The Rust Belt sure Googles the word “n*gger” a lot

Where people Google "nigger"

Via here, and ultimately here: West of the Mississippi is a bastion of non-hate, eh? Well, somewhat I guess. (That’s why it’s a good place to go find a spouse.) The Rust Belt, well … SMDH. It might be a… Continue Reading

Jay-Z offers one of the best summaries of The War on Drugs

Jay Z War on Drugs

I went to Montreal for New Year’s Eve 2008 to 2009. First word of caution: don’t go to Montreal for New Year’s Eve. It’s a beautiful city and it has a tremendous food/beer culture, but … on December 31 of a given… Continue Reading

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Exploring white attitudes on African-Americans in prisons

The whole topic of racial attitudes around incarnation is very fraught — and also very complicated, as entire bodies of research are penned on it across people’s careers. I can’t begin to scratch the surface. I do know this, as… Continue Reading

There are more minorities than whites in U.S. public schools

Here’s a new report from NCES; it has a lot of data points on U.S. public school demographics between here and 2022, and this, summarized in Quartz, might be the most interesting: this fall, Hispanics + Asians + African-Americans + Native… Continue Reading

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Is Craig Watkins’ Conviction Integrity unit in Dallas going to fundamentally change how the justice system works? Damn, let’s hope.

So far, it’s helped exonerate 33 wrongfully-convicted inmates, and the idea of a ‘Conviction Integrity Unit’ has spread to 11 other major U.S. cities, including New York, Detroit, and Cleveland. Here’s the money quote: “In 10 years we’ll look back… Continue Reading

Mark Cuban is a racist? Nope. Mark Cuban was trying to have a conversation. That’s actually a good thing.

There’s the clip. The story that spun off of this alternates between “Mark Cuban is a racist” and “Mark Cuban stirred the racial climate.” In reality, this whole Mark Cuban thing represents two bad elements of society — but not what you’re… Continue Reading

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60 years since Brown vs. Board of Education, and only about 12 percent of African-American/Latino students in major cities have any exposure to white students. Um…

I don’t think you need to have seen The Wire Season 4 to understand this, but perhaps that would help a little depending on your specific background with education (and where you grew up): The UCLA report notes that Latino students are the… Continue Reading

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Brief thought exercise: is ridesharing service Uber racist, or the antithesis of racism?

I really like Uber, but there are two distinct ways to look at it along the “Are they potentially racist or not?” spectrum. Here’s a simple breakdown. Feel free to offer thoughts in comments. Maybe they are: In most (not all) communities, taxi… Continue Reading