black lives matter

Maybe — just maybe — it isn’t the Black women who should issue an apology. Here's how to apologize to a Black woman in ten easy steps.

"I'm hoping that it goes beyond saying a new set of names and actually really changing how we think about everything in this conversation, both in the conversations around policing and racial profiling and the silent mass incarceration, but also in the conversations we have about violence against women."

There are things you can do to have a make an impact. I’ve compiled a list of items that you can consider: What To Do Right Now About Police Brutality

The fact that police killings are calculated by media organizations at all is a victory of the sustained protests of the Black Lives Matter movement. Yet, despite heightened visibility, the killings continue. According to the Guardian, 571 people have been killed by police so far in 2016—3.4 per million Native American and 3.28 Black.

[CN: racism, incarceration, slavery] What happens, they asked, when your community is targeted and generationally oppressed; when you are raised to fear the police because you’ve seen whose blood it is they’re spilling; when your father and uncle and siblings and cousins are all labeled criminals?

Remember how I told you about the nasty little trolligans (trolls + hooligans = trolligans) that felt the need to show their racist behinds in response to a picture of Aamito Stacie Lagum, a Black model, modeling MAC’s new lipstick? And I slightly hinted at the Instagram clapback on the MAC photo feed. Well, what I didn’t tell you is that there’s an Instagram clapback, and then there’s a BLACK Instagram clapback. The two are worlds apart, and baby I promise you, you have seen nothing until you’ve seen a Black Insta-clapback.

While this is not about my or White people’s feelings, this is about White people’s violence. As White people in this country, it’s on us to dismantle White supremacy. Both the problem and the solution lie with us. This involves talking to other White people in our communities, having hard and uncomfortable conversations, examining and confronting our own privilege.

In 2015’s newsworthy year-end reviews, Baltimore will be mentioned.