racism
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Marjorie Taylor Greene and Milo Yiannopoulos have closed a chapter after he repaid her for the financing of Ye aka Kanye West’s campaign website.
According to reports, the controversial far-right activist reimbursed the Republican representative from Georgia for the “use of campaign credit card for personal use,” based on a new filing with the Federal Election Commission. The amount came out to $7,020.16 which Yiannopoulos paid back on May 12th. The purchase was apparently for a campaign website domain, ye24.com, for West who is now known as Ye. Greene’s congressional staff did not respond to requests for comment.
Further details from the filing show that the reimbursement total matches an expense item for a “domain registration and hosting” purchase made with GoDaddy on November 22nd, 2022. That had been previously reported by Greene’s team. According to The Daily Beast, Ye’s team reported paying Yiannopoulos $9,955 for a “domain transfer”. Notably, the purchase was made on the same day that Ye and Yiannopoulos and white nationalist Nick Fuentes arrived at Mar-a-Lago to dine with former President Donald Trump. The situation caused a stir, as a purchase of that type would count as an official sign of entering the 2024 race. The “DONDA” rapper has not yet announced an official presidential run for 2024, although he had a short-lived campaign in 2020.
Yiannopoulos, who has made headlines for seemingly defending pedophilia in addition to making homophobic and racist statements, took credit for the dinner meeting claiming it was “to make Trump’s life miserable.” The dinner would be a precursor to Ye appearing with Fuentes, a rabid Holocaust denier on right-wing figure Alex Jones’ Infowars podcast where he infamously praised Hitler and the Nazi regime along with issuing other antisemitic remarks.
Yiannopoulos would be fired by Ye last December and then rehired in May, but not after suing the rapper for over $100,000. More controversy ensued after Patrick Krason, a former treasurer for Ye, resigned and internal documents were found showing Krason’s concern over Yiannopoulos submitting false invoices.
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The death of Nahel Merzouk at the hands of a police officer in France has spurred numerous protests and shed light on deep racial divisions in the country.
According to reports, the 17-year-old of Algerian-Moroccan descent was detained at a traffic stop in Nanterre, a suburb of Paris last week. Video footage shows one of two officers firing a shot through the windshield of the yellow Mercedes as Merzouk pulled forward. Forensics reports showed that one shot killed the Nahel Merzouk, as the car then slammed into the barriers at Nelson Mandela Square. The killing compelled observers to draw comparisons to the death of George Floyd in 2020 as it was caught on video, which was shared widely through social media. “He saw a little Arab-looking kid, he wanted to take his life,” the teen’s mother said to France 5 Television.
The death of Merzouk sparked intense outrage as many took to the streets to protest Merzouk’s killing in cities and towns throughout the country over the next six nights, often clashing with police and resulting in 3,400 arrests. Protests were even reported in French Caribbean territories such as Martinique and Guadeloupe, and even the island of Reunion in the Indian Ocean.
The fury behind the protests also points to how French society and its government have adopted an official stance of colorblind universalism. In fact, it is considered illegal to compile racially-based statistics in the country. Observers point to that stance as the reason decades of systemic racism have been prevalent in a country that welcomed Black American expats such as James Baldwin.
In 2017, the Défenseur des Droits civil-liberties watch group noted that “young men perceived to be Black or Arab” were 20 times more likely to be stopped by police for identity checks, and in 2021 six groups including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch launched a class-action suit against the French government over its failure to address racial profiling by police.
“For 40, 45 years there have been warning signs about discrimination,” says Abel Boyi, head of the “All Unique, All United” group. The issue has been pointedly addressed by noted authors such as Frantz Fanon, Aimé Césaire, and Léopold Senghor who struck at the colonial underpinnings of France that harmed Black and Brown citizens. “He was a nonwhite person in this country,” university student Syrine Djidi said while at a protest for Merzouk, noting that he was the same age as her brother. “Nonwhite people are targeted by the police.”
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In late May, Sean Diddy Combs sued his longtime spirits partner Diageo, citing racism and claiming the brand was falling short in their support of Ciroc and DeLeon. Today (June 27), Diageo announced it is severing its business ties with Diddy.
Diddy filed his lawsuit with the New York Supreme Court in Manhattan. Per the complaint, Diddy’s Ciroc vodka and DeLeon tequila brands were not being pushed with the same gusto as other celebrity brands under the Diageo umbrella, like Casamigos which is backed by actor George Clooney and which Diageo purchased for $1 billion in 2017. According to Diddy, it came down to racism his brands are perceived as Black and “Urban.” Diddy also pointed to issue with the lack of availability of his brands compared to others in the vast Diageo portfolio that includes Johnny Walker, Guinness, Tanqueray and Smirnoff.
Diageo is denying Diddy’s claims.
Per CNN, Diageo is claiming to have invested $100 million to help grow Diddy’s DeLeón tequila while claiming the mogul contributed a mere $1,000.
“This is a business dispute, and we are saddened that Mr. Combs has chosen to recast this matter as anything other than that,” said a Diageo press rep in response to Diddy’s initial filing. “Our steadfast commitment to diversity within our company and the communities we serve is something we take very seriously. We are disappointed our efforts to resolve this business dispute amicably have been ignored, and that Mr. Combs has chosen to damage a productive and valued partnership.”
Well today, the other shoe dropped. Diageo, which has been in business with the Hip-Hop mogul since 2007, announced that it was cuttings its brand partnerships with Diddy. The brand intends to arbitrate alleged breaches of their DeLeón agreement while the Cîroc relationship is terminated.
“Mr. Combs’ bad-faith actions have clearly breached his contracts and left us no choice but to move to dismiss his baseless complaint and end our business relationship,” said Diageo in a statement. “We have exhausted every reasonable remedy and see no other path forward.”
Combs’ lawyers responded in kind with a statement of their own.”It’s a cynical and transparent attempt to distract from multiple allegations of discrimination,” said Combs’ attorneys. They added, that Combs has “repeatedly raised concerns as senior executives uttered racially insensitive comments and made biased decisions. He brought the lawsuit to force them to live up to that contract, and instead they respond by trying to get rid of him. This lawsuit and Mr. Combs are not going away.”
Diageo also filed a motion to dismiss Diddy’s lawsuit.
Now it’s on Combs to deliver the receipts.
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A Black woman on TikTok publicly shamed a racist sitting next to her on a plane over texts he sent about Black and gay people to his family.
On Friday (May 26), Talia Rouse posted a video that showed her confronting a passenger sitting next to her sending off racist text messages. The travel blogger, who regularly posts tips and hotel reviews through her TikTok account to her 25,000 followers, was on a flight heading from Puerto Rico to Atlanta. The video begins with Rouse telling someone off-camera: “You know what? I wasn’t going to say anything … but I decided I want you to feel as uncomfortable as I do,” she began. “And I want you to know that I saw your text messages, and I think you’re disgusting.”
In the caption of the video, she stated that she initially glanced over at the phone of the man sitting next to her and saw “big Black woman” in a text. “He and his family went on and on about the woes of being stuck next to black and gay people,” Rouse recalled. “Then I see this man say he hopes airlines raise prices so these people get weeded out.”
She told the man that if airlines did start “weeding people out,” then maybe he can afford to sit with his family. “If you’re going to be bold enough to pull your phone out in the middle seat of an airplane and freely talk disrespectfully about Black people, then I’m going to be bold enough to say something to you,” she wrote in the video caption.
The man would offer an apology to Rouse, but she countered that it was only because she saw the texts. “You don’t have to be sorry to me. You’re sorry because I saw it,” she said. Rouse would post a follow-up video showing the man’s offensive text messages on the screen of the phone in response to a commenter asking, “We can’t even send texts to our family about how unpleasant you people are?” on the first video. She countered with the caption, ‘Not when you’re in the middle seat next to me, no.”
Rouse didn’t respond to further press inquiries.
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Idris Elba and his wife Sabrina Elba have been tapped by the BBC and CBC networks to produce a new documentary. Paid In Full: The Battle For Payback will examine racism within the music industry and how Black artists have suffered under the weight of that oppression.
Variety shared details of the impending documentary from Idris Elba and his Green Door Pictures outfit, partnering with Sabrina Elba’s Pink Towel company with Zinc Media’s Supercollider also named as a partner. Paid In Full: The Battle For Payback, which is said to be a working title, will take a deeper look at the music industry and the potential for financial equity for Black artists due to racism and divided opportunities.
The documentary will be a series and is funded and co-produced with Abacus Media Rights and Media Musketeers Studios. AMR will distribute the documentary around the globe.
“This is a story that touches all of us. It’s about the people who created the soundtracks of our lives in popular music and the pain of their exploitation. It’s also about bringing the music industry to account for the injustice inflicted on generations of musical talents who have been deprived of their rightful rewards both financially and in terms of status and respect. At the heart of it is the need to make amends – granting acknowledgment and paying back what is due,” Idris Elba said in a statement.
Tanya Shaw of Zinc Television added, “Far from being a straight music documentary, this series will explore the music industry within a racial context and reflect the history of exploitation within the industry. It will also major in on conversations of structural racism and those who have worked so hard to expose them.”
A release date for the documentary series has yet to be revealed.
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Weeks after being seen on video choking Jordan Neely on a subway train, Daniel Penny publicly speaks about being charged with Neely’s death.
Penny spoke out about the incident for the first time in an interview with Dana Kennedy of the New York Post in a Long Island enclave not far from where he grew up. The 24-year-old, who is facing manslaughter charges for the killing of Neely, claims that his move to put the 30-year-old houseless man in a chokehold “had nothing to do with race.”
“I judge a person based on their character. I’m not a white supremacist,” Penny continued. “Everybody who’s ever met me can tell you, I love all people, I love all cultures. You can tell by my past and all my travels and adventures around the world. I was actually planning a road trip through Africa before this happened.”
The former Marine said he was on his way to the gym after going to school when he encountered Neely on the northbound F train on May 1st. He alleged that Neely was invoking “terror” and was “menacing”. “I can tell you that the threats, the menacing, the terror that Jordan Neely introduced to that train has already been well documented. I don’t think it’s going to even be controverted,” he said to Kennedy. Penny also seemed to suggest that he would do what he did again. “You know, I live an authentic and genuine life,” he said. “And I would — if there was a threat and danger in the present.”
Penny was asked what he’d say to Neely’s family, who buried him last Friday (May 19th). “I’m deeply saddened by the loss of life,” he said. “It’s tragic what happened to him. Hopefully, we can change the system that’s so desperately failed us.” Lennon Edwards and Donte Mills, the lawyers representing Neely’s family, ripped the interview, calling it disgraceful and an attempt to whitewash Penny. “There’s no remorse,” Mr. Edwards said. “There is no accountability. There was no acknowledgment he killed someone.”
Penny was blasted by Reverend Al Sharpton in his eulogy for Neely, focusing on the way Penny has been treated by the media at large and argued that if Neely was a white Elvis Presley impersonator and Penny was Black and choking him, police “would not have let that Black guy leave the precinct that night.” Kennedy informed Penny of those comments, who nodded and said he was “not sure” of who Sharpton is. “I don’t really know celebrities that well,” he said.
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Representative Jamaal Bowman has publicly blasted fellow Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene over her racist tropes & behavior after a verbal confrontation.
The Democratic Representative from the Bronx, New York got into it with the Republican Representative from Georgia on Wednesday afternoon (May 17th) on the steps of the U.S. Capitol after a vote. “Do something about guns!” he said to her. “Invest in education.” Greene shot back, “Impeach Biden,” before rattling off queries about Democrats and their inability to seal off the border. Both were smiling, but reporters noted that she did shake her fist. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez came up to Bowman, gently tugging at his arm while saying, “She ain’t worth it, bro.”
The next day, Greene claimed that Bowman had called her a white supremacist, stating that the term was “equal” to “calling a person of color the N-word.” She continued, saying she felt threatened by him and that his “physical mannerisms were aggressive.” “I’m very concerned about Jamaal Bowman,” Ms. Greene stated, “and he’s someone that people should watch.”
She claimed that she had video footage of the confrontation.
Bowman was outraged over the far-right politician’s comments, but unsurprised. He released a statement through his office. “There’s a history of this, from Mike Brown to Emmett Till to any Black man who is passionate, outspoken, intelligent trying to stand their ground being confronted with violence,” Mr. Bowman responded. “Marjorie’s attack is beyond a dog whistle. It’s a bullhorn. And it’s reckless and dangerous. She has put a target on my back.”
Bowman’s Democratic colleagues in the House of Representatives have risen to his defense. Representative Madeleine Dean of Delaware appeared on MSNBC’s The ReidOut and called out Greene’s rhetoric. “This kind of outward racism, bigotry, dog whistles, as he said, ‘bullhorn,’ when you call a Black man threatening–this is a former school principal,” she said. So far, Greene has not responded again.
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It’s 2023, and the NAACP Board of Directors has issued a travel advisory for Florida, citing that the state is “hostile toward African Americans.” Considering MAGA-friendly Governor Ron Desantis’ blatantly racist legislation aimed at the “woke,” often a replacement for the n-word in far-right circles, where is the lie?
On Saturday, May 2020, the NAACP issued its damning travel advisory. Part of it reads, “Florida is openly hostile toward African Americans, people of color and LGBTQ+ individuals. Before traveling to Florida, please understand that the state of Florida devalues and marginalizes the contributions of, and the challenges faced by African Americans and other communities of color.”
In the past year, Desantis has overseen the kneecapping of AP African American Studies courses for high school students, banned the teaching of critical race theory and has signed four bills that restrict LGBTQ rights including an expansion of the infamous “Don’t Say Gay” law.
Added NAACP President & CEO Derrick Johnson, “Under the leadership of Governor Desantis, the state of Florida has become hostile to Black Americans and in direct conflict with the democratic ideals that our union was founded upon. He should know that democracy will prevail because its defenders are prepared to stand up and fight. We’re not backing down, and we encourage our allies to join us in the battle for the soul of our nation.”
Another feasible question is, when is Texas going to be added to that travel advisory list? History has shown that one way to handle blatant racists in power is to hit them in the pockets.
See some of Twitter’s reactions to the NAACP’s chess move in the gallery.
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Elon Musk continues to prove that you can be a billionaire while still being tone deaf, obtuse and asinine at the same damn time. The guy who ruined Twitter recently asserted that a Texas mass shooter is not a white supremacist, despite said shooter having a tattoo of a swastika on his body.
While appearing on CNBC, Musk told David Faber that the recent mass shooting Allen, Texas at a mall frequented by people of color was a psy-op and “incorrectly ascribed to be a white supremacist action.”
Musk claimed that the allegation was based on Bellingcat, a Netherlands-based investigative journalism and research group, that only used an “an obscure Russian website” for its sourcing
However, as Crooks & Liars pointed out, it was the New York Times that actually reported on the shooter’s white supremacist ties. And Bellingcat went out of its way to point the shooter’s documented history of hate.
Also worth noting, the now-deceased shooter, 33-year-old Mauricio Garcia, has an “SS” tattoo on his arm and a swastika tattoo on his chest. Safe bet he’s a white supremacist regardless of his last name.
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Justin Jones, one of the two Black Democrat representatives expelled by Republicans last week from the Tennessee House, was sworn back in.
On Monday (April 10th), members of the Nashville city council held a special session to return Jones to the legislature. After a prayer by council member Zulfat Suara for the six lives lost in the Covenant school shooting as well as those lost in a mass shooting in Kentucky that day, the vote was unanimously in favor of Jones, 36-0. An hour later, he returned to the state capitol surrounded by hundreds of supporters and took his oath on the steps.
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“I want to welcome democracy back to the people’s house,” he said after returning to his old desk. “No expulsion, no attempt to silence us will stop us, but it will only galvanize and strengthen our movement,” he said, concluding with: “Power to the people!” The move by the Nashville city council members was done so swiftly that Jones hadn’t missed a floor session of the Tennessee House.
House majority leader William Lamberth & House Republican caucus chairman Jeremy Faison issued a statement before the vote saying that “should any expelled member be reappointed, we will welcome them.” A vote to reinstate Rep. Pearson was scheduled to be held by the Shelby County Board of Commissioners in Memphis on Wednesday (April 12th). Both lawmakers have expressed that they will run in special elections to be held later this year to permanently obtain their seats.
Jones, along with Pearson and Rep. Gloria Johnson, were targeted by the Republican majority of the legislative body for expulsion last Thursday (April 6th). The vote took place a week after the three lawmakers had taken to the House floor and interrupted a session by demanding action be taken on gun violence, using megaphones to lead protesters. Jones and Pearson would be expelled through a vote, while Johnson (who is white) was spared, prompting her to cite racism as the reason her fellow Democrats were kicked out.
The move by the Republican majority of the House, something that had only been done twice since the Civil War, sparked local and nationwide outrage all the way to the White House, as President Joe Biden expressed his anger and Vice President Kamala Harris made a surprise trip to Nashville to speak at Fisk University in support of the lawmakers. Lawyers for Jones and Pearson, including former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, sent a letter warning against retaliation to House Speaker Cameron Sexton.