Departments

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George Zimmerman

  • SOURCE: Counterpunch
    5-13-16

    George Zimmerman and the Long History of Selling “Souvenirs”

    by Shawn Leigh Alexander

    George Zimmerman’s decision to sell, as he describes, “the firearm that was used to defend my life and end the brutal attack from Trayvon Martin” is just another link in the long chain of America’s historical obsession with selling and owning memorabilia connected with the murder of African Americans.

  • African American Voters Need to Channel Their Power in State Elections

    by Rawn James, Jr.

    Last month Americans marked the sixty-fifth anniversary of President Harry S. Truman’s signing Executive Order 9981 to desegregate America’s armed forces. African Americans had fought in every American war, including the Revolutionary War, but had done so in segregated units, often relegated to menial labor tasks. By the time President Truman issued Executive Order 9981, eliminating segregation and racial discrimination in the armed forces had become the single most important national issue to African American voters. Their cause was national in both scope and purpose.

  • SOURCE: The Root
    7-18-13

    Peniel E. Joseph: Trayvon, Race and American Democracy

    Peniel E. Joseph is founding director of the Center for the Study of Race and Democracy and a professor of history at Tufts University. He is also the Caperton Fellow for the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute at Harvard University. He is the author of Waiting 'Til the Midnight Hour: A Narrative History of Black Power in America and Dark Days, Bright Nights: From Black Power to Barack Obama. His biography of Stokely Carmichael will be published next year by Basic Books. He can be reached online at penielejoseph.com. Follow him on Twitter.

  • SOURCE: Religion Dispatches
    7-14-13

    Anthea Butler: The Zimmerman Acquittal -- America’s Racist God

    Anthea Butler is a Contributing Editor to Religion Dispatches. Her forthcoming book, "The Gospel According To Sarah: How Sarah Palin and her Tea Party Angels are Galvanizing the Religious Right" will be out in 2012.The not guilty verdict in the George Zimmerman case has me thinking a lot about a book I first encountered in seminary, Is God a White Racist?, by the Rev. Dr. Bill Jones. As a budding seminary student, it took me by surprise. Now, as a wiser, older professor looking at the needless death of Trayvon Martin, I have to say: I get it.God ain’t good all of the time. In fact, sometimes, God is not for us. As a black woman in a nation that has taken too many pains to remind me that I am not a white man, and am not capable of taking care of my reproductive rights, or my voting rights, I know that this American god ain’t my god. As a matter of fact, I think he’s a white racist god with a problem. More importantly, he is carrying a gun and stalking young black men.

  • SOURCE: UPI
    7-17-13

    Professor Anthea Butler calls God a 'white racist' in blog about Zimmerman trial

    The not guilty verdict in the George Zimmerman case has me thinking a lot about a book I first encountered in seminary, Is God a White Racist?, by the Rev. Dr. Bill Jones. As a budding seminary student, it took me by surprise. Now, as a wiser, older professor looking at the needless death of Trayvon Martin, I have to say: I get it.God ain’t good all of the time. In fact, sometimes, God is not for us. As a black woman in a nation that has taken too many pains to remind me that I am not a white man, and am not capable of taking care of my reproductive rights, or my voting rights, I know that this American god ain’t my god. As a matter of fact, I think he’s a white racist god with a problem. More importantly, he is carrying a gun and stalking young black men.

  • Women Played Critical Role in George Zimmerman Decision

    by Brenda E. Stevenson

    It has only been in the last fifty years or so that women have gained such significant presence as lawyers, prosecutors, and jurists. It will become increasingly important, therefore, that we understand the kinds of histories and socializations of females in our society that they bring into the courtroom, that weighs in when they consider the evidence, victims and defendants before them.