by Kioshana LaCount

The last time I went to visit my grandmother, she asked me when I was going to have children. Instinctively, I hesitated, before finally smiling and responding with a non-committal, “I’ll have some when I’m ready, Bigmama.”

by Aja Trotter

People are angry. And rightfully so. There is much to be angry about: the murder of Mike Brown; the funding and backing of genocide of innocent people; the murder of Eric Garner; the withholding of water from residents in Detroit, gentrification in Oakland, CA and Brooklyn, NY, the murder of Ezell Ford, the sentencing of Marissa Alexander; the murders of John Crawford, Zoraida Reyes, and Tiffany Edwards, just to name a few.

Yes, I was an angry black woman. Let me explain.

Anger is a natural emotion that, in my experiences, is often misconstrued for passion and other visceral emotions. It is raw, intense and manifests through recognizable emotional traits. When fueled by love, it causes a sister-in-law to physically assault her much older brother-in-law. When fueled by rage, it causes twin sisters to violently bite, cut, and repeatedly stab their mother after she tried to wake them up for school. It is vivid; it is pure; and if left uncontrolled, it can be deadly.

by Jasmine N. Salters

I woke up this morning to articles and blog posts updating the world on hip-hop mogul Jay-Z and singer Solange Knowles. It seems that we should all be aware that the two were spotted jewelry shopping together on Tuesday afternoon, just a day after the now-infamous videotaped elevator-altercation-turned-virtual-minstrel-show went viral. According to my Facebook newsfeed, Jay-Z was attempting to solve his “100th problem” with an expensive gift.

By Stacey Patton, Ph.D.

Trigger Alert! This piece contains dark fantasies of black people (and their allies of other races) dishing out the Nat Turner-style justice they would like to see child-killer George Zimmerman endure.

We’ve seen it too many times: in the aftermath of racially-charged shooting deaths of young black people, their grieving parents invariably appear in media interviews holding their emotions in check as they speak of prayer and even the possibility of forgiving the men who unapologetically slaughtered their child.

No it is not sanctioned by this nation’s Founding Fathers. No it’s not in the Declaration of Independence. No it’s not in the Preamble. No it’s not in one of the seven articles of the Constitution, nor is it one of the twenty-seven amendments. You will not find it in the Emancipation Proclamation. You will not find it in the statues of this state. Nor in the ordinances of this city.