African Americans

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Quarter of US Households Have Limited Bank Access

Minorities, low-income families hit hardest

(Newser) - A quarter of US households have little or no access to banks—relying instead on nontraditional services such as check-cashing shops, pawn shops, or payday loans, and often paying exorbitant interest rates. The first comprehensive survey of its kind by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. showed that 71% of families...

Second Scribe Sues NY Post for Racism

Fired reporter accused paper of Jim Crow-style segregation

(Newser) - A reporter fired from the New York Post is suing the paper for racism, claiming that he was subjected to routine humiliation and Jim Crow-style segregation. Austin Fenner—who lost his job the same day as editor Sandra Guzman, who is also suing—says he was fired for being an...

Gay Vote May Settle Atlanta Mayoral Race

Norwood, Reed neck-and-neck ahead of today's vote

(Newser) - Mary Norwood will become Atlanta's first white mayor since the '70s if she defeats Kasim Reed in today's runoff election—but the contest hasn't been as racially charged as some expected. A fifth of black voters favor Norwood and roughly the same proportion of whites favor Reed. The city's large...

Young Black Men Hit Hardest By Recession
Young Black Men Hit Hardest By Recession
34.5% unemployment

Young Black Men Hit Hardest By Recession

Demographic's unemployment reaches Depression-era levels

(Newser) - The recession has sent the unemployment rate among young black men soaring to rates not seen since the Great Depression. The jobless rate among black males aged 16 to 24 hit 34.5% last month, more than triple the rate for the general population. The demographic has been especially hit...

Ex-Editor Sues 'Racist' NY Post
 Ex-Editor Sues 'Racist' NY Post 

Ex-Editor Sues 'Racist' NY Post

Employee says boss called her 'Cha Cha #1'

(Newser) - A former associate editor of the New York Post says she was fired for complaining about the paper’s racist and sexist atmosphere. Sandra Guzman, who identified herself as the “only female editor of color at the Post,” is suing parent News Corp. Her suit claims she was...

Steele: I Scare White Republicans
Steele: I Scare White Republicans

Steele: I Scare White Republicans

RNC chair says he sees it in meetings

(Newser) - Rack up another gaffe for Michael Steele. The Republican National Committee chair has been trying to improve his party’s relationship with minority voters, but he may have been a little too honest in a recent interview with NewsOne's Roland Martin. Martin suggested that white Republicans were "scared" of...

Atlanta May Elect 1st White Mayor in 36 Years

Frontrunner Mary Norwood vows to fix the city's accounting mess

(Newser) - A simple focus on accounting is poised to radically—read: racially—change the politics of Atlanta. In a majority-black city that hasn’t had a white mayor in 36 years, a Caucasian city councilwoman from a tony neighborhood has a commanding lead in the polls. Mary Norwood has promised to...

Half of US Kids Will Get Food Stamps at Some Point

Figure hits 90% for black children, study finds

(Newser) - Nearly half of all US children and 90% of black youngsters will be on food stamps at some point during childhood, and fallout from the current recession could push those numbers even higher, researchers say. The estimate comes from an analysis of 30 years of national data, and bolsters other...

Obama Honors Senate Trailblazer Brooke

Republican senator wins Congress' highest honor

(Newser) - Hundreds of people packed into the Capitol Rotunda yesterday to honor Edward Brooke, the Massachusetts politician who in 1967 became the first black senator since Reconstruction. Now 90, Brooke was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal, the legislature's highest honor. Sitting to his right was another trailblazer—President Obama, who had...

Critics: New Black Barbie Not Black Enough

But fans say black women come in all 'shades, shapes, varieties'

(Newser) - Mattel's new black Barbie dolls are more than just white dolls with a paint job—which is what the toy company tried last time. But some critics still say Mattel hasn't gone far enough. The trio of Barbies have features like fuller lips and wider noses, but some complain that...

Good Hair Has a Few Knots
 Good Hair Has a Few Knots 
MOVIE REVIEW

Good Hair Has a Few Knots

Chris Rock shines as interviewer, but social issues get lost in the weave

(Newser) - Chris Rock is a natural and hilarious interviewer, critics agree. But watchers are split on whether the substance of a rather complicated debate shines through in Big Hair, his documentary on black women and their coifs. A sampling:
  • Rock has helped craft a film with "much good feeling and
...

First Lady's Roots Linked to Slave Girl

Genealogist fills in gaps of her lineage

(Newser) - Michelle Obama can trace her lineage to a female slave sold as a young girl from a South Carolina plantation and sent to Georgia. As a teenager, Melvinia Shields became impregnated by a white man, possibly her master, and those two are the great-great-great grandparents of Michelle. A genealogist working...

Black Caucus Worries About Resurgent Racism

Anti-Obama anger troubles CBC ahead of triumphant annual conferences

(Newser) - The Congressional Black Caucus is enjoying unprecedented power, with more of their members in leadership roles than ever before, not to speak of one of their number in the White House, but many are disturbed by changes in the political atmosphere, Politico reports. As the 42-member group holds its annual...

Slavery Reparations Should Be Obama's Next Stimulus

Time for the president to break his long silence on America's racial divide

(Newser) - President Obama is taking so much heat from opponents wrongly convinced that he's keen on redistributing white America's wealth to African-Americans that he might as well go ahead and do it, Naomi Klein writes in the Guardian. Obama's administration has been pursuing "race-neutral" policies that do nothing to close...

Milwaukee Cops Arrest Suspected Serial Killer

Man linked to murders of 9 women from 1986-2007

(Newser) - Authorities in Milwaukee said tonight they have arrested a man they suspect in the murders of at least nine women during the past 21 years, the Journal Sentinel reports. Walter E. Ellis, 49, is charged with two counts of first-degree murder, and his DNA was found on nine women killed...

Americans Split on Health Care Priorities: Poll

But they're divided by race, age, location, not political party

(Newser) - Americans have differing priorities for health care reform based not on a Republican/Democrat divide but on their race, age, and location, a USA Today/Gallup poll found. A majority of African-American and Latino voters among those polled think extending coverage to the uninsured should be the most important aspect of reform...

Another Harvard Prof Accuses Police of Racism

(Newser) - Another black member of Harvard's faculty has accused the Cambridge Police Department of racism, the Boston Globe reports. S. Allen Counter, a Harvard Medical School professor, was arrested outside his home in 2006 on assault and battery charges. “I was polite, and yet police lied and said I was...

Breakthrough Black Model Naomi Sims Dead at 61
Breakthrough Black Model Naomi Sims Dead at 61
OBITUARY

Breakthrough Black Model Naomi Sims Dead at 61

(Newser) - Naomi Sims, the first black model to grace the cover of Ladies Home Journal—and arguably the first black supermodel—has died at 61, the New York Times reports. Her family says the cause was cancer. Sims burst onto the scene in the late 1960s, but chose in the ‘...

African-Americans Must Get Angry About Racial Profiling

(Newser) - Henry Louis Gates and Barack Obama have been “very publicly slapped down for speaking up and speaking out about police misbehavior,” but African-Americans “need to roar out their anger at such treatment,” Bob Herbert writes in the New York Times. Gates, not the officer who arrested...

Caller in Gates Arrest Didn't Mention Race

Tapes show I'm not a racist, says woman who alerted police

(Newser) - The Massachusetts woman who called 911 on Henry Louis Gates and his chauffeur as they wrestled with the Harvard professor’s front door said today she never mentioned race to Sgt. James Crowley, the officer who arrested Gates. Lucia Whalen’s statement contradicts the police report filed by Crowley, which...

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