Much to the chagrin of Roger Goodell and the National Football League’s (NFL) Park Avenue marketing executives, the newest face of the League has evolved into a black quarterback. Not a fair skinned, high yellow mulatto like Patrick Mahomes; or, an articulate, curly haired, bronze colored all-American like Russell Wilson; but one with jet black skin and “Buckwheat” style platted hair who breaks verbs and butchers sentences. He is none other than the late, first-round draft ch

Kaepernick's protest had nothing to do with the flag or patriotism. It was a demonstration to bring attention to police brutality and th

No matter how you feel about the killing of five Dallas police officers by black Army veteran turned sniper and self-avowed black avenger Micah Johnson, or former U.S. Marine Gavin Long who shot and killed three Baton Rouge police officers because he was distressed by the “unlawful” killing of unarmed black men, there almost has to be a twinge of respect and admiration for any man who would sacrifice his life for a cause greater than himself. Whether Johnson and Long are cons

At long last, the sleeping giant which lay dormant on white college campuses has been awakened. The raw power which was demonstrated on the national stage by the University of Missouri football team and the organized efforts of black student organizations recently caught an entire nation by surprise. If a strike or boycott by black football players can force a domino effect of resignations by the University President and the Chancellor of the University of Missouri System cam

Over the past 40 years the United States has increasingly become a country of the haves and the have nots.

I am so tired of the news media fronted by white folk and Uncle Tom Negroes, attempting to pick and choose or disparage current, past or future black leadership. This has got to stop! Or, should I say we black people must stop allowing our destiny to be determined by those who are the traditional enemies to African American progress. In the Monday, October 12, 2015 edition of the New York Times, columnist Charles M. Blow again takes aim at Minister Louis Farrakhan, after the

The peculiar circumstances surrounding the death of Sandra Bland while in the custody of the Waller County Texas jail, continues to become more and more troubling. The case of the African American female who was found hanged in her jail cell three days after being arrested for failing to signal a lane change should shock the conscious of any person with an ounce of humanity or sense of justice. To be pulled over by law enforcement for an alleged traffic violation and end up h

Days after the church massacre that killed nine African American worshipers at the historic Emmanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston, South Carolina, President Obama finally acknowledged the existence of racism. He is to be commended. It was important that this public acknowledgement come from our nation’s first (and last) black President. The question remains however as to what took him so long. It’s unfortunate that it took the murder of nine innocent and blameless black church

Even more disturbing than the rash of publicly exposed killing of unarmed black men by white cops, is the oftentimes presence of black cops who are many times witnesses and accessories to the murder and the cover-up. These black police officers who turn a blind eye, and abet racist white cops who kill and victimize members of their own race are despicable cowards who should be exposed and prosecuted along with their racist white counterparts. In my view, there are always two

For your enlightenment and perspective of the crisis at hand, we are republishing "Baltimore and Beyond ... the Crisis Beneath the Crisis."

As the evidence continues to mount across America showing a pervasive and increasingly blatant manifestation of racism in all of its varied and virulent forms, the nation’s first black President’s acknowledgement and response has been at best, cautious and at worst, non-existent. This is a curious anomaly since President Obama himself has been the target of racist jokes, disrespect, and treated like a nigger from the first day he took office. Recent racist emails directed at

As I ponder the state of the American Negro on the eve of President Obama’s State of the Union address, and the anniversary of the death of civil rights icon Martin Luther King, Jr., I am perplexed and amazed at how television personalities and others, speak of the struggle for racial equality by the African American as something that has already been achieved. They speak of the civil rights movement, and the quest for black liberation in the past tense, as if Dr. King’s drea

Rupert Murdoch, the executive chairman of the News Corporation which owns 21st Century Fox, Fox News, and the Wall Street Journal, recently displayed his supreme ignorance when responding to criticism surrounding the studio’s decision to cast all of the main characters in the movie, Exodus: Gods and Kings, as white. Murdoch, one of the richest and most influential men in the world, recently wrote the following quote in a Twitter message: “Since when are Egyptians not white? A

The election of Barack Hussein Obama as the first African American President was hailed by most as a watershed moment in the centuries old struggle for racial equality in America. This miraculous achievement was in the minds of many proof positive that we had overcome the barriers of endemic and systemic racism in this country. While Mr. Obama’s election indeed was an accomplishment that most thought would never come, it by no means has signaled an end to the structural and s

The continuing aftermath and ongoing discussions about what constitutes justice in the tragic police shootings of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown, and the choking death of Eric Garner begs the question of what justice is, and what is its’ color? The notion of a color blind justice system is not a novel one. Whether African Americans could realistically hope for true equality in this country is a debate that goes back to the earliest black scholars and educators such as W

When I see major college football powerhouses like Alabama, FSU, and Auburn, I see the plantations that my forefathers slaved on all over again. Big time college athletics has become the latest reincarnation of chattel slavery. White men, exploiting the skill and free labor of strong black bodies to build wealth and power for the edification and glorification white institutions. Take a look at any top five football team, or top twenty-five for that matter, the only things whi

The NFL’s latest disciplinary action against Minnesota Vikings star running back Adrian Peterson smacks of institutional and structural racism. Plain and simple, it is a continuing attack on the African American male by the establishment in an attempt to further emasculate and marginalize the black male’s position as a patriarch of African American families. These attacks on the black male are nothing new. They date back to the inception of the Transatlantic slave trade in wh

This article is Part 4 in a four-part series from Gerald Torrence on The Truth About Racism. More than one hundred sixty years after the Civil War and the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, the walls of structural and institutionalized racism continue to be erected. Rather than being torn down, these walls remain through the clever manipulation of voter registration laws, and the creation of new barriers to equality through the Criminal Justice System, and the quasi cr

This article is Part 3 in a four-part series from Gerald Torrence on The Truth About Racism. Now that we’ve been publicly reminded that racism still exists, America must fight the temptation to continue to ignore it, or look the other way. Of course it’s much easier to label the racist comments of Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling an anomaly, and shape the public perception of Sterling as simply a relic from the distant past. Those who live with the scourge of racism

This article is Part 2 in a four-part series from Gerald Torrence on The Truth About Racism. Although I do not agree with the racist views of Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling, I wholeheartedly support his right to be a racist. In a country that was founded on the principles of freedom of speech and freedom of thought, the social and economic backlash against Sterling for expressing his private views is extremely troubling. It is yet another case of political correct