The city of Jacksonville, Florida, is reeling from the racist killing of three Black people at a Dollar General on Saturday, after a white gunman targeted a historically Black neighborhood with weapons emblazoned with swastikas, authorities said. This weekend was already a notorious one for Black Jacksonville, falling on the 63rd anniversary of one of […]
racism
Tulsa Massacre Survivor Becomes Oldest Woman in the World to Release a Memoir
Editor’s Note: This story was originally published by The 19th in 2023. Viola Ford Fletcher, the oldest living survivor of the Tulsa Race Massacre, died at 111 years old Monday. More than 100 years later, Viola Fletcher can still vividly remember the smell of her thriving neighborhood — dubbed America’s “Black Wall Street” — burning. Fletcher, now […]
In a Push for Race-Neutral Policies, Black Americans Will Be Left Behind, Experts Fear
As conservative lawmakers attempt to roll back policies aimed at a more equitable America, a new report emphasizes the need for race-conscious policies to improve economic conditions for Black Americans. Released this week, the Economic Policy Institute report says that race-neutral policies won’t adequately provide solutions to eliminate economic disparities. Although Black Americans have seen […]
From Racial Slurs to Lynching Jokes, New Lawsuit Details Alleged Racism in Nursing Home
Courtney Love was a few months into her job as a nursing assistant at Florala Health and Rehabilitation in Alabama when it became clear that the racism and abuse ran deeper here than the other facilities she had worked in. The insults piled on, according to a federal lawsuit filed last week, coming to a […]
How Alabama and the Politics of Retribution Limit Black Representation
Alabama is becoming fertile ground for the dilution of Black voters’ political power, experts say. Last week, the state’s Republican leaders refused to comply with the U.S. Supreme Court’s order to redraw a congressional map to include two majority-Black districts. Gov. Kay Ivey approved a map with just one majority-Black district. While Black Alabamians make […]
A Black Man Was Elected Mayor in Rural Alabama, but the White Town Leaders Won’t Let Him Serve
NEWBERN, Ala. — There’s a power struggle in Newbern, Alabama, and the rural town’s first Black mayor is at war with the previous administration who he says locked him out of Town Hall. After years of racist harassment and intimidation, Patrick Braxton is fed up, and in a federal civil rights lawsuit he is accusing […]
When White Nationalism and Patriotism Collide
White nationalism often leverages the language of patriotism and love — “protecting” the U.S., “reclaiming” the U.S. — as a vehicle for racial bigotry. And the dangers of the ideology show no signs of shrinking this year: the throngs of “patriots” marching through cities, the gunman who turned a mall into a slaughterhouse, the plots […]
Why the Warning Against BMI Won’t Ease Bias Toward Black Patients
The American Medical Association’s recent warning against the use of body mass index may be a step in the right direction — but longtime critics of the metric worry it won’t fix bias in health care assessments. It has been criticized for years because of its racist history, and many advocates and dietitians have questioned […]
We need to rethink discipline in schools
This story was produced in partnership with Vox as part of the discrimination issue of The Highlight. For many Black children, their first encounter with the discrimination that will trail them their whole lives comes from the school system — a system where they are five times more likely to attend a segregated school than their white counterparts. […]
80% of Black Women Experience Fibroids. Does Racial Trauma Play a Role?
This story was produced in partnership with Vox as part of the discrimination issue of The Highlight. Comedian Dulcé Sloan took to Twitter recently with a burning health question: “Soooo EVERY black woman has fibroids,” she wrote, injecting a bit of hyperbole, “and no one knows why?!” The tweet sparked a flurry of responses theorizing why 80% of […]
