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That Degrading Black Culture

By Orion on Thu, 08/29/2013 - 3:30am |

It seems like the proverbial shit has been hitting the fan a lot with American society  these days. I grew up in it at its best so I can tell you - at its height, living in America was generally so comfortable that it was easy to ignore things, to bury things and to put lingering problems to the side.

With the economic downturn, the election of Barack Obama and other factors, the American lifestyle itself seems to have changed. The way people behave and talk seems different - the tone is much more extreme than it ever was before.

And of course - what's the thing to hit the fan when America begins to unravel. Race. And with race of course comes pop culture - as Fox News reminded us today: 

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Calling Out White America Part Two: Popping The Bigot Balloon

By Orion on Thu, 08/22/2013 - 3:55pm |

Something interested happened yesterday. Just as a trio of young black kids in Oklahoma randomly murdered an Australian track runner and illiciting an international incident, this happened elsewhere in the country:

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Macklemore Calls Out White America - Is It Listening?

By Orion on Wed, 08/21/2013 - 2:35pm |

I am so proud to be from Seattle and to be involved in hip-hop. This is amazing: 

Gawker quotes Macklemore’s Rolling Stone interview, in which he says in part: “If you’re going to be a white dude and do this sh*t, I think you have to take some level of accountability. You have to acknowledge where the art came from, where it is today, how you’re benefiting from it. At the very least, just bringing up those points and acknowledging that, yes, I understand my privilege, I understand how it works for me in society, and how it works for me in 2013 with the success that The Heist has had.”

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For The Church And Wrestling, It's Nonchalantly Gay

By Orion on Sat, 08/17/2013 - 12:25am |

One of the really amazing things about Pope Francis rebuking homophobia was how nonchalant he was about it. There was no huge press conference or media campaign with long explanations about why being gay was now okay - in fact, the Pope seemed to secede his authority on the issue altogether - "Who am I to judge?"

We have a possibly equally strange rebuke of homophobia in the form of professional wrestler Darren Young. After being asked by a reporter if "a gay wrestler could be successful in the WWE," Young simply laughed and said "Absolutely. Look at me. I'm a WWE superstar and to be honest with you, I'll tell you right now, I'm gay. And I'm happy. I'm very happy." Here's the video from The Young Turks:

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Review: Europa Report

By Orion on Mon, 08/12/2013 - 7:14am |

If you plan on watching this movie, beware of spoilers. I didn't really know how to review this movie without dropping a few. Sorry.

It's the big question - Are we alone?

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The False Stigma of Public Housing

By Orion on Fri, 08/09/2013 - 8:02am |

My housing complex has a newsletter and I wrote this article for it - with the topic of public housing as the center of it. It turned out pretty fantastic - all the other ideas I had weren't very good. I thought I'd repost it here. Adrienne, who I mention in the article, was/is my editor. Let me know what you think. 

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"The Innovation of Loneliness"

By Orion on Thu, 08/08/2013 - 4:54am |

I thought this video would be very interesting for people here.

This site is one of the more intimate ones I have ever been involved in - the feedback from this website has been way more intense and personal than anything that I ever did at San Francisco Examiner, Heritage or Elephant Journal. Way more intense. I feel like I have gotten to know especially Michael Maiello, artappraiser and PeraclesPlease really well (though the last one had to bear the brunt of some of my anger on the guns issue).

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"Savor The Wanting"

By Orion on Wed, 07/31/2013 - 12:38pm |

I work as an editor/agent/whatever-is-needed for a friend of mine, Luis Congdon. His first article with my assistance was published just yesterday and I'm really proud to congratulate him - his article "Savor The Wanting" for Elephant Journal is pushing towards 1800 views in only one day. 

Read it for yourself:

 

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Jazz And Hip-Hop: The Intersection Part Three - Pete Rock

By Orion on Tue, 07/23/2013 - 6:42pm |

Hello all, so I have tried pretty hard to write some stuff about all the racial strife that America is going through thanks to the George Zimmerman ruling. Unfortunately, I have felt the need to just scrap almost all of it. I'm not really sure what can be said at this point.

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