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Sunday, May 31, 2020
Black Girl Magic @ MIT
An excerpt from CNN -
MIT elects first black woman student body president in its 159-year history
By David Williams
Danielle Geathers will be the president of the Undergraduate Association at MIT
where about 6 percent of the graduates are black and 47 percent women, according to the school.
Students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have elected a black woman as president of the Undergraduate Association for the first time in the school's history.
Danielle Geathers and running mate Yu Jing Chen won the student government election earlier this month.
Geathers just finished her sophomore year at MIT and is majoring in mechanical engineering. She served as the diversity officer last year.
"In terms of coming from that diversity space and being focused on promoting equity across MIT, it would kind of be important to have someone in the President's role who's focused on that," she said.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/29/us/mit-black-woman-student-president-trnd/index.html
The Added Burden of Keeping Up Appearances
An excerpt from Medium -
Maintaining Professionalism In The Age of Black Death Is….A Lot
I just witnessed the lynching of a black man, but don’t worry Ted, I’ll have those deliverables to you end of day.
By Shenequa Golding
Between Amy Cooper’s Oscar worthy Central Park performance, Ahmaud Arbery shooting death in Georgia, Breonna Taylor’s assassination inside her Louisville home, and the Minneapolis murder of George Floyd, black people in America are running on fumes.
We’re tired, angry, confused and yet, this space is familiar to us. This place of torment and trauma has become a home of sorts. The cycle begins in the far corners of Twitter with rumblings of a killing. Then a recording of the victim’s last moments pop up and shortly after, we finally learn the person’s name.
A new name to add to a growing list no one wants to be part of.
Sparks of outrage, disgust and bewilderment soon follow. Maybe a protest happens, and in the case of Floyd, uprisings. Men and women ballooned with righteous anger take to the streets to make their presence known; to scorch earth and shout from the pits of their belly to the top of their lungs that their lives matter. Whether the powers that be hear or acknowledge their chants is one thing, but it’s the community formed by the injustice of another black death that acts as a temporary solve.
And while some of us take to the streets, the rest of us have to hide these shared feelings behind professionalism.
https://medium.com/@shenequagolding/maintaining-professionalism-in-the-age-of-black-death-is-a-lot-5eaec5e17585
NETFLIX Supports BLM
To be silent is to be complicit.
— Netflix (@netflix) May 30, 2020
Black lives matter.
We have a platform, and we have a duty to our Black members, employees, creators and talent to speak up.
HULU Supports Black Lives
We support Black lives. Today, and every day. You are seen. You are heard. And we are with you.
— Hulu (@hulu) May 31, 2020
Pushed to the Edge
An excerpt from the LA Times -
Op-Ed: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: Don’t understand the protests? What you’re seeing is people pushed to the edge
By Kareem Abdul-Jabar
What was your first reaction when you saw the video of the white cop kneeling on George Floyd’s neck while Floyd croaked, “I can’t breathe”?
If you’re white, you probably muttered a horrified, “Oh, my God” while shaking your head at the cruel injustice. If you’re black, you probably leapt to your feet, cursed, maybe threw something (certainly wanted to throw something), while shouting, “Not @#$%! again!” Then you remember the two white vigilantes accused of murdering Ahmaud Arbery as he jogged through their neighborhood in February, and how if it wasn’t for that video emerging a few weeks ago, they would have gotten away with it. And how those Minneapolis cops claimed Floyd was resisting arrest but a store’s video showed he wasn’t. And how the cop on Floyd’s neck wasn’t an enraged redneck stereotype, but a sworn officer who looked calm and entitled and devoid of pity: the banality of evil incarnate.
Maybe you also are thinking about the Karen in Central Park who called 911 claiming the black man who asked her to put a leash on her dog was threatening her. Or the black Yale University grad student napping in the common room of her dorm who was reported by a white student. Because you realize it’s not just a supposed “black criminal” who is targeted, it’s the whole spectrum of black faces from Yonkers to Yale.
You start to wonder if it should be all black people who wear body cams, not the cops.
What do you see when you see angry black protesters amassing outside police stations with raised fists? If you’re white, you may be thinking, “They certainly aren’t social distancing.” Then you notice the black faces looting Target and you think, “Well, that just hurts their cause.” Then you see the police station on fire and you wag a finger saying, “That’s putting the cause backward.”
You’re not wrong — but you’re not right, either. The black community is used to the institutional racism inherent in education, the justice system and jobs. And even though we do all the conventional things to raise public and political awareness — write articulate and insightful pieces in the Atlantic, explain the continued devastation on CNN, support candidates who promise change — the needle hardly budges.
https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2020-05-30/dont-understand-the-protests-what-youre-seeing-is-people-pushed-to-the-edge
Saturday, May 30, 2020
We Keep Reliving the Same Nightmare
I've included a snippet, but this article is too good to cherry-pick. I hope you'll have the time to read it in its entirety.
A lynching without a rope — and in America, that’s nothing new
It used to be racist mobs. Now it’s racist cops. Watch Donald Trump pivot from 100,000 dead to "law and order"
By LUCIAN K. TRUSCOTT IV
Today, in 2020, it's George Floyd in Minneapolis, killed by a police officer kneeling on his throat during an arrest for the alleged offense of "forgery." Cell phone cameras captured the whole thing. Images of a handcuffed black man lying face-down on the street, under the knee of a white police officer, quickly flew around the world. Rioting broke out on Wednesday and Thursday nights. Stores were looted. Buildings burned. Early on Friday morning, fires burned at the Third Police Precinct in Minneapolis, where the four officers present at the death of George Floyd were assigned.
But long before there were cell phone cameras, there were black men and black boys, and there were cops who beat them or killed them, and there were riots in the streets of cities where the killings took place. What followed was as predictable as it was pathetic. Governors issued lamentations and called for "understanding" and "unity." Stores and buildings destroyed during the rioting were rebuilt. Occasionally, official "commissions" were empaneled to "study" the cause of the violence, and lame pledges were made that we've got to do better.
https://www.salon.com/2020/05/30/a-lynching-without-a-rope--and-in-america-thats-nothing-new/
How Much Time Do You Want?
How much time do you want, for your progress pic.twitter.com/zq7edBylnc
— Qasim Rashid for Congress (@QasimRashid) May 29, 2020
She Did It!
An excerpt from People -
Yale Student Who Grew Up Homeless Reveals How She Achieved Goals: 'Keep Your Eyes on the Prize'
Chelesa Fearce's mother experienced a health battle that led to a series of financial difficulties
By Susan Young
It’s a big leap from homeless teen to Yale medical school student, but perseverance paid off Chelesa Fearce of Clayton County, Georgia.
“Just keep your eyes on the prize,” Fearce, now 24, tells PEOPLE. “You can’t get stuck in the moment and worry about the right now."
"You always have to think about your future and what inspires you," she adds. "That’s helped me get through.”
Fearce was a fourth grader when her mom, early childhood education teacher Reenita Shephard, was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. That began a financial spiral for the mother of four.
“People don’t realize it can happen to anybody,” Fearce says.
She and her family moved in and out of shelters, hotels and even the family car.
https://people.com/human-interest/yale-student-who-grew-up-homeless-reveals-how-she-achieved-goals/
Radio Silence From College Football Coaches
An excerpt from USA Today -
Opinion: College football coaches scared to speak, stand with players in conversations on racism, police brutality
By Dan Wolken
The profession that sells leadership and toughness as if it were a TED Talk was largely silent on Friday.
The profession that relies on the talent of young African-American men to keep millions of dollars flowing to lavish athletics budgets and bloated salaries took a pass on the national conversation around racism, police brutality and unequal treatment before the law.
The profession that drones on and on about becoming a man and doing the hard things decided to sit this one out.
On a day where athletes across many sports were speaking out, just a few prominent college football coaches tackled this painful moment.
The murder of George Floyd and the subsequent protests that have brought us — again — to this miserable place as a country is apparently too hot for most coaches to handle. The pressure to take a public stand about how we need to change as a society, as a culture, was left to the young people, many of whom are grieving and scared. The guys making millions of dollars? They were mostly sending tweets about recruiting, as if the entire concept of George Floyd wasn’t something that was hitting home at that very moment with every black player they recruited and promised to fight for.
Where’s their fight now? Where’s the truth? It certainly wasn’t on social media, where hardly any head coaches even acknowledged that something was desperately wrong in America.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/college/columnist/dan-wolken/2020/05/29/college-football-coaches-silent-george-floyd-and-police-brutality/5287206002/
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