Why Do I Write About Race So Much? Or: What’s Love Got to Do With It?

3 comments

Loveless Sociology

Mar 14 2016

I don’t usually write in first person that much, but it’s been a while since I’ve written anything (has it really been almost a year?), so I thought I’d take a page out of Joselyn’s book and bring a little personal touch to this week’s post to reintroduce myself. Plus, it’s a blog, so I can do whatever the fuck I want. As both of my frequent readers can probably attest, I spend a lot of time talking about race. Specifically, the myriad of social and psychological reasons why black people in this country are fucked, and why that’s not […]

Reflection on a Wedding — And a Killing

1 comment

Loveless Sociology

Aug 10 2015

This week marks the first anniversary of both my marriage to my wife, Brianna, in Atlanta, Georgia, and the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. What follows is a reflection written by my father that originally appeared on Brianna’s blog last fall. – Brad REFLECTION ON A WEDDING — AND A KILLING On a beautiful warm afternoon of Sunday, August 10, 2014, my son, who is 24 years-old and white, married a 23 year-old Black woman in an outdoor service performed by an Episcopal priest in Piedmont Park in the heart of midtown Atlanta, Georgia. On the previous afternoon of August […]

It’s Time for College Athletes to Get Paid

1 comment

Loveless Sociology

May 06 2015

This past weekend’s NFL Draft was the first opportunity for many athletes to finally monetize their talents and be compensated for the vast amount of revenue they have generated over the course of their careers. And make no mistake, they have been generating revenue. Although only 20 athletic departments claim to be turning a profit, this is more due to creative accounting than anything else, with many schools employing a liberal definition of what constitutes a “subsidy.” In reality, the NCAA is a billion-dollar-per-year industry, and is currently cashing in on a $10.8 billion television contract for its basketball tournament and a […]

Demonizing the Poor: America’s Real Welfare Fraud

1 comment

Loveless Sociology

Apr 27 2015

People have pretty strong opinions about welfare. Just about every day, I’ll see someone post a meme or a status complaining about how they, a hard-working tax-paying American, have to struggle to get by while lazy welfare queens sit back and live lavishly on fat checks from the government. Lawmakers in Missouri and Kansas have recently become the latest in a long line of politicians to address this supposed issue, introducing legislation that would ban the use of welfare benefits on steak and lobster, and in tattoo parlors, strip clubs, and cruise ships (cruise ships!). Others have supported mandatory drug testing […]

Caught on Tape: Police Violence and America’s Awakening

1 comment

Loveless Sociology

Apr 17 2015

Since I last wrote, several new incidents have added to the ever-increasing list of unarmed black people killed by the police, once again thrusting the issue into the national spotlight. In North Charleston, South Carolina, Walter Scott was shot eight times by Officer Michael Slager as he was fleeing his vehicle following a traffic stop for a broken taillight. Slager was charged with murder following the release of a video of the incident showing Scott retreating as he was gunned down and Slager planting his Taser by the body. The same day, another officer in South Carolina, Justin Craven, was […]

Blogger Alert! Richard Cohen is a Racist Dick

1 comment

Loveless Sociology

Apr 01 2015

Last week, the Washington Post ran an opinion piece in which columnist and resident shithead Richard Cohen claims that “Ferguson has become the liberal Benghazi.” Cohen suggests that, just as the GOP-led House committee refuted right-wing conspiratorial claims surrounding Benghazi, the Department of Justice’s investigation in Ferguson proved protesters were wrong, and that “Ferguson was not the racist murder it was thought to be.” Here’s the meat of his argument: “Did [Michael Brown] deserve to die? No. But did Darren Wilson shoot him for no reason? Again, no. Did the Justice Department later find that Ferguson’s police force was a cesspool of racism, incompetence […]

The N-Word is Not What’s Racist

3 comments

Loveless Sociology

Mar 24 2015

By now, I’m sure many of you are familiar with the scandal surrounding the Oklahoma chapter of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity, whose members were caught on camera leading the racist chant “you can hang him in a tree, but he’ll never sign with me; there will never be a nigger SAE,” and the subsequent video of the fraternity’s 79-year-old house mother gleefully spouting the n-word with Trinidad James’ “All Gold Everything” playing in the background. Aside from pretty much ruining “If You’re Happy and You Know It” for everyone, the controversy has also reignited the national debate surrounding the n-word and […]

Kendrick Lamar is Wrong (or: Respectability Politics are Bullshit, Vol. I)

8 comments

Loveless Sociology

Mar 10 2015

Rapper Azealia Banks has announced she is giving up Twitter for Lent, and her online feuds likely had more than a little influence on Iggy Azalea and Lupe Fiasco spurning the social media platform as well. Like Kanye West before her, the 212 rapper is also beginning to gain a reputation as a “ranter” (a term like “crazy” that is usually dismissive), despite the fact that she normally says some pretty real shit. She has been very outspoken about racial politics and the issues surrounding cultural appropriation (issues that are inextricably linked to her beef with Iggy Azalea), and was even moved to […]

America’s Racial Denial (FREE MOVIE INSIDE!)

3 comments

Loveless Sociology

Mar 03 2015

In case you missed it, PBS aired the documentary American Denial on its Independent Lens program last Monday. (So the free movie is educational… it’s still worth your time, I promise! Watch it here.) The film explores the contradiction between America’s professed ideals of democracy and freedom and the way it has treated its African American citizens, centered around Gunnar Myrdal’s 1944 study An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy. A Swedish academic, Myrdal came to the United States in 1938 to research American race relations on the dime of the Carnegie Corporation. As an admirer of the American philosophy of equality for […]

So Phony: Iggy Azalea is Rap’s Jim Crow

9 comments

Loveless Sociology

Feb 17 2015

Last week, Langston Wilkins published an article on Iggy Azalea in the Washington Post stating that “hip-hop is no longer a culture owned by black Americans.” And he might be right. White people now account for up to 75% of hip-hop album sales in the United States, so it should come as no surprise that as the influence of hip-hop has diversified, so too have its key players. This is likely the reason that Lupe Fiasco defended Iggy Azalea this past December by asserting that she “has a place in hip-hop.” He sees the changing demographic landscape of the genre’s influence […]

More posts from Cupid