Free Republic

Yale has released the latest of its biannual reports regarding sexual assault claims handled through the university's due process-unfriendly disciplinary system. The report testifies to some interesting changes, strongly suggesting that Yale adjudicates sexual assault claims less on a principle of justice and more out of a concern with avoiding negative public relations. The background for this new release comes in Yale's previous report, which appeared in September and was penned (as were all previous reports) by Yale Deputy Provost Stephanie Spangler. Like other Spangler offerings, it offered hints of the Orwellian nature of sexual assault proceedings at Yale while...

The Democratic Party has found what seems to be a winning formula in both state and national elections – a “War on Women” being waged by the Republicans. The “War on Women” is based on the premise that women are oppressed if they do not 1) have access to free birth control, 2) have unlimited access to abortion, 3) receive “equal pay for equal work” based on credentials rather than performance, and 4) have the support of the state if they have a child out of wedlock. On closer examination, however, this “War on Women” turns out to be something...

What were you expecting? We refer here to that dustup last week over an official MSNBC pre-Super Bowl tweet about a Cheerios commercial that featured a bi-racial family. The tweet read: Maybe the rightwing will hate it, but everyone else will go awww: the adorable new #Cheerios ad w/ biracial family, RNC Chairman Reince Priebus picked up the phone and protested directly to MSNBC president Phil Griffin. Griffin apologized, the tweet was deleted and the employee fired. Nothing to see here, folks, move on. Not so fast. Again, what were you expecting? What else could possibly make some MSNBC employee...

The Trader Joe's grocery-store chain has dropped a plan to open a new store in the heart of the city's historically African-American neighborhood after activists said the development would price black residents out of the area. The grocer, whose stores are found in urban neighborhoods across the nation, said Monday it wouldn't press its plan, given community resistance, The Oregonian ( http://bit.ly/1n7Jyqb) reported. "We open a limited number of stores each year, in communities across the country," it said in a statement. "We run neighborhood stores, and our approach is simple: If a neighborhood does not want a Trader Joe's,...

Senseless and Deadly– Two black teens were arrested today following the brutal attack of an 86 year-old man in Alabama. They beat him in the face and stabbed him several times. (VIDEO-AT-LINK)In Maryland on Sunday two young teens were arrested for killing a 51 year-old woman. A 14 year-old and 16 year-old teen were arrested this weekend for the murder of 51 year-old Kimberly Leto.(VIDEO-AT-LINK)ABC2 reported: Two teenagers have been arrested after police say they burglarized 51-year-old Kimberly Leto’s home and killed her. “That it was a 14 and 15-year-old is unimaginable. There is a loss of life and two...

Budget cuts aimed at weaning Americans off of public assistance may make the start of 2014 lean for many African-Americans. Last month, after much debate, Congress began implementing it’s budget cut plan to reduce funding for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program otherwise known as SNAP. The program provides monetary help for families in poverty and alleviates food insecurity. SNAP, formerly known as the Food Stamp Program, is used by approximately 47 million Americans. But with funding reductions and bans for convicted felons many people wonder how Americans will finally be able to climb out of poverty. Who needs SNAP? The...

As a group of students begins studying for a calculus exam, a white student turns to an Asian peer and says, “Hey, would you mind helping me solve this problem? It’s really difficult, but you can probably do it.” The Asian student agrees to help, but for some reason feels uncomfortable with the way the question was asked. Is the Asian student being oversensitive? Was the white student subtly and subconsciously displaying racial prejudice against Asians? Could both be true? According to Dr. Derald Sue, a professor of psychology at Columbia University, the Asian student may have been the victim...

Rep. John Conyers has been introducing a Reparations Bill in the House for decades [Reparations Moving Forward] There is a lot of hatred against African Americans in the United States even though as a group, we have done little or nothing to earn it. Most of us were brought here against our will. This has been an odd way to act toward people you forced to be part of your population. An example of this hatred is easy to see in the irrational reaction of many toward the twice legally elected President of the United States, Barak Obama. In my...

Those who read me regularly know that I have been extremely critical of the Obama presidency; but it has always been on the issues. I have never denigrated the “office of the presidency” or made personal attacks on President Obama. This has been one of my most difficult columns I have ever written. The only thing I can compare it to is when a parent has to sit their child down and tell them that they have embarrassed the family’s name and reputation; and if their behavior doesn’t change, the family will be forced to turn their back on them...

One out of every three African-American men will be incarcerated at some point in their lives. In order to place this into proper context, one in every 111 white women will ever see prison walls. In accordance with the Cress Theory extolled by Dr. Frances Cress Welsing, the fear of genetic annihilation at the hands of African men continues to drive the world’s most cruel and disparate prison system. African-American men comprise 40% of America’s prison population yet make up roughly 6-7% of the total population. Black men are not inherently criminal and Black America has to begin any discussion...

The Center for Applied Theatre and Active Culture and the New World Performance Laboratory, in collaboration with Ma’Sue Productions, will present, “Facing Our Truth: 10-minute Plays on Trayvon, Race and Privilege” at 7:30 p.m., Wednesday, Feb. 5 at The Balch Street Theatre, 220 South Balch St. in Akron. The staged readings of plays and a folk opera will address the subject of race in the United States. The event is presented as part of The University of Akron's “Rethinking Race: Black, White and Beyond” activities. The event is free and open to the public. A post-show discussion will follow the...

When it comes to gaining true freedom, the words and actions of our most revered Black authentic leaders emphasized economic empowerment. Unfortunately, many of those who spoke the truth and tried to establish an economic foundation for Black people were ostracized, caricatured, vilified, and even assassinated. Despite their sacrifices and refusals to back down from fighting for the most important collective aspect of true freedom, economic empowerment, the vast majority of Black folks either ignored them or chose to follow Black “misleaders” who took our people down the wrong road. Now in 2014, Black folks are still suffering from and...

Pondering the smoking ruins of American racial policy, I wonder whether it isn’t time to say publicly what many, if not most, of both races know: It isn’t working. It isn’t going to work. If it were, it would have. If it were working, we would not need the unending laws to force the races together when they don’t want to be together. If people wanted diversity, it would happen without compulsion. The hope that black and white would mingle amicably if only segregation were dismantled relied on a peculiarly American inattention to life and history and on a belief...

Rev. Jeremiah Wright at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Annual Breakfast in Wilmington, DE: Video “[W]ith one branch of the Tea Party being nothing but a 2.0 upgrade of the lynch party … with some folks doing everything they can to get that black man out of their White House.”

Obama’s former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, gave a speech to a largely black crowd in Delaware on MLK Day. The vile Chicago pastor said the Tea Party is “a 2.0 upgrade of the lynch mobs.” Reverend Wright spewed his toxic nonsense in Delaware yesterday at the 30th Annual Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Annual Breakfast in Wilmington, Delaware. Rather than rejecting his hate speech the crowd gave him a standing ovation.: (VIDEO-AT-LINK)The crowd loved it and gave him a standing ovation. Delaware Online reported, via The Last Tradition: The controversial Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright told a crowd celebrating Martin...

What did CNN’s Crossfire host Van Jones think when he read President Barack Obama’s latest quote about race in this week’s New Yorker profile by David Remnick? “I thought that actually was a pretty honest and accurate assessment.” “There’s no doubt that there’s some folks who just really dislike me because they don’t like the idea of a black President,” Obama told Remnick during one of their many interviews over the last few months. “Now, the flip side of it is there are some black folks and maybe some white folks who really like me and give me the benefit...

Making a rare Ocala visit on the eve of the holiday recognizing black America’s greatest civil rights leader, U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown exhorted members of a predominantly black church on Sunday to remain politically vigilant, lest the gains made by minorities over the past 50 years be reversed. Appearing at the St. Paul African Methodist Episcopalian Church, the Jacksonville Democrat warned that inertia and indifference by black voters, especially young people, could lead to setbacks on voting rights, health care, education and other issues. Yet it also mattered at the lowest levels of government, and in elections farther down...

Sybrina Fulton, who's 17-year-old son Trayvon Martin was shot by neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman in 2012, visited the University of Utah on Thursday to discuss racial profiling. Hundreds attended the Martin Luther King Week event, in which Fulton said that an "upside" to her son's death was the "opportunity to save someone else's child." "Don’t think for one second racial profiling doesn’t happen. Don’t think for one minute even in your community of Salt Lake City it doesn’t happen," she said. "Racism is still alive. Racial profiling is still alive. Injustice is still alive." Fulton said that the circumstances of...

Five years in to Barack Obama’s presidency, the number of African-Americans participating in the labor force has hit rock bottom. The news media has ignored this stunning revelation from Friday’s monthly jobs report by the Labor Department. The exception has been PBS, which interviewed economist Dean Baker who had written about it in a report published Friday. “The drop in labor force participation was sharpest for African Americans, who saw a decline of 0.3 percentage points to 60.2 percent, the lowest rate since December of 1977. The rate for African American men fell 0.7 percentage points to 65.6 percent, the...

The mother of Trayvon Martin will participate in a University of Utah public discussion on Jan. 16 during a weeklong celebration of Martin Luther King Jr., KTVX-TV reports. Sybrina Fulton is scheduled to speak at the university's Union Ballroom for the 30th annual Celebration of the Life and Legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. This year's theme is "Beneath the Hoodie: A Look at Racial Profiling in America." Fulton's son, a 17-year-old black Miami high-school student, was fatally shot in February 2012 by George Zimmerman. A jury in Seminole County acquitted Zimmerman in July of murder. The case stirred...