Month: March 2017

This image is as inspiring as Viola Davis’ Oscar-winning speech.

The actress only has a kindergarten photo to show of her childhood because her family was too poor to own a camera, People noted in its cover story preview on Wednesday.

And like the amazing characters Davis has portrayed, the picture tells a story.

“I have this expression on my face — it’s not a smile, it’s not a frown,” Davis told the magazine. “I swear to you, that’s the girl who wakes up in the morning and who looks around her house and her life saying, ‘I cannot believe how God has blessed me.’”

Davis’ indomitable spirit shined through in her speech at the Oscars Sunday after she won Best Supporting Actress for playing the put-upon wife Rose in “Fences.”

“I became an artist, and thank God I did, because we are the only profession that celebrates what it means to live a life,” the 51-year-old performer said after receiving her first Academy Award following two previous nominations.

At a 2014 Power In Women event, Davis described the “abject poverty” in which she grew up.

“I have stolen for food. I have jumped in huge garbage bins with maggots for food,” she said. “I have befriended people in the neighborhood, who I knew had mothers who cooked three meals a day for food, and I sacrificed a childhood for food and grew up in immense shame.”

That kid in the photo did pretty damn well for herself. 

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Coretta Scott King began trending on Twitter late Wednesday shortly after the Washington Post reported that Attorney General Jeff Sessions had undisclosed contacts with a Russian official last year.

The civil rights hero and widow of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had written a letter opposing Sessions’ nomination for a federal judgeship in 1986 when he was a U.S. attorney. The nomination was killed by the Senate over allegations of racism, including those mentioned in the letter from King, which claimed he “used the awesome powers of his office in a shabby attempt to intimidate and frighten elderly black voters.”

Last month, while speaking out against Sessions’ nomination, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) was silenced by Republicans for reading the same letter on the Senate floor. 

Now, Twitter users are envisioning King, who died in 2006, getting the last word. Here’s a sampling: 

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Who cleans and tidies up the house matters in a relationship. In fact, a 2015 study from the University of Alberta found that couples who didn’t split chores had less relationship satisfaction and less sex than couples who divvied up their chores. (Yikes, time to start tidying up, y’all.)

Still, seeing eye-to-eye on chores is easier said than done when you’re hyper organized and your partner lives a life of complete chaos and clutter. How do you bridge that divide and keep your home spick–and–span? Below, marriage therapists and people in messy-organized relationships share their very best advice. 

1. Resist the urge to lecture the messy partner. 

“De-cluttering is so trendy right now, it’s easy to think people who drop their clothes on the floor or treat furniture as filing cabinets are morally inferior to those who crave order. But before you start in with your lecture on how messiness is the root of all evil, consider this: your need to have things tidy and organized might actually be making your partner anxious. How would you respond if your significant other accused you of having OCD? You’d probably feel misunderstood and not particularly motivated to relax your standards. Instead of lecturing, focus on finding ways to address your different needs.” ― Virginia Gilbert, a marriage and family therapist based in Los Angeles

2. Give the messy partner their own messy personal space, whether it’s a room or a drawer.

“If I left my pile of junk mail in the kitchen, my wife would get pretty frustrated, so I leave it in my office with the door closed. This way, the house stays clutter-free. I used to resist having a small space of my own because I thought it shouldn’t be a big deal to leave a few things lying around. Once I realized her cleanliness isn’t some sort of statement against me, it became much easier for each of us to reach a compromise.” ― Nick Pavlidis, author of Confessions Of A Terrible Husband: Lessons Learned from a Lumpy Couch 

3. Create a Google chore calendar. (Don’t forget to send notifications!)

”It’s common for couples to fight about when to take out the garbage or when to do the laundry ― timing issues. These can easily be fixed by having a chore chart or Google doc and letting the family, kids included, choose their own time to knock out their responsibilities.” ― Tina B. Tessina, a psychotherapist and author of How To Be A Couple And Still Be Free 

4. Remember: You love this person, messiness and all. 

“It’s simple: If you have a partner who supports you, loves you unconditionally, helps you take care of the kids and pay the bills, is kind to your mother and even does your Costco returns, cut them some slack for the underwear by the bed.” ― Galina Nemirovsky, writer at Hearts Everywhere

5. Make a joke out of it. 

“Don’t get stuck in the mud when you find yourself frustrated by the mess. Find humor in the situation. This is who you married. If you can, laugh with your partner about their disorganized ways.” ― Anne Crowley, a psychologist in Austin, Texas

6. Come to a clutter compromise.

“I’m the tidier spouse. To make our marriage last ― and we celebrate 15 years in 2017 ― we’ve had to agree to meet halfway on a number of issues. I no longer complain about the toilet paper roll not being replaced. I’m also less interested in changing her behavior now than I am in helping her understand that for me, to be happy at home there needs to be a base level of order. She, in turn, promised to not leave her cups of half empty tea scattered around the home ― I despise the smell of old tea ― and to respect the man my mother made me: a guy who can not relax if jackets are strewn about the sofa or shoes aren’t side-bye-side by the front door.”  ― Jeff Bogle, blogger at Out With The Kid

7. Ask your partner to be more organized and be OK with their version of neat. 

“I ask my neat and orderly clients to stand back and look at how they came up with the idea that things should be a certain way in the first place. I also tell them if messiness causes them anxiety, they have three choices that are healthy: One: Straighten up the place with a loving heart. Two: Make a request of your partner to be more organized, but be OK with whatever results from this. And lastly, learn to overcome any anxiety their rules are creating for them.” ― Becky Whetstone, a marriage family therapist in Little Rock, Arkansas

8. Recognize that your messy spouse may be set in his or her way. 

“As far as I’m concerned, everything has a place and there is a place for everything. When I need a pair of pliers or some Super Glue, I know where to find it almost instantly. My wife will open some packaged item with a pair of scissors and leave the scissors and package remains on the table and walk away. I know there is no way to change her; it’s either in her DNA, or it’s a can’t-teach-an-old -dog-new-tricks thing.” ― Bill Flanigin, writer and teacher

9. If you’re the messy partner, try to contain the chaos.

“My partner can sometimes be overwhelmed by all the stuff everywhere. Once a day, I shift my perspective and see the mess as my husband might. I spend 10 minutes consolidating the chaos, whether that be finishing the task, putting the shoes away or simply adding the paperwork to my ever-growing personal to-do pile. This goes a long way toward creating a peaceful space for my husband.” ― Kate Chapman, writer at The Life In Process

 10. Have a sense of humor about the situation.

“When I put away the clothes my partner has left hanging over a chair or on a banister or on the floor, I treat is like a rose-petal trail of sorts. A dirty, ragged, rose-petal trail. As I go through the house doing this I think to myself, ‘she left this in this very spot because she wants me to feel close to her even when I am not.’ Sure, most of the time she is eight feet away from me as I pick these things up but it can become quite the romantic adventure to think that one day, I’ll pick up a pair of socks, look up and see a candlelit dinner set out on top of the washing machine.” ― Mike Reynolds, blogger at Puzzling Posts

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

The Best Picture debacle at the 89th Academy Awards is a moment that will forever be cemented in Oscar history.

The awkwardness of the situation robbed “Moonlight” and its creators of fully embracing and enjoying their moment in the sun.

Due to the mix-up, Barry Jenkins, the director of “Moonlight,” and producers were forced to make haphazard speeches while still visibly in shock, instead of speaking more deliberately about a film that explores issues with race and sexuality in the U.S. — which just happened to win Best Picture a year after the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite trended on Twitter.

“Very clearly, very clearly, even in my dreams this could not be true,” Jenkins said onstage. “But to hell with dreams, I’m done with it, because this is true. Oh, my goodness.”

He also added later: “There was a time when I thought this movie was impossible because I couldn’t bring it to fruition. I couldn’t bring myself to tell another story. So everyone behind me on this stage said, ‘No, that is not acceptable.’ So I just want to thank everyone up here behind me. Everyone out there in that room because we didn’t do this, you guys chose us. Thank you for the choice, I appreciate it.”

Jenkins spoke to Entertainment Weekly the day after the Oscars and admitted that he made an “imperfect statement that didn’t come out the right way.” He shared with EW and The Hollywood Reporter what he really wanted to say in his speech.

Under different circumstances, it would have sounded a little like this: 

If only we would have been able to hear that on live TV.

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

The Supreme Court largely ruled on Wednesday for a group of Democratic Virginia residents in a racial gerrymandering case that could have a big impact on legal challenges to GOP-led redistricting efforts throughout the country.

In the wake of the 2010 census, Republican legislators in Virginia redrew 12 House of Delegates districts so that 55 percent of their population consisted of African-Americans of voting age. But a group of Democratic residents from those districts pushed back in court, arguing that the lawmakers focused too much on the race of the voters rather than other, race-neutral criteria for putting them in those districts.

The Constitution prohibits drawing legislative maps on account of race, a practice known as racial gerrymandering, whenever race is the “predominant” factor in redistricting decisions. But the Supreme Court has also recognized that state legislators should have some leeway to draw districts that take race into account to allow minority voters to have a shot at electing candidates of their choosing. 

In 2015, a three-judge federal court determined that 11 of the 12 Virginia districts didn’t amount to racial gerrymanders. But in a near-unanimous decision Wednesday, the Supreme Court asked the lower court to reassess those districts ― while declining to rule the maps unconstitutional outright.

“The District Court is best positioned to determine in the first instance the extent to which, under the proper standard, race directed the shape of these 11 districts,” Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote, refusing to take the next step and pass judgment on how the districts were drawn.

Kennedy acknowledged that redistricting “is a most difficult subject for legislatures,” but reaffirmed the principle that lower courts should look at “racial predominance” when addressing racial gerrymandering ― a complex, fact-intensive test that considers the district’s shape, demographics and other “traditional redistricting criteria.”

Richard Hasen, an election law expert at the University of California, Irvine, characterized the ruling as “more of a punt than a major decision,” noted that the coming “fight will be over the details and application to particular cases.”

But Marc Elias, the Democratic lawyer who represented the Virginia voters and argued the case before the Supreme Court in December, said the ruling will have a bigger impact on the ground than commentators let on.

“Rick’s analysis ignores the vulnerability GOP maps have throughout the country under this ruling,” Elias wrote on Twitter, and predicted that similar challenges will pop up elsewhere as a result of Wednesday’s ruling.

Elias, alongside former Attorney General Eric Holder, is part of a Democratic coalition that’s seeking to use redistricting challenges to turn the tide of aggressive gerrymandering efforts in Republican-led statehouses across the country.

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

In watching the press fawn over Trump’s performance in front of Congress, I wondered how collective journalistic amnesia could have so suddenly swept over even progressive journalists and pundits. I’m not talking about just “lowering the bar,” I’m talking about Trump himself telling us exactly how he would execute his con a year ago in Waterbury, Connecticut. He’s like a three-card monte swindler who tells us exactly how he’s going to take our money and yet we still reach for our wallets. It’s actually kind of breathtaking. However, if we don’t wise up and stay wised up, every June 14th, we’ll all have to stop what we’re doing at precisely noon, raise our right hand toward Washington and pledge allegiance to the Donald (June 14th is his birthday).

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Taser International released a new product this week that will automatically activate nearby police body cameras when an officer draws a gun.

A device called Signal Sidearm from Taser division Axon, which dominates the market for police body cameras, is a sensor designed to attach to most standard gun holsters. Whenever an officer’s firearm is removed, the device starts the officer’s body camera, as well as any other camera within 30 feet. Most Axon cameras already feature a 30-second buffer, which saves footage preceding the equipment’s activation.

“Gun drawn, camera on,” reads the tagline for the product, which goes on sale later this year.

As police body cameras become more commonplace, devices like this could reduce the potential for user error. Although body cameras are supposed to capture an objective record of police encounters, they can only do that when officers remember to turn them on. This can be especially difficult in tense or rapidly developing situations.

“When law enforcement officers must draw a weapon, the last thing they should worry about is their technology,” Rick Smith, CEO and co-founder of Taser, said in a statement.

Police body cameras have emerged as a rare point of agreement between law enforcement and activists pushing for transparency and accountability amid high-profile police killings of civilians, who disproportionately are black men. But public confidence in the devices has been tested by failures to record some controversial confrontations, including fatal shootings.

Questions swirled last year when police in Charlotte, North Carolina, shot and killed Keith Lamont Scott, a 43-year-old black man. An officer who responded was equipped with a body camera, though he reportedly didn’t switch it on until after shots were fired, leaving a critical gap.

Most police departments still have weak or nonexistent disciplinary rules for officers who fail to abide by body camera policies, which may make it harder to ensure that the devices are used correctly. Officers in many departments are still getting used to cameras, however, and some lapses may simply be legitimate mistakes or accidents.

But if law enforcement doesn’t show commitment to gathering the clearest possible documentation of an incident, body cameras won’t serve their purpose, civil rights groups say. They believe it’s fair to be skeptical in cases where officers have failed to properly activate their video equipment.

Last year, the ACLU and University of California, Berkeley, School of Law published a report encouraging state courts to instruct juries to disregard testimony given by an officer deemed to have deliberately attempted to conceal the truth by not recording an incident, or by tampering with footage. If the jury were to conclude that an officer’s failure to record was unreasonable or negligent ― but not malicious ― the court would instruct the jury to devalue that officer’s testimony and infer that the video would have been beneficial to the defendant.

It’s a roundabout legal solution for an emerging problem. If technology can help ensure officers have fewer opportunities to make mistakes ― and fewer excuses to violate policy ― police body cameras could become a more reliable tool for fostering public trust.

For now, Signal Sidearm will only help with incidents that involve officers drawing a weapon.

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Source: HuffPost Black Voices

Harvey Weinstein announced some long-awaited news during his annual pre-Oscars gala on Feb. 25: The film version of “In The Heights” is in the works, and Jay Z is reportedly on board to produce it. 

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the man better known as Beyoncé’s husband is indeed joining the “In The Heights” team, already helmed by producer Scott Sanders (whose company was behind Broadway’s “The Color Purple”). THR sources claim that the latest iteration of the “In the Heights” script ― based on “Hamilton” creator Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first musical ― is complete, but casting has yet to begin.

In an interview with The Huffington Post, Miranda suggested a casting choice of his own: Jordan Fisher, the current John Laurens in “Hamilton,” is his top choice for a “pretty good Benny.” Benny is, of course, the character Christopher Jackson played in the original, Tony Award–winning Broadway production in 2008.

As for any involvement in the film adaptation from Miranda himself, he made it clear he was more interested in a background role: “I don’t want to play the [lead] role if it feels like it’s not age-appropriate with the rest of the cast,” he told HuffPost. “But Chris Jackson and I can be in the background playing dominoes during ‘When You’re Home’ and that would be fucking great.” 

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Source: HuffPost Black Voices

With all of the buzz around Remy Ma’s life-giving Nicki Minaj diss track, “shETHER,” you may have slipped up and forgot that there are other things the rapper has issue with than just Black Barbie.

In a video posted by Marie Claire on Wednesday, Remy drops some quick bars on the unnecessary nature of the men’s right movement ― which, bafflingly, is an actual thing. 

The “movement” cropped up in the 1970s as a reaction to the rise of women’s activism, and has since accomplished little beyond serving as an organizing space for misogyny. 

With verses like “I’m really having a hard time seeing what y’all arguing for,” Remy shares an understandable bewilderment as to why the movement even exists and segues into the disadvantages women routinely face.

“It’s crazy, my bank account is determined by body parts,” Remy rapped. “Breasts affects checks, ass affects cash.”

She also addresses misconceptions about women and dependency: “I’m not pressed for you to hold a door/I’m not stressed for you to marry me.”

Check out the full freestyle below:

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Source: HuffPost Black Voices

With all of the buzz around Remy Ma’s life-giving Nicki Minaj diss track, “shETHER,” you may have slipped up and forgot that there are other things the rapper has issue with than just Black Barbie.

In a video posted by Marie Claire on Wednesday, Remy drops some quick bars on the unnecessary nature of the men’s right movement ― which, bafflingly, is an actual thing. 

The “movement” cropped up in the 1970s as a reaction to the rise of women’s activism, and has since accomplished little beyond serving as an organizing space for misogyny. 

With verses like “I’m really having a hard time seeing what y’all arguing for,” Remy shares an understandable bewilderment as to why the movement even exists and segues into the disadvantages women routinely face.

“It’s crazy, my bank account is determined by body parts,” Remy rapped. “Breasts affects checks, ass affects cash.”

She also addresses misconceptions about women and dependency: “I’m not pressed for you to hold a door/I’m not stressed for you to marry me.”

Check out the full freestyle below:

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Source: HuffPost Black Voices