SUMMARY:As schools across the nation resumed in-person classes, teachers and students faced increased pressure from local school boards and organizations over how to teach and talk about race in the classroom.Dana Crawford, a pediatric and clinical psychologist in New York who has developed approaches to reducing bias, prejudice, and racism, joins to share tips on how to talk to kids about race.
Diana Crawford: ...racism is a socially transmitted disease.
SUMMARY:The death of George Floyd last year has shone a spotlight on what it means to be Black, and especially, to be dark-skinned in America. Special correspondent Fred de Sam Lazaro has our report from Minnesota, home to a growing population of African and other immigrants. It is part of our continuing series "Race Matters", and Fred’s series, "Agents for Change."
SUMMARY:The national calls to action over racial justice have brought new awareness of past injustices in many parts of our society, including the fields of science and medicine. Yamiche Alcindor speaks to Dr. Aletha Maybank the American Medical Association's chief health equity officer, about the organization's racist history, how it plans to reckon with it, and the intersection of race and medicine.
SUMMARY:Trekking to and through a national park is one of the joys of an American summer. As COVID restrictions lift, millions are expected to explore the great outdoors. Now, a provocative article examines the deeper history of how these parks came to be — and their complicated legacy. Stephanie Sy reports.
SUMMARY: As the nation watches the trial of Derek Chauvin, we return to the debate that George Floyd's death ignited. Special correspondent Charlayne Hunter-Gault spoke with current and former law enforcement officers about "defunding the police," and what reforms they believe are needed to improve relations between them and the communities they serve. It's part of our ongoing series, Race Matters.
SUMMARY:President Biden is on the road, aiming to sell his COVID relief law to the American public. His first stop Tuesday was in Pennsylvania with a visit to a Black-owned flooring business near Philadelphia, highlighting the aid that his administration is providing through small business loans and stimulus checks. Yamiche Alcindor joins Judy Woodruff to discuss.
SUMMARY: The COVID relief and economic package is a massive bill that has a far-reaching impact in ways that many Americans don't know about yet. One provision calls for debt relief for Black farmers, who have long been denied access to government funding.John Boyd, a fourth-generation farmer in Virginia and president of the National Black Farmers Association, joins Lisa Desjardins to discuss.
SUMMARY:Living through a full year of closed schools and distance learning has taken a heavy toll on students, parents, teachers and school administrators. The new stimulus bill sets aside roughly $125 billion to help K-12 schools reopen. Laura Meckler, a national education writer at The Washington Post, joins William Brangham to discuss.
SUMMARY:In a time when statues and monuments around the country are being removed for what they represent, the Shaw Memorial in Boston is receiving attention of a different sort. It is being fully restored, with pride that the monument depicting Black soldiers marching off to battle in the civil war, stands the test of time. Special correspondent Jared Bowen of GBH Boston reports.
SUMMARY:Black History Month expands students’ understanding of the Black experience in American history. But one teacher in Akron, Ohio wanted her students to see that Black history isn’t something that happened in the past, it happens every single day through each of them. She worked with our Student Reporting Labs program to record these reflections from students.
SUMMARY:Daily reports of disturbing racial incidents and what appear to be deepening racial divisions within the country leave many looking for answers. Special correspondent Charlayne Hunter-Gault recently spoke with Dr. Ronald Crutcher, a classical musician and president of the University of Richmond, about confronting the complexities of racism.
SUMMARY:Rare documents with 12 signatures of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. sold on Wednesday for more than $130,000. They were penned in an Alabama jail logbook after King was arrested in April 1963 for leading a march against racial segregation. Rikki Klaus reports on the unprecedented item. It's part of our arts and culture series, "CANVAS."
IMHO: Note the Confederacy conducted a war against the United States of America, a union which they signed a contract (Constitution of the United States) to join and support. They committed treason and the Confederacy should never be calibrated nor memorialized.
SUMMARY:As the country faces a moment of reckoning about its treatment of Black Americans and other people of color, the display of memorials, monuments and statues is being reexamined. Some of these symbols are being torn down by protesters, and others removed by authorities or relocated. But what is the historical context behind their origin? Jeffrey Brown reports for our Race Matters coverage.
SUMMARY: The debate over physical symbols of the Confederacy has evolved into a broader one about U.S. history. Judy Woodruff talks to Peniel Joseph, professor at the University of Texas at Austin, W. Fitzhugh Brundage, professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Arielle Hudson one of six students who petitioned the University of Mississippi to relocate a campus Confederate statue.
IMHO: A person moving away (even if they have a knife) from anyone with a gun (LEO or not) is NOT a threat to anyone.
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SUMMARY: Defense attorneys began presenting their case Monday in the trial of a white police officer accused of shooting Laquan McDonald in 2014. Jason Van Dyke has pleaded not guilty to two counts of first-degree murder and other charges, after firing on the black teenager 16 times. Amna Nawaz talks with Jennifer White, host of the WBEZ podcast "16 Shots."
SUMMARY: As part of the Interfaith Youth Core, students and educators from colleges around the nation are coming together to find common ground while respecting differences. Special correspondent Charlayne Hunter-Gault sits down with founder and president Eboo Patel to examine how interfaith dialogue can be used to bridge racial divisions.
SUMMARY: The Trump administration came out against Harvard University's admission practices on Thursday. A legal battle brought by a group of Asian Americans against one of the most selective schools in the world is heading to federal court this fall, and is being widely watched across the country. John Yang talks with Katie Benner of The New York Times about the future of affirmative action in higher ed.
SUMMARY:Against the backdrop of simmering tensions over race and police violence against African Americans, police departments like the NYPD have introduced a relatively new training program aimed at teaching officers about implicit bias. Special correspondent Charlayne Hunter-Gault reports on the research behind “Fair and Impartial Policing” and whether it’s really effective.
SUMMARY: Several black pastors said at the White House on Wednesday that President Trump had helped improve life in inner cities. Yet HUD Secretary Ben Carson has looked into tripling rents for poor tenants on federal assistance, and slowed an anti-segregation initiative. Yamiche Alcindor talks with Bishop Harry Jackson, a member of Trump's evangelical advisory board.
SUMMARY:Recently, NewsHour analyst David Brooks wrote a New York Times column arguing that it's time for a resurgence of localism, flipping power and decision-making away from the federal government. Sherrilyn Ifill of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, another NewsHour regular, says that idea fails to take account of the elephant in the room in America: race. They both join Judy Woodruff to talk about it.
SUMMARY: The incredible views in America's national parks are seen largely by a specific demographic. Visitors are overwhelmingly white, with just one in 10 being Hispanic and 7 percent African-American. Special correspondent Tyler Fingert from the Cronkite School of Journalism reports on efforts to increase diversity among visitors as well as staff, and whether an admission price increase will keep people away.
SUMMARY:At Saguaro National Park, the namesake cactus is both the main attraction for hikers -- and thieves. Special correspondent Tyler Fingert of the Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University reports on how the problem is plaguing parks across the country, and depriving the public of its national treasures.
IMHO: The police who are doing this give a bad name to all the other police officers who do not over react.
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SUMMARY:A profusion of national incidents in which white citizens have called police on black citizens engaged in everyday activities shows how racial bias can escalate into confrontation and even violence or death. Yamiche Alcindor examines the concerns, highlighted by hashtags and memes like #LivingWhileBlack, with NAACP president Derrick Johnson.
SUMMARY: Award-winning author Jesmyn Ward writes the stories of the people and places she found absent in literature while growing up. Her new fiction novel, “Sing, Unburied, Sing,” weaves the supernatural with genuine characters that are molded by the rural and poverty-stricken life in her Mississippi hometown. Ward joins Jeffrey Brown to talk about her community and the stories that have come from it.
SUMMARY: In September 1971, Attica Correctional Facility in upstate New York became the site of a bloody uprising that would shock the nation. Over several days, some 1,300 inmates seized parts of the prison, demanding better living conditions. Heather Ann Thompson documents the untold story in her new book, “Blood in the Water,” and joins Jeffrey Brown to discuss the truth about the riot's violent end.
JEFFREY BROWN (NewsHour): September, 1971, Attica Prison in Upstate New York became the site of a bloody prison clash that would shock the nation. Over several chaotic days, some 1,300 inmates seized parts of the prison and demanded better living conditions.
ELLIOT ‘L.D.' BARKLEY (prisoner): We are men! We are not beasts and we do not intend to be driven or beaten as such!
JEFFREY BROWN:In the initial takeover a guard was killed. Inmates held about 40 prison employees as hostages, negotiating with the state of New York, and bringing in outside counsel including Attorney William Kunstler. Governor Nelson Rockefeller refused a face to face visit, talks soon disintegrated. And on September 13th, hundreds of armed troopers stormed the prison to retake control.
MAN: The instructions is your weapon is not to be taken or you to be taken.
JEFFREY BROWN: Twenty-nine inmates and ten hostages were killed in the takeover, scores more injured.
The story, much of it long kept hidden from view, is told in the new book “Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising o f 1971 and Its Legacy.”
Author Heather Ann Thompson is a historian at the University of Michigan.
Now, you argue there are two stories to tell. One is the “what happened”, one is the aftermath. Start with the “what happened.” What did the period leading up to the riot, what led to it?
HEATHER ANN THOMPSON, Author, “Blood in the Water”:Well, prisons in 1971, much like today, were these out of sight, out of mind places where people were treated very badly, and the guys inside worked through the system first to try get their conditions improved — again, very basic things, enough food to eat, sufficient sanitary supplies — and when that really fails, frustration mounts.
Ultimately, they erupt in a protest, and the book tells that story. It's a remarkable story of men from very different backgrounds who stand together, negotiate with the state of New York, with the help of observers.
JEFFREY BROWN: The riots were not planned.
HEATHER ANN THOMPSON:No, not at all. It actually begins in a quite unexpected clash between prisoners and guards that morphed into something much more organized. The guys elect representatives from the cell block to speak for them, they begin negotiating to the state for better conditions and, for four days, the world watches as the media is there to see how this thing is going to unfold.
I just cannot believe this, a pregnant teen gets maced and arrested FOR CRYING! This is sick!
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SUMMARY: Last September, a federal court in Alabama ruled that the disciplinary practices used by the Birmingham Police Department toward high school students were unconstitutional. The police department's appeal will be heard next month. Ebony Howard, the lawyer who filed the class-action suit, speaks with special correspondent Charlayne Hunter-Gault about the specific police conduct and the settlement.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): Last September, a federal court in Alabama ruled that the Birmingham Police Department's disciplinary practices, including the use of pepper spray for minor discipline problems, is in violation of student rights and unconstitutional.
Attorney Ebony Howard of the Southern Poverty Law Center filed the class-action suit, and returns to court next month when the police department's appeal is heard.
As part of our year-long Race Matters conversations focusing on solutions, special correspondent Charlayne Hunter-Gault reports from Birmingham about reducing tensions between African-American high school students and the police.
CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT (NewsHour):This video of a white South Carolina policeman roughly ejecting a black student from her classroom went viral and ignited a conversation about the proper role for police in schools.
Ebony Howard, a lawyer with the Southern Poverty Law Center, has been involved in that conversation as a result of her successful suit against police macing students in Montgomery, Alabama.
Ebony Howard, thank you for joining us.
EBONY HOWARD, Southern Poverty Law Center: Thank you for having me.
CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: Can you tell us briefly about the case you won in Birmingham last year?
EBONY HOWARD: Sure.
The case was about police officers who are stationed in Birmingham City high schools who are there to protect students, and they were using mace, or pepper spray is what it's sometimes called, against students for engaging in what amounts to normal adolescent behavior.
CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: Like what?
EBONY HOWARD: Like, for example, one of our plaintiffs, plaintiff K.B., she was leaving class and going to another class with a fellow classmate. And as she walked, a boy came up to her and started to call her really foul names that I won't repeat.
But as he called her those names, his friends who had come with him, they started to laugh. And the more they laughed, the more names he called her. And so she tried to walk away from him. And as she walked away, he followed her and his friends followed her, and he continued to call her lots and lots of names.
And so eventually, as she walked the entire length of the school building, she started to cry. And she became hysterical. And when she reached the end of the school building, a police officer walked up. And you would think that he would have taken care of her, but what he did was, he told her to calm down or he was going to arrest her.
And when she didn't stop crying, he put her in handcuffs. And she continued to cry after he handcuffed her, and he told her, calm down. And when she didn't calm down fast enough, he sprayed her with mace.
The other point that I forgot to mention, though, was that she was four months' pregnant at the time when he sprayed her with mace. She was arrested and taken to the local juvenile facility, where she had to take off her pants and her underwear and squat and cough as a part of a strip search.
I am Retired U.S. Navy (22yrs) and a Vietnam Veteran. After my Navy retirement I was in the computer related industry, now retired. In 2000 I was a registered Republican and voted for George W. Bush. Six months of having Bush in the Whitehouse forced me to re-evaluate my political stance. I had always thought of myself as a Moderate Republican, but was a Republican by "default" NOT because of close examination of the GOP. Due to what has happened in America since 2000, I now consider myself a progressive, and registered as a Non-Affiliated voter.
*Anti-First Amendment policies that attempt to turn America into a theocracy by enshrining ANY religious belief as law.
* Any attempt to suppress human or Constitutional rights.
* Any law or policy that supports discrimination based on religion, ethnicity, race/color, gender, sexual orientation, or any law that does NOT support Equal Treatment under the law.
*Any law or policy that attempts to suppress Freedom of the Press or Free Speech.
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