335 Search results for "trans issues"

A Black feminist pleasure praxis acknowledges and affirms the possibility for Black women’s sexual pleasure
We must do the work to detach Black women’s sexuality from violence and we must start with our foremothers. by Haillee Mason This essay contains discussion of sexual violence. The myth of white supremacist history suggests that sexual pleasure and intimacy that enslaved Black women endured were unable to be detached from violence. While I […]
Jemele Hill’s $6 million buyout part of ESPN’s efforts to avoid race and gender in sports
ESPN’s new boss Jimmy Pitaro told Business Insider back in May that “We (ESPN) are not a political organization, we are a sports-media company.” this position seems to have taken its toll on a few employees, chiefly Jemele Hill. Hill’s relationship with the company seemed to be souring following tweets arguing that the best way […]
TSA forces Muslim woman to show menstrual pad in private airport screening
A Muslim woman, Zainab Merchant, was harassed and forced to show her bloodied pad by Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officials during a recent airport screening. Merchant says the officials refused to provide her their identifications to avoid any legal complaints.
“Unite the Right” white supremacist rally vastly outnumbered by counter-protesters
The second anniversary of the “Unite the Right” rally saw about two dozen white nationalists in Washington D.C. While the 2017 rally resulted in the death of an anti-racist protestor, counter-protesters vastly outnumbered the crowd of white nationalists this year. During the first “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, a white nationalist drove towards […]
American history classes are actually worsening kids’ understanding of America
In the year 1995, University of Vermont sociologist and historian James W. Loewen published a book titled Lies My Teacher Told Me which was designed to both criticize the history classes in America and serve as a history text itself. A result of Loewen’s critical analysis of a dozen history textbooks, the book found that […]
We need to challenge fat antagonism in Black activist spaces
by Denarii Grace “I am sick and tired of being sick and tired.” These words, uttered by legendary Black civil rights leader Fannie Lou Hamer, have become as much a part of Black languages and cultural understandings, both past and present, as “lit,” “bumboclaat,” and “the bomb.” Her expression of the ongoing oppression of Black […]
Black youth need more than public health strategies that read sexuality as diseased and immoral
By Jallicia Jolly In the aftermath of National HIV Testing Week in the US, it is crucial that we talk openly and honestly about what it means to live, love, and sex while being Black and young. As an HIV tester and counselor, I am well aware of the conversations about “safe sex” that populate […]
Comic: Revolution means nothing if it doesn’t include Black women and Black queer folks
by JeCorey Holder There is an illness affecting far too many Black people that I feel the need to address. I call this syndrome Selective Wokeness. Symptoms include being fully aware and vocally passionate about the racial issues Black people continually face, but having a total disregard and an outright denial for the issues specific […]
Yes, I can still be unapologetically queer while in the closet
by Indigo One of my personal attributes I am most proud of is my identity as a queer and non-binary afro-boricua. Whether I am in a classroom on my college campus or a house party on a Friday night, I allow my fullest and most authentic self to occupy the space I am in. Among […]
An open letter to my boyfriend after the ghost of my abuser appeared during sex
Content Note: This essay contains descriptions of childhood sexual assault. When I finally cum, I fear it will be an ancestral libation, an offering to him. In death, he has only become even more persistent, and no less of a formidable task to resist. You are on top of me, fully man, but I am […]
I’m finally decolonizing the queerphobia I learned at home
by Indigo I could not have been older than six or so. It was the first time I can remember any indication from my family that queerness was something I would not be afforded the space to explore or embrace. This first memory of anti-queerness was a short conversation between my mother and I. In […]
What do we need for a new freedom?: A proudly fat, disabled, bisexual enby’s vision for #Juneteenth
By Denarii Grace Some days I wonder if the work that I do is worth it. On the surface, Black artists/cultural workers, healers, teachers and activists who live most on the margins have the least to gain in their lines of work. And in a society based on the allure of social and financial capital, […]