5SR - June 26, 2023

Dr. Kate is a professor at the University of New Hampshire and the National Director of Post-Secondary Pathways at BUILD.org. She researches critical race theory, white identity formation, critical whiteness studies, and institutional white supremacy. She has two decently adorable red-headed children, a thing for scotch, and an intense love for a gallery wall. This summer, she’s decided to make rompers-with-pockets her entire personality.

As AIDS epidemic raged, a rogue Reagan official taught America the truth (Washington Post)

I was today years old when I learned about C. Everett Koop, an evangelical Christian and former Surgeon General under Reagan who went full-on renegade against the administration who had appointed him in order to spread urgent and necessary information about HIV/AIDS, which was ravaging the gay community.

This is a fascinating story about a deeply problematic and harmful human being who nonetheless debunked many of the myths surrounding the spread of HIV/AIDS and educated an entire country about preventing the disease.

Gender, Corruption and Unbridled Power in Prime Series ‘The Power’: The Ms. Q&A With Naomi Alderman (Ms. Magazine)

Dove-Viebahn asks author Naomi Alderman, “The power that the girls and women have has this great liberatory potential, right? But also, very quickly has a potential for corruption and violence.”

Whewwww! I read Naomi Alderman’s novel THE POWER just about the dang minute it came out, and it made me feel all the things at once: horror at the impending apocalyptic meltdown after women across the globe gained the power to channel electricity; hopefulness about the enduring nature of kindness and humanity; and yes, complete glee in thinking about what it might mean for me as a woman to be able to wield electricity to defend myself. And the Amazon Prime series made good on the novel, adding haunting, powerful imagery to the stark scenes that Alderman describes.

In this interview, Alderman answers some dope-ass questions about the kind of world she imagines in THE POWER.

New dictionary will showcase the beauty and creativity of Black American English (The Grio)

Touré writes “It’s white supremacy that told you that AAVE (or Black English or Ebonics) was a lesser dialect and indicative of a lack of intelligence. It is absolutely not that. It’s an example of Black genius”.

It is truly amazing that the brilliance of AAVE is being uplifted and codified in a dictionary, especially in a time where so much AAVE is being appropriated in white dominant culture- and it’s long overdue. It’s also a sign that the language is being given the respect that it has always deserved.

Congress Is Sticking Students With the Check (The Nation)

As a professor and former higher education administrator, I’ve seen enough evidence firsthand to understand that eradicating student debt would be one of the single most impactful moves to create economic equality in this country. It would lift millions out of generational poverty, it would re-incentivize higher education, and it would be the equivalent of a defibrillator to the economy if all of the former students paying out the nose every month suddenly had their payments canceled.

Student loans also continue to be one of the biggest contributors to the racial wealth gap in this country, with Black households carrying a disproportionate percentage of education debt. Yet, despite this administration’s promises to eradicate student debt, these efforts are essentially dead in the water. And perhaps most disappointingly, as Lehmann points out, “What’s particularly irksome about this giant step backward is that nothing about debt relief needs to be complicated—indeed, as the Covid pause has shown, such programs work best when they’re not means-tested but extended to most borrowers as an across-the-board benefit.”

Southern States Lag in Medicaid Expansion. Racial Justice Demands They Catch Up. (US News)

Brown writes “While 40 states have expanded Medicaid, 10 states have not – and most of those are in the South. This refusal to enact Medicaid expansion amounts to a refusal to ease the health care burden of some 3.5 million uninsured adults. Racial and social justice demands that these remaining states join the rest of the country in offering help to their most vulnerable citizens.”

Economic justice is racial justice is social justice, and the Southern states that have dragged their feet on Medicaid expansion have some of the highest percentages of Black residents in the country. Because racism is baked into the healthcare system in myriad ways, this is another example of a policy that CLAIMS to be equitable, but has a disproportionate impact on people and communities of color- namely the Black community.