Prayers for Damar; Dr. Love is back; Florida faculty face DeSantis
Friday, January 6, 2023
Welcome to the first edition of What I’m Reading! There’s quite a bit below, but I promise to keep the newsletters concise and to the point. Remember to encourage others to subscribe if you enjoyed reading.
What I’m Reading
Great news! Damar Hamlin, the Buffalo Bills football player who suffered a cardiac arrest during a game against the Cincinnati Bengals, has shown “remarkable improvement,” according to the physicians caring for him. They said Hamlin could communicate through writing and asked them, "who won the game?” That’s a great sign that he’s neurologically intact.
NPR published a thoughtful article about the football player and what he means to his family & his hometown of Pittsburgh. (His GoFundMe has surpassed $7 million!)
Who is Damar Hamlin? The Buffalo Bills safety keeps Pittsburgh and his family close, NPR
Don’t say we didn’t warn you: A facial recognition tool identified a Black man as a suspect in stealing $10,000 worth of Chanel and Louis Vuitton handbags in Louisiana. The man was later arrested three states and seven hours away from the crime scene and spent a week in jail.
But there’s a big problem: The man has never been to Louisiana.
Innocent Black Man Jailed After Facial Recognition Got It Wrong, His Lawyer Says, Gizmodo
Jonathan Cox, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Central Florida, canceled two courses on race that he was scheduled to teach over fears of the “Stop Woke Act,” legislation signed by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis meant to prohibit the teaching “critical race theory” in classrooms.
“Somebody who’s not even in the class could come after me. Somebody sees the course catalog, complains to a legislator — next thing I know, I’m out of a job.”
This excellent report in ProPublica details how faculty members in Florida are watering down or canceling courses meant to teach students about race. Pay attention: Florida won’t be the only state to deal with this…
Muzzled by DeSantis, Critical Race Theory Professors Cancel Courses or Modify Their Teaching, ProPublica
During the Jim Crow era, a beachfront property in California was stolen from Black owners. Their descendants fought long and hard to regain the land from Los Angeles County in 2022. On Tuesday, they announced their intent to sell the property back to Los Angeles County for nearly $20 million.
Family to sell Bruce’s Beach property back to L.A. County for nearly $20 million, The Los Angeles Times
Richmond — the capital of the Confederacy — has removed over a dozen Confederate monuments. To do so, city and state officials turned to Devon Henry and his company to remove them. Bigger contractors — all White-owned — said they wanted no part in taking down Confederate statues.
White contractors wouldn’t remove Confederate statues. So a Black man did it, The Washington Post
What’s In The News
RIP Gangsta Boo. For Essence, Brande Victorian penned an obituary for the hip-hop pioneer and Three 6 Mafia member. She was 43 years old…
Dr. Love is back! You probably remember the scammer extraordinaire Malachi Love-Robinson, who became a meme after impersonating a doctor to defraud a patient. Well, he’s headed back to prison…
The Waffle House employee who went viral for deflecting a chair in a restaurant brawl says she’s been blacklisted and “can’t work at Waffle House ever again…”
Meanwhile, in Mississippi: “Mississippi’s health-care crisis is worsening, and an overhaul of the state’s “current system of care is unmistakably essential,” a leading medical group warned…”
An exclusive from Jimmy Jenkins, a reporter for The Arizona Republic: “Arizona is inducing the labor of pregnant prisoners against their will — sometimes as early as three weeks before their due date. Healthcare experts call the policy unethical. Reproductive justice advocates say it's a human rights violation…”
This story is a few weeks old, but I love it. Community members helped transform one of South Carolina’s most challenging high schools by walking the hallways and mentoring students. Discipline issues fell, test scores have improved, and students are more engaged…
A Black reporter with the Wall Street Journal was conducting interviews outside of a Chase Bank in Phoenix before he was handcuffed and detained by police…
Back in July, 4-year-old Izzy Scott drowned during his second swim lesson — after the instructor told his mom that parents aren’t allowed to stay and watch. Prosecutors in Georgia are now pursuing criminal charges against the instructor…
You may know that Kyra Bolden was sworn in as Michigan Supreme Court’s first Black woman justice on Jan. 1. But did you know she is the great-granddaughter of Jesse Lee Bond, who was lynched in Tennessee in 1939?
What I’m Watching
The trial against Young Thug and YSL is scheduled to begin on January 9…
Tory Lanez is set to be sentenced on January 23…
The latest on Andrew Tate: Romanian authorities have seized his luxury car collection…
My HuffPost colleagues Alanna Vagianos and Taryn Finley appeared on the final installment of Surviving R. Kelly recently. They covered the disgraced artist’s New York trial…
Theophilus London, who had been missing for months, has been found safe, his cousin announced…
This video of a child thinking an innocent bystander was Steve Harvey is hilarious!
Hip-hop heads, rejoice! De La Soul says their classic albums are finally headed to streaming services on March 3. William Ketchum interviewed them this week…
I’ll be at the National Museum of African American History & Culture on Saturday (January 7) for a screening of Netflix & the Obamas' Higher Ground Documentary DESCENDANT. The executive producer of the film, Questlove, will be there to answer questions. I’ll let you know what I think in the next newsletter.
Loved it! 👏🏾
This great, thank you!