives below the poverty line. Over 25% live on less than $3.00 per day.

Of course, it’s not just the lack of money. Roughly one-third of the population experiences deprivations in education, health, living standards, and basic services.

Djibouti is yet another example of how the West loves the fruits of Africa but isn’t willing to pay its fair share so African nations can fully emerge from the West’s abuse — colonial extraction, unequal trade, military convenience, and global shipping systems all that benefit from African geography without adequately investing in African people.

From cobalt for our iPhones and electric cars, to diamonds, to cacao for our chocolate bars, to waterways for cheap Chinese goods.

Maybe it’s time for Djibouti to charge a toll. God knows Europe already took a toll on Africa.

America was founded by white men who claimed that European nations denied their right to religious freedom. Ironically, throughout much of this nation’s history, Black people have faced discrimination when their spiritual practices deviated from mainstream white Christianity. A recent legal case highlights this problem. In Landor v. Louisiana, the Supreme Court ruled 6–3 against a Black man who attempted to sue prison guards and other officials under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA). Damon Landor, a Black man who’d grown his hair for twenty years, showed them a copy of the federal appeals court decision stating that Louisiana’s policy of cutting the hair of Rastafarian inmates violated federal law. Guards disregarded the decision, handcuffed him to a chair, and cut his knee-length hair.

In her dissenting opinion, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson argued that the majority decision meant “prisoners like Landor who suffer violations of their religious freedom in state prisons — no matter how blatant — will be left remediless.” While the biblical Nazarite vow states “no razor shall pass over his head,” specifically prohibiting haircuts, Jackson argued that the prison guards “uncrowned him before God,” without any consideration for the legal precedent established for navigating such cases. Without the law acting as a deterrent, she argued, “state-empowered prison officials will have little incentive to abide by federal law, even if it is handed to them on a piece of paper.” While Rastafarians represent a minority of Black Americans, this does not make their beliefs any less worthy. Yet the majority opinion dismisses the significance of their faith and, by extension, the religious freedom all citizens are entitled to.

Black people who wear locs face discrimination in schools, where they are more likely to be suspended or punished for wearing natural hairstyles, and in the workplace, where they are frequently denied opportunities or restricted to certain positions. For instance, before New Orleans passed the CROWN Act, which prohibits hair discrimination, I worked at a French Quarter restaurant whose policy prohibited Black men from wearing long hairstyles. One busser I worked with, a Rasta man, told me he had to cut off his hair if he wanted to work in the front-of-house, implying that he could only work in the kitchen or back-of-house if he refused to comply. Initially, he refused, but weeks later, for the sake of his family, he agreed to cut off his long locs. But the red-eyed, teary look he gave on his first day in the front-of-house exposed the emotional distress underlying this sacrifice. Managers pressured him into cutting his locs, forcing him to change something essential to his personality, character, and religious beliefs.

In a knee-jerk response to Landor v. Louisiana, some have brushed the issue aside as insignificant, suggesting that once someone is institutionalized, they lose all their rights and that it doesn’t matter whether their religious rights are protected. This, however, misinterprets the law. Those who are imprisoned are still entitled to fundamental constitutional rights, which may be limited only in the name of safety and security. While freedom of movement and privacy are restricted for incarcerated individuals, this doesn’t mean they lack the right to religious freedom. At Angola prison in Louisiana, there are inmate-led religious groups. Under the RLUIPA, prisons have honored dietary restrictions, for instance, for those who choose to eat kosher, halal, or vegan in accordance with their faith. The Civil Rights Division joined a lawsuit defending Sukhjinder Basara, a Sikh who faced disciplinary action after refusing to cut his hair because he believed “cutting one’s hair is a grievous sin.” Yet the Supreme Court’s ruling suggests the government is inconsistent on this matter. If it’s a “substantial burden” to ask a Sikh man to cut his hair, including his beard, then the same could be argued about a Rasta man. Both are religious justifications for a deviation from prison grooming policies, and yet the rights of a Black man were not seen as equally important to be upheld. Indeed, by crumpling up the paper Landor provided to officials, they clearly disregarded his religious freedom.

The discrimination Black Rastafarians experience in prison and within the workplace is reminiscent of Indian children forced to assimilate in boarding schools, where White Christians routinely cut students’ long hair to disconnect them from Indigenous cultural, religious, and spiritual practices. This historical injustice serves as a prime example of how religious and spiritual practices by people of color are often dismissed. A 1902 letter from the Office of Indian Affairs specifically noted that “the wearing of long hair by the male population of your agency is not in keeping with the advancement they are making, or will soon be expected to make, in civilization.” Instructions were given to “induce your male Indians to cut their hair, and both sexes to stop painting,” their skin, which was part of their customs. Such a policy set the tone that ultimately dismissed Indigenous cultural practices as barbaric, ultimately denying them religious freedom.

As someone who is a descendant of enslaved people in Louisiana, I’ve come to understand this dilemma all too well. When the French controlled the colony, they enforced the Code Noir, which stipulated that all residents had to practice Christianity, including the African men and women held in bondage by colonizers. My 5th great-grandfather, Sorlingue, who was born in Africa in 1707, was transported to Louisiana and enslaved by Captain Louis Paul Le Peletier de la Houssaye, making him someone directly impacted by these laws. To challenge restrictions on religious freedom, many Black people in the Attakapas or St. Martinville region practiced syncretism, a blend of West African spiritual practices and Roman Catholicism. As Jouline (2026) noted in their Oklahoma University thesis, the Code Noir “criminalized African spiritual practices, laying an early legal framework for policing Voodoo.” Those Black people who violated these expectations faced punishments, such as being whipped or branded.

While the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution protects the right of American citizens to practice whichever religion they choose, free from government interference, they have routinely deprived enslaved Black people of that right. Furthermore, throughout the Jim Crow Era, Black ministers were routinely targeted and labeled as troublemakers, rather than leaders entrusted by their communities to be stewards of their faith. Churches remained racially segregated throughout much of the country’s history, and at times, racist practices were enacted under the guise of white religious freedom. For example, Justices who originally struck down anti-miscegenation cases in Loving v. Virginia, noted “Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay, and red, and he placed them on separate continents,” suggesting that since God “separated the races,” that “he did not intend for the races to mix.” Given that religious freedom is constitutionally protected, and many hold quite different views, this argument was unconstitutional. Still, laws preventing interracial couples from marrying and cohabitating caused harm for centuries. Even today, there is a legal battle to require Texas students to read the Bible in public and private schools, a battle that exposes a clear bias.

Due to racism in American society, many were dismissive of the significance of Landor v. Louisiana. The image of guards holding down a Black man with long dreadlocks and cutting them may not seem like a big deal to some, but this event was clearly a traumatic event for the man, whose religious beliefs were trampled on. It doesn’t pass the “do unto others as you would have them do unto you” test. How ironic that America’s Constitution claims to protect religious freedom, but the Supreme Court recently sided with the prison guards who forcibly cut a man’s hair, in clear violation of his religious beliefs. Cases like this should make us question who is entitled to religious freedom in America. On paper, we all have the freedom to worship at our discretion, but in actuality, there’s a significant difference in terms of how Black people and some other marginalized groups are treated. By dismissing the clear-worded religious justification for maintaining his hairstyle, the highest court seems to have granted officials a pass to disregard the faith of Black people, who are not Christian.

The Senate Judiciary Committee has formally set July 15 as the opening day of Todd Blanche’s confirmation hearing for Attorney General, with outside witnesses scheduled for July 16. Blanche has been serving as the acting Attorney General of the United States since April 2, 2026. Before becoming acting AG, Blanche served as the Deputy Attorney General since early 2025.

According to multiple sources, Blanche became acting Attorney General on April 2, 2026. Given today’s date (June 26, 2026), he has been in the role for just under three months. Todd Blanche was widely described as “unconfirmable” when Trump formally put him forward for Attorney General because of three major controversies tied directly to his actions as acting AG and deputy AG.

1. The IRS immunity deal for Trump and his family

Blanche authorized a Justice Department action granting immunity from prosecution or IRS enforcement to:

• Donald Trump
• Trump’s family members
• The Trump Organization

This immunity was tied to the settlement of Trump’s $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS. Senators in both parties saw this as an abuse of DOJ authority and a direct conflict of interest.

2. Creation of the “Anti‑Weaponization Fund”

Blanche approved a $1.8 billion DOJ fund intended to compensate people who claimed they were victims of “prosecutorial overreach” during the Biden administration. Critics — including Republican senators — warned that the fund could:

• Pay individuals convicted of Jan. 6 violence
• Function as a political slush fund
• Undermine the legitimacy of federal prosecutions

This decision was cited repeatedly as evidence that Blanche could not be trusted to run the DOJ impartially.

3. His role in the Epstein files compliance dispute

Pam Bondi testified to Congress that Blanche was responsible for determining DOJ’s compliance with the law requiring the release of Jeffrey Epstein–related files. His handling of the issue drew scrutiny, especially from senators who believed he was slow‑walking or manipulating compliance.

When Todd Blanche was still Deputy Attorney General, he made an unusual and controversial trip to FCI Tallahassee to meet personally with Ghislaine Maxwell, who was serving a 20‑year federal sentence for sex trafficking minors. The visit was not announced in advance, was not part of any standard DOJ oversight protocol, and was not accompanied by the Bureau of Prisons’ usual documentation for high‑level official visits.

Blanche later told Senate staff that he went to the prison to “review conditions” and to “ensure compliance” with new Bureau of Prisons directives. But senators, including Republicans, noted that:

• No other facilities received such a visit
• No written report was produced
• No policy review followed
• No other DOJ official accompanied him

The visit stood out because it was singularly focused on Maxwell, not on prison conditions generally.

Within days of Blanche’s visit, Maxwell was quietly transferred out of FCI Tallahassee. Senators learned of the transfer only because it appeared in internal BOP movement logs. The Bureau of Prisons confirmed Maxwell’s move to the Federal Prison Camp in Bryan, Texas, but did not provide operational details about the transfer or the approval chain. They described it only as a “BOP placement decision.” Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche publicly stated that Maxwell faced “numerous threats against her life” and that the transfer reflected security concerns and BOP discretion.

No one has identified who approved the transfer. BOP policy requires a waiver for placing a sex‑offender–designated inmate in a minimum‑security camp. A BOP administrator must approve such a waiver, but no official has confirmed who signed it. No documentation of the decision process has been released. Congressional inquiries have asked for the waiver, the classification review, internal communications, Maxwell’s visitor logs, and any DOJ directives. None of these has been produced publicly. The transfer remains unexplained and irregular.

Several Republican Senators, on and off the record, voiced their opposition to Blanche’s nomination.

1. Sen. Susan Collins (R‑ME) — on the record

“We had an extensive discussion on the Anti‑Weaponization Fund, which he has assured me with no equivocation at all that he is not for it, will not pursue it, that it will not exist.”

2. Sen. John Cornyn (R‑TX) — on the record

“There’s still some unanswered questions about the tax audits and the scope of any immunity from future audits.”

3. Sen. John Cornyn (R‑TX) — on the record

“He provided some clarity… but promised to have a more in‑depth briefing over the details.”

4. Sen. John Thune (R‑SD) — on the record

“We’ll see.He does not currently have the votes.”

5. GOP Judiciary Committee members (collective characterization) — on the record via reporting

“Republicans are making clear that acting Attorney General Todd Blanche won’t have a cakewalk to Senate confirmation…”

6. GOP senators in private meeting (collective) — reported paraphrase

“More than 20 GOP lawmakers vented their frustrations… and panned the proposal he rolled out to establish a $1.8 billion ‘anti‑weaponization’ fund.”

7. GOP Senate source (off‑record characterization)

Blanche “will have to clear several hurdles.” (Translation: He is not currently confirmable.)

8. GOP senators (collective characterization)

Blanche “is certain to be grilled” over the fund and his handling of Trump‑related matters.

9. GOP swing votes (collective characterization)

Blanche is “privately addressing concerns” but still faces “lingering concerns” among Republicans.

In the weeks since his nomination, the odds have changed from definitely confirmable to likely confirmation, and Republican Senators are changing their tune.

1. Blanche “assured GOP senators… the fund is dead.”

In at least two private meetings, Blanche assured Republican Senators that the fund is dead and he won’t support it if Trump tries to revive the idea in the future.”

2. Sen. John Cornyn called a meeting “positive.”

“It was a positive meeting.”

3. John Cornyn acknowledged that Blanche provided clarity.

“He provided some clarity about the scope [of the IRS deal].” (Signals Blanche is addressing GOP concerns successfully.)

4. Blanche promised deeper cooperation with GOP skeptics.

“Promised to have a more in‑depth briefing over the details.”

5. GOP senators privately say Blanche has “addressed concerns.”

“Blanche… assured GOP senators… [and] addressed concerns about the fund.” (Private assurances are often the real signal of confirmation momentum.)

6. Republicans are accepting Blanche’s reversal on the fund.

“Blanche says DOJ is ‘not moving forward’ with the $1.776B anti‑weaponization fund: ‘Period.’”

7. GOP frustration has shifted from Blanche personally to the administration.

“More than 20 GOP lawmakers vented their frustrations with the administration…”

8. Blanche is now seen as responsive and cooperative.

“Blanche… assured GOP senators… he won’t support [the fund] if Trump tries to revive it.”

9. Blanche’s critics (Cornyn, Tillis) are no longer signaling a hard ‘no.’

The two Republicans whose votes matter most are now in “wait and see” mode rather than opposition.

Cornyn: “I would not make a decision… until he testifies.”

10. Senate Majority Leader John Thune’s framing signals Blanche is viable.

“[Thune] isn’t predicting the outcome… noting Blanche will have to clear several hurdles.”

Republican Senators have framed confirmation discussions on two of the three major hurdles Blanche faces, the IRS deal and the slush fund. Except for vague references, none of them are addressing the pedophile in the room. Did they forget about Epstein and Blanche’s personal role in the cover-up?

Todd Blanche has repeatedly acted in ways that appear to shield Donald Trump from scrutiny in the Epstein files investigation. As Deputy Attorney General, Blanche was the official responsible for determining how the Justice Department complied with the law requiring the release of Epstein‑related documents, and lawmakers say his office slow‑walked disclosures, withheld key materials, and provided inconsistent explanations for missing pages.

His unannounced visit to Ghislaine Maxwell, followed days later by her unexplained transfer to a minimum‑security camp that normally bars sex‑offender‑designated inmates, intensified suspicions that Blanche was managing sensitive witnesses rather than overseeing neutral prison operations. Senators have also questioned whether Blanche’s sweeping IRS‑audit immunity deal for Trump and his family, and his role as Trump’s former criminal defense attorney, created conflicts of interest that shaped DOJ decisions about Epstein‑related evidence.

These actions have fueled a bipartisan perception that Blanche has used his position to protect Trump from potential exposure in the Epstein files rather than to ensure transparent compliance with federal law.

The Senate Judiciary Committee, chaired by top Trump flunky Sen. Lindsey Graham, will oversee the confirmation hearings on Blanche. The chairman controls the witness list and determines, for example, if we will hear from Epstein survivors and how many. When Clarence Thomas was confirmed as a Supreme Court Justice, then chairman Joe Biden kept three witnesses backing up Anita Hill’s testimony from testifying.

During her congressional testimony, former Attorney General Pam Bondi repeatedly stated that Todd Blanche was the Justice Department official responsible for overseeing compliance with the Epstein Files Transparency Act. She emphasized that decisions about what was released, what was withheld, and how the department interpreted the law were “handled by Deputy Attorney General Blanche’s office.” Bondi told lawmakers that she “did not personally review” the disputed redactions or missing documents and that Blanche’s team controlled the process for determining which Epstein‑related materials were responsive. She also testified that Blanche was the DOJ official who communicated with the Bureau of Prisons regarding issues related to Epstein‑connected inmates, including Ghislaine Maxwell.

Roughly 3 million Epstein‑related documents have not been released by the Department of Justice. According to Bondi, Todd Blanche is responsible for the unreleased documents, and Senate Republicans are ready to ignore Blanche’s role in all things Epstein if we let them.

The media is complicit in allowing Republican Senators to frame the confirmation on assurances Blanche makes about IRS immunity and his disagreement with the slush fund. They need to get Senators on the record about Epstein. Stop them in the hallways and ask, “Have you forgotten about Epstein?” No discussion about Blanche should take place that doesn’t mention Epstein, and private assurances are meaningless.

Before joining the Justice Department, Todd Blanche was Trump’s personal criminal defense lawyer, representing him in three of the most serious prosecutions Trump faced:

1. The New York “hush‑money” criminal case

Blanche was Trump’s lead trial attorney in the Manhattan prosecution involving falsified business records related to payments to Stormy Daniels.

2. The federal classified‑documents case (Mar‑a‑Lago)

Blanche represented Trump in the federal indictment alleging unlawful retention of national‑security documents and obstruction of justice.

3. The federal election‑obstruction case (January 6 / 2020 election)

He also served as Trump’s defense counsel in the federal case alleging efforts to overturn the 2020 election results.

Now he is acting as Trump’s personal lawyer to protect him from all matters related to Epstein. Making him Attorney General will ensure that the Department of Justice will never prosecute Donald Trump and his friends for their sex crimes committed against children and young women. The public needs to show up at town halls, call their senators’ offices, and write letters to them. Their preference is to forget about Epstein, and we cannot let them.

One of the biggest challenges Black entrepreneurs face is access to capital.

We know Black people start businesses in droves (SBA’s 2024 fact sheet reported about 3.59 million Black-owned businesses), but research shows that they too often start them with less money, and with less access to capital to grow their businesses compared to white-owned businesses.

Federal Reserve data consistently show higher loan denial rates for companies owned by people of color. The Federal Reserve’s Small Business Credit Survey says Black-owned companies “face more challenges than their white-owned counterparts and are more likely to be denied financing when they apply.”

Brookings reported that in 2025 only 6.5% of Black-owned business owners received SBA loans.

It’s no wonder, then, why Stanford/SIEPR reports that Black entrepreneurs are about three times more likely than white entrepreneurs to say they didn’t even apply for credit when they needed it because they feared being denied given the Black experience.

Black-owned startups are also about three times less likely than white-owned startups to say their loan requests are always approved.

Government contracting also reflects major capital and access disparities. Brookings reported that in 2024, only about 1.5% of the federal government’s $637 billion contracting budget went to small Black-owned businesses. That’s staggering.

Venture capital disparities are even more extreme. Crunchbase reported that in 2024, startups with a Black founder or even co-founder received only 0.4% of all U.S. startup funding. Read that number again. 0.4%!

For Black women founders, the gap is worse. The World Economic Forum reported that Black women startup founders received just 0.34% of total U.S. venture capital. This is particularly disturbing given that Black women are increasingly more educated.

To be clear, most startup businesses, regardless of race, struggle to raise money and obtain enough capital to achieve success.

But whatever that struggle is, Black people face exponentially greater hurdles.

Thankfully, there’s a new sheriff in town that can help fix some of this.

Artificial Intelligence.

Small businesses needed capital for all kinds of things.

Money to pay for website and app developers. Money to pay for marketing and graphic artists. Social media managers. Money to pay consultants or employees to help write business plans.

And even bigger things. Money for someone to answer the phones. To have customer support. To track customer sales and information.

But now, if used correctly, AI can create robust websites, beautiful flyers, comprehensive email campaigns, product descriptions, slogans, social posts, and ad copy. A business that once needed paid employees, contractors, or professionals for every imaginable issue no longer needs the money for that.

AI can even help create the right brand name that might be eluding an entrepreneur.

AI can create social media content calendars, captions, hashtags, short video scripts, post ideas, and automated replies to common comments. It can help a small business look active online without hiring a full-time social media manager.

AI can draft responses to common customer emails. It can help process refunds, change appointments, answer FAQs, address complaints, answer shipping and pricing questions, and even generate follow-ups.

It can make menu designs, event posters, packaging ideas, and ad visuals.

AI Bots, complete with coughing, laughter and jokes, are now even being employed as full salespeople across industries. I know one company that has saved millions in dollars using them all while increasing sales!

Programs powered by AI can now help categorize expenses, generate invoices, draft payment reminders, summarize cash-flow issues, and explain financial reports.

AI can write job descriptions, interview questions, onboarding checklists, employee handbooks, training guides, and performance review templates. A small business can professionalize hiring without paying HR consultants for every document.

AI-based programs can now turn complicated instructions into standard operating procedures such as how to open and close the shop. How to handle refunds. Or prepare food. The ways to greet customers. Manage inventory. Even clear written policies on how to respond to emergencies.

What used to be a lengthy and expensive exercise in understanding the playing field, AI can now summarize competitors, compare pricing, identify customer segments, generate survey questions, analyze reviews, and suggest business opportunities. It can give small businesses a cheaper version of a research assistant.

Of course, AI cannot fully replace lawyers, consultants and accountants. It cannot entirely remove humans from the business equation. And indeed, businesses still all to be careful when it comes to compliance with the law.

But many things that once required capital made inaccessible because of racism can be bypassed with AI.

None of this is an excuse for the deep systemic racism embedded into the world of business funding. Nor should it stop any efforts to dismantle those unjust systems.

In the meantime, though, business owners should use AI to their advantage and not wait for institutions to address systemic injustice. The arc of the moral universe may bend toward justice, but it still remains way too long.

Asthe early days of summer get underway, many Americans are looking for ways to beat the heat with modern comforts. If you’re reading this from an air-conditioned room, enjoying an ice-cold beverage from a refrigerated truck, watching your kids run through the sprinkler system on the front lawn, or joining family and friends for a scoop of ice cream, you may not realize these inventions didn’t always exist. They’re so interwoven into our society that people rarely consider where they come from. Yet the technology that keeps food and drinks cold over long distances, chills a room, and makes water activities possible on hot days is the result of the brilliance of Black American inventors.

Black scientists, engineers, and mechanics who worked throughout the 19th and 20th centuries laid the foundation for modern-day climate control and seasonal recreation that makes the summer heat bearable. They did so despite the barriers of Jim Crow segregation, banking discrimination, and exclusion from many universities, trade schools, and professional organizations during their lifetimes. Black inventors remain marginalized in broader historical discussions and are often omitted from many textbooks. Yet their creativity and genius forever changed how the nation keeps its cool.

Fredrick McKinely Jones revolutionized food transportation

Today, companies transporting perishable goods are commonplace. Few even bat an eye at the fact that people thousands of miles away from Florida, for instance, can enjoy oranges harvested there, or that consumers have easy access to eggs, meat, and milk. Yet companies didn’t always have the technology to make these products last, so they had to rely on ice or salt to maintain freshness. Fredrick McKinley Jones, a self-taught Black engineer from Covington, Kentucky, forever changed this dynamic. Orphaned at age 9, he overcame adversity and became a full-time mechanic by 14. During WWI, Jones served as an electrician, helping maintain lines of communication and repairing vehicles, and rose to the rank of sergeant.

In 1938, Jones invented the first mobile refrigeration unit, durable enough to transport perishable goods over long distances. Two years later, Jones developed the Model C, a front-mount unit designed for the exteriors of trucks, trains, and even ships. Alongside his business partner, Joseph Numero, he founded U.S. Thermo Control Company, later called Thermo King. During WWII, the U.S. Army deployed this technology across Europe to preserve life-saving medicine, rations, and blood for injured soldiers. Throughout his prolific career, Jones acquired over sixty patents, including a ticket-dispensing machine and a sound adapter for movie projectors that enhanced the quality and affordability of “sound-on-film,” marking a revolutionary shift away from silent films.

Despite the positive social change Jones sparked with his inventions, he faced racial adversity. Because Jim Crow laws throughout the South limited employment prospects for Black people, he often faced unemployment in his youth and had to perform menial roles. For instance, while he helped design successful race cars for a White auto shop owner, he was fired after driving them on local dirt tracks in Hallock, Minnesota, violating informal segregationist policies. During WWI, when Jones served in the military, the armed forces limited the positions available to Black soldiers. This is why it’s so remarkable that he rose to the rank of sergeant and was praised for his skills as an electrician and mechanic. While he faced economic barriers, his partnership with Joseph Numero helped him overcome some of them and make a lasting impact.

Alice H. Parker laid the foundation for modern-day HVAC technology

Alice H. Parker, a Black woman from Morristown, New Jersey, patented technology in 1919 that laid the foundation for the central heating and air conditioning we enjoy today. She conceived a “heating furnace” system that used natural gas to power heating furnaces, a clear departure from coal- or wood-based systems previously used to keep houses warm throughout the winter. Parker envisioned a network of pipes and passages running through various rooms of a home, the foundation for modern-day HVAC ductwork in homes and offices. This system relied on a series of mini furnaces connected to an air exchanger that distributed warm air to individual rooms. Her design pulled in cool air and pushed out warm air, enabling temperature control in each room and predating thermostat-based systems popular in the modern era.

Due to racism and sexism that limited prospects for Black women, very little is known about the life of Alice H. Parker. Yet there is clearly a public desire to learn more. For instance, conflicting photographs circulated online portray an unrelated White British woman as Parker, and others mistake her for Marie Van Brittan Brown, a dark-skinned Black woman who invented the first closed-circuit television home security system. Despite the popularity of certain viral images, no verifiable photos of her exist. Likewise, reports diverge on her education and occupation. Some articles claim she graduated from Howard University, while others describe her as a cook. Given this ambiguity, we know more about what Parker invented than who she was, including her marital status, whether she had children, and whether she remained in New Jersey throughout her lifetime.

What is clear is that Alice H. Parker patented critical technology, likely navigating the process alone. Due to racism in banking practices that limited resources for Black people and sexism, as women often needed a male cosigner to open an account, she never received the financial support to mass-produce and profit from the design. Still, her invention proved that gas was a safer alternative to coal and that multi-room heating was possible through individually controlled burners with valves, predating the use of thermostats. While white-owned companies, such as Carrier and Lennox, later developed systems based on Parker’s patented technology, she never received the wealth or recognition she deserved, making her a hidden figure.

David Nelson Crosthwait Jr. scaled commercial climate control

While Alice H. Parker’s 1919 gas-furnace invention conceptualized zone-controlled heating in homes, David Nelson Crosthwait Jr. scaled that technology, developing thermostats into automated systems for temperature management in commercial buildings. Born in Nashville, Tennessee, and raised in Kansas City, Missouri, he attended Lincoln High School, an all-Black institution. He earned a full scholarship to Purdue University, where he excelled, earning a Bachelor of Science in 1913 and a Master of Engineering in 1920, becoming a pioneer in large-scale ventilation. Throughout his career, he obtained 39 U.S. patents and 80 international patents related to the regulation of gases, fluids, and heat.

In 1929, he patented a revolutionary sub-atmospheric steam system that distributed heat evenly across a vast network of pipelines. When paired with an automated thermostat that adjusted heat output based on external temperatures, his inventions brought climate control to Rockefeller Center’s iconic Radio City Music Hall in 1932, keeping thousands comfortable despite extreme weather outside. Perhaps his most noteworthy contribution was the differential vacuum pump, a device that helped control temperatures in high-rises without overheating boilers — a dangerous risk common throughout this period.

Crosthwait’s work fundamentally standardized airflow in large buildings, effectively bridging the gap between heating and cooling in the early HVAC industry. While Willis Carrier, a white engineer, is widely celebrated for inventing the mechanical air-cooling unit, that system could not function without the airflow and heat-transfer principles Crosthwait pioneered. From 1925 to 1930, while serving as director of research laboratories at the C.A. Dunham Company in Marshalltown, Iowa, he oversaw the development of industrial refrigeration and air-conditioning units. He later co-authored the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) guide, which sets global industry standards for ventilation and refrigeration systems.

For Crosthwait to succeed, he had to overcome the racist barriers of Jim Crow society. Black engineers were routinely denied entry to professional organizations, which excluded them from professional networks that benefited White engineers. Racist assumptions about Black inferiority posed a challenge for Black engineers, as their ideas were often met with skepticism rather than support. Throughout his career, Crosthwait sought accolades through corporate success and patent approvals. It wasn’t until 1971, the year Crosthwait retired, that he was welcomed as a full peer in the industry, becoming the first Black fellow in ASHRAE.

Joseph H. Smith set the standard for modern irrigation standards

One of the quintessential symbols of summer in America is the sprinkler system. Yet few realize that a Black man, Joseph H. Smith, patented the first rotary-head lawn sprinkler in 1897. Thanks to its spinning design, it evenly sprays water across a lawn. Before his invention, people had to drag heavy hoses and buckets, often wasting water in an effort to keep their lawns green. This technology was built on the work of another Black inventor, Thomas J. Martin, who in 1872 patented a ceiling-mounted fire extinguisher system that helped put out fires in homes and commercial buildings. Martin’s invention, which used pressurized pipes to distribute water overhead indoors in the event of a fire, laid the foundation for Smith’s later invention, which distributed water outdoors.

While Smith was born into slavery and, due to anti-literacy laws, couldn’t read or write in his early years, he taught himself after the Civil War and became a successful, independent mechanical engineer based in Washington, D.C. Smith’s inventions helped develop modern irrigation standards, which are still used today. After receiving his first patent, he upgraded the model by introducing an oscillating motion and received a second patent. During an era when Black people were locked out of educational, financial institutions, and professional organizations, his success in securing patents for his designs points to his resilience and determination. Still, given the time he lived in, he never knew his date of birth or where he was born, and very little is known about his personal life.

Lonnie Johnson: The aerospace engineer behind the “Super Soaker”

Another invention that helped cool off the nation was the Super Soaker, a water gun invented by Lonnie Johnson, an aerospace engineer who revolutionized the toy industry. Born in 1949 in Alabama, “The Professor,” as his friends would later call him, earned a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering and a master’s in nuclear engineering from Tuskegee University. The toy design, originally patented as a “squirt gun” in 1986, came to him while he was experimenting with an eco- friendly heat pump that squirted water across the room. Initially, toy companies rejected his ideas, but in 1989, Johnson licensed the design to Larami Corporation. The following year, his invention hit the shelves as “Power Drencher,” but by 199,1 it was rebranded as the “Super Soaker.” While previous designs only squeezed water out over a short distance with a weak stream, Johnson’s invention, which included a pressurized reservoir chamber, produced a strong, high-velocity blast of water that traveled more than 40 feet, helping popularize water gun fights on hot days.

Throughout his career, Lonnie Johnson worked as an aerospace engineer, at times on classified projects. Before creating the Super Soaker, he worked in the U. S. Air Force and at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. His prolific career includes designing a fault-protection system for the Galileo spacecraft, enabling it to operate independently in the event of a mechanical failure while millions of miles from Earth. He also created a backup system to ensure a secondary system would take over if radiation destroyed the computer chips necessary for the Cassini Mission.

As a Black man from the Jim Crow South, he endured many of the barriers associated with that era, witnessing racial segregation firsthand. A high school guidance counselor once told him he should settle for becoming a technician rather than an engineer. Thankfully, this didn’t kill his dream. While in high school, Johnson became the only Black person to enter a regional science fair at the University of Alabama and won for his design, a compressed-air robot he named “Linex.” Lonnie Johnson made substantial contributions to the field of mechanical engineering but was initially shortchanged on agreed- upon royalties for his Super Soaker design. Finally, in 2013, he won $72.9. million in a settlement with Hasbro. “In spite of the things that have been perpetuated on my race… we succeed anyway, to a very large extent. We just need to realize what we’re capable of,” he noted.

Alfred L. Cralle — The mechanics behind the ice cream scoop

Another invention that helps Americans beat the heat is the ice cream scoop. Still, few realize that this iconic tool was patented in 1897 by Alfred L. Cralle, a Black man born in Kenbridge, Virginia, the year after the Civil War. His father taught him carpentry, but he also received a formal education in Washington, D.C., where he attended Wayland Theological Seminary, an institution established to educate free Black people. Later, he moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he worked as a porter. Noticing that employees at Markell Brothers drugstore struggled to serve ice cream to customers with basic utensils, he designed a device, originally called an “ice-cream mold and disher,” that could be used with one hand. Because the ice cream scoop was durable and inexpensive to manufacture, it became a sensation, and workers began serving ice cream to customers without making a mess.

It’s hard to imagine a summer without a scoop of ice cream, yet given the racism against Black people, it’s rare that people associate this mechanical design with the Black inventor who created it. Black inventors during this period were often denied mainstream engineering roles, so despite his ingenious design, Cralle worked mostly as a porter at the St. Charles Hotel and at Markell Brothers drugstore. By serving as an assistant manager at the Afro-American Financial, Accumulating, Merchandise and Business Association, he had access to support and resources denied by whites-only trade organizations and financial institutions. Still, he was denied the wealth associated with this invention, even as white-owned manufacturing companies profited greatly from his design. Next time you have a scoop of ice cream, remember that a Black inventor who faced discrimination designed it.

It’s easy to take modern-day comforts for granted, but more Americans should learn about Black inventors who helped to cool the nation. From Fredrick McKinley Jones, whose invention enabled refrigerated trucks to transport perishable food over long distances, to Alice H. Parker and David Nelson Crosthwait, Jr., whose work advanced technologies that control temperatures in homes and commercial buildings, their contributions are something we can feel and experience daily. Whether we’re reflecting on Lonnie Johnson, who designed the iconic summer toy, the Super Soaker, or Alfred L. Cralle, who engineered the modern ice cream scoop, their inventions have become synonymous with our summer routines and deserve recognition.

Black inventors faced racist barriers, such as exclusion from financial and educational institutions and professional erasure. Despite traditional forms of support being denied, their accomplishments are a lasting testament to the resilience of Black Americans, who are determined to improve the quality of life for the entire nation. It’s ironic that the same country that often dismisses the intelligence of Black people benefits from their inventions. And in a political climate where black history is often suppressed or marginalized within educational curricula, learning about and sharing these contributions is essential work in chipping away at lasting racial stereotypes. Next time you use some of these inventions to find relief from the summer heat, take a moment to consider the hidden figures who engineered the comfort that we all enjoy.

Donald Trump did not invent Donald Trump. He was assembled, piece by piece, by a family whose history reads like a manual for manufacturing a man who would treat life as a demolition derby. The Trumps were not a Norman Rockwell clan with a white picket fence and a golden retriever. They were a dynasty built on opportunism, reinvention, racial exclusion, and the unspoken rule that feelings were for other people. If you want to understand the man who would one day insist he alone could fix America, you have to understand the family that taught him that losing was a moral failure and winning was the only proof of worth.

This is the story of growing up Trump, a childhood shaped by a grandfather who ran frontier hotels and brothels, a father who built an empire on federal subsidies and segregation, a mother who vanished into illness, and a brother who drank himself into an early grave. It is not a story of wealth. It is a story of training.

I. The Grandfather: Friedrich Trump and the Original Hustle

Donald Trump never met his grandfather, Friedrich Trump, but he inherited the man’s worldview as if it were a genetic mutation. Friedrich was a draft‑dodging immigrant from Bavaria who reinvented himself in America with the moral flexibility of a man who understood that rules were for the rule‑followers. He made his first real money in the Klondike Gold Rush, running hotels and restaurants that offered miners everything they needed: food, liquor, and sex. The polite term was “sporting house.” The accurate term was brothel.

This was the first Trump business model: Find a boomtown. Build something fast. Extract as much money as possible. Don’t ask questions. Leave before the sheriff shows up.

When Friedrich returned to New York, he invested his profits in Queens real estate — the seed that would grow into the Trump empire. Then he died in 1918, leaving behind a widow, three children, and a blueprint for how Trumps would operate for the next century:

The family would later claim Swedish ancestry to hide their German roots during WWII. Donald would repeat the lie for decades. Reinvention wasn’t a strategy; it was a family tradition. In his 1987 book The Art of the Deal, Donald Trump explicitly wrote that his grandfather “came here from Sweden.”

II. Fred Trump Sr.: The Enforcer

If Friedrich built the template, Fred Trump Sr. turned it into a doctrine. Fred was thirteen when his father died, and he responded by becoming the kind of man who never again wanted to feel powerless. By fifteen, he was building houses. By twenty‑two, he had a company. By middle age, he was one of the most powerful real‑estate developers in New York — and one of the most feared.

Fred Trump was not subtle. He built his empire on federal housing subsidies while loudly insisting he was self‑made. He kept his buildings white by design, not accident. When folk singer Woody Guthrie moved into Fred’s Beach Haven apartments in 1950, he was so disgusted by the racial exclusion that he wrote a song about it: “Old Man Trump.” Guthrie accused Fred of stirring up “racial hate” and drawing a “color line” through the complex. The Department of Justice later agreed, suing Fred and Donald in 1973 for systematic discrimination.

This was the household Donald grew up in: A father who believed racism was a business model, tenants were adversaries, and compassion was a defect. Several years after Guthrie’s song, Fred Trump Sr. was arrested at a Klan protest of a Memorial Day parade in Queens. Donald later claimed his father wasn’t there.

This is nonsense, and it never happened. This never happened. Never took place. He was never arrested, never convicted, never even charged. It’s a completely false, ridiculous story. He was never there! It never happened. Never took place.”

The same attorney who represented Fred also represented six Klan members arrested at the same time. Fred was released without charges.

Fred Trump taught his children that the world was a battlefield and the only safe place was on top. He favored Donald because Donald mirrored his aggression. He dismissed Donald’s older brother, Fred Jr., as weak. He rewarded dominance and punished vulnerability. He was the sun around which the Trump household orbited — and he cast a long, cold shadow.

III. The Mother Who Disappeared

Donald’s mother, Mary Anne MacLeod Trump, was the opposite of Fred: soft‑spoken, devout, and elegant. She immigrated from the Outer Hebrides at eighteen, worked as a domestic servant, and married into a world she could never have imagined as a child in a Gaelic‑speaking fishing village.

But when Donald was young, Mary Anne suffered a traumatic medical emergency after childbirth. She was hospitalized for months and never fully recovered. For long stretches of Donald’s childhood, she was physically present but emotionally absent — a ghost in the house.

This left Donald with a father who barked orders and a mother who could not buffer the impact. The emotional center of the home collapsed, and Fred Trump filled the vacuum with his own values: toughness, dominance, and the belief that love was conditional.

Growing up Trump meant learning early that affection was earned, not given — and that the safest way to earn it was to imitate the man who controlled the room.

IV. The Brother Who Became a Warning Label

If Fred Trump Sr. was the enforcer, Fred Trump Jr. was the family’s cautionary tale. He was charming, kind, and uninterested in real estate. He wanted to fly airplanes, not collect rent. He joined TWA and built a life outside the family business. His father hated it.

Fred Sr. mocked his son’s career, belittled his choices, and treated him as a disappointment. Under the weight of that contempt, Fred Jr. began drinking. His alcoholism worsened. He died at 42.

Donald watched all of it. He saw what happened to the son who didn’t fight hard enough. He saw what happened to the child who didn’t mirror his father’s aggression. He saw that gentleness was punished and vulnerability was fatal.

Fred Jr.’s death didn’t just teach Donald to avoid alcohol. It taught him to avoid weakness in himself and in others. It taught him that the only safe identity was the one his father approved of: the fighter, the winner, the killer.

V. The Schools That Tried to Contain Him

Donald Trump was not an easy child. Teachers at the Kew‑Forest School described him as disruptive, aggressive, and impossible to discipline. By thirteen, he was getting into fights and pushing boundaries in ways that alarmed his parents. Fred Trump’s solution was not therapy. It was militarization.

He sent Donald to the New York Military Academy, a boarding school where discipline was enforced with boots and shouting. Donald thrived in the hierarchy. He learned to command attention, to dominate peers, and to treat rules as negotiable if you had enough swagger. He learned that leadership was performance and performance was power.

After NYMA, he drifted through Fordham and then Wharton, where he was not a standout student but an absolute standout self‑promoter. He told classmates he would be famous. He told friends he would be rich. He told the world he was destined for greatness long before he had done anything to justify the claim.

VI. The Family Mythology That Became His Operating System

Growing up Trump meant growing up inside a mythology — a story Fred Trump told so often that it hardened into family scripture:

• We are winners.
• We are self‑made, even when we aren’t.
• We are strong, even when we’re terrified.
• We never apologize.
• We never lose.
• If we lose, we say we won.

This mythology required constant performance. It demanded that Donald present himself as the embodiment of Trump success, even when the facts contradicted the narrative. It taught him that truth was flexible, that shame was optional, and that the past could be rewritten if it became inconvenient.

It also taught him that the world was divided into two categories: killers and losers. His father was a killer. His brother was a loser. Donald knew which one he had to be.

VII. The Man the Family Built

By the time Donald Trump entered adulthood, the influences that shaped him were fused into his personality:

From Friedrich, he inherited opportunism and the belief that rules were obstacles, women were objects to be possessed and used.

From Fred, he inherited aggression, racial hierarchy, and the obsession with dominance.

From Mary Anne, he inherited a void — the absence of maternal warmth that left him hungry for attention.

From Fred Jr., he inherited a warning: never be vulnerable.

From military school, he inherited the idea that leadership was performance and performance was war.

Donald Trump did not become who he is by accident. He became who he is because the family that raised him rewarded aggression, punished empathy, and treated winning as the only moral value.

VIII. The Family as Destiny

Growing up Trump meant growing up in a house where love was conditional, success was mandatory, and the family name was both a shield and a weapon. It meant learning that the truth was negotiable, that losing was unacceptable, and that the only safe position in life was on top.

Donald Trump is not an anomaly. He is the logical outcome of the Trump family system — a man engineered by a lineage that believed in dominance above all else. To understand the adult, you have to understand the child. And to understand the child, you have to understand the family that built him: a grandfather who hustled, a father who enforced, a mother who vanished, and a brother who broke. Growing up Trump was not a childhood. It was an apprenticeship.

If only the pattern ended with Donald. It seems three of his children have inherited the same traits from Donald. I don’t have to document it, you already know. Don Jr. attempted escape and didn’t speak to his father for years before crawling back. Ivanka tried to separate herself, but is on call when needed. She and her husband, Jared, are attempting to create a luxury private island rivaling anything Epstein owned.

Welcome to Jared and Ivanka’s Private Island

A Project Built in Sunlight, After the Deals Were Done in the Dark.

The PolisWilliam Spivey

There are generations of Trumps who have been exposed to the Trump traditions. All haven’t succumbed, time will tell about the rest.

The fatal police shooting of Kohen Wiley, a 1-year-old Black infant, sparked painful conversations about the value of Black lives in America. On June 14th, his mother, Vellesiya Wiley, visited a Walmart in Senatobia, Mississippi, to pick up some diapers. As they were leaving the store, an employee stopped them and accused her friend of shoplifting. Because it had nothing to do with her, she kept walking and waited for her friend in the car. Someone at the store notified authorities of a suspected theft, leading police to block their car from leaving. Even though Vellesiya was lifting her baby to show he was inside, an officer discharged their weapon three or four times into the vehicle, shooting the child in the ribcage and critically injuring their family friend. While state investigators claimed they drove toward the police officers, placing them in danger, the mother has disputed their description of the events leading up to the shooting.

After a petty theft allegation turned deadly, we’re left to consider why America’s legal system seems to prioritize property over Black lives. Breshari Faulkner, a 27-year-old Senatobia resident, survived an encounter with local police in the same Walmart parking lot on Mother’s Day last year, when a dispute over a handicap parking space led officers to handcuff her and threaten to tase her in front of her children. In this case, she said, “We lost a child because of the carelessness and recklessness of the police.” In Mississippi, the penalty for petit larceny, defined as stealing property valued under $1,000, is a misdemeanor carrying a maximum sentence of six months in jail and a fine. Nowhere in the United States does the law authorize the death penalty for those accused of, or even convicted of, theft. So when police officers use deadly force to apprehend those they suspect of shoplifting, they’ve effectively carried out an extrajudicial punishment that far outweighs the legal parameters. Yet few officers are held accountable for fatally shooting Black people suspected of theft, or innocent bystanders.

The fatal police shooting of Kohen Wiley highlights a systemic problem — that property is often valued above and beyond Black lives. While many would deny this in the abstract, racial disparities in the use of force persist. “Black suspects are more than twice as likely to be killed by police than are persons of other racial or ethnic groups; even when there are no other obvious circumstances during the encounter that would make the use of deadly force reasonable” (Fagan & Campbell, 2020). Likewise, research published in Race and Justice suggests “the threshold for being perceived as dangerous, and thereby falling victim to lethal police force, appears to be higher for White civilians relative to their Black and Hispanic peers” (DeAngelis, 2024). These findings suggest that Black lives are valued less than White lives because the standard for judging the reasonableness of lethal force is tainted by racial bias.

Throughout America’s history, Black lives have often been devalued relative to property. For instance, in 1882, a mob of White locals killed N. David Lee, a Black man in Franklin Parish, Louisiana, who locals accused of stealing a hog. According to the Equal Justice Initiative, a Black man named Caesar Sheffield was killed by a mob of White men near Lake Park, Georgia, in April 1915, after being accused of stealing meat from a smokehouse. Locals deprived him of due process by removing him from the jail, which local law enforcement had left unguarded, and then fatally shot the husband and father in a nearby field. Authorities found his lifeless body the next day. Their report noted, “the deep racial hostility that permeated American society burdened Black people with a presumption of guilt that often served to focus suspicion on Black communities after a crime was discovered, whether evidence supported that suspicion or not.” While the legal standard during Jim Crow didn’t authorize officials to kill a Black person suspected of theft, that didn’t stop the culture of racism from depriving Black citizens of justice. In these cases, the accusation that they stole meat led to lynchings, which are extrajudicial killings.

On October 3, 1974, a Memphis police officer fatally shot Edward Garner, a 15-year-old Black teenager, in the back of the head as he fled the scene of a suspected $10 theft. This tragic case, highlighted in Tennessee v. Garner (1985), led the Supreme Court to hold that “such force may not be used unless it is necessary to prevent the escape and the officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect poses a significant threat of death or serious physical injury to the officer or officers.” Justices noted that the officer “saw no sign of a weapon” indicating an imminent threat. While the state law granted police the authority to pursue someone they suspected of committing a crime using “all necessary means,” the Supreme Court determined that this standard for the use of lethal force violated citizens’ Fourth Amendment rights. “Where the suspect poses no immediate threat to the officer and no threat to others, the harm resulting from failing to apprehend him does not justify the use of deadly force to do so,” the justices noted.

In the case of the fatal shooting of Kohen Wiley, a one-year-old child, it’s clear he didn’t pose a threat to the officers, nor was he a suspect. The outcome of this case, whether the criminal justice system will hold the police officer who fired into the vehicle accountable for his death, will likely hinge upon the perception of threat, specifically whether the driver, the unnamed family friend, intended to physically harm police officers with their vehicle. Mississippi officials claimed police acted legally because the driver “drove in the direction of the officers,” but the Wiley family has argued the driver was backing up, not driving toward the officers. Ben Crump, the family’s attorney, said, “A 1-year-old child is dead because police officers in Mississippi opened fire on a car in a crowded Walmart parking lot. Kohen Wiley was a baby. His mother, who has not been charged with any crime, says she was trying to communicate with officers that there was a baby in the car. They fired anyway,” he noted, adding that they will be seeking justice through the courts. While authorities have placed the officer on administrative leave, no arrests have been made in connection with the shooting.

Material goods should not be considered more valuable than a Black person’s life. And yet, Black Americans live in a country where police and others have used lethal force after suspecting someone of theft. For instance, a jury recently found Chikei Rick Chow, a South Carolina convenience store owner, not guilty after fatally shooting a 14-year-old Black teenager, Cyrus Carmack-Belton, accused of stealing four water bottles in 2023. Although witnesses noted they “did not see anything in Cyrus’s hands while he was running from the store,” and video footage proved he had returned the water bottles, the jury still acquitted Chow on the grounds of self-defense, believing the claim that the teenager pulled out a weapon during the chase, a point disputed by prosecutors who noted he was shot in the back while running away. Like the death of Kohen Wiley, this tragic case sparked criticism that America’s criminal justice system values material goods over Black lives. According to Dr. Kimberly Barsamian Kahn, a Social Psychology professor, “stereotypes can influence when force is used, how quickly, and ultimately the amount of force and decisions to shoot.”

If you were to ask the average American what matters more, material goods or the lives of Black people, most would likely tell you the latter. Yet, research indicates the probability of being Black, unarmed, and shot by police is 3.49 times the probability of white people who are unarmed (Ross, 2015). Discussions surrounding these cases often overlook the explicit and implicit bias of police officers responding to suspected theft. Some say “stop stealing,” or “just comply,” without considering that White people accused of committing crimes are less likely to be killed. Kohen Wiley was a baby who didn’t steal anything, yet he lost his life because the goal of catching a suspected thief was prioritized over public safety. It’s a heartbreaking case to say the least. Taking a photo of the license plate or using security and traffic cameras to locate someone suspected of theft is more humane than desperately firing a weapon in a crowded parking lot. And yet our country’s legal system has often valued property over Black lives.

I’m a straight man, but I wasn’t always so sure. This didn’t come down to desire, but how my masculinity presented. To this day, people ask about my sexuality regularly.

Richard Gadd’s work on Baby Reindeer caused a paradigm shift within me. I was forced to reflect on my beliefs about consent, desire, and masculinity. (Read about it here.) Half Man, his newest show, did it again.

The Setup

Half Man follows Niall and Ruben, who grew up as brothers despite not being blood-related. On the surface, they seem like opposites. Niall is reserved and closeted. Ruben is charismatic and violent. However, they bond in a way that most would describe as unhealthy and unnatural.

The show jumps through time, showing us that something will happen between the brothers that results in violence and possibly death.

Internalized Hatred

“Why can’t you be happy with that side of yourself? It’s the 21st century. Nobody cares anymore.”

Niall is initially such a relatable character because of his familiar internalized hatred. It is something many people, especially minorities, experience at some point in their lives. As a Black man, it was something I went through at an early age.

Niall’s issues stem from his sexuality. He is surrounded by homophobic slurs and bullying despite his mother being gay. His mother’s presence likely makes his struggle more difficult. He argues it is worse when men are gay. Although this sounds ridiculous, it is a legitimate real-world belief that stems from the patriarchy.

Society views men as superior, so in some twisted logic, it is okay for women to pursue other women because this is a masculine trait. However, for a man to diminish himself by giving up some form of masculinity is unforgivable. This is why some men who desire other men or even act out on their desires will still sometimes claim they aren’t gay. They will find some ineffective way to defend this. Niall is no different.

Niall allows his first lover to take a beating from Ruben to protect his secret. Once he grew up, he claimed not to be gay because he avoided love and relationships. Even though people close to him knew his secrets, he even stole money for conversion therapy.

Just Words

“They are just words. (They only do damage) if you let them…..This is all your shit, son, it has nothing to do with me. Do you want to know who the real homophobe was in your life… You. You were the only one who cared, Niall… You wasted your whole life dancing to other people’s tunes, but you never had the rhythm.

This is Ruben’s response after Niall blames his struggles on Ruben’s use of homophobic slurs when they were children.

I’m not gay. I can never truly relate to that struggle, but I’ve had so many people assume I was gay my entire life that I at least understand the surface-level obstacles. As a kid, it bothered me. I ate the slurs regularly, but they were just a common part of the language at the time. Still, I remember taking some of them personally, even when I was hurling them meaninglessly at my friends.

I once had a relative say I walked like I was gay. I’m still sometimes conscious of how I walk. I remember catching myself standing with the “limp wrist” in elementary school. It genuinely frightened me. I wasn’t attracted to boys, but I was sure this was a secret sign that I must be gay. I made sure it never happened again. Like Niall, society taught me to keep it a secret.

Niall eventually tells most of the people in his life, but he never truly tells himself. I’ve grown a lot since my childhood. I no longer use slurs, and when my students ask if I’m gay, I take it as a compliment. So many of them have opened up to me because of this assumption.

One student once told me it was because of how much I cared, the patience, the softness. Of course, if we look at the big social picture, these are not considered traditionally masculine traits.

What are masculine traits? All we need to do is take a look at Ruben.

Masculine Competition

“I’m your fucking muse.”

Ruben is tall and muscular. Girls love him. He responds with violence. Sometimes this violence is almost heroic, like when he protects Niall from bullies. Sometimes it is horrifying, like when he responds to jealousy.

Ruben seems completely cool and content when compared to Niall’s more fragile character; however, there are moments of weakness in his childhood, especially when his father is mentioned. Once the boys grow up, Ruben’s traditional masculinity has only doubled down after spending time in prison. He moves with confidence and has become the breadwinner.

Niall can’t stand seeing Ruben so successful, and most of the later conflict comes from the delicate balance in their relationship. However, it is revealed that Ruben’s masculinity is just as fragile as Niall’s. He hides his financial failures because he wants people to see him as a provider, as a man. He is extremely jealous when it comes to his girlfriend, and extremely insecure because he can’t have children.

When Niall mentions the infertility, Ruben partially attacks him and partially sexually assaults him. This confusing reaction is something we see a few times between Ruben and Niall.

Each man has a desire to dominate the other, mentally, emotionally, and physically. In most cases, Niall is the dominant force, and when he loses that position, he immediately reacts with violence to reestablish himself. Niall’s dominance is sneakier. He brags about having a child. When the opportunity presents itself, he has unprotected sex with Ruben’s girlfriend. When Niall realizes that he isn’t the only man she has cheated with, he grows upset because he thought he was special. In other words, he thought his masculinity was finally dominating Ruben’s.

Ruben and Niall’s relationship is extreme, but it does remind me of my relationship with my brother. He is the Ruben to my Niall. He is taller, stronger, more athletic, and more financially successful. He has a wife and kids, and he does a great job fulfilling those masculine roles.

I’m proud of him, but there are moments when I feel like Danny DeVito to his Arnold Schwarzenegger. Ironically, most of his motivation came from competing with me. He needed to show his dominance over me. There is no violence or envy there, at least as adults. However, I was struck by how much our masculinity and dynamic mirrored Niall and Ruben.

I was his muse, and he was mine.

To Be a Man

“Fucks you up, man. Makes you a fucking half man…..I spent my life proving it. Filling myself back up to the top.”

Ruben reveals that his father sexually assaulted him when he was a child. He struggles with how his body reacted, even admitting that in a lot of ways, it was the closest he’d ever been to someone.

This complex relationship between assault and sexuality is something personal to Gadd. What I want to point out is how traditional masculine roles are used to almost cleanse Ruben. Lean into the extreme violence because that makes you a man.

The show works in extremes, and it wants the audience to find sympathy for two men who are truly horrible people. It asks us to consider where the responsibility lies. Is the weight of masculinity and a homophobic society too much?

In the end, the desire to dominate each other kills them. Ruben smothers Niall, just like he did in life. He always needed to be on top. Niall, on the other hand, backstabbed Ruben in life and while he was dying. The phallic symbol and the sexual nature of their final struggle aren’t lost on me.

In the end, the two men destroyed each other because they couldn’t love themselves.

The Truth About My Masculinity

If asked, I’m quick to say I’m comfortable with my masculinity. I may even say something that implies I’m “not like other men.” I don’t respond with violence. I’m not driven to prove I’m a man by reproducing, but what I considered to be masculine as a child still drives me.

I perform masculinity, and I enjoy it. I open doors for women. I pay for meals. I insist on fixing things or doing the job myself, even when I should accept help. I struggle to accept gifts or affection. (Read more here.) Never cry.

What did I learn from my father? I wanted to be nothing like him, and to me, that was manhood. Still, I’m motivated by the same systems that destroyed Niall and Ruben. Performing masculinity makes me happy, but I also support tearing these systems down. The patriarchy hurts everyone. The truth is clear. We should be free to express ourselves however we want.

Gadd’s work understands progress does not equate to solution. We still have a long way to go, and he is never afraid to have the difficult conversations.

The Bellinger’s have a Father’s Day ritual. At the top of the day, Eric, his two sons Elysha and Eazy, and his father, drive to a local car show that showcases a mix of antique autos and European whips. The three generations, Eric tells me while seated in his family car on a Saturday afternoon, enjoy every moment.

Bellinger, 42, speaks to fatherhood from a place of success. He grew up with an ever-present dad who, he says, has powered his ambition through a never-not-try mantra. And although he didn’t seek instructions from his father on how to raise his own children, his dad’s influence shows up in how he parents.

“I’ma do the things that a father should/ cause ain’t no hood like fatherhood,” sings Bellinger on “Fatherhood,” a melodic tribute to men raising their offspring with all intentions of showing them the right path. The song, Bellinger hopes, will become an other-side-anthem that rubs elbows with Tupac’s ode to Afeni (“Dear Mama”) and Boyz II Men’s “A Song for Mama”. At the very least he’d like the song to be universally loved just as Luther Vandross’s “Dance With My Father.” 

“We needed something a little Jodeci-esque,” he jokes.

His self-titled upcoming album is drenched in this level of vulnerability. It exposes the parts of Eric that he has not been willing to share thus far. He says it’s been more difficult to write these songs because it required him to go deep within himself and scribe the trials that got him to the album's triumphant close “Everything is in Order.”

Ultimately, the album becomes another blueprint for his children, a map of the choppy road that led to his success.

LEVEL: Tell me a little bit about growing up in your house with your mother and father.

ERIC BELLINGER: Growing up with my mom and dad shaped me. I get a lot of personality and character traits from my mom, but there's this undertone, this hustle, this determination that comes from my dad.

You had your first kid at 30. Did you reach back to your dad for instructions on how to keep this living-breathing thing alive?

Me and my wife just moved in and we had been living together, but after that point it was like we going to show him we got this. And I don't know why [we took that stance]. We were blessed to have so many people around us. Right now, oh, we have activated the village, but before it was definitely like, we got this.

Before you activated the village, and even after, what has been the hardest part of being a father?

Having to go away and tell them they can’t go with me. A part of me is sick of saying no — there’s a part of me that wants to say “yeah, just come with me.” But I know there's a program in place and a routine that my wife has configured to perfection. I don't want to mess with that plan or that program, but it's really tough to walk out that door and know that they're missing me. It’s tough to hear one of them got in trouble at school today. I think, is it because I'm not there and not able to give him that real manly discipline that they need? I’m not there to put my foot down in a way that has him trembling, nervous, but with love to do the right thing.

Take me back to the origins of the song “Fatherhood.”

I was in the studio with Tony Dixon and Chris Riddick. They just did a lot of the songs with Kelani like “Folded” and SZA’s “Snooze” I was in with them working on Kelani’s music and was like, "Yo guys, this is so magical. We need to cook up for my new album." We decided to come back the next day. She just won the Grammy so that energy was in the room. 

[My manager] Lee had an idea like, "Yo, how did it feel when you became a dad? Have you ever written a song? We got a bunch of Mother's Day anthems, but what about the dads?" Lee had been challenging me [to discuss more personal] topics because musically I tend to make songs that are lifestyle music. And she challenged me to make music about my life. The big moments: becoming a dad, how I felt after grieving my mom, crying in front of my wife.

There are many hit records centering motherhood. Why are song on fatherhood less ubiquitous?

There's a stigma on dads not being there — deadbeat dads. It's just so loud that people haven't been bold enough to celebrate the ones that are there. What about the dads that do show up? What about the fathers that put their children first? So I was like, let's make a song that is a proud dad's song that can represent. I love “Dear Mama” and “Mama” by Boyz II Men. I love all those songs but let's do them for the dads so we can add to the list.

Only Luther’s “Dance With My Father” comes to mind.

We got “Dance With My Father,” but I'm trying to get hood. I'm trying to rep for the gang. We out here, we’re tough, we’re manly and we hold it down for our families [laughs].

Talk to me about the chorus on the song.

Ain't no hood like fatherhood, but I also made sure I shouted out the moms. Ain't no hood like motherhood, either.

There’s a particular kind of coward who doesn’t argue with history. He just edits it.

That’s what we’re looking at with this 85-page “American Heroes” document, rolled out by a MAGA-aligned outfit ahead of the country’s 250th birthday. Eighty-five pages of heroes. Eighty-five pages of the people they want our kids to draw for an art contest. And somewhere in all those pages, the single largest moral catastrophe in American history was the enslavement of millions of Black men, women, and children that just quietly vanishes. Not debated. Not contextualized. Erased.

Somewhere in those 85 pages, I expected to find the word. The whip, maybe. The auction block. At minimum, the name of the system that consumed two and a half centuries of this country’s history. I read every entry. The word never came. What came instead was a verb: *escaped.* One verb. Tucked inside Frederick Douglass’s biography. That was all the Freedom 250 crowd needed to give American slavery.

Frederick Douglass, they tell us, “escaped from slavery to become a leading voice for liberty.” That’s it. Escaped. Like he slipped out of a bad apartment lease. No owner. No auction block. No whip, no chain, no branding iron, no child sold away from a mother. The sentence moves so fast you’d miss that a man was once property in the country these people claim to love. They add that he “taught himself to read and write, proving that education is a powerful tool for achieving freedom.” Inspiring, sure. But they leave out the part where teaching an enslaved person to read was a crime in the very system they refuse to name.

When you erase the cage, you erase the courage it took to break it. That’s the trade they made. They made it on purpose.

The erase-and-replace method

This document isn’t one sloppy sentence; it’s a whole curriculum of omission. Once you see the pattern, it’s everywhere.

Harriet Beecher Stowe makes the list as a writer whose novel “opened the eyes of the nation to the importance of liberty for all people.” Liberty from what? They won’t say. *Uncle Tom’s Cabin* is a book about the brutality of slavery, and they wash it into a generic devotional about “the principles of the Bible” and “the cause of justice.” The word “slave” never has to appear if you let the abstract nouns do the work.

Robert Gould Shaw is honored for leading “the first all-black regiment from the North during the Civil War” and dying at Fort Wagner. They praise his “leadership and sacrifice.” But why was there a war? Why was there an all-Black regiment in the first place? The cause disappears. The Confederacy becomes a nameless foe treated with dignity at Appomattox, where Joshua Chamberlain “showed great dignity and respect to his former foes.” A war with no reason, just gentlemen agreeing to stop shooting.

Medgar Evers is there, too. They tell you he “faced constant threats but never wavered in his commitment to justice and equality.” Threats from whom? Shot by whom? White supremacy becomes weather. You just “face” it. Murder becomes a vague “sacrifice” in the “ongoing struggle for civil rights.” The system that killed him gets ghosted from his own obituary.

That’s the technique: praise the Black hero, bury the white system he fought.

Who survives the edit

Look at who does get named plainly and praised without complication.

Christopher Columbus “opened the door to the founding of the New World” and “set the stage for the growth of a land dedicated to liberty.” No mention of enslavement, conquest, or the racial hierarchy baked in from that landing forward.

Andrew Jackson appears as a “champion for the common man.” The Trail of Tears doesn’t make the cut.

The conservative canon is fully intact: Calvin Coolidge, praised for saying “the chief business of the American people is business”; Whittaker Chambers, the heroic ex-Communist; Jeane Kirkpatrick, Cold War defender of “freedom.” There’s plenty of room for ideological comfort food.

The people who assembled this document, whoever signed off on the Douglass entry, whoever approved the Stowe blurb, whoever decided Andrew Jackson was a “champion for the common man” without mentioning the Trail of Tears, made each of those choices. Somebody typed that sentence. Somebody approved it. And the document never once tells a child, in direct language, that for more than two centuries this country ran a race-based slave system enforced by white law, white guns, and white pulpits.

So no, they didn’t run out of pages. They ran out of nerve.

Remove the crime and their courage shrinks into a Hallmark card. Name the crime, and you finally show kids what real moral resistance looks like.

What honesty would actually do

Here is what cowardice costs. Not the document editors. Not the contest sponsors. The kids are drawing the pictures.

Telling the truth wouldn’t hurt Douglass, Stowe, or Evers. It would make their heroism make sense.

Frederick Douglass isn’t remarkable because he “worked hard.” He is monumental because he reclaimed his humanity from a legal order that had formally stripped it away, then made that order answer for itself. The 54th Massachusetts didn’t just “fight bravely.” They marched into fire to prove Black citizenship and Black courage could no longer be denied. Medgar Evers didn’t just “stand firm.” He stood in front of the machinery of Jim Crow and dared it to kill him. It did.

The document already admits we have enemies. It celebrates Todd Beamer’s “Let’s roll” on Flight 93. It praises Desmond Doss for saving “75 fellow Americans” under fire. It has no problem naming enemies abroad. It just can’t admit there were enemies of freedom at home: men in suits, robes, uniforms, and crosses.

Two hundred and fifty is old enough

Black people in what became America were enslaved by white owners. They were bought, sold, whipped, raped, and worked to death under laws passed by American legislatures, enforced by American courts, and blessed by American churches. That isn’t a footnote. It’s a load-bearing beam in the house they’re trying to repaint red, white, and blue.

A nation old enough to throw itself a 250th birthday is old enough to say that sentence out loud.

This document couldn’t do it. It gave slavery one word, “escaped,” and hoped no child would ask the next question. So let’s ask it anyway, in plain English:

If Frederick Douglass escaped from slavery, who exactly was he escaping from?

The answer is written in the silence between their sentences. And as long as they insist on that silence, the rest of us have an obligation to be loud.

The 85-page “American Heroes” document is published by Freedom 250 for its student art contest. Every quotation above is drawn directly from its pages.

I was playing cards with a group of Black men who all had served 20 or more years in the military. I asked, “What does America’s 250th Anniversary mean to you?” Their answers could be summed up as, “Not a damn thing.”

It wasn’t always the case that America’s anniversary was so lightly regarded, if not regarded negatively. I think back to 1976 when America celebrated its 200th Anniversary, the Bicentennial, and patriotism ran high. Flags and red, white, and blue decorations were everywhere. Some entrepreneurs went so far as to paint rocks in those colors and sell them as “Bicentennial Rocks,” sometimes attaching a small flag to make them more official.

The Bicentennial arrived just one year after the Fall of Saigon and in the immediate aftermath of Watergate, when the country was hungry for a sense of renewal. Historian David Ryan notes that the Ford administration framed the Bicentennial as a moment of “renewal and rebirth” rooted in traditional American values. This framing worked. Patriotism became a kind of national therapy.

The American Revolution Bicentennial Administration reported that over 90% of Americans participated in at least one Bicentennial event or activity. This included parades, festivals, historical reenactments, museum openings, and local heritage projects. That level of participation is unmatched by any other civic celebration in modern U.S. history. Americans in 2026 are more likely to have participated in No Kings rallies, Anti-ICE protests, or protests about not releasing the Epstein files than participating in a 250th anniversary event. Americans generally loved America in 1976. In 2026, half the nation believes the other half are enemies of the state.

I decided to write about the times over the last 250 years we almost lost our Republic. Benjamin Franklin was right to be concerned as to whether we could maintain it. When asked while leaving the 1776 Constitutional Convention whether America had a Republic or a Monarchy, he replied, “A Republic, if you can keep it.”

America has faced the loss of its republic more than once, sometimes from foreign enemies, sometimes from internal conspirators, and sometimes from its own elected leaders. The first great rupture came in 1806, when former Vice President Aaron Burr raised a private army in the West and attempted to carve out an independent nation from U.S. territory. Whether Burr intended to seize New Orleans, detach western states, or invade Mexico, the effect was the same: a sitting vice president assembled troops to break the Union. President Jefferson treated it as an existential threat, ordering Burr arrested for treason. The republic survived, but only because the conspiracy collapsed before Burr could act.

Just a few years later, the United States nearly lost itself again in the War of 1812, when British forces burned Washington, D.C., and the government fled the capital. The young republic was militarily weak, politically divided, and economically fragile. New England states openly discussed secession at the Hartford Convention, arguing that the war was illegitimate and ruinous. Had the British held the Chesapeake or severed New England from the Union, the United States might have fractured permanently. Victory at New Orleans and a negotiated peace saved the republic, but the war exposed how close the nation was to dissolution.

The greatest internal collapse came in 1861, when eleven Southern states seceded and formed a rival government. This was not a political dispute but the destruction of the constitutional order itself. The Confederacy raised armies, seized federal property, and waged a four‑year war to replace the republic with a slaveholding empire. The Civil War was the moment the United States truly ceased to function as a single nation. Only through unimaginable bloodshed was the Union restored — and even then, the republic was lost again during Reconstruction’s overthrow, when white supremacist militias and complicit state governments violently dismantled multiracial democracy between 1873 and 1877. The federal government literally looked away for almost a century as Jim Crow infected first the South, later the rest of America.

Foreign threats returned in the 20th century, when the United States entered World War I under the shadow of global autocracy. The German Empire’s unrestricted submarine warfare and sabotage campaigns on U.S. soil pushed America into a conflict that threatened democratic governments worldwide. At home, the Espionage and Sedition Acts criminalized dissent, and mass surveillance targeted immigrants, labor organizers, and political radicals. The republic survived, but civil liberties did not.

The danger was even greater in World War II, when fascism conquered most of Europe and the Pacific. Had the Axis powers succeeded, the United States would have faced a world dominated by totalitarian empires with the resources and ideology to challenge American democracy directly. The attack on Pearl Harbor demonstrated how vulnerable the nation was, and the fall of the Philippines showed how quickly American territory could be seized. Victory was not guaranteed; defeat would have meant the end of the republic as a free, self‑governing nation.

Across these episodes — Burr’s private army, the burning of Washington, the secession crisis, the collapse of Reconstruction, and the global wars against autocracy — the United States repeatedly approached the edge of losing its republic. Each moment revealed the same truth: the greatest threats come not only from foreign enemies but from internal fractures, political extremism, and leaders willing to place personal ambition above constitutional order. The republic has survived, but never without cost, and never without reminding Americans how fragile it truly is.

America has reached another critical point in history, where the Republic could be at risk. Can anyone say for sure what will happen after the 2026 midterms or the 2028 presidential elections? Will the results be contested? Will the military be ordered into the streets?

There has always been a hopefulness about America that things will somehow work out, the moral arc bends toward justice, and that our elected officials generally have the interests of the people at the forefront of their minds. That wasn’t the sense of the men at my card table today. I think a large percentage of Americans aren’t sure either.

America has been close to losing its republic before, but rarely has the danger come from so many directions at once. The threats today are not as dramatic as British troops burning the capital or fascist armies overrunning continents, but they are quieter, more procedural, and in some ways more corrosive. A republic can be lost not only through invasion or secession, but through the steady normalization of exceptions, when agencies stop enforcing the law, when courts narrow the meaning of rights, when elected officials treat whole communities as expendable, and when the machinery of government bends toward the interests of the powerful rather than the protection of the people.

That is the moment we are living in now. The danger is not a single cataclysm but a slow unthreading, a willingness to accept that some Americans can breathe polluted air, lose their vote, or live without equal protection because it is politically convenient to look away.

If the United States hopes to reach the Tricentennial as a functioning republic, it will require more than nostalgia or ceremonial patriotism. It will require a recommitment to the basic work of self‑government: enforcing laws evenly, protecting vulnerable communities, strengthening democratic institutions, and refusing to let fear or partisanship justify the erosion of rights. It will require citizens who insist on accountability, public servants who remember their oath, and leaders who understand that power is not a trophy but a trust. The republic has survived conspiracies, invasions, civil war, and global conflict — but only because enough people chose to defend it when it mattered. That choice is before us again. The Tricentennial is not guaranteed; it must be earned, protected, and kept.

If you add too much cream to a cup of coffee, you won't be able to taste its unique flavor profile. In that same respect, when history is diluted, it no longer reflects the truth about the past. Instead, it becomes propaganda. According to author and philosopher Jason Stanley, "fascist politics cherry-picks the past, avoiding anything that would diminish unreflective celebration of the nation's glory." It's hard to ignore the parallels between Stanley's description and the coordinated effort we've seen over the past few years to limit access to black history in classrooms, libraries, museums, and parks. In January, for instance, the National Park Service removed an exhibit featuring educational information about the country's legacy of slavery. This exhibit at the President's House Museum in Philadelphia allows visitors to learn more about the people enslaved by George Washington. Yet some felt offended by the negative light this history cast on the country.

According to a lawsuit filed last February, the order to remove black historical exhibits mirrored the actions described in George Orwell's dystopian novel 1984. "All history was a palimpsest, scraped clean and reinscribed exactly as often as was necessary. In no case would it have been possible, once the deed was done, to prove that any falsification had taken place." If this whitewashing campaign is successful, few Americans would know much about the experiences of Black people or the contributions they've made. But there is resistance to these efforts. U.S. District Judge Cynthia M. Rufe ordered officials to restore the exhibit removed in Philadelphia, noting in a memorandum that the government lacks the authority "to disassemble historical truths." The Department of the Interior filed an appeal. Yet, these efforts to limit access to black historical narratives have attracted further attention.

District Judge Angel Kelley in Boston, Massachusetts, issued a preliminary injunction on June 12th blocking the administration's efforts to remove exhibits featuring black history, a decision that applies nationwide. Perhaps there's some poetic justice in this announcement taking place a week before Juneteenth, a national holiday, which celebrates the emancipation of enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, held in bondage until federal troops arrived and demanded their release. The order to restore historical exhibits marks a major victory for those who believe the full history of America should be preserved for future generations, including the good, the bad, and the ugly. History includes enslaved Black people building landmarks such as the White House without pay, those who survived the perils of Jim Crow, and who fought tirelessly for the advancement of civil rights. The story of Black Americans shouldn't be watered down to appease the political preferences of some.

While many states passed laws banning "divisive topics," this battle began when President Donald Trump signed Executive Order 14253, which triggered the removal of historical presentations deemed "divisive" and harmful to the country's reputation. However, Judge Kelley suggested this was misguided. They noted, "Under the guise of promoting American dignity, this administration seeks to share a limited history by ordering the removal of all signs, displays, and interpretive exhibits at National Parks that do not align with its preferred narrative, thereby telling half-truths… not only does this undermine the integrity of the National Parks; it sets a dangerous precedent of censorship and sanitization." Furthermore, they argued that the government has a responsibility to "present history in full rather than in favored fragments."

Black Americans have made and continue to make significant contributions. When the national narrative is diluted, it cannot provide a reliable basis for shared knowledge. Opinions should be diverse, especially in a nation with people from different racial, ethnic, and national backgrounds. But the government doesn't have the right to censor factual, historical information. From abolitionists such as Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, and Fredrick Douglass to musicians such as Louis Armstrong, Ray Charles, and Ella Baker, to authors such as Toni Morrison, Alice Walker, and Malcolm X, and to poets such as Maya Angelou and Langston Hughes, the history of Black people in America is rich, dynamic, and culturally impactful.

Ironically, efforts to ban black history have sparked renewed public interest. Just as conservationists invest in endangered species, some have responded to censorship efforts by working to preserve these narratives and ensure their availability to the public. Across the country, people have started book clubs and revitalized efforts in schools, churches, and nonprofit organizations to ensure that more Americans have access to black historical narratives. For instance, last year, after reports surfaced that historic artifacts could be removed from the African American History museum, civil rights leaders formed the "Freedom to Learn" campaign and a march. In Common Dreams, Tiffany D. Joseph noted that the Republican Party's attempts to sanitize history will fail, and that "efforts to erase the truth are sparking the opposite effect: a renewed urgency to preserve it." Their response shows that while the goal of those banning black history or removing it from public view is to diminish public access to these narratives and marginalize them, their efforts have triggered further interest in these stories.

Reports of the administration restoring exhibits about slavery and black history will raise public awareness about these topics, which is ironic since the entire point of removing them is to obscure their relevance. On social media, around the water cooler at work, and in the streets, people are talking about the experiences and contributions Black people have made. Turns out, if you pour too much milk into someone else's coffee, they won't just accept it. Some will respond by getting another cup so they can enjoy the depth of flavor in each sip. The censorship movement, while popularized in Republican politics, will likely fail in the long run. When people feel that information is hidden, they tend to seek it out, elevating information that is often obscured into the limelight.

Judge Angel Kelley suggested, "history cannot be faithfully told while excluding the experiences of communities whose contributions, struggles, and achievements form an important part of our Nation's story." When we consider that Black people fighting to be free, to be treated as equally, as citizens, created precedents that are fundamental to American society, such as the 13th Amendment prohibiting slavery, the 14th Amendment guaranteeing "birthright citizenship and equal protection," and the 15th Amendment guaranteeing voting rights, the understanding of American society would be incomplete. We cannot "faithfully" tell the story of this country, with honesty and integrity, when Black history is excluded.

Imagine you just accomplished one of the biggest moments in your career, perhaps in your life. The world is watching, and someone puts a microphone to your mouth. What would you say?

I imagine some people would speak about what it means to accomplish something so monumental. Some people will thank friends, family, or maybe God. Perhaps they’ll do something honorable like call for peace.

Well, we aren’t in that world anymore. Josh Hokit took the opportunity to call former first lady Michelle Obama a man.

He is another white man obsessed with tearing down Michelle Obama. I would say he is telling on himself, but racism and sexism aren’t just accepted in America, it is glorified.

Josh Hokit is a fighter in the UFC, the biggest mixed martial arts promotion in the world. I was once a fan. Unfortunately, I had to give it up as it became more Trump-centered. By the time I stopped, every fighter was praising Trump at the end of their matches, and the camera spent more time on the orange guy than the athletes.

I wasn’t imagining things because fast forward a couple years, and the UFC is at the White House. (For more on the UFC and the White House, check out Kenny Minker’s article here.)

After thanking the Lord, Hokit said, “And lastly, Michelle Obama is a man! Am I right, America?’’

Why, in your biggest moment, are you talking about someone who hasn’t been in office in a decade? They are obsessed. They are envious. The Obamas, and especially Michelle, represent everything they fear.

She is smarter, more elegant, more powerful, better educated, more honorable, and more beautiful than they are. She is all of that despite the disadvantages. She took all the slander and never wrestled in the mud with them. It drives them crazy, so they repeat the same dribble to fill their shriveled genitals with blood.

Black Women and Masculinity

I know many Black women who are concerned with their masculinity. One friend who works out consistently occasionally asks if she is starting to look too manly. Another is worried that she is too independent, thus giving off masculine energy.

I never hear these concerns from white women, and I suspect this is due to how society and the media present each group. Black women are expected to fit into the same box as white women if they want to be categorized as feminine.

However, since slavery, Black women have been put into one of three boxes. They are the desexualized mammy, the hypersexualized jezebel, or the masculine worker. These categories are easier for the ignorant to understand, and it allows them to cling to an archaic narrative that was never true.

Serena Williams, Simone Biles, and Michelle Obama, some of the most successful people in their fields, are all placed into the masculine box.

It reminds me of a conversation I once had with a friend. She asked me about my “type’ of woman. I used the word strong and it frustrated her. She explained how Black women always had to be in their masculine energy because they were always expected to be strong.

I’m speaking from a personal place of ignorance when I say the thing I love the most about Black women is their strength. They darn near bend reality with nothing but willpower. For me, that is purely feminine energy. That is my mother. That is my aunt. These are the women who draw me in as an adult.

However, when the white world is constantly telling you that strength is a masculine trait, it becomes easy to believe it.

Whenever I feel myself buying into the narratives around me, I look to Michelle Obama. She is so strong, but she is so feminine. It is so clear that they are intimidated and envious.

Black Men Can be Idiots, Too

I don’t have a lot of firsthand experience with white men calling Michelle Obama a man. It just isn’t the type of thing they will feel comfortable saying around me, but I have heard Black men attempt to call Black women masculine.

It isn’t common, but the reasoning reveals a lot. It usually happens after a rejection or a breakup. The man either calls her this because he is trying to tear down her physical appearance because she wasn’t interested in him, or he is trying to tear into her independence because she doesn’t need him.

Sadly, sexism isn’t bound by race. I think of how Barack Obama talked with Black men because they were reluctant to vote for Kamala Harris, a Black woman. I think of Derrick Lewis, the Black man who was defeated at the White House by Josh Hokit. No, Lewis wasn’t fighting for Black women. He is just another brainwashed Trump supporter.

Black men could do better when it comes to supporting Black women.

I think the first time I paid attention to Melania Trump was when I saw a picture on social media comparing her to Michelle Obama. It was something about how beautiful and feminine she was.

Melania is the opposite of Michelle in so many ways, but just like these envious white men, she want to be Michelle Obama. Don’t forget, Melania plagiarized Michelle’s speech and presented it as if no one would notice.

So, what is feminine in the eyes of the people who love to call Black women manly? It seems to be quiet, submissive, and ignorant. From my experience, many Black women love to be submissive if someone gives them a reason to trust, but that trust does not come easily. As for that ignorant bit, I’m sure Hokit needs his women to be ignorant to receive any type of attention. He isn’t going to find that with Michelle Obama, and calling her playground names isn’t going to change that.

To anyone who lets these racist, sexist, transphobic comments slip into your brain, remember it comes from a place of envy and insecurity. Dust off your shoulder and pay attention to people who matter.

Botham Jean was on his own couch, eating ice cream, when the door opened, and a cop walked in and shot him in the chest. Not a wrong neighborhood. Not a traffic stop. His apartment. His couch. The ice cream was still there when Dallas police arrived.

That was September 6, 2018. Amber Guyger, then a Dallas police officer, went to the wrong floor of her apartment building, entered Jean’s apartment, and killed him. She said she thought it was her own unit and that Jean was an intruder. Jean, a 26-year-old Black accountant, died in his living room after being shot by a white off-duty officer who was still carrying her service weapon.

There was no split-second street confrontation here. There was no visible weapon. There was no lawful reason for Jean to justify his existence inside his own home. There was only a fatal mistake made by an armed officer, followed by a system that still moved with familiar caution when the person who pulled the trigger wore a badge.

The conviction was supposed to be the answer. What came next is why his case never closed.

A rare conviction, and a familiar limit

Guyger was not arrested for three days, and the case initially came in as manslaughter before a grand jury elevated the charge to murder in November 2018, about three months later. That sequence told the public, right out of the gate, what priority the system assigned to the death of a Black man in his own home.

Then came something rare. On October 1, 2019, a Dallas jury convicted Guyger of murder. In a country where police officers are seldom convicted for fatal shootings, especially when they can frame the encounter as fear, confusion, or perceived threat, that verdict carried real weight.

But the sentence told a different story. The jury gave her 10 years in prison, near the low end of a 5-to-99-year range, despite prosecutors asking for 28 years. That is what American accountability often looks like in racialized police violence cases: a headline that sounds historic and a punishment that feels calibrated to soften the blow.

The hug that comforted the country

The courtroom scene after sentencing became bigger than the sentence itself. Brandt Jean, Botham’s younger brother, told Guyger he forgave her and then asked to hug her. He did. It was personal, human, and deeply rooted in his own faith.

But the public reaction was shaped even more by what happened next. Judge Tammy Kemp stepped down from the bench, gave Guyger a Bible, and hugged her too. A bailiff was also filmed touching Guyger’s hair — Kemp would later say it was a routine contraband search conducted when Guyger was taken into custody, though many observers saw something else. Those images raced across the country. America found its exit.

A victim’s brother choosing forgiveness is one thing. A court, through its symbols and its actors, extending visible tenderness to a convicted killer, is something else. For many Black observers like myself, the question did not wait: would a Black defendant headed to prison have been met with that kind of compassion from the bench? Personally, I don’t think they would because of history, like in the rapper Meek Mill's case.

A Black judge sat over Meek Mill’s case, and she came down hard. Judge Genece Brinkley sentenced him to two to four years in November 2017 for a probation violation, even though the prosecutor asked for no jail time. The trigger was a popped wheelie on a dirt bike, an airport scuffle, a failed drug test. People assume a Black judge shields a Black defendant. Brinkley didn’t.

That should tell you how bias actually works. It is not a white problem you can sort by checking the color of the person on the bench. The contempt that meets a Black man at the defense table soaks into everyone in the room, including the people who share his face. We absorb it the same way we absorb anything, from the courtroom, from the news, from a century of being told the Black face belongs to the defendant and never the lawyer.

And it does damage that outlasts the sentence. Walk into a room believing the verdict was set before you sat down, and the body does not wait for the gavel. It braces. Hold that bracing for years, and the cost is one of the research is clear on: broken sleep, depression, a nervous system locked in threat. Black men and women carry it into courtrooms, into traffic stops, and into the waiting for a probation officer’s call. The harm is not only the time served. It is living braced for a judgment that feels decided in advance, and what that does to a mind over a lifetime.

Naming it is the work. You can’t treat an injury you won’t admit you carry. And the same goes for gatekeepers. They filter but the wound is visible.

Why Botham Jean’s case still matters

Botham Jean’s case mattered because it was not only about one man’s death. It exposed the moral imbalance built into American policing and American punishment. He had to be perfect in death to receive sympathy. Guyger got to be flawed, emotional, exhausted, mistaken, and still legible to the public as redeemable.

The legal process did not end with the conviction. Guyger appealed in 2020, seeking either an acquittal or a reduced conviction. The intermediate Court of Appeals of Texas upheld the murder conviction in 2021. The higher Court of Criminal Appeals declined to review the case in 2022, and the U.S. Supreme Court denied her final appeal later that year. The murder conviction held.

Then the next chapter arrived: parole. Guyger became eligible for parole on September 29, 2024, a date that would have been Botham Jean’s 33rd birthday. The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles denied her request in October 2024, and her next review is scheduled for October 2026. Even the calendar in this case seems to know how to reopen a wound.

The math behind the outrage

The reason Botham Jean’s case does not leave the conversation is that it cannot. It sits inside a much larger pattern.

Police killings in the United States did not recede after the protests of 2020. They climbed. Mapping Police Violence counted at least 1,365 people killed by police in 2024, the highest total in its modern dataset. That is not an abstraction. That is someone’s brother on his own couch. Other reporting found that deadly police encounters hit a decade high even as homicide and violent crime fell more broadly.

And the racial imbalance remains brutal. According to Mapping Police Violence’s 2024 analysis, Black Americans are about 2.9 times more likely than white Americans to be killed by police. Black people account for roughly 24 percent of everyone killed by law enforcement, while making up about 13 percent of the population. The numbers are not subtle. They do not whisper. They shout.

This is why his case keeps landing with such force. It was one of the rare cases where the system admitted the obvious and returned a murder conviction. Yet even then, the low sentence, the ritual of public comfort, and the long fight over appeals and parole all signaled how hard this country works to preserve empathy for the armed agent of the state while asking the dead and their families to carry the burden of grace.

The post-George Floyd reform era has stalled badly. By 2025, the current Trump administration’s Justice Department was moving to end or walk back several police reform agreements and civil-rights findings, including post-Floyd settlements involving major cities. That retreat matters because the data do not show a system healing itself.

So the lesson of Botham Jean’s case is not that justice won. The lesson is sharper than that. Even in one of the clearest possible cases, with an unarmed Black man killed in his own apartment and a jury willing to convict a police officer of murder, the system still bent toward mercy for the person who carried the gun.

A hug did not close the file. A conviction did not solve the pattern. And until the numbers move in the other direction, the story of Botham Jean will remain what it has always been: not an exception to the rule, but one of the clearest windows into it.

Watching the Knicks secure this championship win was nothing short of amazing.

Sure, as a long-term Knicks fan (and yes, I do have two teams, the other of which is the Celtics. I know, I know but it’s Been like that since childhood and won’t be changing any time soon) it’s possible that I’m biased, but I like to believe I am as far and balanced as any part-time fanatic can be.

Indeed, narratives, scripts, and conspiracy theories aside, this was one of the most organic wins I’ve witnessed in pro sports in quite some time.

Overall, it just seems like a group of men, a few of which have been close since they played in college, worked their butts off and finally achieved the impossible.

I mean, as a fan of the team I have to be candid: the Knicks are always in the conversation but they have been breaking my heart in the finals for decades.

So, although I’m always hopeful, I have never been too confident in a win since childhood.

This year, I watched them knock out team after team like it was light work, and I’ve never been so proud of a team in all my days.

Not because of their performance alone, but because they did it with so much grace and teamwork which can oddly be pretty rare in the pro sports realm.

To be quite candid, it made me reconsider the positive aspects of fanaticism on a personal level. I’m someone who hates hype and avoids bandwagons like the plague, but there are times that even I have to take off my thinking cap and put on a team SnapBack.

I expressed my sentiments in full on my new TikTok. You can listen here.

And if you’re on TikTok, don’t forget to give me a follow!

I watched them win with humility and lose with grace in a way that has inspired me in ways I hadn’t expected.

That said, here are the top 8 lessons I think any underdog can use based on watching the Knicks win the championship.

Be Delusional like Brunson

I’ve been overlooked my entire life, but I never doubted myself. ~Jaylen Brunson

Sounds cliché, I know, but as a chronic overachieving underdog, this has never rang so true. Jalen Brunson is over a foot shorter than Wembanyama, which put an insane amount of pressure on him to dominate from the very beginning. Based on size alone, Wembanyama is the type of player it takes real skill to beat.

Nevertheless, Brunson stayed cool as a cucumber and calmly cooked the freakishly large player. I mean, some of those shots were so amazing that I’ve been inspired to take up editing, but that’s another conversation for another day.

The point is, from the outside looking in, most would assume that Brunson had no chance against Wemby. But the level to which he believed in himself was so profound, that he forced the rest of the world to believe in him to.

As someone who has frequently beaten odds to do everything from survive childhood to graduating from both high school and college right after giving birth, I can tell you that sometimes the naysayers are so loud they start to drown out your inner voice. Brunson has shown us what happens when you are seemingly delusional in terms of how much you can accomplish: the delusion becomes reality.

Play Your Role Like Josh Hart

Although Brunson is clearly the man, my favorite Knick is actually Josh Hart. Not just because he’s talented, but because he shows what happens when you niche down instead of constantly fighting for the top spot.

I was sold on Hart from the moment I witnessed him easily grab like 18 rebounds while in foul trouble and benched for a good part of the game.

I mean, as a basketball fan, I love Jordan, but without Rodman, the Dream Team would’ve been just a dream. And it’s funny, I didn’t appreciate Rodman’s role as a child, but in retrospect, he was one of the most important players on the team.

And that’s exactly how I feel about Josh Hart. He’s not necessarily the top scorer, but he can definitely score, and he’s not leading the league in assists, though he’s shown immense growth in that area as well. But when it comes to getting the ball to his teammates, he is a machine. He does not get enough fanfair, and if I have to be the one to start the bandwagon, I’m here to do just that.

Channel Grief Like KAT

I connected with KAT this season on another level. Although I’m an empath and feel horrible for virtually anyone deep in the grief trenches. However, for someone who has recently lost my own mother, his story touched me so profoundly.

Indeed, I am in the midst of beating yet another bracket of odds in my continuous life story of comebacks, and I can’t lie: without my mother here on earth, everything feels infinitely more hollow. Making her proud has always been a top goal of mine, and unfortunately, it seems that my own mother checked out before my biggest wins as well.

I felt his tears in my own throat when I saw him shed them after games. Losing someone that close both devastates and fuels you in ways you have to experience to understand. Either way, I’m so happy for him that he was able to add yet another win to his mother’s legacy and pray that I continue on my path to doing the same.

Be Humble Like OG

OG Anunoby is a man of few words, but he always manages to say the right ones. When they lose, he’s like, “Hey, we need to play better.” And when he wins, he’s gracious enough to admit it was a team effort. Either way, he was absolutely instrumental in this Knicks win, and quickly becoming the unlikely favorite, and it’s beautiful to see.

As a fellow introvert who is not always up for social events, he seems so much happier and lighter since the win. I don’t think this is a new character unlocked by any means; I just believe that he was so focused on achieving his goals that he never felt the need to open himself up to the world. But now that he finally is, everyone seems to love him. He’s still a quiet guy, but his charm is on full display, and I just know this is going to lead to many more opportunities for him in the near and even distant future.

Stay Relatable like Mikal

This may not seem like much of a compliment, but Mikal Bridges won me over just by being transparently human throughout the series. He was there to admit to regrets over missteps when things went awry, and gave the most heartfelt speech after they secured their big W.

Best of all, he has been spending lots of time on Instagram Live getting lit and communing with his fans, and I love it! Baby, he’s been drunk for like 2 days, and I’m not judging him at all. You’re supposed to celebrate big wins for days, weeks, months, or even years.

I think we can get too caught up in achieving our goals to stop and appreciate when we actually start achieving them. Mikal is showing us how to keep the celebration going even as you get back to everyday life, and he has gained so many fans by doing just that.

Celebrate Like You Mean It

Watching the Knicks take their proverbial press victory lap has been one of the most wholesome parts of this experience. First of all, I saw a clip of them playing basketball right after the big game, during their celebration, which demonstrates just how much they all love the game.

They have been on a tour just to talk about what they love and continue their journeys as champions. They are showing up with warm energy, hilarious jokes, and enough inspiration to inspire us all. The smiles are genuine, and they seem genuinely excited to meet everyone they come in contact with.

This is the type of celebration you see from a team that has worked to get to where they are and who are truly passionate about what they do. This is highly inspirational for anyone working towards a big win. It shows that you don’t have to change even after you make it, especially when you bring your friends and family along for the ride.

Every Team Needs a Spike Lee

I wouldn’t consider myself a day 1 Knicks fan, but certainly a day 2. Born in Boston and raised in the Fingerlakes region of NY, picking pro sports teams was more complicated than necessary. I’m a day 1 Bills fan, I live for the Celtics, and the Knicks can do no wrong in my eyes. Yes, that does make my fandom infinitely more complicated, but if you’ve been following me for a while, you know this is ridiculously on brand.

At any rate, day 1 fans, such as Spike Lee and Tracy Morgan have shown so much support over the years that they’ve become synonymous with the brand. As much as I’ve loved watching the Knicks win, I’ve enjoyed watching them celebrate the wins almost as much.

I realized Spike Lee was a different kind of monster years ago, when my oldest son complained about “the old guy who’s always yelling at the refs.” And Tracy Morgan has literally been through illnesses and near-death experiences, which only mildly impeded his ability to root for his team courtside.

So, I am loving watching Spike pop up everywhere for celebrations and still chuckle at Tracy’s commercial where he jokingly demonstrates his new zen lifestyle and how he’s peaceful until it’s time to root for the Knicks.

When it comes to the Knicks, crazed fans from all walks of life are just part of the deal, and I love how, instead of a distraction, it’s just viewed as a part of Knicks culture. Even the biggest celebrities, politicians, etc., are in awe of what these players achieve day after day, and I do think that is a level of inspiration that can fuel us all to shoot for the impossible.

Don’t Lose Like Wimby

I’m not going to lie, I actually like Wimby and was rooting for him until it was time to face the Knicks. I mean, he’s so freakishly huge, it’s hard to imagine him doing anything else with his life besides dominating the NBA. And when you’re that naturally athletically inclined, of course you’re going to have an insane level of confidence.

Nobody’s mad at that.

However, where he really started to turn me off was when he showed that he’s a horrible loser and will almost stop at nothing to secure a W. Yes, pro sports are dirty in general, true indeed, but some of the moves I’ve seen from Wimby were unlike anything I’ve ever seen without a tech and a swift ejection from the court. I’m astounded that he was only ejected from one game, because some of those moves really looked malicious. And given his massive size, that could really become problematic in the very near future.

I mean, he was putting dudes in headlock moves and hopping across the floor onto players like he was playing in the UFC. At his size, he doesn’t need to do all that to secure a win; he simply needs to continue to practice and trust the process. But this brings me back to the off-putting part of it all; he is starting to seem like the type who isn’t above cutting corners to secure a win. Now, in the NBA, that could mean lots of things, but unfortunately, most of them aren’t good.

And the way he refused to shake hands when the game was over solidified him as an NBA villain. Yes, I understand that he’s disappointed. Who wouldn’t be?! But as a fellow sore loser, you have to know when to cut your losses. Getting all the way to the finals in his second season is a great sign for what’s to come if he locks in and focuses on improving his game. Also, the Knicks are true vets at this point and have worked so hard to get to where they are. I would think someone with true sportsmanship would have at least acknowledged that much.

Not Wimby.

He was so pissed he even walked out on the press after saying, “See you never.” Honestly, the petty princess in me was quite tickled by this, but it was just so childish and sounded more like what I say to my exes after a drunken call than something an almost NBA champion should be saying in public.

As mentioned, I made a short edit of some of the highs and lows of this series. If interested, you can check that out here:

If you have a YouTube account, don’t forget to drop me a sub!

The Bottom Line

This unprecedented win was the first in 53 years, and it happened when many, including myself, least expected it. If nothing else, it shows the power of focusing on your craft and remaining dedicated to your dreams even when the odds are stacked against you.

Congratulations to the Knicks and everyone who has been impacted by this win, no matter the reason. It hurts to share losses, but one major shared win can be the catalyst for new heights for all.

There’s rarely a week, aside from when a new war breaks out, without an op-ed or news piece involving transgender-identifying people.

I counted no fewer than 25 stories on Fox News over a recent few week period involving trans people, while not a whisper about the Black unemployment rate hovering at a staggering 8%.

I’m not going to lie. I don’t fully grasp it all myself. I’m a child of the 1970s and 80s. Back then, we only knew gay and straight. L and G. I hadn’t heard of LGBTQIA2S+, and the last few letters were things I first learned about only recently.

Gay and straight weren’t hard to grasp when I was a teenager. Some people were clearly born with a natural attraction to the opposite gender, and others were clearly born with a natural interest in the same gender.

It never offended me. It never occurred to me that I needed to enforce Biblical injunctions on God’s behalf. I wasn’t going around stoning Sabbath violators or people engaging in premarital sex. I wasn’t trying to punish anyone for mixing linen and wool.

I knew several gay kids in high school and college and they were just as good or bad as the rest of us.

I simply didn’t care who someone loved as long as no one was being harmed. Like a child. Or someone without the ability to consent. Or in cases where a relationship could produce a child with severe health risks due to incest.

In recent years, people have identified in many different ways.

Here’s the current breakdown of LGBTQIA2S+ as I understand it.

L — Lesbian. Women who are romantically or sexually attracted to other women.
G — Gay. People, often men but used broadly, who are attracted to the same gender.
B — Bisexual. People attracted to more than one gender.
T — Transgender. People whose gender identity differs from the sex they were assigned at birth.
Q — Queer or Questioning. An umbrella term for sexual and gender minorities, or people exploring or unsure about their orientation or gender identity.
I — Intersex. People born with sex traits that don’t fit typical definitions of male or female bodies.
A — Asexual, Aromantic, or Agender. Experiencing little or no sexual attraction, little or no romantic attraction, or identifying as having no gender.
2S — Two-Spirit. A term used by a small number of Indigenous peoples in North America to describe diverse gender or spiritual roles.

Plus-All other identities not listed, such as Nonbinary, Pansexual, Genderfluid, Demisexual, and Bigender.

And with all of this visibility has come a loud, angry backlash. Much of it in the name of religion.

To be fair, we should be able to have compassionate conversations about whether it’s equitable for a naturally born male to compete against females in athletics. A naturally born male won the strongest woman competition in 2025. We should be able to talk about that calmly, without cruelty or dehumanization.

And we should be able to have caring conversations about whether 12-year-olds should be taking hormone-altering drugs. While rare, it has happened.

We should also be able to discuss, without bad intentions, what age is appropriate for any sex-related topics. These are conversations societies have always navigated.

But what we shouldn’t be doing is pouring endless energy into fighting human dignity.

We fixate on trans athletes in collegiate sports when, by recent counts, there are fewer than 10 out of more than 500,000 total athletes.

Meanwhile, we ignore enormous issues like homelessness, poverty, affordable housing, healthcare, childcare, our racially lopsided criminal justice system, and economic inequality.

Why aren’t we carrying out God’s so-called will when it comes to these issues?

It’s almost like we use this issue as a convenient distraction from confronting real injustices. It’s harmful to the LGBTQ+ communities and it’s harmful to every other community suffering injustices.

Every person who identifies in a certain way is still a human being. Whether we understand it, like it, or “agree” with it. They are someone’s child. Someone’s parent. A sibling. A coworker. A friend.

We don’t need to understand everything. But we should be willing to treat people with dignity, love and respect as long as they aren’t harming others. I can assure you that you won’t catch trans if you hug someone.

And let’s be crystal clear. LGBTQ+ communities aren’t causing the breakdown of the American family.

Child abuse. Spousal abuse. Divorce. Adultery. Poverty. The mass stress of racism. These are the things occurring at epidemic levels among good old-fashioned straight folks.

Those should be the things that get under our skin. The things that alarm us. The things that deserve our energy to fix.

Let’s make empathy great again.

Independence Day has always made me a little queasy. The slight ache in my tummy has less to do with the greasy comfort food on traditional July 4 menus than it does with the document that Independence Day commemorates: the Declaration of Independence, best known for its author Thomas Jefferson’s disingenuous but often-quoted line “All men are created equal.”

The Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, 1776, which was actually more than seven years before the Treaty of Paris formally freed the 13 original colonies from British rule on September 3, 1783. Some of those years were spent on battlefields actively fighting for the independence the patriots had prematurely declared to be theirs. The British didn’t surrender at Yorktown until October 19, 1781, so by claiming independence in 1776, the 13 original colonies were essentially printing new business cards before landing the new role.

Whether one considers July 4 or September 3 or October 19 to be the true Independence Day, as a Black American, I have a hard time celebrating the birth of a nation that was largely built on the forced, unpaid labor of people who looked like me, people who, on July 4, 1776, were not considered to have been “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

It’s just as hard to celebrate the birth of a nation in which people who looked like me had minimal to no voice in the new government. Twelve years later, in 1788, the newly ratified U.S. Constitution deemed that for the purpose of determining representation in the House of Representatives, only three-fifths of the entire enslaved population in a state would be counted toward its population. This decision has long been widely misinterpreted as being tantamount to considering enslaved Blacks to be only three-fifths human, but the subtext is actually more complicated than simple math suggests.

Depending on how you look at it, the three-fifths compromise either gave Southern slave-holding states undeserved legislative power they’d never wield in the best interests of their enslaved populations, or it curbed their legislative power by reducing the population that determined their representation in Congress by two-fifths of their enslaved populations. Regardless of how you look at it, to much of the slave-holding South — and likely to much of the North as well — the humanity of Black people was debatable. And according to Thomas Jefferson’s own racist musings in Notes on the State of Virginia, Black people were hardly created equal to white people.

The Fourth of July has become more glaringly problematic to me since the emergence of Juneteenth as a national holiday in recent years. Coming a mere fortnight before July 4, Juneteenth puts into high relief the original sin that the United States has never quite been able to wash away by looking away.

Unlike White Americans, Black Americans don’t even get the honor of being seen as responsible for our own independence. The White version of U.S. history that’s taught in American public schools erases Black participation in the Civil War in much the same way that George Washington, the man most credited with securing American independence, initially wanted to erase Black participation in the American Revolution.

George Washington has long been highly regarded as the father of his country. It’s hard to imagine that the 13 original colonies that became the United States would have won their independence from Britain in the Revolutionary War without Washington as their fearless military leader.

But when it came to pulling out all stops to win the war, Washington is said to have had his limits.

According to Ken Burns’ sprawling six-episode documentary The American Revolution, which was released last November, Washington, who led the Continental Army for eight years, from 1775 to 1783, objected to allowing Black soldiers to fight on the side of the patriots. His reasoning, the documentary claims, wasn’t about military strategy or whether Black manpower could actually help win the war.

“Washington was also shocked to see Black soldiers encamped alongside their White neighbors,” actor Peter Coyote says in his narration. “Unconvinced they could ever make good soldiers, Washington persuaded the Massachusetts provincial Congress to enlist no more of them.”

“I think that Washington was concerned about what it might mean for slavery and slaveholders,” historian Christopher Brown says in the docuseries. “I think he was alert to the ways that it could end up eroding the institution.”

As Coyote explains, at the time of the American Revolution, 40% of the population of Virginia, the colony Washington called home, were enslaved Blacks, while only 2% of the New England population were enslaved. Owners like Washington lived in constant fear of uprisings like the unsuccessful ones that had risen up on the then-British colony of Jamaica three times in 15 years.

Virginia’s royal governor Lord Dunmore issued a proclamation in November of 1775 that any enslaved person owned by a rebel who escaped captivity and fought on the side of Britain would gain their freedom.

“Britain is the biggest slave-trading nation on Earth,” writer Rick Atkinson explains in episode 2, “An Asylum for Mankind,” which focuses largely on how the American Revolution affected the enslaved population in the colonies. “Nevertheless, the British believe that if they can convince enough slaves to abandon their masters in the South to take up arms against the American rebels, that this is a manpower pool that can also derange the economies of the Southern states.”

Dunmore’s proclamation resulted in the Southern colonies becoming more dedicated to the revolution’s cause and deepened the divide between the colonies and Britain, as some 800 enslaved Black men and an equal number of women and children escaped to Dunmore’s Ethiopian Regiment. The men, for the first time in their lives, received a paid salary. One of them, Harry Washington, who was enslaved by Washington at Mount Vernon, managed to escape captivity after an unsuccessful attempt in 1771 and fight on the side of the British.

To be clear, historian Vincent Brown explains, the British were not anti-slavery. “They are firmly committed to slavery,” he says. “But, opportunistically, when they think they can encourage slaves to rise up against rebelling colonists, they’ll do so.”

“For enslaved people, this seemed a way to get out of a situation that was intractable,” historian Annette-Gordon Reed adds. “And it gave them an impetus to get involved in all of this. In the sort of chaos of war, they found an opportunity, a way to escape their situation.”

Washington, according the the documentary, “called Lord Dunmore a monster and an arch traitor to the rights of humanity.”

Said Washington (voiced by actor Josh Brolin): “If that man is not crushed before spring, he will become the most formidable enemy America has. His strength will increase as a snowball by rolling and faster. Nothing less than depriving him of life or liberty will secure peace to Virginia.”

The American Revolution takes a detailed look at the war and painstakingly uncovers the various layers of the conflict, including the dark irony of a war for independence being launched by White men who owned enslaved Black people.

In recent years, the reputations of founding fathers like Washington and Thomas Jefferson have suffered because of their contradictory views about slavery and race. While they preached independence, enslaved Black people toiled for free on their plantations.

The docuseries underscores this shift by presenting an alleged encounter between Washington and Darby Vassall, a 6-year-old boy the general found swinging on the gate of a house the Continental Army had taken possession of in Cambridge, Mass. “Washington urged him to come inside and get something to eat,” Coyote says. “He had plenty of chores for him to do. When Darby asked what sort of wages he could expect, Washington thought the question impertinent and unreasonable.”

“Darby Vassall lived to be a very old man,” the narration continues, “and when asked, he liked to say that, in his experience, George Washington was no gentleman, since he’d expected the boy to work for free.”

Watching Ken Burns’ The American Revolution, wasn’t an experience that kept me on the edge of my seat. We all know how the story ended. But for the first time in my life, I wasn’t squarely on the side of the Patriots. I wasn’t exactly Team Loyalists either, but I did find myself wondering what would have happened if the outcome had been different.

More surprisingly, I found myself cheering on the inside every time the British scored a decisive victory. Their defeat at Yorktown didn’t fill me with the pride my teachers had force fed me in history class while growing up. I realize that enslaved Blacks were just pawns to the British, a way to hobble the Southern states and secure a win, but had the British been triumphant, how might that have changed the course of history for Black people on the American continent?

Slavery was abolished across the British Empire in 1834, more than 30 years before it ended in the U.S., through Parliament’s 1833 passage of the Act on the Abolition of Slavery in the British Empire. Had the United States remained part of the British Empire, what difference would those 30-plus years of emancipation have made for Black Americans? Would slavery have been phased out even earlier than the 1830s?

Would there have been a Civil War, or nearly a century of segregation and Jim Crow, or thousands of Black lives lost to lynching between the end of the Civil War in 1865 and the 1960s, or the Rosewood massacre, or the Tuskegee experiment? Would Martin Luther King Jr. have lived to a ripe old age? Would Emmett Till have made it to adulthood? Would Black Americans feel our generational trauma less intensely today because we’d be more than a mere 60 years removed from the source of it?

Perhaps nothing would have changed. Anti-Black racism is not an exclusively American scourge. It’s a global phenomenon I’ve experienced in many places outside the U.S. That said, it’s neither as aggressive nor as overt in any of the other countries I’ve lived in across five continents (South America, Australia, Asia, Africa, and Europe) — with the exception of South Africa, which is less than 40 years removed from its Apartheid era. Anti-Black racism there is perhaps even more complicated and insidious than in the U.S.

The profitability of slavery to the Southern states and therefore, by extension, to a victorious Great Britain may very well have delayed emancipation in the British Empire for years or even decades. One thing is for certain, though: The outcome of the American Revolution did not benefit Black Americans (it was even more devastating for Native Americans, but that’s a rant for another post), and we were less than afterthoughts in the Declaration of Independence. For those reasons, I will always feel some kind of way about celebrating Independence Day.

Happy Juneteenth!

Going from unemployed to full-time consultant was a welcome reprieve. And learning I had time to receive unemployment while trying to figure it out was exactly what I needed. 

I was very aggressive with my consultancy rates, making sure I am being paid my worth–and beyond. 

Being out of work was scary so I wasn’t settling for just anything. The next go round would have to have more of a cushion in case things went sideways. As I now know they can. When the ink was dry on the contracts and after I made the decision to come back to the office, I had to take a moment to get a proper view of my finances and figure out what the road ahead would look like.

I didn’t want to. Because as long as I didn’t approach the ways I stayed above water while I was out of work, those things never happened. 

But they did. 

I borrowed from a few of my people – humbling for sure. 

There was that moment when I made a pretty good penny using an upscale resale site for some of the suits and luggage I hadn’t used in years. That cold hard cash was helpful.

And then, I borrowed from my 401K. A lot. A whole lot. I left fumes. 

At my age, this is not ideal. I should be focusing on wealth accumulation, paying down bad debt and having 1.5 times my annual salary saved. In addition, I should be aggressively putting 20% of my annual salary into my tax-advantaged accounts like my 401K. Not taking any of it out when it’s growing and working to improve my net worth. 

And when you work for a company who is contributing, taking out a loan should only be in an emergency.

Well, losing your job, being out of work for an extended time, that becomes an emergency real fast. 

And there is no reason for me to feel a way about taking out the loan. 

It turns out 13-20% of all 401k participants have an outstanding loan at a time and research shows that in a five year time frame, 40% of all participants will borrow from the fund. 

Now, things are a bit calmer. I have decent monthly income and I’ve also been able to complete some smaller one-off projects that have replenished my emergency savings fund. 

So, now what?

First, I have to stop beating myself up over the loans. I often equate how prepared I am for an emergency with my self worth. 

I didn’t say it made any sense. But those feelings have to go. I needed it. Thankfully it was there and now I can put it back. I didn’t buy a convertible or even a real estate investment. It was an emergency. Period. 

My financial advisor told me before putting it back to make sure I have the basics squared away: six month emergency fund. 

I had a three month fund that I thought would be enough. It wasn’t. If I had six months worth, (just a few hundred dollars more per pay period) I would not have had to touch my 401K at all.

Lessons learned. Moving forward. 

So, my emergency savings is replenished and this time it’s six months instead of three. I had about ten thousand on my Amex which I also leaned on when I was out of work. Nothing like using that American Express to buy essentials at the bodega. After that was paid off, we went over anything I was paying interest on, no matter how small. 

And now, I am slowly but regularly and aggressively adding big chunks back into my 401K, enough to have a bit more than I had in there in the first place. But of course, I lose the market growth that money would have earned if it was never taken out. 

But I know it’s better to start over with something than to keep moving with nothing. 

When Donald Trump was reelected, a student asked me if we were going to be slaves again. I laughed it off and said something like, “You don’t need to worry about something like that right now, but remember it is always important to stay informed and vote.”

Honestly, I share her fear.

The move backwards will feel like an avalanche, but it has been a steady crawl that is now picking up enough speed for some people to notice.

Several years back, during Trump’s first term, I rode with a coworker to a teacher event a couple of hours from our school. I remember two conversations from the long, uncomfortable car ride.

In the first conversation, the older, white woman told me how much she loved Madea. At the time, this was especially annoying to me. Although Madea and Tyler Perry were a presence in my life, being a Black man in America, I couldn’t stand them.

It was even more frustrating that every white person tried to relate to me by telling me how much they loved Madea. Madea felt like one of those things that was specifically for us because anyone else watching it just couldn’t have the context for it without some of the minstrel imagery I felt was apparent in Perry’s work.

Nevertheless, I bring up this initial discussion to better understand the second one.

This teacher, a wise woman in many regards, argued some people were not intelligent enough to live free. She said they needed to live in an area where someone could tell them what to do. They can work, receive housing, food, etc.

I’m relatively certain she compared it to slavery, but either way, we ended up using slavery to debate the ethics of this.

Of course, she argued this would be based on intelligence and not race. “We aren’t talking about chattel slavery here. Children wouldn’t be born into it.”

I won’t bore you with the details, but I couldn’t convince her of the obvious problems with this system. She argued it would be kind. She argued it would be fairer than the current prison system.

Again, I am a Black man, and after discussing Madea, she felt completely comfortable bringing up a return to slavery.

I also need to note that this lady was nothing but kind to me. When I was young and poor, she insisted on buying lunch even when I refused because she noticed I didn’t eat. She always offered teaching advice, much of which I still keep in mind today.

Yet, this kind lady is ready to bring back a form of slavery. She later voted for Trump, and I shouldn’t have been surprised. If a kind lady like that is willing to openly tell a Black man her ideal world involves slavery…well, what do you think Trump’s more aggressive supporters are thinking?

Well, the quiet part is getting louder. After the Supreme Court weakened the Voting Rights Act, states across the South are taking the opportunity to redraw voting maps to diminish the power of the Black vote.

Step 1: A loss is never a loss

In 1870, the 15th Amendment was ratified. This was only a handful of years after slavery was abolished, and the right to vote was being protected by law, in theory.

In actuality, a loss is not a loss, and white people found other ways to suppress the Black vote. Poll taxes, literacy tests, and the grandfather clause were all applied to keep Black people away while protecting white votes.

Over the next hundred years, people fought for actual equal rights. Progress really started in the 1950s with Brown v Board of Education, which ended the “separate but equal” mandate.

More marches.

More boycotts.

More sit-ins.

More sacrifice.

Finally, the Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964, which outlawed discrimination based on race and sex. Another big win, but remember, a loss is never a loss.

Poll taxes and literacy tests were carefully crafted to circumvent the new laws.

Many white people were even more desperate to keep Black voices down. Black people had received so much, yet they wanted more! They actually wanted to be able to vote just like any white person.

Marches continued, including a key one in Selma. The violence was caught on camera. Peaceful protestors beaten for wanting their humanity. America, a country that claimed to be the world’s hero, was doing this to its own people.

The timing was right. Back then, some people actually cared when they witnessed violence on camera. A handful of months later, the Voting Rights Act was passed, finally eliminating the last vestiges of legal, open Confederacy oppression.

However, remember, a loss is not a loss.

Step 2-rebuild, rebrand

Progress continued to march forward despite constant pushback. On the surface, things were getting better. They were better. On the streets, however, people were dying. Imagine what the police do when everyone has a camera. Now, imagine that world without a camera. I’m still convinced the government introduced crack to Black communities.

As for the Black vote, apathy was now the key. Rebrand. Call your opponents the racists. Language is key.

Lee Atwater, a political strategist, utilized dog whistles. Instead of being overtly racist, they used coded language to gather the support of other racists while also being able to deny their own racism.

“You start out in 1954 by saying, ‘Nigger, nigger, nigger.’ By 1968 you can’t say ‘nigger’ — that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites… ‘We want to cut this,’ is much more abstract than even the busing thing, and a hell of a lot more abstract than ‘Nigger, nigger, nigger’” source.

We would be lying if we didn’t say this was effective. When I ask most white people why they voted for Trump, they tell me something like the economy. It is a one-word answer that makes absolutely no sense, especially if we look at it in hindsight.

However, Trump was just the final nail in an already pierced coffin. By the time enough people care, the body count will be high, and some of us may be in chains.

Step 3: Capture the Supreme Court by any means necessary

The first crack came when the Supreme Court voted unanimously in Brown v Board of Education. Control the court and control the law. Control the law, and roll back civil rights.

This plan truly went into motion near the end of President Obama’s final term. A Black man becoming president was enough for racists to take the mask off. There was no time to play fair. They refused to ever let anything like that happen again.

So when Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia died, Republicans blocked Obama’s nominee Merrick Garland. Garland was a moderate who would probably not have allowed his political biases to impact his reading of the law, at least not as much as what we see today.

The seat was vacant for a year. Trump was able to appoint 3 justices, including one he appointed during his last year as president. These justices were not at all moderate and were loyal to Trump. I hope the hypocrisy is obvious because that is key in the next phase.

Step 4: Do whatever you want and ignore criticism and hypocrisy

It was a long road, but we are here. They stripped away DEI initiatives, not only hurting Black people, but also women, disabled people, and so on.

Most recently, the Trump-powered Supreme Court weakened the Voting Rights Act, allowing states to redraw maps to ensure Black voters will have less of a voice.

This isn’t just about Black leadership being selected, but about who leaders are meant to serve. When the Black vote loses power, it is even easier to ignore those communities.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, one of the few dissenting voices on the Supreme Court, warned the court against appearing biased when it rushed the new ruling, failing to wait the usual 32 days to issue the final judgment. The goal to allow Louisiana to redraw its map before the election is obvious.

Jackson’s peers responded by calling her points baseless, trivial, and insulting. Of course, they did; even Trump’s justices have the playbook. We are on step 4. We get to do what we want!

Step 5: Um, apparently, say the quiet part out loud. Nothing matters anymore.

Trump has normalized speaking the truth and then saying the opposite. Sometimes it feels like the whole world, or at least white people, is gaslighting me.

It is no secret why the Supreme Court weakened the Voting Rights Act. It was obvious when states rushed to redraw majority Black districts to eliminate Black leadership and even white leadership who worked for the Black community.

South Carolina called for a special session, rushing to do the same thing. The goal was clear: get rid of James E. Clyburn, South Carolina’s only Black representative at the Congressional level.

At the time of writing, the vote hasn’t been a smooth ride in South Carolina. Trump specifically called for SC to strike now. Yet, there is still some hesitation.

Has the first state to secede from the Union grown in a way the rest of the South clearly hasn’t?

Absolutely not.

SC State Senator Shane Massey revealed the truth:

“Most South Carolinians are conservative. That doesn’t mean they always vote for Republicans, but they are conservative. Um, and I think when you do something like this, there is going to be an impact. I also think that one of the side effects of this is, very candidly, you are going to motivate the Black turnout…and there will be repercussions for that” -source.

Of course, this debate boils down to the best way to control the Black vote. It isn’t about if Black people should have a voice; it is about the best way to limit that voice.

What now?

Perhaps you once thought the march of progress was inevitable.

I did.

We now know this is so far from the truth. It is always in jeopardy. It is always a fight, and we got lazy. People chose apathy and ignorance to enjoy the peace of the moment.

We allowed Trump to win…twice!

We are now playing on hard mode, but it is only going to get harder if we don’t fight back now.

Where does it end?

Well, I can’t help but think about the question my student asked me, and that possible future feels more real every day.

I don’t have all the answers, but I’m making phone calls, and I’m encouraging my friends and associates, especially the white ones, to make similar calls.

What worked fifty years ago won’t work now, but we can’t sit on our hands and ignore the problem. It is back to the streets. Back to the boycotts. Back to the marches. Back to the sacrifices.

It may be a little uncomfortable, but our ancestors made the impossible happen. Let’s do it again.

Let me take you into my world in 1999. We thought the computers would take over then too. I thought I was in love with T. I also thought I was in love with L. E thought she was in love with me. Or, at least, someone kept calling my landline, palm over receiver, hanging up.

None of us loved each other like I loved the Knicks. Teenage love can’t stack up to fan heartbreak. My mother’s Canarsie bedroom was my secret haven with a mirrored wall-length closet and plush green wall-to-wall carpet. I hated the Spurs and we were facing them in the Finals via one-handed phenom Latrell Sprewell, Light-Skin-Always-In Allan Houston, and spindly-armed Marcus Camby. Larry Johnson was also on the tail end of his very decent career, and had been imported to get New York one step closer. He’d done just that.

Patrick Ewing, our Caribbean hero of the 80s and 90s, had run out of gas, and sat on the bench like a rusty tow truck on a country road.

There are no long odds when you’re young. The world unfolds like a series of wins, like my hands up T’s skirt on the L train, her grinning and breathing different. Like the doughy aroma of 6 a.m. Avenue L bagels.

Catching the bus by the straps of my backpack caught in the door. I didn’t know how to mourn yet. How disappointment sat in the lower intestine waiting to drag me to the sewer. I knew sadness through the Knicks and being Black and young and overlooked. But these were vague emotions, the kinds I recorded in the little raps stuffed in my math notebook. I knew sadness like I knew ghosts who kept me awake. They had no texture, only a chilly presence in rooms I needed to escape.

The night the Knicks won their only Finals game, I was hanging out with my mother in her beautiful boudoir, sitting on the floor. She had laid on the bed in her curlers and bonnet, invested but not as knowledgeable once Ewing, the Jamaican, had faded into his sunset. I have to look at the box scores to remember all of it, but the expansive letdown started that evening as a kernel of light in my chest and kept widening until it poured out of my ears.

They barely held on to scratch out the win. No Knick shot well. I felt stymied, like I’d been tricked into believing something unlikely and cruel. As Michael Jordan’s career had ended, I thought, “We’re up next, obviously” not realizing ‘next’ could mean ‘never.’

Then Tim Duncan entered the picture. Then LeBron James. Steph Curry. A lot of stars were better than the Knicks, and shined brighter lights. They were also giants who shunned playing for a team that had more commercial wins outside of Madison Square Garden than in it.

That didn’t stop them from celebrating on our logos, stomping out our dreams. Duncan and company grabbed their first title in New York, and it’s like the basketball world left the Orange and Blue behind while each great went to the dance. Curry lit up 7th Avenue with 54 points in his debutante performance. LeBron James and Kobe Bryant bested each other’s 50-point outpourings during the same dismal season.

We sunk to the lowest rung of sports fandom: watching home games to witness other players.

A certain forlornness can be excused when you live in a walkable city, webbed with taxi stands and bikeways, local and express trains. The Big Apple’s protective of both your anonymity and your simultaneous, constant need for attachment and noise.

No worry.

Sirens will always drown out the quiet of your soul’s saddest depths.

Then, there was the night. That night. With the greatest comeback in basketball history. The greatest comeback of my life, too, though.

Life ain’t been no crystal stair for New Yorkers, for Knicks, for me. A couple days after the president dragged his demonic sludge through the place, some magic happened.

There are those who’ll tell you magic doesn’t exist. They’ll scoff at your altars and demolish your prayers. They’ll call your hope foolishness and their cynicism wisdom.

It’s the opposite. You have to reach the far edge of life, cliffhanging, roiling in apathy and sorrow to realize that faith is the only deliverance.

The Knickerbockers delivered an entire city, bred and masted at the maw of hell, to a single ecstatic reality: no hope is too silly. No dream will flourish unwritten. With 12 minute stretches of basketball, a game where the turns of a literal sphere dictate your pulse, the New York Knicks purged an entire city’s trauma.

Your world can exist in a bounce.

Then they won the championship. I was with my boys, from post-college, from the smoke-filled rooms, from the days where some left their dreams hanging just as thick as the weed in the air. We hugged and we cried and we FaceTimed. One of my best friends has two sons who now love basketball because they watch their dad break down the game and all the life to be learned from it. The thought alone tightens my rib cage around my swelling heart and produces the flood.

This year’s been really hard. My father died and — because of our difficult relationship— I refused to ID his body. The brutal mist of funeral home formaldehyde almost sucked my pupils out of their sockets as I signed his death certificate. Then I was laid off from my job for no reason. I had to accept my reality, but not lose my spirit in the agonies of a professional game.

I wrote. I wept. I exercised. In private.

But sometimes neither life nor fantasy is enough. My love for the Knicks occupies that indefinable space between improbable imaginary wins and heavy, cold stuck-ness.

Take, for example, their contradictions:

They’re run by a famously stingy, out-of-touch owner, James Dolan, but led by a star who took an enormous, unheard of pay cut to enlist his college bros to play with him.

They preside over the “World’s Most Famous Arena” but have long struggled to bring glory to it.

Their team is staffed by 8-figure millionaires, none of them classic “stars” — more like redemption stories, grinders, and hardheads who have few individual pro awards but plenty proof of their commitment to each other.

Knick fans — and this must be said — are almost exactly like New York itself: a group of transplants, recent arrivals, and dreamers contending against a league of old diehards, long rooted residents, and tastemakers. Miami financiers and Brooklyn plumbers. Astoria graphic designers and Long Island realtors. Only abiding by the paper chase.

Yet we manage to get along in the spirit of never quitting before the finish.

We have seen the valleys, trust. Karl-Anthony Towns is a befuddling and dazzling player. Prone to foul trouble and mental absences, he stirs the ire of crazies and critics alike. At one point during this epic season, he seemed pouty, dissatisfied with his role and terrified to be traded. That seemed to coincide with his engagement to a socialite and Kardashian familiar, Jordyn Woods. When the Knicks could’ve been hitting their stride, both he and the fanbase worried about the Towns tenure. He would be just another in the litany of stars who jumped on the wagon past their prime, carrying away with him more hope refuse. Amaré Stoudemire Lite.

Mikal Bridges also seemed degraded to pure fossil fuel, unable to convert his usual shorthand flick shot against Atlanta in first round. The fans banished him to Governor’s Island despite his penchant for late-game heroics. He’d turned from stud to dud when the playoffs came. John Starks Redux.

Before he was 2026 Finals MVP Jalen Brunson, he was tunnel-vision Brunson in my living room and others. “He can’t keep trying to shoot over everyone.” “Why does Jalen force the action so much when he can’t beat the D?” “That’s not the shot we want!” The very qualities we watched in awe became the bad luck omen we’d feared. A star-less franchise, we couldn’t afford another MacBeth-like arc. A Carmelo Anthony Incarnate.

Forget rewriting legacies. The team who entered the 2026 Playoffs looked like another reference stub for the endless index of futile years past. Hash marks on an old slab. The drudgery of real life where imaginary wins are all most of us get.

That’s how I entered my friend Shak’s place, after a Lyft Citibike ride from Greenpoint to Bed Stuy, and heavy with dread that this would be the loss that turned the series bleak. My basketball cohort has grayed so we don’t run threes in the parks anymore. Bad knees and separate lives. Things change in an instant.

So then how do we rewrite love? A reunion on championship night.

His wife, C, let us in on a spell she’d cast the other night, during the Big Comeback.

“Whatever you want to happen, just say it to the T.V. I promise this works.”

I tried it. “Jalen’s gonna get 44, 45 tonight.”

“Mitch got that rebound! Yea, let’s go Mitch!” And we forgave the players their flaws, that they flop against talented foes. We zeroed in on the Spurs pups, non-shooting bursts of vigor.

“He’s gonna miss that free throw.”

“Let him shoot that, that’s what we want.”

The tidal wave of New York magic started to lift our guys and sink theirs. Instead of preparing for the restless aches of more loss, we froze in consensus joy.

We were about to do it. As the buzzer sounded, the spell’s final chant came.

“We did it! I can’t believe we did it!”

Had we really done it?

Yes.

It’s true they had practiced, lived for the game, moved coasts and roles as athletes. But it was in order to leave the worrying, wishing, and hoping to us. Unlike Midwest industrial haunts or South Atlantic brewery hubs, New York’s powered equally by 80s gold chain hip-hop and 80s Wall Street cocaine.

We are violence and friction and maybe, by will of our pessimism — the bulky sense that nothing good is allowed to happen to you as a New Yorker — we found an exception. The Knicks should win because we need a win more than anywhere else.

We are addicted to opioids too. We’ve been priced out of our homes and jobs by corporations and their robots. We don’t know what the hell is going on but shit keeps changing without getting cheaper, easier, or smarter. Nothing feels like rest.

Until today.

I walked up to Fancy Free on Lafayette for Spike’s Annual Block Party. It was 18 hours after the Knicks had won the championship when I’d strolled Tompkins Ave in Bed Stuy. I’d never seen so many new New Yorkers like that night.

It scared me. The neighborhood had been majority Black all my life but you wouldn’t know it that Saturday.

Shit keeps changing.

As our group huddled near Herbert Von King Park, we noticed that the main people screaming “Knicks in five” were young and white with mullets. They were rolling in packs. New York looked like a small town, people remarked, but more like a college town in Iowa than a steel town in Jacksonville.

At Fancy Free the next day, the OGs sang hip hop standards. Biggie’s “Warning” and Mobb Deep’s “Shook Ones.” Songs made from struggle and grit and crime. We are violence and friction so the songs from that time lay us bare. I snapped pictures of jubilation in graying locs and bamboo earrings. Nike sneakers and Oakley jerseys. I guess we were at a survivor’s rally and we could fit the whole group into a neat quarter-block right off the corner of BAM.

I wanted to let out the flood and couldn’t.

Before and since the Knicks won, I’ve made love. I’ve wept. I’ve sat one hundred percent still. Life has almost nothing left to give me, I figure. I’ve experienced so many rushes as a New Yorker, most from tragedy and sin.

Before and since the Knicks won, I’ve raged. I’ve screamed at a screen that wouldn’t let me in, composed and erased the same text, wondered if me and all the lovers ever loved each other. I’ve passed exes like commuters on a train and forced myself to forget where ecstasy lived.

But I’ll be damned if since the Knicks won, I didn’t think of the wonderful, hopeful, broken and broke-down New York loves who cursed that team with me. I’ll be damned if I didn’t spend the three nights, after the three decades waiting, holding back the flood.

I’ve constructed an entire personality on my relationship to disappointment. I have outsmarted, outfoxed, and denied hope. I have convinced the small light flickering inside me that it is the worst type of fiction: a false god ready to snatch me away. Secretly, I prepared for a humble life because I saw my child-self tearing up every time he lost. I didn’t want to do that to him so we both stopped praying.

Since the Knicks won, I don’t know what do with myself.

Although we like to judge and generalize based on our own experiences and beliefs, relationships in 2026 are as nuanced and unique as fingerprints.

This is why I try not to judge people’s relationships in a way that comes from a place that assumes the superiority of my own values. At the same time, though, I am noticing a disturbing pattern that seeks to destroy the standards and boundaries of Black women, forcing them to just take whatever they can get to avoid being shamed for being alone, especially as they age.

K. Michelle made it clear that her man can cheat as long as he’s not helping the women financially.

Watch the clip here:

Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy that she got the ring from the man she has been dating on and off since forever. Yet and still, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that this arrangement is a compromise on her part only, which makes it one-sided. And the one thing I’ve learned about those types of relationships is that they either kill your spirit or die a horrible death on their own.

The No Tricking Clause

Stockholm Syndrome is so prevalent in the realm of misogyny/misogynoir, it’s sickening. Cheating is one of the biggest areas where women are compelled to believe it’s impossible to beat them, so we might as well join them. And sure, we all have free will, but if you’re looking for a happy relationship with a man who loves and respects you, this is simply not the way to go.

You see, instead of putting her foot down and demanding that her husband remain faithful to her, she has taken to the ideology that she is superior to other women because she has a ring, and thus, cheating is OK.

In K. Michelle’s situation, in particular, she has stated that she is fine with the cheating as long as her man isn’t paying their bills.

Cool.

But this is also where it gets incredibly sticky.

First of all, the average man pursues women who are younger and far more attractive than they are, which often means money is required simply to get their attention.

Like, do you think the average 20-something is just dying to have sex with a wealthy man twice their age with zero financial benefits? If so, I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you, tax-free!

Let’s be real, younger, attractive women are often only attracted to older men because they are stable and don’t mind paying a bill or three. So, giving your man a pass to have sex with them as long as he’s not helping them is peak delusion.

Moreover, what about the money he’s spending on dates? I mean, unless you are suggesting that he have sex with prostitutes, most women don’t just meet a man and open their legs with zero effort. So, how is he even supposed to get to the sex without spending any money on them?

Honestly, I think this is just a boundary women set to have some illusion of control over men with zero sexual discipline.

The Truth Behind the Clause

If I can be candid about this situation, these clauses are just frivolous boundaries put in place to justify women meddling in their husband’s affairs while pretending not to care.

Think about it: if you’re with a man who is narcissistic enough to demand exclusivity from you while also expecting you to accept their cheating ways, he’s not going to take kindly to the constant questioning that is only natural when a woman is in love with her partner.

This is how these clauses come into play. It reframes the meddling: it’s no longer cheating; it’s “We have an agreement, and I need to make sure you’re sticking to it.”

It also serves as a warning to the women who are interested in said man. K. Michelle is going on record to say hey you can get sex from him, but he will never care about or take care of you. But realistically, there is no way to know what is going on between a cheating man and his women. So, including this clause creates a loophole allowing her to meddle while pretending she’s okay with the cheating.

I mean, if you agree to allow a man to cheat in peace, constantly questioning him about who he is dealing with becomes impossible. However, if you add a clause, you can pretend you are just checking up on the finances when you’re really trying to make sure he’s not getting too close to any of the other women. The arguments shift from “Who were you with last night?” to “Where did this $3,000 charge come from?" But, deep down, they are still the same argument.

Clauses such as these are how women save face and justify their cheating husband’s actions. She knows that women are laughing at her because they have the same access to the man she chose to marry, so this is her way of reclaiming her power over the situation: “You can get him, but you will never get my lifestyle.”

Fine and dandy.

I have often seen this attitude coming from less successful women who are with well-off men, but seeing this from someone as successful as K. Michelle is especially concerning. I’m quite sure she can afford her own mansions, cars, bags, and vacations. Yes, having a wealthy man adds to it, but she’ll most likely be fine either way.

And sadly for K. Michelle, he is likely paying many bills, whether she knows it or not. Not just because that’s what’s expected when wealthy men date younger, attractive women, but especially because she has come out and said this in public, which adds more friction to his frivolous hook-ups. He doesn’t just have to convince them that his wife is okay with it; he now has to convince them that they’re not just another notch in his belt.

No matter what rhetoric K. Michelle chooses to use, most women aren’t okay with being used and thrown away. So, when he approaches women, they will say, “Yeah, you just want free sex, no thanks.” In which case, he will have to prove that’s not the case, and what better way to do that than by putting your money where your mouth is?

I mean, look at what happened with Wendy Williams. She allowed the cheating as long as there were no babies, and didn’t he go and have one anyway? Exactly.

And unlike with children, spending money is much easier to cover up, so this is really just an unenforceable boundary on behalf of K. Michelle that will likely blow up in her face in the worst way. Because self-important men don’t just cross boundaries; they obliterate them and make you embarrassed to admit you ever tried to work with them in the first place.

Also, I wonder if she’s ever considered the possibility of him coming across a beautiful woman who is more successful than her and doesn’t ask as many questions. What happens then?

I said all that to say this: women, stop settling.

No, I’m not saying don’t compromise, nor am I saying be single forever. But please stop accepting things that you know you don’t truly accept all in the name of keeping a man. Those are often the very things that force you to eventually leave after losing yourself, and you are much more likely to put up with the mistreatment for far longer just to save face.

In K. Michelle’s case, I think the best option would have been to stay single. Of course, that is never what any woman wants to hear, but if you’re sharing your man anyway, you might as well just continue dating him and leave your options open, the same way he is doing even while married. Even if you want the financial benefits, there is such a thing as joint accounts, life insurance policies, etc., that can be taken advantage of without a ring.

Betraying your own values in such a way is often a recipe for disaster in both your relationship and your own self-esteem. So, although I wish them the best, I feel bad because it’s clear as day that she doesn’t want to continue to share her man; she just feels she has no other choice. And to any woman who may be dealing with a similar conundrum, I want to say there is always another choice: choose yourself and walk away.

Many people, Jewish or not, have a gross misunderstanding of who and what the Jews are.

It might not seem like a big deal, but those misunderstandings often can turn negative, even blurring the lines between hate for Jews and dislike for Israel. It even contributes to a horrible misunderstanding of what real Zionism means.

Let’s first start with the word religion.

The word itself comes from Cicero around the 1st Century A.D. The Latin word religio meant things like reverence, obligation, ritual observance, and proper care toward the gods. It didn’t include things like food, customs, clothing, or other cultural components. It had nothing to do with tribe or ethnicity.

The word later entered the English language in about the year 1200.

Categorizing people into something called religions, which was limited to these certain concepts, didn’t exist when the Hebrew-Israelite nation formed over 3,000 years ago.

Sure, the Jews had some components that would fall into something called a religion, but it was far broader, and indeed, someone didn’t lose their membership in the Jewish people if they didn’t follow the religious components.

In contrast, if someone doesn’t believe in Jesus, they can’t be a Christian. If someone rejects the tenets of Hinduism, they aren’t Hindu. If a person thinks the Qur’an is hocus-pocus, they can’t be a Muslim. Not at all invalidating them, and there certainly are cultural elements to some of those, but those belief systems are things we choose as adults.

If a Jew doesn’t believe in God, though, and thinks the entire Hebrew Bible is made up, lo and behold, they’re still Jewish. Still a member of the Jewish people.

Sort of like if someone born into the Pueblo people of northeastern Arizona rejects their tribe’s snake release ritual that is believed to cause rain. Nobody would suggest that person is no longer Native American.

A Jew is a Jew is a Jew no matter their spiritual beliefs.

Thus, Jewish isn’t a religion.

Race is another way today we categorize people, but that group category also didn’t exist 3,000 years ago.

Sure, there were people all over the world with vastly different skin tones and facial features. But categorizing those people by race as part of any hierarchy or system didn’t exist until mass colonization and slavery in Africa. First with the Arab slave trade beginning in the 7th century, but even more so with the European slave trade in Africa, which focused exclusively on enslaving, colonizing, and dominating Black people. A racial caste system that hasn’t let up since.

From the beginning of the Jewish people, Jews included people born into the people. And Jews who joined the new people. Those who accepted the Jewish rituals, culture, community responsibilities, customs, traditions, holidays and Hebrew language.

They all were full Jews. Regardless of the later developed racial categories.

Jews included olive-skinned people who were born in Israel. Darker skinned people, like Moses, who passed as the Pharoah’s grandson. People from Kush-Ethiopia who joined the Israelites. Dark-skinned Midianites who joined the new Jewish nation. And even some lighter skinned Macedonians and Romans who joined the Jewish nation.

Others from neighboring and faraway places and regions visited Israel, trading and seeing the Jewish nation. Their traditions and food. Their faith. Some deciding to join the first organized monotheistic people. And despite their skin colors being different, these new people also fully became part of the tribe. A part of the new Jewish nation.

Then tragedy came.

Most Jews were kicked out of their namesake home (Judea) by the Romans. Jews were displaced across the globe 2,000 years ago. Some fled to places throughout the Middle East and North Africa. Others were taken by the Romans as slaves to Europe. To build things like the Coliseum. And yet some others went even further east.

European displacement and abuse of Jews further dispersed Jews across the globe over the ensuing 2,000 years. We know those sad stories. From the English burning Jews at the stake to pogroms in Russia to the Spanish and Portuguese Inquisitions to the Holocaust.

As a result of how the Jewish nation was formed and the later worldwide dispersal, Jews come in all colors and skin tones. From the Igbo in Nigeria to Polish Jews. From the Mountain Jews of Northern India to Persian Jews. From Tunisian Jews to American Jews.

Jewish isn’t and has never been a race. Jewish isn’t Black. It isnt’ white.

And yet there’s something scientific in most Jewish DNA. If you’ve ever done an Ancestry DNA test, it’s possible your DNA tested some percentage of Jewish. You can’t test Christian, Mulsim or Bahai.

Jews from Europe share certain DNA clusters. Many with smaller DNA clusters from, wait for it, the Middle East. Jews in the Middle East, North Africa and other places also share DNA.

And in one wild study, Jews 3,000 years removed from ancient Israel who today identify as part of the priestly Jewish tribe in the Bible called the Kohanim, share unique Y-chromosome haplotypesnot not shared by others.

DNA and the Origin of the Jews - TheTorah.comIs there a genetic marker for Kohanim (priests)? Are Ashkenazi Jews descended from Khazars? Why is there such a close…www.thetorah.com

So, Jews aren’t a religion. And they aren’t a race. Two concepts that came after their founding.

That still leaves us with the original question. What and who are the Jews?

The best way the Jews can be described is peoplehood. A tribe.

A tribe that began in their homeland called Israel and Judea.

They had a central Temple (the Wall in Israel being the remnants of the last one) located in Jerusalem. They had their own clothing. Their own customs. Traditions. Songs. Dances. Their own food. Language. Even their own mannerisms and sense of humor.

While that land was conquered and controlled by many over millennia, including the Romans, Persians, Assyrians, Ottomans and British, regardless of where this peoplehood of Jews resided, they always kept their original home in their hearts and minds.

A Jew in Russia, England, Yemen, Algeria or Ethiopia prayed towards Jerusalem for centuries and still does.

Jews in Venezuela, Nigeria, New York, Iran, Paris and Iraq for centuries ended their Passover Seders with a hopeful proclamation, “Next Year in Jerusalem.”

At the end of the day, Jews, Judeans, are a people an origin story in the land of Israel.

You can’t separate the two.

Thus, you can’t love and respect a Jew and simultaneously deny his or her connection to Judea. To Israel. And that’s why there’s much discussion over whether one can reject Israel as a Jewish nation and not be antisemitic.

Let’s bring this full circle.

The modern Zionist movement that started in the 1800s to bring Jews back to Israel isn’t the origin of Zionism.

Yes, that’s the first time the word “Zionism” was ever used. A movement created by European Jews who had been beaten, raped, slaughtered and forced to convert for too long. Told for centuries to “go back to Israel. Where you came from.”

Debating whether that 19th century movement was a good idea or how it was carried out is fair game. That movement, no matter what and who is to blame, would result in the displacement of Arabs living in the land that was once ancient Israel. Israel’s rebirth remains a sad story for many Arabs who lived there.

But real Zionism wasn’t created in the 19th century. It’s the 3,000-year-old concept of the Jewish origin story. Of Jewish peoplehood. The Jewish belonging and longing of Jews to Zion. Jerusalem. To Judea. To Israel.

Importantly, it was never a concept that meant abuse of others. It has nothing to do with war. Or displacement. It never was supposed to be about harming others or denying dignity for Palestinians or any other group.

It simply was and remains the heartfelt Jewish connection to Israel. And the idea that one day the Jews would get to return to their original ancestral home.

It’s easy and possible for a Jew to hold that identity and love for self and simultaneously care for the dignity and welfare of others. To validate others’ heartfelt connection to their own identities. And their origin stories.

Of course, there are some so-called modern Zionists who believe in total domination. In displacement of people. In endless wars. In abuse. We all know their names.

If that’s how you define Zionism, that’d make me a staunch anti-Zionist, too.

But being an authentic Jew. A Judean. And Zionist in its original form. Those are synonymous with being Jewish by definition. It’s who we are as a people.

All with the deep understanding that a heart is big enough to love self and others.

There’s a new phenomenon in American politics.

The sudden outbreak of moral courage and consciousness among politicians right after they leave office.

I don’t need to list all of Trump’s racist ways or obsession with opposing diversity while simultaneously hiring unqualified people for his administration. If you deny the racism at this point, there’s not much anyone can say.

We all know he refers to Mexican immigrants as rapists, told an American Congresswomen to “go back” to her country, called African and Caribbean countries he’s never visited shitholes. Called Somalis garbage.

He’s accused Jews who didn’t vote for him of basically being sell-outs to their own people and saying they need their heads examined, renamed military bases to their slave-owning Confederate general names, and hired dozens of far-right wing white supremacists over his two administrations.

And don’t even get me started on his removal of military books highlighting the contributions of Black people. Or his 2025 removal of web pages, biographies, and “Notable Graves” links honoring Black, Hispanic, and female service members from the Arlington National Cemetery Website, including General Colin Powell’s dedicated biographical information.

Most of the time Republicans remain eerily silent on these and a whole host of other issues, or in worse cases, deflect the conversation to “he could have used a better tone,” or they change the subject altogether.

Yet when it’s time for retirement, or decisions not to run for reelection, a different tone emerges where moral clarity and critiques of Trump are miraculously plentiful.

Senator Jeff Flake of Arizona voted with Trump 85% of the time and supported his candidacy for President. Not so much as a peep about Trump’s vile bigotry.

Then something wild happened. Flake chose not to run for reelection in 2018.

Since then, he’s called Trump “morally repugnant.” He slammed Trump’s response to Nazis in Charlottesville. And criticized his demonization of immigrants.

Senator Bob Corker of Tennessee, a lifelong conservative, supported nearly every Trump policy and nomination while in office. He gave Trump a near free pass on all of his divisive rhetoric and race baiting. Even voted for far right wing extremists to important political posts.

Then out of nowhere, after Corker decided not to run for reelection, he went full in on criticizing Trump. He called the White House an adult day care center. Called Trump’s conduct and words dangerous and was highly critical of Trump after Trump’s nod to white supremacists after Charlottesville.

After announcing he would not run for reelection, Congressman Don Bacon criticized Trump’s Ukraine/Russia approach. He said the White House lacked “moral clarity” on Ukraine and reportedly called Trump “the new Chamberlain” over Russia policy.

North Carolina Republican Senator Thom Tillis suddenly became outspoken against Trump in his final year, criticizing officials and policies, including DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, racist Stephen Miller, Medicaid cuts, and some Trump-aligned decisions.

Former Speaker of the House Paul Ryan completely enabled Trump’s first term agenda and avoided nearly all public confrontation. That was until, you guessed it, retirement. He has since called Trump divisive, un-American and, in reference to his racism, “not who we are.”

Numerous others like Adam Kinzinger, John Kasich, Admiral William McRaven and Anthony Scaramucci were largely quiet until their retirement or election defeat. Even space laser bigot Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Trump cult ringleader, grew some spine during her retirement tour.

Oh, and mark my words, scores more will come out of the woodwork when Trump passes away. They’ll have a come to whoever they worship moment.

I can hear it now. “I never liked… [you fill in the blanks].”

But we need moral clarity not when there’s nothing on the line.

The silence when it matters most approach signals to the marginalized and targeted that their suffering isn’t worth personal political risk. That power is more valuable than principle. That polls matter more than people.

Retirement bravery is better than nothing, for sure. But it’s like showing up to a fire after the house has burned down and proudly holding a bucket of water.

Where were all you so-called brave people when the flames were raging?

Moral courage after power isn’t real courage. It’s just commentary the rest of us already knew.

Real bravery is about risking something while it still costs you. When a vote, a voice, and influence could still challenge bad decisions or policies.

Real courage is when speaking up might mean losing an election or angering the most extreme of your party base.

This isn’t just about Trump.

It’s about a culture of self-preservation across the political spectrum that rewards silence and punishes conscience. It’s about a country where too many leaders treat decency and intellectual honesty like golf. Something to take up like a hobby during retirement.

We could easily chalk this all up to fear of Trump. We know that politicians of both parties are too scared to offend their so-called base.

But the next time a politician waits until their career is safe or over to tell the truth and stand up for dignity, let’s not pretent that’s integrity. Or a profile in courage.

The true test of character isn’t what you say when nobody’s listening. It’s what you’re willing to stand up for when you can still make a difference.

The Democratic Party would be nothing without its strong base of Black voters, especially Black women. Election after election, Democrats take the turnout of Black voters for granted, the most dedicated group of the factions that make up the Party. Black voters made it possible for Joe Biden to be President. Black voters helped Democrats sweep the 2021 Georgia Senate runoffs, giving Democrats a temporary majority in the Senate. Black voters won enough Districts to allow Democrats to maintain control in the House of Representatives, but that advantage was lost in the 2024 election.

Many, if not most, Black Democrats were born into Democratic families. That wasn’t always the case. Some Republicans point to the allegiance a majority of Black people have to the Democratic Party as being on the “Democratic Plantation.” They might not be aware that Black people once voted in even higher numbers for Republicans. Republicans can accurately point to the founding of their Party being deeply rooted in the abolition of slavery. There were decades of racial progress associated with the Republican Party from its inception in 1854 until its gradual decline, starting with the Compromise of 1877. Republicans share the blame for ending Reconstruction and looking the other way for almost a century of Jim Crow.

What Republicans still like to refer to as the “Party of Lincoln” has become the Party that will do anything to win an election. That was true in 1877 and is more so today. All the things they allegedly stood for, small government, fiscal responsibility, and moral integrity, have been set aside for trying to win at any cost. Not fairly, mind you. It seems the only tactic they have left is to keep those opposed to them from voting under the poorly disguised veil of voter integrity. They are attempting to prevent minorities (especially Black people) from voting in large numbers to win with a minority of voters. The Party of Lincoln is using racist tools to accomplish what they could not otherwise. They are left with appealing to a rotting base of mostly aggrieved white people who feel a loss of entitlement because their advantages are slightly reduced, though not nearly gone.

You might be asking, how did the Party founded on ending slavery become the home of bitter white people who used to be Democrats? The Democratic Party, especially southern Democrats, supported enslaving people. They were the Klan and all they represented. They were responsible for and supportive of lynching Black people, suppressing their votes, preventing their education, denying them fair housing, and good jobs. There was no good reason for a Black person to be a Democrat until they became the better option.

People think white bigots began leaving the Democratic Party during the 1960s during the Civil Rights Era, but the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were just the last straws. Democrats started moving to the Republican Party as early as 1948 when Harry S. Truman integrated the armed forces. The Voting Rights Act was a reaction to the brutal beatings on national television of peaceful protesters at the Edmund Pettus Bridge. The integration of the military followed the lynchings and beatings of Black veterans, including Isaac Woodard, returning from serving their country overseas. Dissatisfaction with the Democratic Party sent many white people to the Republican Party, where they were happily accepted. It was then that Black voters began to become Democrats. They didn’t leave the Republican Party; the Republican Party left them. Replacing them with the white evangelicals that propped up enslavement, the Black Codes, and Jim Crow, as if all that was God’s will.

“What next? Free them, and make them politically and socially our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this; and if mine would, we well know that those of the great mass of white people will not. Whether this feeling accords with justice and sound judgment, is not the sole question, if, indeed, it is any part of it. A universal feeling, whether well or ill-founded, cannot be safely disregarded. We cannot, then, make them equals. It does seem to me that systems of gradual emancipation might be adopted; but for their tardiness in this, I will not undertake to judge our brethren of the South.” — Abraham Lincoln

You can see that neither Party has been all that good to Black people. Even Lincoln-era Republicans against enslavement wanted to ship enslaved people off to Liberia or Central America at war’s end. They might have wanted to end enslavement, but didn’t want the freedmen and women as their neighbors. At their best, Republicans didn’t want us aroun;d at their worst, which arguably is now. They don’t like Black people to vote, have good jobs, health care, equal housing, and want over-policing of our neighborhoods and sentencing disparity.

Not to say Democrats have a sterling record. Their record of late is better than it was. At their worst, they killed Black people to keep them from voting or disrespecting a white woman. They were for enslavement, capital punishment, and keeping us illiterate and poor. But when they had the chance to enact legislation to promote true equality. They always chose not to, without regard to their reliance on Black voters to put them in power. When Democrats last controlled all three levers of government, they failed to pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, leaving the door open for the attacks on Black representation taking place now.

I’m not saying at all that Republicans are a viable option. They don’t even pretend concern for the issues important to Black people. Right now, they are busy enacting legislation all over the country to suppress our voters and reduce our voting strength. They’ll cede us a limited number of Congressional Districts and pack the bulk of Black voters into them. We’ll have some representation but no power. Name the top elected Black official in the Republican Party? If you came up with a name, they have no real control within the Party. You might have said Senator Tim Scott (SC). He recently headed up the Republican side in negotiations on the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act. Those talks fell apart because a Black face didn’t mean he could pull white Republican Senators along with him. His main job as a Republican is to give them cover by saying, “America Is Not a Racist Country!”

I once worked for a grocery chain that would tell you they’re the leading grocer in the Southeast. They indeed are, but only because nobody else is trying hard enough. They way too often violate health and safety codes. They say their top priority is “premier customer service,” but their actions show they value profitability more. Their break rooms are full of exhausted workers, struggling to keep their bodies and minds from breaking under strain. For Black people, the Democratic Party is like that. We give the Party our all; in return, we get as little as they can get away with.

There are Black people in positions of leadership within the Party. We even had a Black President for two terms. Does any of that translate into Black power? It may mean that James Clyburn can affect legislation to bring the bacon home to his District. It also meant he had to support the Party’s choice of the President’s nominee. In the same way, his support turned around the Biden campaign when it was floundering. He stuck a dagger in the backs of Kamala Harris and Cory Booker to ruin their chances. Right now, Republicans are working to reroute the Black voters in his District to remove him from power.

Black people are far better represented in the Democratic Party than they are in the Republican Party. But does that make much of a difference? The Democratic Party is standing by while Republicans rob Black voters of their strength. Democrats invented voter suppression, so they know it when they see it; they control the Senate, the House, and the White House. They could do something about it, but lack the will. After the 2026 mid-terms, they may once again have the power, but will they use it?

So what do Black Democrats do? Most of their options only benefit the Republicans, who are still the worst option. Donald Trump convinced a larger number of young Black men to try him, asking, “What the hell do you have to lose?” We’ve seen that voting Republican got them nothing, bit does voting Democratic get them that much more? Voting any of the existing third parties does the same thing. It’s time for us to elect representatives who will do our will, or replace them.

We have elected officials in the Party, both Black and White, who are more concerned with their reelection than representing the people. If they are more focused on relying on archaic traditions like the filibuster than on accomplishing our goals, then find someone willing to do what it takes. If they are ready to stand by and let voter suppression and redistricting wipe out our voting strength, they need to be voted out. Republican officials are afraid of being primaried by someone to their right. Democrats need to get rid of those unwilling to support the people’s agenda. Joe Manchin didn’t do any good as a Democrat in West Virginia.

Whatever you may think of Republicans, they are maniacal in trying to push their agenda through. Whether it be voter suppression, blocking abortion, or cutting taxes for the rich. They never waiver from pursuing their goals without regard for who it hurts. Democrats are wishy-washy, especially when it comes to the needs of their Black constituents. Like that grocery chain I mentioned. They may be the best available option, but only because nobody else is trying.

The two options I see for Black voters are either taking charge of the primary process or ousting any elected official not willing to support our causes. Republicans cast out those unwilling to get on board. Democrats keep nominating and electing those whose votes differ little from Republicans. The second option is to create or join a third party. Imagine a third party not already bought out by the rich and powerful, especially if we could ally with other traditionally Democratic voters like Hispanics or Asians that also see little benefit from voting blue. The risk is always that if a third party pulls almost exclusively, it will help Republicans win. The status quo is that Republicans win, or we belong to a Party that acts just like Republicans.

When the Republican Party was formed from nothing in 1854. It only took six years before they elected Abraham Lincoln, the first Republican President. We’ve seen how little it took for causes like the Tea Party to take over a Party. Why can’t a righteous cause sweep through or replace the Democratic Party? The things they are willing to let stand are unacceptable. There are Black leaders within the Party who will fight change tooth and nail. If they are unwilling to lead to achieve the goals of the Black voters that put them in power. They should get the hell out of the way or be replaced.

The likelihood is that Democrats will control the House of Representatives by a healthy margin after the 2026 mid-terms and possibly control the Senate. After the 2028 Presidential Election, Democrats may control all three branches again, assuming we’re still having elections. If they don’t make more of an effort to remember those who brought them to the dance. They don’t deserve unlimited loyalty. Republicans once had over 90% of the Black vote, but lost it. It isn’t impossible that Democrats could do the same.

There’s widespread backlash to the guilty verdict and sentencing in the case of Karmelo Anthony, the Black teenager who claimed to have acted in self-defense when he fatally stabbed Austin Metcalf, a white teenager, during a Texas track meet. Without context regarding the nation’s history of racial prejudice, some may wrongly assume that those calling the outcome of the case an injustice support acts of violence, but this couldn’t be further from the truth. For instance, in an online statement, Bernice King, the daughter of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., suggested “a Black teenager has been sentenced to 35 years in prison after being convicted by a jury with no Black jurors,” adding that “whatever one believes about the verdict itself, we cannot ignore the larger truth that many Americans are still wrestling with: justice is still being administered through a system with a long history of racial disparity in sentencing and punishment.” What may seem like a colorblind process often falls short of that standard.

While self-defense laws appear race-neutral, research suggests otherwise. For instance, one report found that “white-on-black homicides have justifiable findings 33 percentage points more often than black-on-white homicides,” in states with Stand-Your-Ground laws. According to a Texas Defender Service (2024) report, from 1992 to 1999, Harris County prosecutors sought the death penalty for Black defendants at a rate “more than three times higher than when a similarly situated defendant was white.” These findings point to a criminal justice system in which Black people are more likely to be found guilty and face stiffer punishment. Law professor Addie C. Rolnick explained in the Cardozo Law Review that “while the laws governing stranger self-defense are facially race-neutral, self-defense is assessed only according to whether the defendant’s fear is reasonable to the reviewing prosecutor, judge, or jury. Research on unconscious bias and cultural myths about criminality demonstrates that fear is racially contingent.”

Who gets to be seen as reasonably afraid often reflects prejudicial assumptions within a given society.

The Collin County jury, one comprised mostly of white jurors and none who were Black, found Karmelo Anthony guilty, relative to the standard of self-defense in Texas. Section 9.32 of the penal code states that deadly force is only legal when the person poses an immediate danger of deadly force or to stop someone from committing an imminent violent felony. Since Texas state law describes shoving as non-deadly force, the jury didn’t consider the stabbing as a reasonable response. They didn’t believe Anthony was afraid enough to use deadly force and saw his warning not to touch him as provocation. The analysis of this law as it pertains to the case is subjective. While the prosecutor argued that Anthony responded with deadly force when he shouldn’t have, the defense claimed he only acted to stop Austin Metcalf from inflicting further violence against him. Despite Austin Metcalf initiating the physical altercation, the jury found Anthony guilty of murder, and he was sentenced to 35 years.

After hearing the verdict, Anthony’s grandmother shouted, “Racist! Bias,” while sitting in the passenger side of an Acura sedan, near a crowd waiting outside the courthouse. Her sentiment echoed throughout the black community, sparking conversations about the lasting impact of racism in the criminal justice system and how stereotypes that frame Black people as inherently violent impact public perception and even jury deliberations. Brittany Coakley, an activist who spoke outside the Texas courthouse, told reporters, “So many of us Black Americans have similar stories of us being bullied or harassed by these people, and when we try to defend ourselves, it’s an issue.” Like some others who voiced disapproval, she saw the trial of Karmelo Anthony as evidence of a racial double standard, that Black people are being deprived of equal protection under the law. Who gets to be seen as reasonably afraid often reflects prejudicial assumptions within a given society. According to an Urban Institute report, “white-on-black homicides were most likely to be ruled justified, and black-on-white homicides were least likely to be ruled justified (Roman, 2013). While it’s difficult to prove how much impact racial bias played on this jury process, research indicates that it has generally tipped the scales against Black defendants.

The alternative to shining a light on racial injustice is to allow prejudice to persist under the cover of darkness.

In America, Black people are overrepresented in the criminal justice system, not because they are more likely to engage in criminal behavior, as racists often claim. According to a Stanford Law School report, “Empirical analyses do not support the notion that people of color are disproportionately represented in the criminal justice system solely as a result of committing more crimes. Rather, individual and systemic racial biases drive disparities.” Those who adopt a colorblind worldview often ignore evidence of systemic racism in the criminal justice system, and in doing so, fail to consider how the race of a defendant impacts how they’re seen. Researchers at St. Mary’s University explained that “The permanence of racism is evident in unrepresentative juries and the quality of deliberations, as Black defendants are more likely to be convicted and sentenced to longer and harsher sentences when Black jurors are not present during jury deliberations (Conyers et al., 2025).” Within this context, it’s clear that many Black people commenting on the case of Karmelo Anthony are expressing reasonable frustration with a system that often produces racially disparate outcomes.

When Black people cry foul play, they’re often accused of playing the race card. But the alternative to shining a light on racial injustice is to allow prejudice to persist under the cover of darkness. And that is something we shouldn’t do. A Marshall Project report found homicides of Black men by White people were considered justifiable at eight times that of any other combination, a phenomenon that’s persisted for decades (Lathrop & Flagg, 2017). Consistent with other studies, the findings suggest that although self-defense laws appear fair and impartial, our system produces disparate outcomes. Perception of reasonable force used in self-defense cases is tainted by racial bias. Consider, for instance, that Duke University study found that in two Florida counties from 2000–2010, “all-white jury pools convict Black defendants 16 percent more often than whites,” a disparity eliminated entirely once a single Black juror was included.

“Why do you have to make everything about race?” Black people are often asked this when they raise awareness about racial disparities. And yet, as Rolnick (2013) argued, self-defense cases involving strangers are essentially “always ‘about race’ in the sense that they are about individual and shared fear and are therefore uniformly vulnerable to widely shared biases.” In this case, while Anthony knew someone under the team tent and planned to stand there until the rain stopped, the assumption that a Black teenager didn’t belong there and should be promptly removed by force started a chain of events that ended in tragedy, with the death of a white teenager and the long-term incarceration of a Black teenager. Conversations surrounding the trial, while difficult, have exposed the myth of race-neutrality in self-defense cases, and more broadly, in the disparate treatment that Black people endure within the criminal justice system.

Yesterday marked the 37th anniversary of the massacre of thousands of young people in Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China. The protesters had been gathering daily to voice their disapproval of high inflation and rampant corruption, and for freedom of the press and free speech, among other issues. China eventually declared martial law, positioning tanks and troops throughout the city, eventually marching into Tiananmen Square. Soldiers fired at the students with assault rifles, killing an unknown number (estimated between several hundred and several thousand with thousands more injured. On this anniversary, the event is barely spoken of in China, with the government accusing the outside press and US government officials of a “violation of International Law” for bringing it up. The US demands that China talk about its darkest moments, which is quite hypocritical given the scant mention of numerous events on US soil, almost all perpetrated against minorities.

Here are 12 events that are often omitted from school curricula, glossed over, or misrepresented in popular accounts.

The Ocoee Massacre

Because two black men had the nerve to try to vote in the 1920 Presidential Election, white people from Orlando (including a former police chief), Winter Garden, and surrounding communities, shot and killed random black people and burned out the rest. Ocoee had no black residents for the next 40 years. To their credit, the current leaders now mention it and are organizing a memorial. Depending on who you believe, the death toll for blacks was between 39 and 500. The headline the next day in the major newspaper read, “Two Whites Killed in Race Riot.”

Black Wall Street

It started when a young black shoeshine boy was accused of raping a white elevator operator in a building he had permission to enter to get water and use the bathroom. She didn’t file a complaint or press charges, but officials went ahead and arrested Dick Rowland anyway. White people formed a mob and demanded that he be lynched. Black men stood outside the courthouse until a white man with a gun approached and confronted an unarmed black man. There was a struggle over the gun, and the white man was shot.

Black people retreated to the Greenwood District, probably the richest black township in America. Greenwood had black-owned banks, restaurants, hotels, and businesses. They formed a barrier and awaited the assault. White people outnumbered the black people greatly, including members of the National Guard who used planes to drop nitroglycerin bombs on the black citizens. When it was over, 35 blocks and over 600 homes had been destroyed. The official death toll was 26 black victims, but estimates range as high as 500. Be on the lookout for the upcoming film, “Tulsa 1921.”

The Colfax Massacre

Another election-related massacre in 1872, where the black citizens of Colfax, LA, were under the misconception that Reconstruction was still ongoing and they could vote: Democrats and the Klan, which were often the same. Using rifles and a cannon, they surrounded the black people in the local courthouse, killing some and taking dozens captive for several hours before ultimately killing them too. A few of the perpetrators were convicted but ultimately freed after the US Supreme Court declared the Fourteenth Amendment only applied to the government and not individuals, nullifying rights previously passed by Congress to protect the Civil Rights of black people.

Sand Creek Massacre (1864)

The Sand Creek Massacre unfolded on November 29, 1864, when Colonel John Chivington led roughly 700 Colorado volunteer cavalrymen in a surprise attack on a peaceful Cheyenne and Arapaho village camped along Sand Creek in southeastern Colorado Territory.

The village, led by Black Kettle, was flying both a white flag of truce and an American flag — symbols meant to signal their intent to negotiate and remain under U.S. protection. Despite this, Chivington ordered his men to advance. What followed was a brutal assault that killed more than 150 Native people, the vast majority of them women, children, and elders.

Survivors described soldiers pursuing people into the creek bed, killing indiscriminately, and mutilating bodies. News of the massacre sparked national outrage once eyewitness accounts reached the East Coast. Multiple federal investigations condemned the attack as an atrocity, with one congressional committee calling it “a foul and dastardly massacre,” yet no one was criminally punished.

The event deepened distrust between Native nations and the U.S. government, fueling decades of conflict on the Plains. For the Cheyenne and Arapaho, Sand Creek remains a defining trauma — a moment when promises of peace were betrayed, and entire families were destroyed under the banner of U.S. military authority.

Opelousas Massacre

In the fall of 1968, several black men from Opelousas, LA, attempted to join the local Democratic Party in nearby Washington. They were rejected, and the local unit of the Knights of the White Camellia (Klan) gathered to oppose them. An 18-year-old white teacher wrote an article and invited blacks to become Republicans. He was beaten nearly to death and fled to the North.

Thinking the teacher had been killed, blacks marched on the courthouse, some armed although they didn’t have the same right as white citizens to bear arms. After a confrontation, 29 black people were taken prisoner and put in jail. Twenty-seven of them were killed, touching off weeks of the Klan randomly killing black people in the area. When it was over, Republicans said 200–300 black people had been murdered, Democrats put the number between 25–30, presumably not including the original 27 removed from the jail and then killed.

Hanapepe Massacre

Kaua’i, Hawaii, was a paradise in 1924, unless you worked on the sugar plantations. The newest minorities on the block were from the Philippines, having less status than the Chinese and native Hawaiians. By 1922, the Filipinos had begun to organize, and in 1924, a strike was called, demanding $2 a day and an 8-hour workday. Ultimately, strikers were assaulted by police with clubs and guns (the strikers were unarmed). Fourteen Filipinos and four policemen were killed. It goes without saying that the Courts sided with the companies in denying the workers a living wage.

Chinese Massacre

It struck me as ironic that this massacre broke out on Calle de los Negros (Street of the Negroes). Black and mulatto people had been displaced by the Chinese in what could graciously be called a slum. Chinese residents had little protection from whites, as laws had been passed prohibiting them from testifying against white people. An incident occurred, and a white policeman was injured, blowing his whistle for reinforcements. When it was over, between 17–20 Chines had been hanged and displayed in multiple locations. They didn’t suffer as they’d been shot and killed first. Ten of the mob of over 500 were arrested, and eight were convicted of manslaughter. The convictions were all later thrown out on technicalities—no justice, no justice, never any justice.

Elaine Massacre

The Elaine Massacre erupted in Phillips County, Arkansas, in late September 1919, when Black sharecroppers gathered in a rural church to organize for fair payment for their cotton harvests. Their efforts threatened the exploitative plantation system that had dominated the Delta since Reconstruction. A confrontation outside the church — still disputed in its details — became the spark white planters needed.

Within hours, posses of armed white men, joined by federal troops, descended on the area. Over the next several days, they killed an estimated 100 to 200 Black residents, making it one of the deadliest racial massacres in American history. Most of the victims were not involved in the labor organizing at all; they were simply Black people living in the wrong place at the wrong time.

In the massacre’s aftermath, authorities arrested more than a hundred Black men and charged them with inciting insurrection. Twelve were swiftly sentenced to death in trials that lasted minutes, with coerced confessions and no meaningful defense. The NAACP intervened, launching a national campaign that eventually led to the landmark Supreme Court case Moore v. Dempsey (1923), which ruled that mob‑dominated trials violated due process.

Though the ruling saved the defendants’ lives, it did not undo the devastation inflicted on the Black community in Elaine. The massacre stands as a stark reminder of how racial violence, economic exploitation, and the legal system intertwined to suppress Black political and economic power in the Jim Crow South.

Wilmington Coup & Massacre

The Wilmington Coup and Massacre of 1898 was a planned, coordinated overthrow of Wilmington’s elected multiracial Fusionist government by white supremacist leaders who used months of propaganda, intimidation, and paramilitary organizing to justify violence. On November 10, white mobs burned the Daily Record, killed dozens of Black residents, and forced the mayor and aldermen to resign at gunpoint, installing their own slate of officials in the only successful coup d’état in U.S. history.

In the aftermath, thousands of Black residents fled the city, their businesses and political power destroyed. At the same time, the coup’s leaders faced no consequences and went on to shape North Carolina’s Jim Crow regime. Wilmington — once a thriving Black-majority city — was transformed through violence, disenfranchisement, and state-sanctioned erasure, leaving a legacy that shaped the state’s racial and political landscape for generations.

Ludlow Massacre

The Ludlow Massacre occurred on April 20, 1914, during a violent confrontation between striking coal miners and the Colorado National Guard near Ludlow, Colorado. The miners — many of them immigrants from southern and eastern Europe — had been evicted from company housing after demanding safer working conditions, fair pay, and the right to unionize. They and their families lived in a tent colony that had become the symbolic center of the strike. Tensions escalated as the Colorado Fuel & Iron Company, owned by the Rockefeller family, hired private guards and pressured the state to intervene. On the morning of the attack, Guardsmen opened fire on the camp, and the fighting continued for hours as miners attempted to defend their families.

By the end of the day, the tent colony had been burned to the ground, and at least twenty people were dead, including two women and eleven children who suffocated in a pit where they had taken shelter. The massacre ignited national outrage and triggered a broader wave of violence known as the Colorado Coalfield War, as miners across the region retaliated against company property and guards. Although no one was held criminally responsible for the killings, the Ludlow Massacre became a turning point in American labor history, galvanizing public support for workers’ rights and contributing to later reforms in labor law and workplace protections.

Bear River Massacre

The Bear River Massacre took place on January 29, 1863, when U.S. Army troops under Colonel Patrick Connor attacked a winter encampment of the Northwestern Shoshone near present‑day Preston, Idaho. The Shoshone had been suffering through a harsh winter, facing food shortages and escalating tensions with settlers who were encroaching on their homelands. Connor’s forces launched a dawn assault that quickly overwhelmed the camp. What began as a brief firefight turned into a rout as soldiers pursued fleeing families into the river bottoms, killing indiscriminately. By the end of the attack, an estimated 250 to 400 Shoshone men, women, and children were dead, making it one of the deadliest massacres of Native people in U.S. history.

In the aftermath, the Army framed the massacre as a battle, and Connor was praised and promoted, while the Shoshone survivors were left devastated, displaced, and without justice. The massacre shattered the Northwestern Shoshone’s ability to sustain themselves on their ancestral lands, accelerating their forced dependence on government rations and missionary control. For generations, the event was minimized or omitted from official histories. Still, it remains a defining trauma for the Shoshone people — a stark example of how federal policy, settler expansion, and military force combined to destroy Indigenous communities in the American West.

Mountain Meadows Massacre

The Mountain Meadows Massacre occurred in September 1857, when a wagon train of emigrant families from Arkansas — known as the Baker‑Fancher party — was traveling through southern Utah on its way to California. At the time, tensions between the U.S. government and the Mormon leadership in Utah Territory were extremely high, with rumors of invasion and martial law shaping local fears. In this climate, a group of Mormon militia members, aided by Paiute allies, surrounded the emigrants at Mountain Meadows and initiated a siege that lasted several days. The emigrants attempted to defend themselves, believing they were under attack by Native groups, unaware of the militia’s involvement.

On September 11, the militia leaders orchestrated a deceptive plan: they approached the emigrants under a white flag, promising safe passage if the group surrendered their weapons. Once the emigrants complied, the militia separated the men, women, and older children and then carried out a coordinated killing of nearly all of them — around 120 people. Only a small number of very young children were spared. In the aftermath, territorial leaders attempted to conceal the militia’s role, blaming the massacre entirely on Paiute warriors. It took decades for the truth to emerge, and only one participant, John D. Lee, was eventually tried and executed. The massacre remains one of the most painful and controversial episodes in the history of the American West, illustrating how fear, isolation, and religious extremism can converge with devastating consequences.

When I say these were limited examples, I was underestimating. The history we’re not taught paints a far different picture than who we are. Legislators in Texas are trying to impose yet another history on us in which American Exceptionalism is to be highlighted, and slavery was like summer camp. The next time we want to point out other nations' failure to discuss their history honestly. We should take a closer look at our own.

Roasting celebrities and comedians has become a common way to create buzz and make some quick money. I remember watching a few as a teenager, and being shocked that the comedian was expected to sit there, not because it was so offensive, but because the origins of the roast called for a response.

If you are going to roast me, I’m going to roast you back.

What we think of as a “roast” has its origins in the 1940s in New York, but the true history goes further back.

The roast has gone by many names: roasting, cracking, and snapping are all terms I’ve heard in my lifetime. However, as far as I can tell, it was originally called "playing the dozens" in America.

It is intellectual sparring with the sharpest mental blade. The goal is to verbally tear down your opponent before they can take you out.

The game likely originated in West Africa and made its way to America during the slave trade. The name likely came from slaves with disabilities or weaknesses being sold “by the dozen.”

Allegedly, the game was meant to prepare children for life’s stresses. If you can’t handle someone telling “yo momma jokes,” you may not be ready for the real world.

Playing the dozens was a formative part of my childhood, and if I’m being honest, it did make me stronger. As a nerdy kid living in the projects, it was my best tool against bullies. They could outnumber me. Some of them were bigger than me. I even had to worry about retaliation if I beat them in a fight. However, if I beat them in a verbal battle and they retaliated, they were soft. They couldn’t handle a “yo momma joke.”

The dozens grew into the celebrity roast we see today. On the surface, they are harmless. However, the simple rule of sitting there and taking it no matter what someone says is starting to show its cracks.

For me, the roast of Kevin Hart went too far.

“Right now, George Floyd is looking up at us all laughing so hard he can’t breathe,” said comedian Tony Hinchcliffe. He is white.

This was a joke Hinchliffe made when referring to Kevin Hart’s career at the roast. His delivery was mediocre, and it was mid-level middle school humor at best.

Hinchcliffe is known to me because he occasionally says racist stuff. He was first brought to my attention by a student who was complaining about his Puerto Rico “joke”. He called it a “floating island of garbage.” This was especially upsetting to the student because Hinchcliffe was the warm-up act for one of Donald Trump’s rallies.

Trump's treatment of many minority groups, especially Hispanic people, is no secret.

Let me say this now. I support freedom of speech. I have no problem with Tony getting on stage and saying racist stuff in hopes of shocking people into laughter. However, the audience also has the right to dislike what is being said, and we can also judge what is being said based on the history of the person.

A white man who supports Trump made a joke about George Floyd being in hell after he was brutally murdered by cops…at a Black comedian’s roast.

The joke wasn’t even funny.

“Tony reminds me of Charlie Kirk, in that he’s definitely been on camera letting a guy unload in his throat,” said Pete Davidson.

Some of the people who criticized Tony loved Davidson’s joke. I will tell you the difference. Both jokes are edgy and depend on shock value to be funny, but the difference is that Pete’s is clever and actually funny.

Stay with me.

Davidson is poking fun at the homophobic types who are secretly gay. Tony has been accused of this. Davidson then pairs this with the murder of Kirk, who was shot in the neck on camera.

It is clever, but if I’m being honest, I don’t think either joke was worth it even with my disdain for Kirk. (Read more about my thoughts on Charlie Kirk here.)

Roasting the dead

Where I come from, most things were fair game in playing the dozens, but one thing you never did was speak ill of the dead. If you did this, throwing hands was the only response.

A student was recently expelled for fighting. When he told me that people were talking about his dead brother, I understood why he felt he had no choice. As an adult, I said what I was supposed to say. “What do you think your brother wants for you?”

However, I already knew his response. “What would my brother think if I walked away?”

I’m not sure I could have sat and supported a show with Tony Hinchcliffe joking about the murder of George Floyd. Kevin Hart sat there and laughed at Tony’s unfunny joke.

Sadly, Hart even defended Tony after the show.

Too far is the point?

“Would I tell those jokes? No. But do I get why they’re being told? Yes. I’m not looking at Pete crazy….I’m not looking at Tony. I know what you’re going to do. I know your style of comedy,” -Kevin Hart.

Hart believes that “going too far” is the point of the joke.

I’m not so sure this makes for a good comedian. I always found the skill of comedy was finding the line and dancing on it. Once you cross the line, you lose the audience. That used to be the fault of the comedian. Now, we have comedians saying if you don’t like a joke, you are too “woke” or against free speech or whatever.

I disagree. You can do your bad joke, but don’t complain when you receive backlash.

I grew up on Dave Chappelle. I had so much respect for him. When he made his return, I was thrilled. I thought he went a little heavy on the trans jokes, but it was a hot topic. I admit I laughed…then he did another special full of trans jokes…and another special…and slowly his audience dwindled.

Did he blame himself? Nope. He blamed the fans even though so many were with him and ready to give him the benefit of the doubt because he had so much goodwill.

Is roasting a problem?

I grew up roasting. I even believe there is some truth behind roasting building strength and character, but I also think of how roasting breaks kids.

If the roastee isn’t fully engaged in the game, do you know another name for roasting?

Bullying.

When I was roasting, it wasn’t because I was “in on the joke.” I was the outcast. I used it to defend myself.

My sister also experienced the roast, and she didn’t adapt as easily. She cried, and this only made her a bigger target.

I’m not saying roasting is all bad, but we must reestablish the rules of engagement. Keep the focus on the people in the room. George Floyd was not in that room.

Dead people, especially the recently deceased, are off limits. If the line is crossed, repercussions should be expected.

Despite a good joke, Pete went to far for me. Tony, however, did what he usually does. He disrespected an entire culture that he isn’t a part of and doesn’t understand. One day he is going to catch the hands.

Freedom of speech does not mean freedom of repercussions.