I am Darren Wilson
I am Darren Wilson. Which is to say I am guilty in the slaying of Michael Brown. Think of me as the guy who drives the getaway car - who provides the means of escape. Or think of me as the guy who, with malice [...]
Rachel. Trayvon. Michael. Dying. Laughing. A. Fiction
“I hear what your cousin Big Mike said,” Rachel tells Trayvon, “and you know I like Big Mike, but I’m saying how come it’s so hard for black boys to love black girls then it’s so easy for y’all to lean all up on us when [...]
A Light-Skinned Latina Like Me Will Never Be Able to Live in The Land Of Whiteness
I’ve been told that I’m the ‘good’ kind of Latino because of my skin color What exactly does being a light-skinned Latina mean for me? It means that all at once, I am just dark enough, too dark or not dark enough at all. It [...]
“I’m Now As Poor as I was Before” — Prison-Created Poverty
No one likes to talk about the fact that “doing time” leaves the majority of returning citizens worse off than before they were incarcerated. Prior to my imprisonment, I had a very successful consulting business and I lived a solidly middle-class life. I worked hard, I [...]
I Looked at a Rapist In The Mirror and Saw Him Smiling Back
*This piece has been published with permission of the referenced ex-partner. Other relationships may have been slightly altered to protect specific identities.* The first time I was sexually assaulted I must have been 9 or 10 years old. I was violated by two family [...]
On Bill Cosby, Victim Blaming, and What it Means to be a Rape Survivor
Fourteen years ago, I was raped. It was late fall 2001. I was in the first semester of my 9th grade year in high school. I was14 years old. My parents had just gotten divorced, and I’d recently transferred to a new school district for a [...]
I, Racist
What follows is the text of a “sermon” that I gave as a “congregational reflection” to an all White audience at the Bethel Congregational United Church of Christ on Sunday, June 28th. The sermon was begun with a reading of The Good Samaritan story, and [...]
Bryan Stevenson on Charleston and Our Real Problem with Race
Bryan Stevenson has spent most of his career challenging bias against minorities and the poor in the criminal justice system. He is the founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative, based in Montgomery, Ala., an advocacy group that opposes mass incarceration and racial injustice. [...]