When we stepped out onto the roof, the wind whipped me sideways, and it took me a second to get my bearings. I was nine stories above Times Square, staring at the back of its biggest LED sign, and it was thrilling.
20 million gallons of potable water later, the massive double “trunk line” break that’s resulted in spectacular flooding in the streets of Los Angeles and throughout the UCLA campus has finally been sealed off and crews have this bulbous blockage to thank for it.
Danish researchers just created the Usain Bolt of networks. A team from the Technical University of Denmark used a single multi-core optical fiber to transfer 43 terabits per second, making it the world’s fastest fiber network . I’d say it makes Google Fiber look like 1996 AOL dial-up from a decrepit rural phone line, but that comparison is too kind to Google Fiber.
Sprint isn’t the only company hoping to shell out billions for the privilege of scooping up T-Mobile’s US branch; according to the Wall Street Journal, a French company called Iliad wants in on the action as well. Iliad, which owns a mobile operator…
Back in March 2014, two United States senators accused the Central Intelligence Agency of infiltrating Senate computers. Worse, they accused the CIA of hacking Senate computer networks and accessing files while the Senate’s Intelligence Committee was…
A new report suggests T-Mobile may have a new suitor. French carrier Iliad, a bit of an upstart in their own right, have reportedly made an offer for the Deutsche Telekom company. Details of the offer are sketchy, but it brings a second carrier wanting to snap up T-Mobile USA. T-Mobile’s valuation is just shy of $25 billion, which is … Continue reading
She’s African-American. Kids know it — and not just kids of color. White kids know it too.
And boys know she’s a girl.
And that is all awesome.
Doc McStuffins is a crossover hit ($500 million in sales last year). Her “blockbuster sales” suggest she’s adored not only by African-American girls, but by girls and boys from many racial demographics.
But for some reason, we adults seem to have a problem with the fact that our kids know Doc McStuffins is Black and female.
Adult explanations of Doc McStuffins’ success reveal volumes about the way we adults — white adults in particular — think about race. At the moment, these revelations are pretty disappointing and have huge implications for how we talk about race and model racial behavior to and for our children.
I’ll tell you why.
It’s starts with “colorblindness,” an ideology that’s a total dead end if we are serious about the development of white children along a pathway of healthy racial identity. By healthy racial identity, I mean what Janet Helms means: an identity that manifests a genuine and interested embrace of diversity while being comfortable in one’s own skin, a strong antiracist sensibility as part of one’s own white racial identity, and an ability to navigate a multiracial world without presuming oneself to be the dominant, “generic,” or race-less norm.
If any of these attributes fail to become a deep and formative part of how our white children (becoming teens, young adults, etc.) understand themselves and their relationships with others, they will not be the able participants in a truly plural, diverse democracy that those of us who claim to value equality and justice want them to be.
On top of this, colorblindness also erases the interesting and beautiful value of difference (e.g., ask most Latino or Black folks if they want their race to be seen and usually the answer is “yes”). It’s also based on the degrading assumption that there must be something “wrong” with “color.” If there wasn’t, why wouldn’t we want to notice it?
So, colorblindness is a big “no, no” in my book. And, I think many of us, white parents included, increasingly recognize it as a big “no, no.”
Yet, we continue to talk about white kids as if they are colorblind. We do this 1) as if this were true and 2) as if (if it were true) this were a good thing. Meanwhile, neither of these things is the case.
This all came up for me again while reading a the recent New York Times article on Doc McStuffins’ success. Much of the article was great. It explored the importance of Doc McStuffins’ visibility for young African-American children, girls especially, in a media market where positive images of blackness and Black femaleness are shamefully few and far between.
I agree.
Go Doc McStuffins!
But the article also repeatedly suggested that Doc McStuffins’ crossover success is due to white kids not seeing her as Black (and boys not recognizing her as a girl).
Consider the statement by Doc McStuffins’ creator Chris Nee:v “The kids who are of color see her as an African-American girl, and that’s really big for them… And I think a lot of other kids don’t see her color and that’s wonderful as well.”
The “other kids” (a.k.a., white kids) don’t see her color?
Again 1) I doubt this is true and 2) if it was, this would not be cause for celebration (and the fact that we think it is reveals a lot).
To the first point: The depth and savvy with which young kids do see color, relentlessly in a society as racialized society as ours, has been documented over and over.
Colorblindness does not exist in the United States. Not even for 2-year-olds. That reality alone has huge implications for how we should be engaging white kids on race.
To the second point: What’s going on that so many adults continue to celebrate the fallacious belief that white kids don’t see color? More frightening, if that’s where we adults are at, how are we possibly going to enable our kids’ healthy racial identity development? (I’m pretty convinced here that lots of adult talk about kids and race says a whole lot more about adults’ racial identities than about kids’.)
The article goes on to engage Dr. Margaret Beale Spencer, professor of comparative of human development, who explains: “Children’s play is serious business… They are getting ideas about who they are from these objects.”
As a parent, I didn’t need to read the studies to tell you that she’s absolutely right. I watch what characters, books and shows do to the psyche and self-image of my daughters every day; how they shape the worlds they imagine to be possible.
And that’s is precisely why a character like Doc McStuffins, as a Black female, is so important for all of our children.
Yes, I agree with Spencer’s emphasis on how important it is for African-American girls to see a powerful and confident character who looks like them. In a society that denigrates blackness and femaleness, the chance for these girls to identify power and confidence with both is indeed a kid toy success.
The stakes are higher for children of color. But Doc McStuffins is important to my young, white daughters too, and would be doubly so if they were sons. And not because “they don’t notice.” We who teach and parent white kids should never encourage them to see Doc McStuffins as a raceless, genderless person.
White kids need to associate power and confidence with blackness and femaleness too!
And the thing is, I think (at least in the moment of their adoration of Doc McStuffin’s) they already do. Or, they will. Or, they could.
If only we adults would stop relentlessly overlaying our “colorblind” ideologies (anxieties?) over what our white kids are actually racially experiencing in the world. If we don’t, eventually they’ll absorb our myth, separate themselves from their actual experiences and then live all of this out in ways that will do more to help keep our current oh-so-inadequate racial order just as it is. All while smiling proudly about how “colorblind” they are.
Our kids are not colorblind and we should help them to remain that way.
That’s the least we can do for the sake of all of our children. After all, my white kids are going to be the schoolmates, colleagues, coworkers and, I hope, allies of children, teenagers and adults of color now and in the years to come.
So when they think they see Black and female manifested as powerful and confident? And, even better, when they accept and love what they see? Our jobs are simply to say this: “Why yes, yes, in fact, you do.”
It seems that Ford, a company that will ditch the BlackBerry and provide iPhones for some of its employees, alongside General Motors who are working on wireless charging capability for its vehicles, are under scrutiny by the Alliance of Artists and Recording Companies. Both Ford and GM were named in a class action lawsuit due to the fact that some of their vehicles feature CD-ripping capability, where the music industry group touted that both Ford and GM’s vehicles have violated federal law in such a manner, and are asking compensation to the tune of millions of dollars.
Interestingly enough, a few decades ago, record labels went to Congress with issues of cassette tapes making unauthorized recording of music, resulting in the Audio Home Recording Act (AHRA) of 1992 that will require both importers and manufacturers to fork out royalties when it comes to “digital audio recording devices”, among others.
Apparently, such legislation would also apply to several newer recording devices, which include CD players – and it is this capability that has landed both Ford and General Motors in the current quagmire, since some of their rides do feature the ability to rip audio CDs into an internal hard drive, and hence, violating copyright law.
The outcome of this particular case will be worth looking into, considering the legality of “recording” devices when it comes to future car entertainment systems. How will the court interpret the role of the car here in relation to the law? Only time will be able to tell.
Ford And GM Face Lawsuit Over In-Car CD Ripping
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It’s easy to get caught up with Twitter and the avalanche of information that gets reported on the day of the MLB trade deadline. But, as the MLB Network was reminded on Thursday, the trade deadline is a time where fake reporter Twitter accounts come out to wreak havoc.
Shortly after the blockbuster trade between the A’s and Red Sox was reported, the MLB Network relayed a tweet from an account pretending to be Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports. The fake account had some enormous fake news, tweeting that the Detroit Tigers were about to make a deal with Tampa Bay for ace David Price.
OMFG! #MLBNetwork just got trolled! Isn’t he sitting in your studio? pic.twitter.com/Ffd4TqhhJ9
— Waiver Wire Warrior (@WaiverWarrior) July 31, 2014
The real Ken Rosenthal was quick to shoot down the fake report.
This is a fake. Block him. RT @Ken_Rosenthal_: Sources: #Tigers close to finalizing deal with #Rays involving David Price and Ben Zobrist.
— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) July 31, 2014
BEWARE!! RT@FOXSportsLive: REMINDER: Follow @Ken_Rosenthal & @jonmorosi.
BEWARE of Fake Accounts.
— FOX Sports: MLB (@MLBONFOX) July 31, 2014
For more than three weeks now, fierce violence has raged between Israel and Hamas, taking an enormous toll in human life and suffering. Who among us is not deeply shocked and saddened by the losses suffered in this round of violence?
One’s heart goes out to the families of all those who have died or been injured, in particular the children whose lives have been cut short by this deadly conflict. The devastation and homelessness in Gaza must be addressed immediately or the suffering there will only continue to lay the seeds for further and deeper violence.
Yet the fighting continues with neither side apparently willing to call a halt.
The United States, the international community and all people of goodwill should joint together now and tell both sides that it is time for the fighting to end through a sustainable cease-fire agreement.
Israel has the right to defend itself proportionately against the threat of relentless rockets and to destroy tunnels leading into Israel. But it’s now time for Israel to look for a way out of this war. Ultimately, there is no military victory to be achieved here because we are dealing with a fundamentally political conflict. Calls for Israel to “reoccupy Gaza” are deeply irresponsible and will only lead to thousands more dead.
We need to back efforts by President Obama and Secretary of State Kerry as well as the engagement of other countries such as Egypt to bring about an immediate cease-fire. Any such cease-fire must account for Israel’s security concerns, specifically from rockets and tunnels, as well as Palestinian humanitarian needs, and should be structured to lead to negotiations to establish arrangements related to security, political issues and humanitarian assistance. The Palestinian Authority should be given a larger role in the cease-fire and in the negotiations around security, political arrangements and humanitarian assistance.
Every effort should be made to establish arrangements that minimize the chances that another round of violence erupts again in two years. A real solution for Gaza must address Israel’s legitimate security concerns from both rockets and tunnels, while also establishing a structure that brings the West Bank and Gaza together politically and allows Palestinian differences to be settled politically. It must address the serious humanitarian issues that face the civilian population in Gaza including greater freedom of movement for people and goods for non-military purposes.
Ideally, the cease-fire negotiations could also be used to advance prospects for a Palestinian unity government committed to early elections and demilitarization in Gaza. Allowing the previously-signed reconciliation agreement between Palestinian factions to move forward as part of the cease-fire deal might pave the way for a Palestinian government with a broad mandate and committed to a long-term cease-fire.
Secretary of State John Kerry has been working for such an agreement but his efforts have been hampered by the leak of a confidential document passed to the Israeli government for comment last weekend. The attacks on and mischaracterizations of the Secretary’s efforts to resolve this crisis have only strengthened those in Israel who wish to re-conquer all of Gaza regardless of the human cost.
The deeper truth which everyone by now should realize is that the ongoing conflict between Israelis and Palestinians and the violence it spawns cannot be addressed without looking at the more fundamental issues that are at stake.
This conflict didn’t start when the latest rockets began flying three weeks ago or with the terrible kidnapping and murder of three teenagers or Israel’s response to that incident. The roots of this conflict remain the tragic fight between two peoples over one land and the unresolved status of territory won by Israel in the 1967 war that has been occupied since and on which the Palestinian people will one day build their state. Failure to address and resolve these underlying issues through a two-state solution condemns both peoples to a never-ending spiral of violence that will only deepen as technology improves and hatred festers.
There remains no alternative to a comprehensive diplomatic resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that results in two states for two peoples. A never-ending and deepening cycle of violence will do nothing to advance that cause. Only a two-state solution that resolves the underlying conflict will ensure Israel’s safety, security and legitimacy as the democratic homeland of the Jewish people and provide the Palestinian people with freedom, dignity and self-determination.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.