Category: Racial Equality

Star Wars actress Kelly Marie Tran deletes Instagram posts after abuse – BBC News

~ mcequality

Star Wars actress Kelly Marie Tran, who has suffered months of racist and sexist abuse on social media, has deleted all her posts on Instagram.
Tran starred as mechanic-turned-Resistance fighter Rose Tico in 2017’s The Last Jedi.
But she experienced a fierce backlash from some fans, who took aim at her ethnicity and appearance.
The film’s director, Rian Johnson, has defended the star, apparently describing some fans as “manbabies”.

via Star Wars actress Kelly Marie Tran deletes Instagram posts after abuse – BBC News

Outrage as it emerges schoolgirl is racially abused by drivers regularly while walking to Lincoln school – Lincolnshire Live

~ mcequality

A student in Lincoln who wears a hijab is being racially abused by motorists as she walks to and from school.

The Priory Academy LSST pupil walks along Cross O’Cliff and the lower High Street every day to get to school.

But shockingly, people in passing cars are shouting at her as they drive past, Lincolnshire Police have revealed.

via Outrage as it emerges schoolgirl is racially abused by drivers regularly while walking to Lincoln school – Lincolnshire Live

Trans Migrant Roxana Hernández Dies In ICE Detention

~ mcequality

A 33-year-old transgender Honduran woman who was part of the so-called refugee caravan has died after being detained by immigration authorities.

Immigration officials identified the woman as Jeffry Hernandez, but LGBTQ immigrant rights advocates with the Transgender Law Center said she was an asylum seeker named Roxana Hernández.

A representative with the group Pueblo Sin Fronteras, which organized the caravan, confirmed Hernández was a member of the caravan.

via Trans Migrant Roxana Hernández Dies In ICE Detention

Black People Created Memorial Day—Literally

~ mcequality

Think barbecues, lemonade. A precious three-day weekend full of sun, sales and slacking off. But this is The Root, and you know there’s another part of this story.

Little-known fact: African Americans created Memorial Day.

Rewind to the end of the Civil War. In 1865, Charleston, S.C., was in ruins, and many Union soldiers were being held prisoner in a converted racecourse. At least 257 of the captives died because of the horrific conditions, and their bodies were discarded in a mass grave.

via Black People Created Memorial Day—Literally

The Government Is ‘Not Legally Responsible’ For Losing Nearly 1,500 Refugee Children

~ mcequality

As for what happens to those children, migrant rights expert Michelle Brané told Mother Jones on Friday that frankly “we don’t know,” as the ORR “does very little to no follow-up.” In 2014, the Washington Post got a preview of what can happen to those children, as in the case of a group of minors who were given over to traffickers posing as family friends and ended up enslaved in an Ohio egg farm, where they lived in roach-infested trailers and spent their days debeaking chickens and cleaning the pens.

via The Government Is ‘Not Legally Responsible’ For Losing Nearly 1,500 Refugee Children

Federal officials lost – yes, lost – 1,475 migrant children

~ mcequality

The Trump administration recently announced a new, get-tough policy that will separate parents from their children if the family is caught crossing the border illegally.

It was a big news story. So big it overshadowed the fact that the federal government has lost – yes, lost – 1,475 migrant children in its custody.

Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen told Congress that within 48 hours of being taken into custody the children are transferred to the Department of Health and Human Services, which finds places for them to stay.

“They will be separated from their parent,” said Democratic Sen Kamala Harris.

via Federal officials lost – yes, lost – 1,475 migrant children

I’m Tired of Enduring the Abuse and Pain That Makes Me a ‘Strong Black Woman’

~ mcequality

It started because I couldn’t hear my co-workers. We were returning from a trip where we had seen an exhibit that discussed the explicit manifestation of racial bigotry and how it was perpetrated by those meant to govern and protect. We used the words that we are comfortable using in the safety of our offices, words that I had temporarily forgotten are triggers for the outside world.

“White privilege” is not a term up for debate among my co-workers. “Systemic inequity” is the basis of our discussions. The analysis that drives our work is an understanding that racism is the cause for negative life outcomes for folks who look like me.

With this conversation going on, I asked the driver to please lower the volume on the radio. He responded rudely. He was not going to do so. I let it go. I was in the first row of four in a van and nearest the driver.

via I’m Tired of Enduring the Abuse and Pain That Makes Me a ‘Strong Black Woman’

Trump Fantasizes About Abolishing Immigration Courts

~ mcequality

In a surprisingly and wildly out of character turn of events, President Trump is questioning why our immigration court system isn’t even more cruel to undocumented immigrants than it already is.

After Trump’s MS-13 fear mongering session on Wednesday, the president met with Fox and Friends minion Brian Kilmedee for a brief interview. Trump lamented the current state of America’s immigration court system and the “thousands” of judges he imagines work within it.

via Trump Fantasizes About Abolishing Immigration Courts

Why Is New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell Working With White Nationalists?

~ mcequality

Now the city has a new mayor, and the fate of the Robert E. Lee statue is again up for debate. When asked about the future of the removed Confederate monuments in April, a few weeks before her inauguration on May 7, Mayor LaToya Cantrell—the city’s first black female mayor—told the Gambit: “My plan is to work with those who care about [the statues] and come up with a plan that I could support. And they will pay for it.”

via Why Is New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell Working With White Nationalists?