Free Food for the Community Programme, 1971, Oakland. Photograph by Stephen Shames
(via queennubian)
I’ll have this in future. As a matter of fact, i’ll have a better marriage/relationship than this.
May it be so for you and anyone else who wants it.
(Source: joanwolf, via frenchemotioninmypassion)
it’s like people don’t want to hear the truth. without hearing the truth, how will there be progress?
sure there might be jealous dark-skinned girls, but there’s a REASON why. people bash on them all the time and clearly give all the tlc to light-skinned girls. no wonder they’re…
DO NOT BE SILENCED. They may not listen but that does not mean you should not speak up and speak out. No one can tell your truth but yourself. The problem with using rap music as the catch all for Black America is it’s one point of view sent out to one type of mind. It’s Black men speaking for themselves and what they believe to be important. Keeping silent to get along will leave you nothing. Nothing but incorrect, vulgar, mean spirited, warmed over male centered rhetoric.
Come Close | Common feat. Mary J. Blige
I just want you to know
Your whole being is beautiful
(via runbacktoyourfantasy)
MARISSA ALEXANDER | FLORIDA | STAND YOUR GROUND LAW
This is the Evolution of a Women w/ a Masters Degree who defended herself, from a
MANwho attempted to choke her… MULTIPLE TIMES. So when is ‘Stand Your Ground’ justifiable? When being nosey (Zimmerman) or, shooting a warning shot at the individual you filed a restraining order against (Alexander)? She was sentenced to 20 YEARS IN PRISON.1 SHOT + 0 FATALITIES = 20 YEARS IN THE PENN
Enough is Enough! | We MUST take care of our Women! | http://alturl.com/5jgdx
HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY
Yes he was a man…oh Marissa…
I can’t believe this is real. I literally have no hope for the future or for this fuck hole of a state I live in. This beautiful young mother? Like WHY. This could easily be a relative or friend. WHY.
I hate that I live in Florida…… My state is fucking up left and right. smdh
(via thepanduchessofshade)
What an amazing photo! Found this on my recent business trip to NYC.
Measuring 3 x 4 3/4 inches, it likely dates from the 1940s & is printed on the kind of paper that is characteristic of photobooth photos from this era. It was likely shot at a carnival or local county fair, but I’ve never been certain whether this type of portrait was mechanical, like in a booth, or whether a photographer was involved. There is so much to like about this image, but I was partly drawn to it because it reminds me of the recently published book by Leon Borenzstein titled American Pictures (Nazraeli Press), which we have at Ampersand. This book is one of my early favorites of 2012 & features portrait photographs he shot of families in the late 70s & 80s. The backdrop is such a key component to his photographs, as is the case here—the tiled floor, simple bench & loose backdrop remind us that a photographic process has taken place. This may be obvious, but details like this recall the various types of photography that no longer exist in the digital age. Not only would it have been cool to converse with this stately African American couple, it would have been amazing to meet the photographer behind the camera.
- Collection -
04.12.2012
(Source: ampersandgallery, via queennubian)
Malcolm X, W.E.B. DuBois, Marcus Garvey: Certified Brooklyn by Adrian Franks
(via queennubian)
![joshuabrandonbennett:
A sobering reminder that the prison system has always gorged itself on the lives of Black men and women. Heartbreaking story.
thealphagirl:
riya-noir:
He was 14 yrs. 6mos. and 5 days old —- and the youngest person executed in the United States in the 20th Century.
George Junius Stinney, Jr.,
[b. 1929 - d. 1944]
In a South Carolina prison sixty-six years ago, guards walked a 14-year-old boy, bible tucked under his arm, to the electric chair. At 5’ 1” and 95 pounds, the straps didn’t fit, and an electrode was too big for his leg.
The switch was pulled and the adult sized death mask fell from George Stinney’s face. Tears streamed from his eyes. Witnesses recoiled in horror as they watched the youngest person executed in the United States in the past century die.
Now, a community activist is fighting to clear Stinney’s name, saying the young boy couldn’t have killed two girls. George Frierson, a school board member and textile inspector, believes Stinney’s confession was coerced, and that his execution was just another injustice blacks suffered in Southern courtrooms in the first half of the 1900s.
(CLICK THROUGH FOR THE REST OF THE ARTICLE.)](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lhz8b3qYrE1qzchvao1_500.jpg)
A sobering reminder that the prison system has always gorged itself on the lives of Black men and women. Heartbreaking story.
He was 14 yrs. 6mos. and 5 days old —- and the youngest person executed in the United States in the 20th Century.
George Junius Stinney, Jr.,
[b. 1929 - d. 1944]
In a South Carolina prison sixty-six years ago, guards walked a 14-year-old boy, bible tucked under his arm, to the electric chair. At 5’ 1” and 95 pounds, the straps didn’t fit, and an electrode was too big for his leg.
The switch was pulled and the adult sized death mask fell from George Stinney’s face. Tears streamed from his eyes. Witnesses recoiled in horror as they watched the youngest person executed in the United States in the past century die.
Now, a community activist is fighting to clear Stinney’s name, saying the young boy couldn’t have killed two girls. George Frierson, a school board member and textile inspector, believes Stinney’s confession was coerced, and that his execution was just another injustice blacks suffered in Southern courtrooms in the first half of the 1900s.
(CLICK THROUGH FOR THE REST OF THE ARTICLE.)
(Source: riyanoir, via queennubian)
"There was one girl in our school whose mother made her wear a clothespin on her nose to make it thin. There were quite a few girls who tried to bleach their skin white with bleaching cream and who got pimples instead. And, of course, we went to the beauty parlor and got our hair straightened. I couldn’t wait to go to the beauty parlor and get my hair all fried up. I wanted Shirley Temple curls just like Shirley Temple. I hated the smell of fried hair and having my ears burned, but we were taught that women had to make great sacrifices to be beautiful. And everybody knew you had to be crazy to walk the streets with nappy hair sticking out. And of course long hair was better than short hair. We all knew that.
We had been completely brainwashed and we didn’t even know it. We accepted white value systems and white standards of beauty and, at times, we accepted the white man’s view of ourselves. We had never been exposed to any other point of view or any other standard of beauty. From when I was a tot, I can remember black people saying, “Niggas aint shit.” “You know how lazy niggas are.” “Give a nigga an inch and he’ll take a mile.” Everybody knew what “niggas” like to do after they eat: sleep. Everybody knew that “niggas” couldn’t be on time; that’s why there was c.p.t. (colored people’s time). “Niggas don’t take care of nothing.” “Niggas don’t stick together.” The list could go on.
We had been completely brainwashed and we didn’t even know it. We accepted white value systems and white standards of beauty and, at times, we accepted the white man’s view of ourselves. We had never been exposed to any other point of view or any other standard of beauty. From when I was a tot, I can remember black people saying, “Niggas aint shit.” “You know how lazy niggas are.” “Give a nigga an inch and he’ll take a mile.” Everybody knew what “niggas” like to do after they eat: sleep. Everybody knew that “niggas” couldn’t be on time; that’s why there was c.p.t. (colored people’s time). “Niggas don’t take care of nothing.” “Niggas don’t stick together.” The list could go on.
To varying degrees we accepted these statements as true. And, to varying degrees, we each made them true within ourselves because we believed them.
"—
Assata Shakur
“but we were taught that women had to make great sacrifices to be beautiful…”
(via jellyfishcorpses)
(Source: daughterofzami, via bad-dominicana)
Photo Series: “I’m On a Bike”
All photographs by Malick Sidibe
(Source: dynamicafrica, via fifine-adore)
