You may not know this, but back in day, yours truly was a “close friend” of Donald Duck for a number of years. And I hated the job for the longest time.
Today the billed one turns 90. Here’s a little ditty from a while back that changed my outlook on the world, the people in it, Disney, and me.
💛 “The Jim Crow Era Was Never ‘Happy Times’ for Black People”
By @clayrivers
Despite what you may have heard in the news lately, the period of Jim Crow was never nor can it ever be viewed as a period of benefit for Black families.
@TheConversationUS@blackmastodon Trump doesn’t even have much if any discernible skill. It’s still the Koch family and other oligarchs with a lot more actual wealth than Trump pulling the strings with their overwhelming ability to fund disinformation campaigns that progressively pull people further and further off the rails.
“I believe that Trump can be placed among a long line of demagogues who possess the skills needed to tap into the fears and anxieties of a group of people that perceives itself as marginalized, at risk and not in control.”
@TheConversationUS@blackmastodon ..." a group of people that perceives itself as marginalized, at risk and not in control.” That group of people got him elected the first time, and included Blacks. This Trump is a politician and will lose much of his prior support base. Only Republicans now. There is also no real choice of opposition. Biden never should have been elected. The US is overwhelmed with political savvy. Nobody really cares.
"Black Barbie: A Documentary" produced by Shonda Rhimes, will be released on Netflix on June 19. TODAY shares this clip, featuring Kitty Black Perkins, the designer of Black Barbie, and Beulah Mae Mitchell, who worked on the production line at Mattel, remembering conversations with Barbie creator Ruth Handler. “(Handler) would say, ‘Do you have any suggestions?’” Mitchell recalled. “I was able to say, ‘We want a Black Barbie.’”
We want you to know the name Alice Ball. She was the first woman and first African American to earn a master’s degree in science from the College of Hawaii.
Ball remarkably developed a treatment for leprosy, but she passed away shortly after.
Arthur Dean, chair of the College of Hawaii’s chemistry department, took over the project, and renamed Ball’s method to the “Dean Method,” never crediting Ball for her work.
Black Opry, a blog-turned-movement focusing on Black roots musicians, is fundraising to help cover the costs of expanding their work! Please chip in if you're able, and share it around.
Scott Brick, the audiobook performer, pisses me off.
He has a commanding, sonorous, soothing voice, and can read without sounding like he's reading, but his cadence irks.
He speaks in an American WASPy preacher. Add this to his commanding audio-presence and it comes off...dictatorial.
No more Brick. Enderverse, Foundation, the list goes on. No more Brick! Give me queer, gender non-conforming black people. And pay them properly, dangit!
> “Walking while Black” laws, first created in California in 1925 as a safety measure and lobbied by the automobile industry, are controversial due to racist enforcement and because they shame pedestrians while giving more protections to cars on the road
@BigAngBlack@blackmastodon@BlackMastodon I live in a cluster of predominantly white towns (the Monterey Peninsula) and believe you me, most of the people jaywalking in this tourist-heavy microcosm are NOT people of color.
Beethoven is A great composer, but not THE great composer, according to a music professor who believes it’s time to reframe Beethoven’s greatness “within the context of historic ideals of whiteness and patriarchy.”
“If Americans could acknowledge that our music and music education are deeply rooted in these two ideologies, then we could realize that Beethoven, surely a good composer, was simply one of many.”
@TheConversationUS@blackmastodon The conversation on this subject with regard to Shakespeare has been robust. The outgoing director of the Folger Shakespeare Library really thought it was an important conversation, and the incoming director (a woman of color) is even more devoted to it. It’s a valuable conversation, once you get past the screamers.
Hey everyone! My good friend is up for Supermom of the year! Please read about her and vote! She's been through hell, she really needs this. Please? 💞💞💞🥹🥹🥹 #BlackMastodon
It takes more than simply hiring someone to address issues within an organization. It takes a top-down commitment to be part of that change. –Lecia Michelle