In 2009, Chicago was the United States’ bid to the International Olympic Committee to host the 2016 Summer Olympics. There was a collective sigh of relief on the South Side of Chicago when it was announced that Rio De Janeiro would be the host. Many South Side residents who would have been directly impacted by […]
Read more "Waiting For Obama"I. Last week, author and essayist Thomas Chatterton Williams wrote a full-scale assault of fellow writer and author Ta-Nehesi Coates in an New York Times op-ed entitled “How Ta-Nehesi Coates Gives Whiteness Power.” He makes the case as to why this country’s devotion to race as a construct will continue to perpetuate the deep divisions […]
Read more "How Thomas Chatterton Williams Gets Race Right"I. It wasn’t until the second season of Insecure that I saw the hashtag #LawrenceHive take on new life. This hashtag community sprouted up as a season one plot-twist made the central character villified, and suddenly Lawrence emerged as the victim. There was a near unanimous celebration of Lawrence by the end of season one. It’s […]
Read more "Why Black Men Need #LawrenceHive"Because the administration of Trump was a veritable dumpster fire even before the inauguration, the Democrats never had the usual trial by fire and public shaming that the losing party normally gets. There was never an opportunity for the Democratic party to listen to its constituents and perform a full autopsy on just how catastrophic […]
Read more "Dead on Arrival, Why Kamala Harris Shouldn’t Be the Presumptive Presidential Nominee"A Sunday morning Facebook post asked “Is Black Lives Matter still a thing?” and I immediately did an eye-roll. The technical answer is in the affirmative. They still are a thing. I still get emails from them. I also know that in many activist circles that Black Lives Matters functions as a real, almost tangible entity. […]
Read more "Lessons I Learned from #BlackLivesMatters"Michael Eric Dyson penned an essay paying homage to the black digital intelligentsia in 2015 that paid homage to names that had some level of household recognition amongst black folks as well as some non-black circles naming people such as Ta-Nehesi Coates, Jelani Cobb, Melissa Harris Perry, Marc Lamont Hill, Jamilah Lemieux and Salamisha Temet. […]
Read more "A Requiem for Black Intellectualism"If you’re black and want to go to an HBCU, go watch “School Daze,” if you want to go to a PWI, go see “Dear White People.” If you’re white and have no idea what I’m talking about, go watch both movies. Justin Simien’s directoral debut “Dear White People” was and is a refreshing look […]
Read more "Dear White People: Simple Comedic Satire or Complex Real-Life Drama"I began to pen this less than one hour after the press conference occurred. Apparently the president of the United States, Barack Obama appeared at a regular press briefing held by White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, and fielded one question surrounding the death of Trayvon Martin and the verdict in the George Zimmerman case […]
Read more "Restoring Blackness: Obama’s Commentary on Trayvon Martin"One month later… There’s not a whole that has changed monumentally surrounding the start of the Obama’s second term living at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. For what it’s worth, everything, from my point of view has continued on as normal. The Republican party seems to still be the party of No, tempting the fate of this […]
Read more "One Month Later"Anyone who reads this blog with any level of consistency knows where I stand on the hot-button topics of race, religion, politics and anything else that can be devoured in the context of cultural criticism. Most people know, I self-identify as a Democratic socialist at the heart of my political being–meaning I support the idea […]
Read more "The Bias of Mainstream Media"
Joshua Lawrence Lazard 