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OPINION: Shonda Rhimes Offers a New Word for "Diversity" — Let's Start Using It

By goodblacknews on March 19, 2015
Shonda Rhimes (Source: Jordan Strauss/AP)

Once a term to describe the laudable aim of ensuring equal representation, “diversity” has devolved into a trite talking point.

It’s an issue that Shonda Rhimes, the mastermind behind television hits such as Scandal, Grey’s Anatomy and How To Get Away With Murder, touched on while accepting an award at the Human Rights Campaign’s gala event in Los Angeles last weekend. In her speech, Rhimes said she’s tired of the way “diversity” is understood by most people.

“I get asked a lot by reporters and tweeters why I am so invested in ‘diversity’ on television,”  Rhimes said, according to Medium‘s text of her speech. “‘Why is it so important to have diversity on TV?’ they say. I really hate the word ‘diversity.’ It suggests something other. … As if there is something unusual about telling stories involving women and people of color and LGBTQ characters on TV.”

Rhimes offered an alternative to the term “diversity,” saying she’d rather describe what she’s doing as “normalizing.”

“I am making TV look like the world looks. Women, people of color, LGBTQ people equal way more than 50% of the population. Which means it ain’t out of the ordinary. I am making the world of television look normal,” she said.

Rhimes makes a great point.

“Diversity” in itself has limits. In the past few decades, the word has become wildly popular, appearing everywhere from corporate websites to college recruitment brochures. In many cases, however, the concept is reduced to simply ensuring that a collection of people who look different from each other occupy the same space. That’s why many diversity fliers for companies and schools paint a picture of wide representation, but the actual demographics of those same institutions remain monochromatic.

Five Years Ago Today: Good Black News was Founded

By goodblacknews on March 18, 2015

copy-gbnthumbnail.jpegGOOD BLACK NEWS proudly celebrates its fifth anniversary today, with 8,941 Facebook followers, 5,073 Twitter followers, 3,938 Tumblr followers, 1,043 via Pinterest, and thousands more via Instagram, Google+, YouTube, WordPress, our RSS feed, and LinkedIn.  Although initially launched on March 18, 2010 as a Facebook page (read the detailed story behind GBN’s creation here), in September 2012, GBN created this dedicated website, goodblacknews.org, which has allowed us to expand our presence on the internet and provide archives and search functions to you, our loyal readers.
In the past year, we were greatly honored to be featured on NewsOne’s list of the 15 Most Share-Worthy Black Blogs and Sites of 2014. GBN also successfully managed our first-ever giveaway contest, and will most definitely offer more in the coming months. The outpour of appreciation you’ve shown us via likes, comments, shares, reblogs and e-mails means the world to us, and only inspires GBN to keep getting bigger and better and create more original content.
Good Black News remains a labor of love for our Founder/Editor-In-Chief (Lori Lakin Hutcherson) and Lifestyle/Fashion Editor (Lesa Lakin), and we must gratefully acknowledge this year’s contributors (Susan Cartsonis, Julie Bibb Davis, Ashanti Hutcherson, Warren Hutcherson, Brenda Lakin, John Levinson, Jeff Meier, Minsun Park, Gabriel Ryder, Terry Samwick, power stringer Becky Schonbrun, Teddy Tenenbaum, Arro Verse, Joshua A.S. Young, and venture capitalist/business advisor Darryl Wash), who are all unpaid volunteers, and deeply, greatly appreciated.
We’d also like to shout out a few of our power users across the web:  Thank you to Ms. Charmian Neary (@CharmianNeary) for being our top Twitter follower and contributor, Heidi Durrow (@mixedremixed) for the most Twitter mentions of @goodblacknews, Mr. Militant Negro at theobamacrat.com for being our number-one reblogger, and to Mrs. Shawna B. (MrsShawnaB) for being our most prolific repinner on Pinterest.  Your active interest and sharing mean everything!
Please continue to help us spread GBN by sharing, liking, re-tweeting and commenting, and consider joining our e-mail list via our “Contact Us” tab on goodblacknews.org.  We will only use this list to keep you updated on GBN and send you our upcoming e-newsletter — nothing else. And, of course, you may opt out at any time.
GBN believes in bringing you positive news, reviews and stories of interest about black people all over the world, and greatly value your participation in continuing to build our shared vision.
Thank you again for your support, and we look forward to providing you with more Good Black News in the coming year, and beyond!
Warmly,
The Good Black News Team

Lori Lakin Hutcherson, GBN Founder/Editor-In-Chief
Lori Lakin Hutcherson, GBN Founder/Editor-In-Chief

by Lesa Lakin
Lesa Lakin, GBN Lifestyle/Fashion Editor

Record Breaker: "Empire" Soundtrack Scores Rare No. 1 For TV Series on Billboard Albums Chart

By goodblacknews on March 18, 2015
Empire_The-Soundtrack_FINAL

According to Deadline.com, not only is Empire the most successful debuting drama in the past 25 years of television history, now its soundtrack is the No. 1 album in the country, debuting in the top spot on the Billboard 200 this week. This is a rare feat — especially for a network drama series.  The last time any TV soundtrack reached No. 1 on the charts was in 2010, when three Glee collections hit the top spot (also a Fox show).  The main distinction, however is that Glee‘s soundtracks were covers of already-popular tunes; Empire’s soundtrack are mostly new songs produced by Timbaland and performed by the original artists/cast members.

Billboard’s official stats come out Wednesday morning, but leaked numbers suggest Original Soundtrack From Season 1 Of Empire will keep Madonna from having a No. 1 debut for the first time since 1998 with her new release “Rebel Heart.”  Empire‘s ratings grew in each of its first nine weeks on the air and last week hit a high of 14.9 million. This number is sure to be even higher tomorrow night after its two-hour season finale.
article by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (follow @lakinhutcherson)

Sigma Alpha Epsilon Fraternity to Announce Plan to Combat Racial Intolerance

By goodblacknews on March 18, 2015
CHICAGO (AP) — A fraternity under scrutiny because of a racist chant caught on video plans to announce an extensive review of its chapters around the country.
Sigma Alpha Epsilon Fraternity said it will unveil Wednesday what it calls a “national plan to combat racial intolerance.” The Evanston, Illinois-based organization is holding a news conference in Chicago to announce its plans to eliminate insensitivity among its members.
The fraternity is responding to a video that surfaced last week. It showed University of Oklahoma fraternity members engaging in a racist chant that referenced lynching and indicated that black students never would be admitted to that university’s chapter.
SAE has disbanded the local chapter for the video. The university has expelled two students and banned SAE. Two students identified in the video have apologized publicly.
article via blackamericaweb.com

MUSIC: Kendrick Lamar on His New Album and the Weight of Clarity

By goodblacknews on March 17, 2015
Kendrick Lamar is working to purify hip-hop, a genre he hopes to ground in his true experiences growing up poor in Compton, Calif.,  the son of a former gangbanger. (Credit: John Francis Peters for The New York Times)

LOS ANGELES — Following the success of his major label debut, “good kid, m.A.A.d. city,” in 2012,  Kendrick Lamar did not indulge in earthly luxuries. Instead, he got baptized.

That album was the story of his redemption, not just from street gangs through rapping but from a life of sin by embracing Jesus Christ. His long-awaited follow-up, “To Pimp a Butterfly” (TDE/Aftermath/Interscope), which was made available online Sunday night, ahead of a planned March 23 release, is about carrying the weight of that clarity: What happens when you speak out, spiritually and politically, and people actually start to listen? And what of the world you left behind?

Mr. Lamar, who grew up in Compton, Calif., had previously been saved as a teenager in the parking lot of a Food 4 Less, he said, when the grandmother of a friend approached him after a tragedy, asking if he had accepted God. “One of my homeboys got smoked,” Mr. Lamar recalled. “She had seen that we weren’t right in the head. That was her being an angel for us.”

On his new album, “To Pimp a Butterfly,” Mr. Lamar is an evangelist for black power. (Credit: John Francis Peters for The New York Times)

Nearly a decade later, having found that fame and riches did not offer additional salvation, or happiness, he “wanted to take it to the next level — being underwater,” he said. “I felt like it was something I had to do.”

Whereas “good kid, m.A.A.d. city” zoomed in on a day in the old life of Mr. Lamar, a gifted but wayward high schooler in a neighborhood filled with death and temptation, “To Pimp a Butterfly” brings listeners up to his present day, from world tours to the B.E.T. Awards, and the separation he feels from his past. Rather than relief, his escape from Compton has brought only more opportunities for sin and self-doubt, an internal chaos reflected not only in Mr. Lamar’s intricate stories but also in vigorous jazz- and funk-inflected production that builds on the smoother West Coast sounds of his debut.

Dr. Olivia Hooker, 1st Black Woman in U.S. Coast Guard, Honored with Training Facility & Dining Hall Dedications

By goodblacknews on March 16, 2015

Screen Shot 2015-03-16 at 12.59.24 PM
In 1945, Olivia Hooker, a 30-year-old black woman from Tulsa, Oklahoma, joined the U.S. Coast Guard. The now-Dr. Olivia Hooker holds a PhD in psychology, worked until she was 87, and just turned 100 in February. But 70 years ago when she enlisted she became the Coast Guard’s first African-American woman on active duty.
Screen Shot 2015-03-16 at 1.00.06 PMThursday, Coast Guard brass honored her by naming a dining hall on Staten Island in her honor. But the commandant of the Coast Guard announced that a training center at Coast Guard Headquarters in Washington, D.C., would also bear the name of this 100-year-old pioneer.
“Oh, this is beyond my wildest dreams. I’d never even imagine,” Dr. Hooker said. “It’s still astonishing to me. I’m so grateful that the sun was shining today and we were able to get here.”
To see Fox5NY video of this story, click here.
Hooker grew up in a home that Klan members ransacked during the Tulsa race riot of 1921.
Basic training in Manhattan Beach and the duties of a yeoman first class at the Boston separation office where she worked — and from which she later wrote her own separation letter — looked and felt a lot different than Tulsa in 1921 or White Plains, N.Y., in 2005.
“I learned a lot more about people who grew up in different kinds of situations,” she said. “There are many, many more opportunities but there are still more challenges.”
Hooker’s goddaughter Diane Harris and a roomful of Coast Guard leadership traveled to Staten Island for Thursday’s ceremony.
“She doesn’t act like a 100-year-old to me,” Harris said.
“When I try to reach my toes and I can’t quite reach them, then I’m reminded,” Dr. Hooker said.
Five years ago, at age 95, Dr. Hooker joined the Coast Guard Auxiliary, the service’s civilian reserve.
article by Mac King via myfoxny.com

Struggling Philadelphia High School Strawberry Mansion Hires Music Teacher, Starts Using Recording Studio Donated Last Year by Drake

By goodblacknews on March 15, 2015

Drake with students from Strawberry Mansion High School (Photo: ABC News)
Drake with students from Strawberry Mansion High School (Photo: ABC News)

The students at Strawberry Mansion High School, once considered one of the most dangerous schools in the country, have started using the school’s brand new recording studio donated by rapper Drake after a music teacher was finally hired.
Located in a poor Philadelphia neighborhood with a high crime rate, Strawberry Mansion is a school plagued by violence. It once spent six years on the state of Pennsylvania’s “Persistently Dangerous Schools” list.
In a special ABC News “Hidden America” report on the school that first aired in May 2013, Diane Sawyer and ABC News producers followed the daily lives of the school’s students and faculty, including its then-new principal, during the 2012-2013 school year. ABC News then went back in September 2013 to follow Strawberry Mansion at the start of the new 2013-2014 school year for a second special that aired in December 2013.
Click to see ABC News video of this story here.
Grammy award-winning hip-hop artist Drake was so moved by the ABC News specials, especially after learning that budget cuts had left the school without a music teacher, that he donated $75,000 to Strawberry Mansion for a new recording studio.

Drake Reveals Big Surprise for Philadelphia High School
Strawberry Mansion High, Once One of US’s Most Dangerous Schools, Receives Hope, Help
Strawberry Mansion: Fighting for a Future

But even though members of Drake’s crew finished the studio last summer, Principal Linda Cliatt-Wayman told ABC News that budget issues and the school’s violent history made it hard to find a music instructor.

So the studio, which included new keyboards and other equipment, as well as sound booths, sat unused for months.
Finally, Ben Diamond arrived in February to take on the role as a part-time music teacher who would teach studio production, but even then, Wayman said student interest was low at first.
It wasn’t until she used the school’s PA system to broadcast the first student-produced song to come out of the new recording studio that Wayman said students became interested. Now 91 students have signed up for the studio production class, she said.
“Music has a way of bringing people together,” Wayman told ABC News via email. “That is what I want the music to do for my kids, bring them all together to find the special gifts that lay dormant inside of them. I want them to get distracted on their positive attributes to help them create within and around them. They all love music. That is the one thing they all have in common.
“For me, the opening of the studio is more than about music,” Wayman added. “It is about making and keeping a promise to students who are constantly disappointed, pleasing them, making them happy and getting them to see that they must finish what they start [and] work hard to bring dreams into reality.”
In addition to Drake, other ABC News viewers donated money to Strawberry Mansion after the 2013 specials aired. Their generosity helped provide school uniforms, jackets for the school’s first football team, warm-up suits for the basketball team, school trips, PSAT and ACT prep classes, as well as scholarships for seniors heading off to college. Viewer donations also helped provide basic necessities that were missing at Strawberry Mansion, including books, notebooks and calculators.
article by Claire Weinraub and Lauren Effron via abcnews.go.com

Chicago Doctor Fred Richardson Makes House Calls in Dangerous Neighborhood Because They Need It Most

By goodblacknews on March 15, 2015

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Chicago Dr. Fred Richardson attending to a patient during a house call (Photo: BlackDoctor.com)

Remembering where you come from nowadays seems like it’s just a saying. With ambitions of a family, wealth and better health, most of those living in low-income neighborhoods move away and rarely have time to give back. But a Chicago doctor decided to do something different.
Dr. Fred Richardson returned to the neighborhood where he grew up to specifically provide care to those who need it most: his old neighbors.
Dr. Richardson was raised in Englewood, a low-income area on Chicago’s South Side with one of the highest unemployment and crime rates in the Midwest. After finishing medical school, for the past 25 years, Richardson has given back by making house calls in some of the city’s most dangerous neighborhoods so residents can get proper medical support.
Though house calls may seem a little bit old-fashioned in these days of selfies, online appointments and doctors Skyping, Richardson says that sometimes it’s the only way his patients can receive support.
“These old guys can’t get out,” he told the “Today” show, explaining that some of his patients are unable to leave their homes for care. “Medicare will pay for a home visit — actually will reimburse better than [for] an office visit.”
And his patients love the down-to-earth, personable care that sometimes lacks in a big, busy, corporate hospital setting.
“One of the things I enjoy the most about having a doctor like Dr. Fred is that he’s a good listener,” Alberta Bowles, one of his house call patients told the Chicago Tribune. “You can talk to him. He does not doctor4rush you to do anything and he never dismisses anything you say.”
Richardson was the only African American in his medical class, and he received a great measure of negative feedback.
“I was told many times, ‘Your grades aren’t high enough to do this,” Richardson told one class. “They said I would never do it.” However, he proved that he could. That’s why Richardson, who works six days a week, and is on call 24 hours a day, also finds time to empower future generations.  Several nights a week, in his office, he mentors minority medical students who are struggling free of charge. To date he has helped 50 students become successful doctors! His daughter Jessica is one of those doctors.
Giving back isn’t just something that sounds good to Dr. Fred, it’s a way of life.
article by Carter Higgins via blackdoctor.com

Arnold Donald, Carnival Corporation's 1st Black CEO, Navigates Cruise Lines to $1.5 Billion in Profit

By goodblacknews on March 15, 2015

Carnival Cruise Lines CEO Arnold Donald
Carnival Cruise Lines CEO Arnold Donald (Photo Credit: cruisecurrents.com)

MIAMI – Arnold Donald has swag. Not the phony suburban swag, but that old-school, down-home New Orleans Black neighborhood kind of swag that signals the confident chief executive strolling into the board room is clearly in charge. As Carnival Corporation’s first African-American CEO, Donald has prepared for this high-level, high-profile, high-paid position all his life.
At the prestigious St. Augustine High School in New Orleans, an all-boys, all-African-American Catholic school where Donald received a scholarship, he recalled this inspirational mantra from his teachers: “Three times a day, they would say: ‘Gentlemen, prepare yourselves, you’re going to run the world.’ ”
It’s close enough. Today, Donald, 60, leads the world’s largest cruise line with 120,000 employees and 100 ships for the 10.5 million passengers who cruise with Carnival each year. Sitting inside his spacious 10th-floor office at Carnival Corp. in suburban Miami, Donald talked about his vision for leading the Carnival Corporation. For Donald, it’s all about trying to offer unprecedented customer service.
He spends some of his time sifting through “psycho-graphics” to determine which of his nine “brands” – cruise ships — will best suit individual passengers. He enjoys talking to “guests” about their experiences while cruising and often asks passengers how Carnival can better serve them.
“We’re in the vacation business and part of our job is to help people have a good time,” Donald said in an interview with BlackAmericaWeb.com. “We can’t make more very fast. We can’t sell more volume. It’s not like selling shoes. Our ships sail full, we can’t sell more cabins, you can’t just build as many ships as you want in a year, there are only so many shipyards and they are limited in the number of ships they can build in a year.” “So we want to create onboard experiences where we’re giving the guests what they want,” he explained. “And therefore they are willing to pay for it. So the trick is to determine what the guests really want.”

Actor Justin Hires Cast in Chris Tucker Role for CBS' "Rush Hour" Series Pilot

By goodblacknews on March 14, 2015
CBS' Rush Hour: Justin Hires Cast
Justin Hires (FRAZER HARRISON/GETTY IMAGES)

Actor Justin Hires has been cast in the Chris Tucker role in CBS’ drama pilot adaptation of the “Rush Hour” film franchise.
Hires had a small part in 2012’s “21 Jump Street” and more recently has made appearances on Comedy Central’s “Key and Peele.” In the Warner Bros. TV pilot he’ll play a cocky, maverick LAPD detective who is assigned to work on a case with a stoic detective from Hong Kong. Jon Foo has already been cast in the role played by Jackie Chan opposite comedian Tucker in three “Rush Hour” features.
RELATED: Networks Casting More Actors of Color This Pilot Season
Comedy scribes Bill Lawrence and Blake McCormick wrote the script for the TV redo and are executive producing with the director and producer of New Line Cinema’s “Rush Hour” pics — Brett Ratner and Arthur Sarkissian — and Jeff Ingold of Lawrence’s Doozier Prods. Jon Turteltaub is directing the pilot and also executive producing.
Hires got his start out of college as an on-air personality for the MTVU cable channel. He’s also produced sketch comedy videos for various YouTube outlets.
article by Cynthia Littleton via Variety.com