American history is rife with examples of Black people making gains, making progress and gaining power, and white conservatives snatching it from them to maintain white supremacy. Today, the GOP under Trump is working in earnest to diminish Black voting power on the federal, state and local level, and erase Blackness from political, civic and economic life. As Trump drowns out most of the noise with his drama and antics, these are the battles people are not seeing.

The move by Louisiana GOP lawmakers to eliminate the position of Calvin Duncan—a Black elected official in New Orleans—is a case in point.

Duncan won the election for Orleans Parish Criminal District Court Clerk in November, winning with 68% of the vote, and was sworn in on April 21. A wrongfully convicted man who spent 28 years in prison for a murder and armed robbery he didn’t commit, Duncan—who is set to assume office May 4—was exonerated, became a lawyer, ran for elected office and won. His victory prompted the Louisiana legislature to propose a bill that would eliminate Duncan’s elected position. The legislation would merge the positions of Orleans criminal district court clerk and Orleans civil district court clerk—a role currently held by Chelsey Richard Napoleon, a Black woman—to form a single office called Orleans district court clerk. Republican Gov. Jeff Landry plans to sign the bill into law.

While Louisiana is on the frontlines of the war on Black voters, the battles to weaken Black political power are being waged across the country. In the shadow of the redistricting war between red and blue states, red states are exploiting this opportunity to wipe out Black voting power. This is what white supremacy looks like when implemented as policy. Unable to win by sheer numbers and faced with changing demographics, the MAGA GOP has convinced itself that white people are an endangered species and victims of a conspiracy to replace them with melanated folks. Their only strategy to win is thievery and deception, which is what colonizers do. And Black voting power—which has taken decades to build since the Voting Rights Act was enacted in 1965—may take many more years to rebuild once it is stolen.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Supreme Court seems poised to gut Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which provides redistricting protections that provide Black people the opportunity to elect representatives of their choice. The case before the court, Louisiana v. Callais, involves the redistricting of Louisiana’s congressional map after a group of white voters—now listed in court filings as “non-African Americans”—claimed that using race as a factor to draw district maps discriminated against them. The court’s ruling, expected in June, could imperil 15 House seats currently held by Black members of Congress.

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Authorities in Washington, D.C., arrested a California man on Saturday evening during a desperate attempt to sneak into the club without his wristband.

The Associated Press reports.

A man armed with guns and knives stormed the lobby outside the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner attended by President Donald Trump on Saturday night, charging toward the ballroom in a chaotic encounter with Secret Service agents as guests dived under tables at the sound of shots being fired.

The president was uninjured and was rushed off the stage. The armed man, who officials said was a guest at the Washington Hilton where the dinner was being held, was taken into custody and was expected in court Monday.

For Black people, this is light work.

According to a peer-reviewed research study, 84.2% of Black people have been at a party where a shooting started (when a dude at my barbershop told me this, an old man peered over his glasses and said: “sho nuff”). While Chris Brown has issued numerous warnings against hating from outside the club, many people don’t know what to do when an assassin starts to tear the club up.

Black people, however, are very good at not being assassinated.

Even if you count the unsubstantiated rumors about Abraham Lincoln, Black presidents, vice presidents and federal officeholders still boast a 99.999% non-assassination rate. Why do you think there were so few Black people at the WHCD (aside from racism, mainstream media purging of Black journalists and the unseasoned chicken they probably served)?

In the spirit of brotherhood, we put together these 10 tips for our caucasoidal brothers and sisters who may find themselves in the middle of an assassination attempt.

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Green was born to formerly enslaved parents in Mound Bayou, Miss., and his father was one of the founders of the all-Black town. At 17, Green left his hometown to enroll in Fisk University. In 1914, he graduated from Harvard Law School and enlisted in the Army. Although the Army’s segregation policy prevented Black soldiers from serving in combat roles, as the judge advocate for the 92nd Division, Green helped convince President Woodrow Wilson and the secretary of war to essentially loan the all-Black unit to the French Army during World War I.

That’s why the 92nd was the only Black unit to serve in a combat role in WWI. In fact, the Black soldiers who fought in the Meuse-Argonne Offensive—which still stands as the largest and deadliest military operation in American history—were not actually fighting under the command of the U.S. Army. That’s why Green returned to Mound Bayou with a patch on his uniform that no one had seen before. Like most Army insignia, the patch represented America. The crossed rifles symbolized the infantry. But the uniquely American animal in the center and the nickname for Green’s division came from the Native American name for the toughest, most formidable animal on the entire North American continent.

The Buffalo Soldiers.

Anyway, in 1919, when Green was 29 years old, he was elected mayor by the citizens of Mound Bayou. He built an HBCU. He traveled around the country, fighting Jim Crow as the NAACP's attorney. In a few years of taking office, crime plummeted, but not because Green was “tough on crime.” But because, well…

It would sound racist if I said that crime was low because white people weren’t around. So, instead, I’ll quote an article by David Beito, a white scholar writing for the Independent Institute, a non-profit, non-partisan public policy research and educational organization:

His diplomatic skills proved critical in heading off external threats from hostile whites and keeping the peace internally.

A hallmark of Green’s long tenure was an informal system of adjudication, negotiation, and consensus to control crime and resolve disputes. “The only rowdyism of any consequence ever known in or about the place,” one local citizen commented during the 1920s, “was caused by some poor whites coming to Mound Bayou on a Fourth of July picnic and getting drunk on whisky they had brought with them. There is not a loafer or vagrant in our town.” Crime was so low that the town closed its only jail in 1929 as “a useless and unnecessary institution.”

Told y’all.

In 1941, Mound Bayou broke ground for the Taborian Hospital. Built by McKissack & McKissack, the all-Black firm that designed the training facilities for the Tuskegee Airmen, the hospital was funded by a nationwide fraternal group initially created to organize a national slave revolt.

Twenty-five years before white people thought of Medicare, any Black person who paid the $8.40 annual dues could come to Mound Bayou for free medical care, including surgery. To lead the facility, Green hired chief surgeon T.R.M. Howard.

Called “the most militant Negro voice heard in the Mississippi wilderness,” Howard’s “Don’t Buy Gas Where You Can’t Use the Restroom” campaign would inspire the Montgomery bus boycott. He helped uncover the Emmett Till murder. He mentored Jesse Jackson, Medgar Evers and Fannie Lou Hamer. Jackson’s Rainbow Coalition was founded in his living room. Unfortunately, Howard had one problem:

White people wanted to kill him.

That’s how we know what happened to Emmett Till.

Howard eventually moved to Chicago and opened Friendship Medical Center on the South Side. After the U.S. Supreme Court decided Roe v. Wade, Howard performed the first legal abortion in the state. When people wondered how he was so prepared, he confessed that he had been performing abortions for women who traveled to Mound Bayou for years.

Green served as mayor of Mound Bayou for 40 years, until his death in 1960. And, if you’re wondering why his impact on an all-Black town isn’t celebrated more, it’s because Mound Bayou is not that different from most all-Black towns.

The all-Black Hayti District in Durham, N.C., organized one of the first sit-ins. It was so prosperous that it earned the nickname “Black Wall Street” long before Tulsa. Boley, Okla., boasted an electric company, two HBCUs and one of America’s first Black-owned banks and virtually no crime—except when white people came to visit. Ads for homes in all-Black Eatonville, Fla., claimed it had “solved the great race problem,” and in 1930, during the height of the Great Depression, 73% of residents owned their homes.

So what was so different about Benjamin Green?

Well, Mound Bayou was not the first all-Black town in America. But Black towns like Eatonville, Fla., Oscarville, Ga., and Nicodemus, Kan., evolved from Black farming settlements. Boley grew from a railroad stop that was settled by Black freedmen who already lived in “Indian Territory.” Hayti was ultimately absorbed into Durham.

Conversely, Mound Bayou’s founders were business owners who wanted to build a city. They built schools and mapped out a downtown area and the streets with the idea of “a self-reliant, autonomous, all-black community” in mind. Mound Bayou did not become a town; it was conceived as one when it was incorporated in 1887.

“The streets of the town are laid off regularly and are graded and graveled,” the Mississippi Clarion reported. “Concrete Sidewalks are along the principal thoroughfares, which are lined by tall and shapely Lombardy poplars.”

The article was framed by a picture of a Mound Bayou founder holding the first child born in the city…

Benjamin Allen Green.

But Green didn’t grow up on a farm. He grew up with Black neighbors and attended Black schools and went to a Black college and fought with Black people and then returned to the all-Black neighborhood where he learned everything he knew.

Benjamin Allen Green was the first boy in the ‘hood.

Today’s Reading List:

• Something is wrong with white people by Michael Harriot

• Where the Hood At? Fifty Years of Change in Black Neighborhoods by Michael Lens

• Mississippi historic Black farming hub hit as White South Africans take farm jobs by Reuters

• The Cruelty Is the Point by Adam Serwer

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In three weeks, three Black women were shot—two of them fatally—in their own homes by the men who said they loved them. Nancy Metayer Bowen, vice mayor of Coral Springs, Fla., was killed just as she was about to announce a run for Congress; Dr. Cerina Fairfax was shot and killed in her own basement two weeks before the court ordered her husband out. Shaneiqua Pugh in Shreveport, La., was shot in the face and seriously injured by her husband, who then killed eight children, ages 3 to 11, the day before their separation court date. Eight babies. Used as a weapon against a woman trying to leave.

Most of the conversation that followed was about Black men’s mental health. The women, especially Cerina Fairfax, became footnotes in their own murders. We centered him in the story of her death, in real time. Before I go one line further, let me say what needs to be said: Our men are hurting. I know that. I am the daughter, sister, auntie, partner and friend of Black men, and I love them, and I am for them. But loving them has to include telling the truth about how we got here. We did not get here at the trigger. The road to that trigger was paved a long time ago.

My Grandmother Stayed 77 Years. We Called It Love.

My grandmother married my granddaddy at 15. He was 20. She wanted to be a school teacher. Her family could not afford to keep schooling her, and he had a little bit of land. That was the match. She birthed nine children, raised seven (two she lost in infancy). She never drove a car. She worked, but never enough to be independent. They were married for 77 years. All my life, I told that story like a love story.

We adored my granddaddy because my grandmother hid her pain deep enough that the grandchildren never saw it. She covered for him so her children would know they had a good daddy, even when he was not always a good husband. He ran the streets, and everybody knew. Some of those women were her friends. Some were family. But the proud family story we passed down at the table was that no matter what he did, he came home every night. That was the bar. He did his dirt, but he came home. What we did not talk about was what she swallowed to keep that story intact, and I believe now that the swallowing is what made her sick. I recently learned that one night, in a drunken, jealous rage, my granddaddy cut my grandmother’s breast so deeply she needed over 40 stitches. Forty stitches. And he was a good man. That is what we said. That is what we still say. And we talked about their marriage like a love story.

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I should begin with the hole in my sister’s face.

I should describe how surprisingly clean a hole a bullet bores into a skull—as if her head was a watermelon or a piece of wood or a thing we did not lov…

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As one of the world’s foremost experts in cousinomics, my inbox exploded a few days ago, after Things I’ve Learned podcast host Steve Owens posted this Instagram reel:

While everything in Owens said is technically correct, this social media dissertation is exactly I spent my life pioneering the field of wypipology.

First, allow me to present my credentials:

Wypipologist is based on wypipo, a Black slang term for “white people” (particularly those perceived to be racist, unaware of their own privilege, or engaging in cultural appropriation) based on a Black colloquial pronunciation of the phrase.

Added to wypipo is the suffix -ologist, signifying someone with expert knowledge of a particular domain of study, usually a kind of science (think biologist). A wypipologist, then, “studies” wypipology— the science of white people, as it were, or white, mainstream culture.

The term wypipologist appears to have been coined by journalist and commentator Michael Harriot

— The actual dictionary

Besides my AI-certified contributions to academia, I am also a Nobel prize-winning anthropologist (I won the 1988 World Series of Pittypat at my aunt Nobel Bradley’s liquor house), who has published numerous peer-reviewed studies in auntieology, Thanksgivinomics, cookoutograhy and other cousin-related arts and sciences.

Now that you have my curriculum vitae, I can add some additional context.

While Owens is not wrong, he is presenting a Eurocentric social construct known among my cousinsdemics as “whitefolkin’.” Not only is the numerical hierarchy that defines Yakubian cousinhood a social construct, but, like most things that follow the dictates of white supremacy, it’s just something white people made up to get more things.

No, seriously, I’ve actually studied this.

According to most scholars, European kinship systems evolved from the need to manage land, inheritance and resources (“kinship” is the Caucasoidal term for “my people”). More importantly, no one uses this system but white people. In fact, the lineage structure that Owens describes is so white-centric that it doesn’t even translate to Chinese, Filipino and most indigenous languages. For instance, the First Nation people in so-called Australia don’t have cousins. Other societies differentiate between patrilineal and matrilineal cousins. In many communal cultures, there is no difference between a cousin and a sibling. And in West African cultures, from where most Black Americans descend, cousinship cannot be defined by blood or a chart.

That’s why, for the first time in cousin history, ContrabandCamp has decided to list the types of Black cousins. While some may call this cultural appropriation, we admit that this was inspired by Owens’s post. However, this groundbreaking work of CRT (Cousin Relationship Theory) is not just necessary; it is rooted in the Africana studies’ principle of how Black people see themselves.

Plus, white people do it all the time.

Here is the definitive ranking of the nine types of Black cousins.

9. Saycousins

These are people who might be genetically related, but have heard rumors that they share a common ancestor. In most cases, the familial connection cannot be documented by a family tree, but it is more than just a rumor. Only three people are qualified to certify someone as “saycousins.”

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I knew I was wrong.

When I saw the look on my mother’s face, I immediately concealed the cigarette lighter I was holding, bolted out of the kitchen and waited for my cousin to join me in my bedroom. My cousin Tyran was a year younger and had never been knocked into next week; he couldn’t have predicted the danger he was in. Finally realizing that an 8-year-old has no rights his infuriated mom was bound to respect, Tyran stopped pleading his case and eventually joined me in my pretrial detention chambers.

My cousin and I had found the rusted, empty Zippo cigar lighter a few hours earlier on our way home from school. As soon as we got home, we went to the barn, refilled the lighter with gasoline from our trusty lawnmower and tried to strike it. When that didn’t work, I suggested we jump-start it by taking the now-refueled lighter into the kitchen and striking the flint while holding it over our gas stove. When our mothers walked through the door, I was standing on a dining room chair, perched over the stove next to Tyran, who was still holding the gas can.

Sitting in my bedroom, we began discussing our legal defense. As a veteran of the Harriot criminal justice system, I tried to explain why a plea deal was off the table. We were caught red-handed by two eyewitnesses—our mothers. While I thought we could beat the charges by boysplaining our science experiment, Tyran believed our only option was to plead guilty. So, standing before our two-person jury, we gave a full confession of our crimes and threw ourselves at the mercy of the court.

“I broke the rules,” Tyran declared to our two-person jury. “I’m not supposed to cook when you’re not home.”

“I know a chair is not a stepladder.” I chimed in. “And you told me to stay in the house until you and Aunt Phyllis came back from the grocery store, so I’m sorry I went outside to get the gas can. That was wrong.”

After reprimanding us for somewhere between 20 minutes and 20 hours, the Harriot Supreme Court justice sisters sentenced us to two weeks of solitary confinement, a month without television privileges and one year of community service (having everyone in the community call us “The Firestarters”). Realizing that there would be flying cars before our parole hearing, we returned to my room and searched for the bright side.

“OK, maybe my plan didn’t work,” said Tyran, breaking our stunned silence. “And what is an ‘aspiring arsonist’?”

“I don’t know,” I replied. “Anyway…Since we can’t use the stove, we can get some matches for next time.”

“And maybe charcoal lighter fluid instead of gas,” my cousin concurred.

“At least we learned from our mistakes,” I added, flicking the flint of our soon-to-be-refurbished firestarter.

An Arsonist’s Apology

Tucker Carlson is sorry.

On Monday, the former Fox News host admitted his role in helping Donald Trump set American democracy on fire.

“It’s not enough to say ‘I changed my mind’ or ‘this is bad'; I’m out,’” Carlson said during a conversation with his even whiter-named brother, Buckley. “I want to say I’m sorry for misleading people. It was not intentional. But anyway…”

To be clear, Carlson is apologizing for helping Donald Trump get elected—not for serving as an accelerant for the white supremacist “great replacement theory.” According to The New York Times, “no public figure has promoted replacement theory more loudly or relentlessly than the Fox host Tucker Carlson.” Apparently, the cross-burning connoisseur has no regrets about that. Carlson is also not sorry for saying white people weren’t “designed” to live around immigrants. He doesn’t feel guilty about giving oxygen to white nationalist flamethrower Nick Fuentes, who proudly describes himself as “a racist.” And while Tucker privately dismissed claims that the 2020 election was stolen, he hasn’t apologized for publicly endorsing the lie. But anyway…

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Born to a regular degular English family in 1622, Henry was never going to be a king or a duke. Fortunately (for Henry), in 1618, the Virginia Company of London began granting 50 acres of free land to the people who could pay for workers to relocate to the fledgling colony. Like many others, Henry soon realized the “workers” also included enslaved Africans. So in 1651, Henry packed up his wife and six kids, moved and redeemed his headrights coupon for 297 acres.

One year after his family relocated to the floundering startup, he was elected to the first legislative body in America, the Virginia House of Burgesses. Although it had existed since 1619, it had no royal backing until England’s newly restored King Charles II certified the body in 1660. By then, Henry had imported enough Africans to own more than 6,000 acres of free land. His daughter Judith had married Henry Randolph, an even wealthier, more powerful slave-owning lawmaker, while Soane’s son, John, worked in the human trafficking industry. So when it came time for Virginia’s legislature to choose the leader, guess who got the job as speaker of the House?

Henry Soane.

Unfortunately, Soane died just before Virginia’s first royally sanctioned legislative session opened in 1661. He was gone but not forgotten. Judith's husband, Henry Randolph, had been elected as clerk of the House of Burgesses. And in 1662, Clerk Randolph urged the colonial legislature to honor his father-in-law by passing every bill Soane had authored, including one that would define race, whiteness and chattel slavery in America:

“WHEREAS some doubts have arisen whether children got by any Englishman upon a negro woman should be slave or free, Be it therefore enacted and declared by this present grand assembly, that all children born in this country shall be held bond or free only according to the condition of the mother.”

— Virginia General Assembly Act XII, December 1662

Henry’s son, John, never married, partly because of his new job working with the royal family. The Virginia Company of London had been dissolved, but his father’s connections helped him land a new position as the chief surveyor in charge of headrights. After John’s father died, King Charles named John chief agent of the Royal African Company.

John’s brothers inherited his land, but he gave all of his surveying instruments to his nephews. And since Judith’s wealthy husband had died, she remarried a dude named Peter. Their only daughter, Mary, inherited John Soane’s slave-trading wealth, Henry Soane’s land that came from owning slaves, the Randolph slavery wealth and all the wealth that came from being America’s No. 1 human trafficker. There was just one problem:

They weren’t educated.

In her defense, Mary didn’t have to educate her son, Peter. Although he was barely literate, anyone who enslaves that many people and inherited so much land doesn’t need a nine-to-five. Although Peter struggled with reading and writing, he learned “plantation management” to maintain the family wealth. Plus, when he doubled back up the family tree and married Jane Randolph (who was technically not his cousin), he also doubled the family’s landholdings. The family wealth tripled when he was named executor of the estate for his wife-cousin’s uncle, William Randolph. Not only was William the wealthiest and most powerful man in Virginia, but he was also a founding trustee of the second college in America, William and Mary, which was founded on one of the Randolph’s plantations.

Most of Peter and Jane’s children died before they reached adulthood, but they raised the Randolph kids. So when Peter died, his 14-year-old son inherited:

• 5,000 acres of free land from the richest, most powerful families in the British colonies

• The labor from four generations of enslaved Africans

• The wealth of the No. 1 human trafficker in colonial America.

• The clout from a family with speakers of the oldest legislature in America.

• Admission into the second-oldest institution of higher learning in the American colonies.

• Free college tuition.

• And all the laws, wealth and privilege that America had to offer.

Although Peter and Jane’s son enslaved more than 600 human beings, he didn’t technically have to buy slaves or traffic them, because he inherited them. He was one of the largest property owners in the history of this country, but he didn’t have to buy land. His ancestors weren’t educated, so we don’t know if his family valued education.

And because his great-great-grandfather literally invented white privilege, we don’t know how smart or talented he was. In fact, there is only one thing we can say we truly know about Peter and Jane.

They raised a liar.

When Jane died at 57 years old, she knew her son had all the wealth, status, education and power that six generations of the most powerful people had specifically tailored to benefit and protect him. In her final act of motherhood, she gave him the title to the people she enslaved. Had she lived another three months, Jane could have read the biggest lie her privileged son had ever told:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”

How the fuck would he know?

Was Thomas Jefferson smart?

Thank you, , , , , , and many others for joining the Wake-Up Call! Join us every Friday for the Wake-Up Call.

Today’s Reading List:

• The Privilege of White Individuality by Michael Harriot

• Dr. Russell Barkley on attention deficit disorder

• A Dangerous Distortion of Our Families: Representations of Families, by Race, in News and Opinion Media by Color of Change and Travis L. Dixon

• Prevalence and Risk Factors Associated With Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder Among US Black Individuals by Jude Mary Cénat, Camille Blais-Rochette, Catherine Morse, Marie-Pier Vandette, Pari-Gole Noorishad, Cary Kogan, Assumpta Ndengeyingoma and Patrick R. Labelle

This story was published on Feb. 12, 2018.

The most dangerous madmen are those created by religion, and … people whose aim is to disrupt society always know how to make good use of them on occasion.

— Denis Diderot

Any day now, the Robert Mueller investigation will end, and everyone will read about …

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AT&T had a billion-dollar diversity problem.

In 2019, the company’s WarnerMedia division created the role of chief diversity officer to address the company’s lack of women in the upper ranks. After the George Floyd protests shined a spotlight on corporate inclusion, AT&T invested more than $3 billion to make its 74% white, 7% Black lea…

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As someone who is allergic to cheese, milk and other byproducts of cow titties, many options on the latchkey kids' menu were not available to me. Even worse, we were too poor to afford extravagances like Hot Pockets and luxury-brand Lunchables, so pizza, cereal and grilled government cheese sandwiches were off limits. The sound of the cream truck meant nothing to me. And, as the Apostle Paul once wrote to the Thessalonians:

“For what is a baloney sandwich if there is no cheese?”

Still, I needed something between breakfasts of icingless Pop-Tarts (the icing contains milk) and my home-cooked dinners. And because my family’s homemade jelly recipe would put the entire Welch family to shame, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches became my go-to DIY meal. I mean, I ate them a lot. My afterschool struggle sandwich diet was probably responsible for the golden era of peanut farming (you’re welcome, Jimmy Carter).

When I attended college, I was even poorer. And since I no longer had access to my aunt Marvell’s free jelly, I had to buy my own jam products. According to an analysis by one AI platform (Chat PB&J), retail jelly sales increased 24.2% during the early ’90s. I did that (probably).

I finally escaped from the peanut butter and jelly plantation. I’m still allergic to cheese and other milk products. My aunt still sends batches of homemade jelly (mostly for biscuits). My light bread consumption has not waned. But because I can now afford other options, I rarely eat PB&J, causing a downward trend in the peanut industry.

While my historic impact on the peanut butter and jelly market is undeniable, some naysayers give Smuckers the credit for attracting Black men. Others attribute the decline in peanut sales to allergies and the availability of non-nut spreads. Even though I have never grown a nut or made a jar of fruit preserves, you might be shocked to learn that the executives at Skippy or the marketing team at Peter Pan have never reached out to ask me:

“How do we fix peanut butter?”

This story is about the Democratic Party.

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“Play stupid games; win stupid prizes.”
— Ancient African-American adage

Long before Jake Paul’s jaw found out about the dangers of fucking around from Anthony Joshua’s fist, back when Johnny Knoxville and Bam Margera were still drea…

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Culottes are a type of shorts. But they’re also pants. And they’re also a skirt. They’re basically what happens when a sundress goes to a day party and, after a few too many mimosas, has a one-day stand with a pair of basketball shorts, gets pregnant and raises the baby in the suburbs surrounded by skorts and capris.

Short-sleeve yoga pants, if you will.

My sisters and I were raised in a fundamental holiness church, where a six-piece shouting music band played for our five-hour services four nights a week. At the Household of Faith, the bouncers ushers wouldn’t let a man through the door who wasn’t wearing hard bottoms, a coat and tie. Our Jesus wouldn’t even talk to a woman who didn’t wear a prayer cloth, a slip and stockings to cover her legs.

If we were white, they’d call it a cult.

In our church cult, women who wore pants were considered “jezebels” (which, I thought, was pronounced “jazzybells”). And, because I used my “kernel mind,” I just assumed being a “jazzybell” was a form of burlesque dance. (Back then, I didn’t know that “burlesque” was basically a steampunk stripper).

In any case, our church considered pants to be a gateway drug for Jazzybelles. Girls who wore tight jeans were headed down the road to heathenry, drinking Seagram’s wine coolers and listening to secular music (which, I thought, was “sexual music”). To be fair, men who skipped church services and listened to Prince would also become whoremongers (Or “whore monsters,” which I assumed is how Godzilla and Freddy Krueger were conceived). And because my sisters were not aspiring jazzybells, they didn’t wear pants.

Even if you’ve never met my sisters, there was probably a girl in your middle school glee club whose entire wardrobe consisted of long jean skirts and blouses (People with the Holy Ghost don’t wear shirts; they wear blouses). And, according to a stat I made up, the Black church is responsible for 72.5% of all domestic jean skirt sales. I’m pretty sure the entire prayer cloth industry would collapse without Pentecostals, COGIC and the greater Holy Ghost community.

This no-pants edict was not a problem for my youngest sisters, Comelita and Robin. Like most heathens, they questioned everything. By the time they were in junior high school, they were listening to boompity-boom music, praying without wearing a Holy Ghost lace front and leaving their slips at home. And after years of searching the scriptures for the verse in which the Apostle Paul wrote to the Thessalonians about the dangers of sweatpants and denim leg coverings, they realized that Jesus didn’t have a dress code and started keeping a secret stash of acid-washed Jordache jeans in their school locker.

My oldest sister, Sean, was different. She shouted at church, led the children’s choir and adhered to protocol. Sure, she watched Soul Train, cussed a little bit and did the wop when no one was around. But unlike her younger sisters, she was not on the jazzybell trajectory. She just followed the rules.

And Sean played sports.

Not only was Sean the strongest, fastest and most athletic person in our family (boy or girl), she was also the only Black girl at her all-white, Christian private school. I’m not making a racial stereotype, but the fact that she made the basketball, volleyball and softball teams in a skirt said a lot.

Because of rules against violating religious rights, a public school would’ve probably had to let Sean play in her Holy Ghost attire. But because she was at a private school, she was really worried about the team uniform. And if you’re thinking, “They wouldn’t dare kick the best player off the team because of something so insignificant,” you forgot one thing:

These were white people.

White people are keen on forcing other people to follow rules that don’t affect them. They can always find a loophole to excuse their own behavior, but they will paint other rule-breakers as thugs or heathens destined for hell.

When you think about it, racism is an apt comparison to religion. They are governed by illogical unwritten rules that don’t make sense. They both follow traditions based on centuries-old rules that men made up. And they both weaponize shame and fear. Whether it’s a church service, the Klan or the Supreme Court, there’s probably a robe involved. And religion and white supremacy are both weaponized against Black women…

To protect them.

Because Sean was contending with a system where whiteness and religion were intertwined, it was natural for her to believe these arbitrary rules were sacrosanct. If Jesus’ team had a uniform policy, then why wouldn’t a Christian school basketball team? Conversely, if dressing like a jazzybell makes you a jazzybell, then are you even a volleyball player if you don’t wear volleyball shorts? She was in a pickle, and there was only one person who could solve this dilemma:

Me.

After studying the subject, I discovered that culottes was the solution. The boneless pants would give Sean all the movement of shorts while also hiding her Jazzybell parts. They were basically jogging pants for Jesus.

A sweat skirt, if you will.

Sean and I prepared an entire presentation to present her case to my mom. As we rehearsed our arguments and came up with rebuttals for any pro-arguments, Comelita and Robin screamed to my mom, who was in the other room.

This is an exact transcript of the incident

Comelita: MAMA! IF SEAN WEARS COOL-OFF SHORTS TO PLAY BASKETBALL, WILL SHE BE A JAZZYBELL?

Mama: WHAT IS COOL-OFF SHORTS? AND WHAT IS A JAZZYBELL?

Sean (whispering): Shut up, girl! We ain’t ready!

Me (also whispering): It’s culottes!

Robin: MIKEY SAID IT’S “CULOTTES!” IT’S PANTS!

Mama: CLOTHES DON’T MAKE YOU A JEZEBEL! WE’LL GO GET SOME CULOTTES TOMORROW!

AND WHY ARE YOU HOLLERING? I’M TRYING TO WATCH MY STORIES!

It turns out my mama cared about Jesus’ dress code as much as Jesus cared about Jazzybells. Her children’s ability to navigate this world as kind, principled humans was her biggest concern. By the time they finished high school, Comelita and Robin were out of the pants closet, and I was allowed to skip some church services. Mama wanted us to think critically, not just to follow arbitrary traditions just because someone said so.

And guess what?

Not one of us became a Jezebel or whoremongerer (OK, I may have done a little mongering during my 20s, but I didn’t target Jazzybells). But we also learned something that changed our lives.

Sometimes you can just ask!

Thank you , , , , , and many others for tuning into the Wake-Up Call Live! Join the conversation every Friday at 9 a.m. ET.

Today’s Reading List:

• White People Can’t Tell Me Nothing by Michael Harriot

• There Is No Post-Racial America by Ta-Nehisi Coates

• Gullible, Cynical America by Adam Serwer

• The Caucasians’ Guide to Black Churches by Michael Harriot

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This article was originally published on April 7, 2018.

On April 4, 1968, a bullet entered the right cheek of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., killing him.

It was you who bore the shame. It was you who hung your head and imagined yourself tainted with the unthinkable legacy. But no one ever bla…

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Members of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. were seen clutching their signature neck adornments during a Trick Daddy performance at the South Atlantic Regional Conference’s Step and Stroll competition on Friday in Orlando, Fla. While the artist reportedly agreed to perform a pre-approved list of songs, his sexually suggestive lyrics caused some members to leave the event room before the performance was cut short.

After members left in disgust, Regional Director Tiffany Moore Russell (which might be the most AKA name ever) issued an official statement explaining she ended the performance after Trick Daddy disregarded the organization’s language requirements and the list of pre-approved songs. Hours later, a representative from Trick Daddy Dollars Incorporated responded to the sorority leader’s comments with an official statement of his own.

Before I continue, our white readers should know that there are certain parts of this story that you can’t comprehend.

1. This story is not about a Black “sorority.” While Black women make up the membership of Alpha Kappa Alpha and the organization can be found on college campuses, Black Greek-letter fraternities and sororities are not the same as Tri-Delts, TKEs and ATOs. The differences don’t matter, and there are no white equivalents. For the sake of this story, you should understand that they are entirely different institutions.

2. There will be no Trick Daddy slander: The story has nothing to do with his rapping ability or the quality of his music. Trick Daddy has the same number of platinum albums (two) as Gwen Stefani and three additional gold albums. Trick Daddy has been a huge star for nearly 30 years. If you’re more familiar with one than the other, you know why.

3. This story is not about elitism or being bougie: If you’re white, you probably don’t know why that statement is even necessary. But if you ever get to know a Black woman who wears a lot of pink and green, you’ll learn.

As a Black alumnus of a predominantly white institution called America, there are aspects of Caucasian culture I can never truly understand.

For instance, I know my wash-clothless brothers and sisters consider One Battle After Another to be a good movie. I even predicted that it would win Best Picture. But I can’t explain “why.” Conversely, I understand why Bob Dylan, Elvis and Paul McCartney are ranked above Luther Vandross in Rolling Stone’s list of the greatest singers of all time. It’s not racism (after all, Mary J. Blige is ranked No. 25) or subjective taste. Just as white people can’t fully comprehend why Sinners, Parliament Funkadelic’s “Flashlight” and my mama’s biscuits invoke the same exact euphoria as the Black Holy Ghost, I am not equipped to assess the music that moves white souls (They weren’t ranking the “greatest” or “more influential” singers, mind you, but the “best”).

Even if you are someone who prefers Caucasoidal cinema, pumpkin-based desserts and Bob Dylan songs to Ryan Coogler, peach cobbler or Marvin Gaye (no, seriously, he’s ranked five spots behind Dylan), there is still a lot this story can teach you as a white person.

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Three days after his arrest, trial and public lynching, a well-known community activist has reportedly received a posthumous pardon from his father, granting him a reprieve from death.

Known by his numerous street names, including J Christ, Da’ Messiah and Young Jeezy of Nazareth, Yeshua Ben Yosef had long drawn the ire of the Herod administration for giving away free healthcare, demonizing the rich and promoting other “radical leftist ideas.” After Ben Yosef and other protestors interrupted a local church service last week, administration officials raided the Olive Garden in Jerusalem’s Gethsemane neighborhood and charged the 33-year-old Bethlehem native with a litany of crimes, including:

• Disorderly conduct

• Walking on water without a boating permit;

• Operating an illegal water-to-wine business;

• Healing the sick without a medical license;

• Disrupting the business of a federally licensed money-lender; and

• Violating the federal ban on diversity, equity and inclusion.

Herod appointee Pontius Pilate sentenced Ben Yosef to death after a jury convicted Ben Yosef in a rushed trial that many compared to a lynch mob. Longtime associate Simon Peter was also initially charged with assaulting an officer and resisting arrest for cutting an officer’s ear off. But prosecutors dropped the charges when public defenders pointed at the officer’s pristine earlobes. Pressured to testify against the protest movement, at least one member of Jesus’ crew declined.

“Who are y’all talking about?” asked trusted ally Peter, just before a cock crowed. “I told y’all three times I don’t know no damn Jesus!!”

Some speculated that the protest leader might get a pardon, but others were skeptical. “We don’t have enough money to buy a pardon,” said Thomas, doubtfully. “That’s as a camel passing through the eye of a needle.” Thomas also dismissed rumors that a crypto account owned by Judas Iscariot recently received a deposit of 30 bitcoin.

Although civil rights organizations and legal experts noted the lack of due process, the activist was executed at a Calvary crucifixion facility known on late Friday evening.

On Sunday, social media sleuths began to post evidence that contradicts the government’s account.

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“This is not who we are.”

Even if you are patriotic and filled with love of one’s country, it is impossible to utter this phrase if you have a rudimentary understanding of politics, history or global events. Anyone with a scintilla of national self-awareness knows that America is capable of anything. This country’s founders didn’t just participate in rape, human trafficking, genocide and labor theft, but they enshrined this inhuman, race-based system of violence and theft in the foundational document of this country in order to protect it. But this country also fought the bloodiest war in its history against traitors who believed in the founders’ dream. We used violence to enforce a tyrannical system of racial apartheid, and we fought a world war against a tyrant who used violence, land theft and genocide to build an empire that was based on America’s system of racial apartheid. We fought for democracy while refusing to become one. We are a constitutional republic that withheld constitutional rights from the republic’s Black citizens.

There is nothing that falls beneath America’s standards. We are every evil, racist or corrupt thing that ever was.

And we are dumb.

Thank you, , , , , , and many others for tuning in to The Wake-Up Call Live. Join us next Friday for our next live conversation.

Today’s Reading List:

• Young Hoes Cook Everything On High Heat by Zoe Cummings

• Gullible, Cynical America by Adam Serwer

• Black Twitter Explodes With Rumors of Resurrection by Michael Harriot

  Subscribe now

This article was published on March 30, 2018.

I was 9 years old the first time I was punched in the face.

During a church service, I absconded from the sanctuary with two of my older cousins and headed to a neighborhood store. When I returned, my mother asked where I had been, and I snitched: “I went to the store with Bernar…

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Like the popular subreddit “Explain Like I’m Five” (ELI5), ContrabandCamp’s “Explain Like I’m a Racist 5-Year-Old” (ELIAR) series simplifies racial issues down to concepts simple for a racist baby to understand.

Hi, Mr. Harriot. Do you have a few seconds to talk?

Hello, Racist Baby! It’s been a long time! I thought you had forgotten about me. Of course, I always have time for you!

What would you like to talk about?

I have a few questions that need answering. Do I have to get a rectal cleanse first? Do you hypnotize me before I start? I don’t know how this works.

What are you talking about, my fascist friend? I don’t do hypnosis.

And why in heaven’s sake would you need a rectal cleanse to talk to me?

Well, I heard you started some kind of camp since we last spoke. My dad always says, “My favorite kind of camp is a concentration camp,” then he bursts out laughing. So I figured that I had to really focus on what you’re saying.

Plus, I know you’re a member of the press. A few years ago, my parents took me on a special field trip to the U.S. Capitol to prevent people from making metal. I still remember the date—Jan. 6, 2021. When we were touring the building, I overheard someone say, “The press gives enemas to the people.” I figured I had to get one to talk to you.

After all, my mom always says that the Democrats are full of crap.

I’m pretty sure your dad’s friends were saying: “The press is the enemy of the people.”

And I didn’t start a concentration camp. I founded a site called ContrabandCamp, and you’re welcome anytime. Is that what you wanted to talk about?

Wait…was your dad part of the Jan. 6 insurrection? And why doesn’t he like metal?

No, we went to D.C. to stop the steel.

But I’m here about my mom. Usually, she’s pretty happy. In fact, she’s been on cloud nine ever since Mr. Trump issued an executive order for the Queen of Country Music to clean my dad’s illegal vinyl collection. But a few days ago, my mom saw something on X that upset her. She’s been crying for the past four days!

She hasn’t been this mad since the illegal immigrants stole the erection from white men!

First of all, my mini lynch mobber, I doubt Trump made Dolly Parton clean your dad’s albums. He wiped your dad’s criminal record clean by giving him a pardon!

Anyway, what did your mom see that made her so upset?

She was watching a racist video making fun of Bill Belichick’s widow.

Bill Belichick is not dead, Racist Baby.

Well, I hate to be the Bear of Bad News; it’s one of my favorite movies. But I’m sorry to inform you that a leftist named “Auntie Fur” killed a “great Patriot.” Everyone knows that Tom Brady is alive, so they must be talking about Bill Belichick (may he rest in white power).

I can’t believe you didn’t know! I thought you were up on current events!

Oh, wait. You’re talking about Charlie Kirk.

Who’s that? What position did he play?

Receiver.

He caught bullets.

Anyway, what happened to Charlie Kirk’s widow that upset your mother?

Well, it all started with Druski, who is one of my favorite content creators. I used to think he was hilarious. But a few days ago, he released this viral video:

At first, I thought Druski had somehow gotten footage of my mom. But when I showed her the video, she wasn’t exactly proud that she was going viral. She said it was racist!

My mee-maw told me that “the coloreds all know each other,” so I just wanna know why you allowed Druski to be racist against my people.

I thought we were friends!

I don’t know Druski, Racist Baby. But tell me why you think this video is racist, my sweet kindergarten klansman?

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