article by Sameer Rao via colorlines.com
Culture critic and “Bad Feminist” author Roxane Gay told Buzzfeed News yesterday (January 25) that she split with her next book’s publisher, Simon & Schuster, over its recent deal with infamous Breitbart journalist and banned Leslie Jones Twitter troll Milo Yiannopoulos. The Hollywood Reporter first revealed in late December that Yiannopoulos signed a $250,000 book deal with Simon & Schuster’s conservative-leaning imprint Threshold Editions.
“When the announcement about Milo’s book first came out, I was relieved because I thought I didn’t have a book with Simon & Schuster and tweeted something to that effect,” said Gay to Buzzfeed News. “Then I remembered my TED Book and that TED is an imprint of Simon & Schuster.”
TED Books slated Gay’s “How to be Heard” for publication in March 2018. It is still listed on Simon & Schuster’s website. “I was supposed to turn the book in this month and I kept thinking about how egregious it is to give someone like Milo a platform for his blunt, inelegant hate and provocation,” she continued. “I just couldn’t bring myself to turn the book in. My editor emailed me last week and I kept staring at that email in my inbox and finally over the weekend I asked my agent to pull the book.”
To read full article, go to: Roxane Gay Pulls Simon & Schuster Book Deal Over Milo Yiannopoulos’ Advance | Colorlines
Posts tagged as “TED talk”
(Washington, DC) – This month, forty-three black fathers, nonprofit leaders and businessmen in Akron, Baltimore, Detroit, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh will receive $400,000 in grants to help them strengthen their communities. The grants are presented by BMe Community, a growing national network of 12,000 black men and others of all races and genders who are committed to building better communities across the U.S.
According to BMe Community, the 43 men, called “BMe Leaders”, were nominated by local residents and chosen because they were already consistently helping thousands of their neighbors. Each of the men has also agreed to stand up for important values in America’s evolving dialogue on race, community and our nation’s future.
Specifically, BMe Community believes that the most prosperous way forward for America is to value all its people, recognize black men as assets, reject stories that denigrate people, and work together for our common interests in caring and prosperous communities. The BMe Leaders embody those values. Their personal stories and leadership inspires others to reach for those values as well. Participants in BMe Community use the hashtag #ReachWithUs to share, inspire, and empower each other with words of congratulation, useful information, images, and event invites.
BMe started honoring these 43 “Community Fathers” in local ceremonies that began June 18 and end tomorrow in Detroit on June 27th. The events and BMe Community are backed by private donations, leading foundations and corporations including the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Open Society Foundations, The Heinz Endowments, JP Morgan Chase, and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. Since 2012, BMe has named 143 BMe Leaders in five cities, sponsored over 100 community events and produced countless stories of solutions and the inspiring people behind them.
One of the first to ever be named a BMe Leader is Shaka Senghor, an author, speaker and leader in criminal justice reform who was named a BMe Leader in 2012 for his efforts in Detroit to increase literacy and decrease violence. The honor came less than two years after he was released from serving 19 years in prison for a crime he committed as a teenager. In the three years since BMe recognized him, Shaka has rattled off an impressive list of accomplishments including being named an MIT Media Lab Fellow, a Kellogg Foundation Community Fellow, being featured in BMe’s bestselling book “REACH: 40 Black Men Speak on Living, Leading and Succeeding” and producing a popular TED Talk titled “Why Your Worst Deeds Shouldn’t Define You.” He currently serves as BMe’s National Outreach Representative. To see his Ted Talk, watch below:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtXyGFMBWBs&w=560&h=315]
BMe encourages anyone who shares its values to register for the events or become a participant in the network. www.bmecommunity.org.
BMe Leaders come from all walks of life, ranging in age from 21 to over 80. They are black men who are often unheralded yet lead by example on matters ranging from creating businesses to educating children to protecting human rights. The BMe Leaders work with men and women of all races who also want cities that are prosperous, safe, and provide hope and opportunity to future generations.
“America is at another one of those historic moments where we can choose chaos or community” says Shorters, “These men have always been here. We just admit their existence and invite people of all races and genders to reach with us to build assets, build community and give our children a better story of America’s future.”
The next Induction Ceremony is open to the public tomorrow in Detroit at the University of Michigan Detroit Center, Michigan Room at 1:00 p.m. RSVP: www.bmecommunity.org/detroit2015
article by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (follow @lakinhutcherson)
Beyoncé may sing about girls running the world, but she’s under no delusion that it’s actually true. The superstar recently penned an article for The Shriver Report about the lack of equality between the sexes.
“We need to stop buying into the myth about gender equality,” Knowles-Carter writes, “It isn’t a reality yet.”
Beyoncé’s essay is a part of The Shriver Report: A Woman’s Nation Pushes Back from the Brink, a “multi-platform nonprofit media initiative led by Maria Shriver that seeks to modernize America’s relationship to women.” The report, which can be downloaded for free until January 15, features essays and photos by some of our nation’s preeminent thinkers, activists, entrepreneurs, and celebrities including Anne-Marie Slaughter, Howard Shultz, Sheryl Sandberg, Jada Pinkett Smith, Hillary Clinton, Dr. Nadine Burke Harris, LeBron James, and Tony Porter.
In her article, Beyoncé discusses the wage gap between the sexes and makes a passionate plea to men to step up to the plate and “demand that their wives, daughters, mothers, and sisters earn more.”
The essay marks yet another step in Beyoncé’s feminist journey. Recently, the singer made waves when she featured excerpts from Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s TED talk, “We Should All Be Feminists,” on the song “Flawless,” causing many to wonder if Beyoncé was simply calling herself a feminist to sell records or if she was actually identifying as such.
Despite referring to herself as a “modern day feminist” in the past, this essay may silence her critics and perhaps lend some much-needed support to The Shriver Report, which attempts to tackle some of the most pressing issues that face women today.
Check out out Beyoncé’s essay, Gender Equality Is A Myth! below:
We need to stop buying into the myth about gender equality. It isn’t a reality yet. Today, women make up half of the U.S. workforce, but the average working woman earns only 77 percent of what the average working man makes. But unless women and men both say this is unacceptable, things will not change. Men have to demand that their wives, daughters, mothers, and sisters earn more—commensurate with their qualifications and not their gender. Equality will be achieved when men and women are granted equal pay and equal respect.
Humanity requires both men and women, and we are equally important and need one another. So why are we viewed as less than equal? These old attitudes are drilled into us from the very beginning. We have to teach our boys the rules of equality and respect, so that as they grow up, gender equality becomes a natural way of life. And we have to teach our girls that they can reach as high as humanly possible.
We have a lot of work to do, but we can get there if we work together. Women are more than 50 percent of the population and more than 50 percent of voters. We must demand that we all receive 100 percent of the opportunities.
Download The Shriver Report for free from January 12-15th here.
article by Britni Danielle via clutchmagonline.com