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Remembering Tyrik
My little brother was murdered on his birthday last year. Now I mourn the way violence and trauma disrupted our childhood.
Media for good trouble.
Liberation lives here.
Southern politics
'A modernized, streamlined incarceration experience.' New prison technology surveils life on both sides of the wall.
While new tech promises prisoners connection, safety, and security, it also weakens incarcerated people's connection to loved ones—and hands their information over to law enforcement.
The Dropout dramatizes Elizabeth Holmes' fraudulent rise. Endless military funding is also a scam.
"The Dropout portrays, with acute awareness of this reality, the priorities and allegiances of our political leaders. Theranos raised $945 million from high-profile investors and public figures."
Women have long borne the brunt of over-policing. Now, they're the fastest-growing incarcerated population in Texas.
Texas Center for Justice and Equity fellow Cynthia Simons on how the growing number of women in prison continues the carceral state's cycle of dismantling Black and brown families.
I grew up against a backdrop of white evangelical power. Florida's new CRT ban means even more Black students will, too.
When it comes to the protection of whiteness, separation of church and state has been enforced primarily as a matter of convenience.
Contrary to popular belief, healthcare in prison is far from free. Sometimes, it can cost your life.
Seven states in the nation—all in the South—prohibit those in prison from making money yet still charge medical fees. The physical and financial costs can follow incarcerated workers for years.
Arts & Soul
Bookmobiles to the rescue
In 26 states, students' access to books in school is under attack. Texas leads the nation with 16 districts enacting 713 individual bans.
How to do away with copaganda: Three Emmy-nominated shows to watch with an abolitionist lens
"I hope there's someone in the writers' room with an abolitionist mindset. Because I know how the cop closure ending goes. We all do. We've seen it. What else is possible?"
'beyond a better hell' / talking to ghosts: a mixtap/e/ssay
History is a groove according to hip-hop scholar A.D. Carson. But when the soundtrack of Black grief continues to be remixed and sampled without meaningful change, Black folks are forced to compare this current hell to the last one.
Netflix's 'Spiderhead' forgets that the truth about prisons is stranger than sci-fi
Netflix's $100 million movie is an expensive and poorly written portrayal of the abusive norm in many prisons throughout the country.
'The imaginary line in the sand': Texas artist's installation challenges U.S.-Mexico border
Karla García's binational art installation, 'La Línea Imaginaria,' makes personal memory the center of focus in the southwest desert landscape—rather than the imperialism of the U.S. border.
Race & Place
Only Murders in the Building exemplifies the lies in 'true' crime
"The most insidious message of the show is masked behind the comedic brilliance of the performances by Gomez, Martin, and Short—an obsession with true crime makes us, citizens, arm-chair cops eager to figure out who-dun-it, violating boundaries and ethical lines, endangering ourselves and others, and confirming biases."
Yellowjackets shows a world without police as disorderly. Abolitionists aren't buying it.
"Not all copaganda is legible as such—shows like Yellowjackets and so many other films, stories, and sci-fi in this genre play a critical role in the process of convincing us that a world…
Abbott Elementary and the promise of schools without cops
"Quinta Brunson asks us both: What does it actually feel like to be a Black student? And: What should it feel like?"
RuPaul's Drag Race visibilizes queerness—and the police state
"Intersectional queer solidarity of drag queen sisterhoods, shantay you stay. Copaganda and promotion of the police state, sashay away."
The White Lotus is supposed to be satire. Hawaiians deserve the last laugh.
"While The White Lotus does, cursorily, outline colonial and systemic problems, it provides no escape from them. It replicates, and in this way perpetuates, tired and problematic tropes."
