Welcome to the first podcast of “The American Race”. My first episode asks the burning question: What are aging white boomers (think Don Imus) to do for cool, now that they can’t pretend to be Dave Chappelle?

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[…] Countless studies show that stressful environments and situations raise blood pressure. And few things are as consistently stressful as being black. By almost every measurable social category �" such as income, infant mortality, education, incarceration rates and employment �" blacks fare poorly, making everyday life a constant struggle. Only a buried-head ostrich would say that racial discrimination does not play a role in many African Americans’ poor health.

What’s so pernicious about this “bad gene” theory is that it attributes current health disparities to actions taken nearly four centuries ago, when the more relevant issue may very well be what is happening today. Reducing health disparities to genes obscures more sensible conversations about the contemporary nature of discrimination, how it affects minority health and how best to improve health outcomes. Racial disparities in health are real. But a bit of caution should be exercised when playing the gene card to explain them. […]

| Go back for the rest of Center for Genetics and Society director Osagie K. Obasogie’s Alameda Times-Star op-ed “Oprah’s unhealthy mistake,” and then make time for his Bioethics Forum essay “Racial Alchemy: Bioethics and the Skin Tone Gene”

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Sometime after posting Why Black Rock? recently, I reran the first few episodes of the mind-opening 1995 PBS series Rock Roll (wasted a half-hour trying to find link to the normally great PBS web page for this classic). I was…

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[…] Arts groups must reflect their communities, or their very existence is in peril, experts say. The seven-county region is 13 percent African-American, 2 percent Hispanic and 2 percent Asian, based on 2005 U.S. Census Bureau figures. The city, home of Music Hall, is 46 percent black.

“Part of the issue is the pool of people of color trying to get into orchestras has been very small,” says Henry Fogel, president and CEO of the American Symphony Orchestra League. “In the 18 years I managed the Chicago Symphony (1985-2003), for auditions that attracted 150 or more applicants, the number of African-Americans was between 0 and 2.”

The musicians are the most visible representation of the Cincinnati Symphony, one of the nation’s top 25 big-budget orchestras. Seven years ago, the 112-year-old orchestra hired its third African-American.

It’s not alone. Nationwide, blacks and Latinos comprise just 4 percent of orchestras. Scores of highly trained musicians compete for few spots. […]

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It’s another all listener feedback episode as we continue our semi-hiatus here at Addicted to Race:

• Jason, a new listener, calls in with his thoughts on the show
• Liam McGrath encourages us to ask ourselves why we are here. Why do we listen to this podcast? Why are we engaged in these conversations? What do we want to accomplish?
• Latoya Peterson comments on some recent news items on people of color and politics, including Condoleezza Rice’s dating life. Oooooo!

SUBMIT YOUR FEEDBACK!
There are 3 ways to get in touch with us. Leave a comment to this post, call our voicemail number at 206-203-3983, or email us at addictedtorace@gmail.com.

HELP US SPREAD THE WORD!
Please help us reach new listeners by voting for us on Podcast Alley, reviewing us on Yahoo’s podcast directory and reviewing us in iTunes.

NEW TO PODCASTS?
Check out this great introduction for the new podcast listener from iTunes. It breaks down all the different ways you can find podcasts, listen to them, subscribe to them, and so on.

Duration - 24:37
File Size - 10.0 MB
Right-click here to download an MP3 of Addicted to Race Episode 69
or
Click here to never miss an episode by subscribing to us in iTunes
or
click the button below to play it immediately

[See post to listen to audio]

New York Times Blog: CBS blocks comment on Obama Mainstream blog felt compelled by stream of racist comments (tags: Obama racism African+Americans blogs 2008+presidential+race) What Do White Fans See in Obama? Wash Post piece plumbs 10 white political psyches (tags:…

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by Carmen Van Kerckhove

I’m excited to announce that New Demographic’s seminar, Racialicious! When Race and Pop Culture Collide, is now available in both audio seminar and e-book formats!

DESCRIPTION
From the neo-minstrelsy of Flavor of Love to the racial segregation on Survivor, from the race-swapping families on Black.White. to the fascination with interracial sex, from Gwen Stefani’s use of Harajuku girls as mute human props to Angelina Jolie’s obsession with international adoption, from Michael Richards’ lynching tirade to Rosie O’Donnell’s “ching chong” remarks, race and pop culture are colliding more now than ever before.

What does pop culture reveal about our attitudes toward race and racism? Does pop culture’s treatment of race help or harm discussions about race? As consumers of pop culture, what kinds of stereotypes and assumptions should we look out for?

AUDIO SEMINAR

Format: MP3 file that you can download, keep and play as many times as you like
Length: 42 minutes
Fee: $29.99

E-BOOK

Format: Adobe Acrobat PDF file that you can either print out or read on the screen. You can also download the file and keep it forever.
Length: 14 pages
Fee: $39.99

Please note:

• Within 24 hours of the time you place your order, you will receive an email with a link to the MP3 (audio seminar) or PDF (e-book), which you can download and keep forever.
• If you’d like to pay by credit card instead of PayPal, click one of the buttons above. When you get to the PayPal page, look in the lower left-hand corner where it says “Don’t have a PayPal account? No problem, continue checkout” and click the “Continue” button there.

This is an all listener audio comment episode:

• Frances shares her thoughts on the Don Imus controversy
• Jeff weighs in on misogyny in hip hop
• ME discusses the word “queer”
• Tereza responds to our episode on white people and hip hop

SUBMIT YOUR FEEDBACK!
There are 3 ways to get in touch with us. Leave a comment to this post, call our voicemail number at 206-203-3983, or email us at addictedtorace@gmail.com.

HELP US SPREAD THE WORD!
Please help us reach new listeners by voting for us on Podcast Alley, reviewing us on Yahoo’s podcast directory and reviewing us in iTunes.

NEW TO PODCASTS?
Check out this great introduction for the new podcast listener from iTunes. It breaks down all the different ways you can find podcasts, listen to them, subscribe to them, and so on.

Right-click here to download an MP3 of Addicted to Race Episode 67
or
Click here to never miss an episode by subscribing to us in iTunes
or
click the button below to play it immediately

[See post to listen to audio]

“I had to deal with the obstacle of limited expectation on the part of people with whom I interacted and the people with whom I worked. If you’ve never seen an African-American in a certain position, a lot of times people will assume there are no African-Americans qualified to do that. […]” (Waco Trib)

“We want to have a national footprint. There are no national brick-and-mortar African American businesses. You can go from cable companies or store to store and buy Ebony and Black Enterprise magazines, but I don’t know where you can walk into an African American bank in Washington, New York, Boston, Charlotte and Richmond.” (WaPo)

[…] The number of people in similar straits is rising today with the shifting populations of a globalized world. The emergence of new democracies is also a factor, particularly in Africa, where the granting or removal of citizenship is used as a political weapon.

By the most common count, there are 15 million stateless people in the world, but by its nature, this is a number nobody can know for certain. […] (NYTimes)

“It’s kind of hard to be out on campus and still be successful. As an out gay man, if I wanted to pledge, that door is pretty much shut to me. That’s just the way it is.” (WaPo)

“Black children really need black dolls. She wanted us to know there was nothing wrong with the way we looked, that we were just as beautiful as the blonde-haired, blue-eyed dolls.” (BosGlobe)

[…] Sunday morning is still the most segregated time for America, but many churches will find themselves temporarily integrated by visits from various candidates of all races and their surrogates during election season. Obama shouldn’t be expected to abandon his minister to appease political foes, but at the same time it’s important he convince voters his preacher is a spiritual adviser and nothing more.

In the black church, your pastor is the considered the leader of your flock; if Obama wants to get to the White House, he will have to learn how to be a shepherd on his own. (JS Online)

“My first choice would be a minority. Because of the situations we’ve had, the difficulties with the minority populations, we need to normalize and stabilize that so the minority community feels the Police Department works for them.” (Statesman.com)

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A truly outrageous case. A minor pushes a hall monitor and gets 7 years. To some in Paris, sinister past is back In Texas, a white teenager burns down her family’s home and receives probation. A black one shoves a…

JC & CVK
Well it took awhile but we finally finished our big move. Check us out at www.racialicious.com! We’re going to disable comments on this blog so head on over to our new blog if you’d like to comment!

JC & CVK
Loyal readers, we’re going to need a bit more time for our make-over/relaunch of Mixed Media Watch. Stay tuned…we are hoping that we will just be a day delayed. Thanks for your patience! We want to make sure that all is just right before unveiling. Thanks!

• Black GOPers run racially-tinged radio ad - MSNBC.com
  “A national black Republican group is running a radio advertisement accusing Democrats of starting the Ku Klux Klan and saying Martin Luther King Jr. was a Republican, a claim King researchers challenge…”
  (tags: africanamerican politics civilrights)
• Live-Blogging Survivor: Cook Islands, ep. 2 - reappropriate
  Another hilarious installment of Jenn’s live-blogging. Cao Boi tells a racist joke and the other Asians tell him to shut up, the Latino rocker dude declares he identifies more with metal culture than with Latino culture, and oh yeah, the Asians won again
  (tags: tv survivor raciststereotypes racistjokes)
• Racist Parents Kidnap Daughter and Try to Force Abortion - Rachel’s Tavern
  Another great post from Rachel, analyzing how the media keeps pushing the racist elements of this story to the back of the agenda. This is the case in which a couple kidnapped their 19 year old daughter to force her to have an abortion because the baby’s
  (tags: africanamerican caucasian black white interracialrelationships racism parenting)
• It’s ‘racist’ to ask for more diversity in the ad industry? - MultiCultClassics
  HighJive tears apart a letter to the editor from an Ad Age reader. Similar to my recent rant on Addicted to Race, the reader claims that the NYC Commission on Human Rights’ requests for the advertising industry to diversify its hiring practices is “racist
  (tags: advertising diversity workplace)
• Return to the dark ages (re: Kate Moss blackface) - The Guardian
  “…Blacking up has become acceptable in the same way that pole dancing is now sold to women as an empowering thing to do. Both assume that the thing they are poking fun at no longer exists - ie discrimination, racism and sexism. But of course they are wr
  (tags: african black blackface international)
• About face (history of blackface in US and UK) - The Guardian
  “…Phillips believes the blackface tradition in the UK is less rooted in ideas of racial superiority than in the US but is baffled by its resurgence…”I am all for satire but I don’t understand how the image has re-emerged. It doesn’t seem to be satire
  (tags: blackface)
• ‘NYT’ Commenters Remind You That Racism Is Over - Gawker
  Gawker points out awful the comments were in reaction to Thursday’s New York Times piece on the lack of blacks on Wall Street. You can guess it: all about how blacks need to shut up, stop complaining and do some work, a healthy dose of oppression olympics
  (tags: africanamerican black business workplace institutionalracism)
• Harvard, Princeton Drop “Early Admissions” �" Should Others Follow? - Diverse
  “…as other institutions consider eliminating these programs, they should also strongly consider adopting another policy that has caught on at Harvard and other institutions �" full financial aid, with minimum debt burden, for most needy, academically e
  (tags: academia education institutionalracism)
• Princeton Establishes Center for African American Studies - Diverse
  “Princeton University announced this week the creation of a Center for African American Studies �" a plan that includes doubling the number of faculty in its African American studies program, enhancing the undergraduate curriculum and seeking funds to en
  (tags: academia africanamerican education)

This is especially dedicated to all of those short-sighted african americans who endorsed racial and ethnic profiling of arabs and muslims after 9/11. Those with clearer heads could see what would happen, which is that the barrel of the faux…

Another sign of the new era where partisans are more open and direct with their racism. Watch this clip from Chris Matthews. Amy Goodman can hold her own pretty well, but even she is momentarily non-plussed when Matthews starts spewing…