9/21 NEWSBREAK: Grand jury indicts Folly Beach wedding night DUI suspect

Documents filed Wednesday show a Charleston County grand jury recently returned an indictment on four charges for a woman accused of being intoxicated and hitting a golf cart with her car, killing a bride and injuring three others.

In the indictment, Jamie Lee Komoroski, now 26, is charged with one count of felony DUI resulting in death, two counts of felony DUI resulting in great bodily injury and one count of reckless homicide.  Komoroski remains in the Charleston County jail. Bail was denied Aug. 2.

Authorities say Komoroski was heavily intoxicated April 28 when she collided with a golf cart on Folly Beach, driving 65 mph in a 25 mph zone. A blood toxicology report showed her blood alcohol level at 0.261 on the night of the crash, more than three times the legal limit in South Carolina.

The husband of the woman killed in the crash filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Komoroski on May 17. The lawsuit alleges Komoroski drank heavily that day and the establishments she visited had an obligation to “exercise due care” in serving alcoholic beverages. 


In other news:

CP ARTS: MOJA brings international musicians, storytelling, more to Charleston. The MOJA festival, which celebrates Black artists and highlights African American and Caribbean contributions to culture, will take place in various venues across the Charleston peninsula from Sept. 28 through Oct. 8.

CP NEWS: Apartment units soar but Charleston is still playing catch up to housing demand . Apartment units from downtown to the sea islands are filling up faster than they can be built — despite nearly 10,000 units opening in the Charleston market over the last three years, according to an August study.

Forecasters track area of low pressure along S.C. coast. Forecasters are keeping an eye on a non-tropical area of low pressure that could form off the U.S. east coast this week. The system has a 30% chance of development over the next seven days.

S.C. hits new employment record in August. South Carolina hit another employment record in August as more workers found jobs even as businesses added fewer positions. New employment data showed 2.4 million people were working in the Palmetto State last month, about 11,300 more than in July.

CARTA to undergo study for optimization. The Charleston Area Regional Transportation Authority is undergoing a study funded by the federal government that they say will help them optimize their bus routes in downtown Charleston.

The story behind the Folly Beach graffiti path. Hurricane Hugo brought one of the best-known art canvases to Folly Road — the Folly Boat. But around the same time, the concrete path at the Lighthouse Inlet Heritage Preserve started to gain popularity as a much larger canvas.

Life Raft Treats issue recall after potential listeria contamination. Charleston’s Life Raft Treats, known for their Not Fried Chicken ice cream products, issued a recall on the 64-ounce Not Fried Chicken Bucket, 2.5-ounce bar and Life Is Peachy 6-count box after a potential Listeria monocytogenes contamination.

Charleston’s Baker and Brewer to close later this month. Baker & Brewer became one of the friendliest venues to grace the peninsula, serving beer brewed by Holy City Brewing and pizza crafted by the people behind EVO Pizzeria. But now four years later, its time has come to an end.

Test results show how tri-county area students are faring. The South Carolina Department of Education released the End-of-Course Examination Program test results, showing student results from Berkeley, Charleston and Dorchester counties.

Charleston Co. continues discussion on early learning center. Members of the Charleston County School District came together on Wednesday night at Camp Road Middle School to discuss the future early learning center on James Island.

  • To get dozens of South Carolina news stories every business day, contact the folks at SC Clips.

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Black children’s book authors will be the focus at new Gantt Center festival this weekend

Local and nationally-known African American children’s book authors and illustrators will be the focus of a free festival on Saturday at the Harvey B. Gantt Center for African American Arts and Culture.

The festival is a first for the Gantt Center. It will include authors such as the Lincoln Center’s poet-in-residence Mahogany L. Browne and Alicia D. Williams, who won the Newberry Award and Coretta Scott King Award for her book “Genesis Begins Again.” Charlotte author Tameka Fryer Browne will also be on hand to sign and read from her books. Her latest, “That Flag,” tells the story of two young girls, one Black and one white, who have different opinions about the Confederate flag.  

Carla Jarrett, the Gantt’s visitor experience and museum store manager, says the festival will give Black youths a chance to discover books that focus on issues important to children of color, such as Williams’ “The Talk,” which details conversations many African American parents have with their children about how to respond when approached by a police officer. Jarrett says Black youths will also find books on famous and fictional characters who look like them, something many Black youths do not find in their school libraries.

And Jarrett says the festival is important now because of an increase in school book bans about sensitive topics like race.  

“A lot of our books highlight some of these civil rights icons and authors are taking into account what’s happening socially and politically and bringing it to a level for children’s books,” Jarrett said. “Some of these topics and situations are being glossed over and cut out of schools, so we want everyone to be aware of these topics and subjects.”

And Jarrett says although the festival focuses on African American authors and illustrators, it is designed for youths and families of all races.  

“Even though the authors and illustrators and the books are all done by Black authors and illustrators, (that) doesn’t mean it’s only for black children. We wanted to create this to be a festival and create visibility for these authors,” said Jarrett. “All races will buy these books.”

The free book festival at the Gantt Center will be held Saturday from 10:30 a.m. until 5:30 p.m. It will include book signings, a drum circle, storytelling, games with prizes, food, vendors and other activities.

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Theatre Lawrence’s new season to kick off with ‘Crowns,’ a celebration of Black women

photo by: Courtesy of Theatre Lawrence

Tiffani Smith, left, plays Yolanda, and Andrea Billings-Graham plays Mabel during a rehearsal for Theatre Lawrence’s production of “Crowns.”

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Theatre Lawrence is opening its new season Friday with a musical that explores the lives of Black women and, along the way, delves into an array of divides – Black/white, rural/urban, North/South, young/old, shame/pride.

“Crowns,” as director Annette Billings says, “is a very celebratory play, and I think it fits so well in our current times of lots of personal and professional and (national) stressors.”

Written by Regina Taylor in the early 2000s and based on a book by Michael Cunningham and Craig Marberry, the musical follows the experience of young Yolanda, who travels from the urban North to her grandmother’s home in the rural South after her brother is killed in the city. There she encounters something very different from the street life she’s accustomed to in New York: “a group of hat-wearing, church-loving, jubilant women,” as Billings describes the quintet of mentors who shepherd Yolanda through her darkest valley.

The five women all tell Yolanda what hats have meant to them individually and to African Americans throughout history. In the process, much is revealed about their struggles, both private and social, and also their triumphs.

photo by: Courtesy of Theatre Lawrence

Gay Glenn plays Wanda during a rehearsal for Theatre Lawrence’s production of “Crowns.”

They use “a lot of storytelling and music to convey to her her roots,” Billings says. “She’s trying to find herself, and each of these women in turn, they minister to her.”

As the title suggests, the role of headwear, whether African tribal adornment or modern millinery, plays a central role in the musical as a form of pride and self-expression.

During slavery, Billings says, the only place where slaves were allowed to congregate was in churches, and presenting oneself before God and the congregation in one’s finest — with a fancy hat being an outfit’s crowning glory — became a way for an abused and marginalized people to reclaim their stolen dignity, their “sense of royalty.”

“Church became a very powerful influence,” Billings says. It was “a safe place, a place they could draw strength from and add strength to.”

The intermingling of fashion and faith — and entertainment — became a hallmark of Black churches and spilled over into the broader community.

“The wearing of hats, the wearing of finery to decorate oneself is something that’s very familiar and common to us as a people,” Billings says. “Throughout the things that we’ve endured through time, we have maintained that sense of importance and royalty and right — the right to be, the right to be oneself and the right to express oneself in a way that feels familiar and empowering.”

The musical, which features a good deal of gospel music as well as nods to jazz and rap and other African American art forms, is also about relationships and how “supporting one another can be such a vital part of living,” Billings says.

photo by: Courtesy of Theatre Lawrence

Tiffani Smith as Yolanda in Theatre Lawrence’s production of “Crowns”

In the end, via her elders’ influence, the ballcap-wearing Yolanda, through a figurative — and often funny — process of wearing different hats, goes from feeling lost to regaining a “sense of what her rightful place is in the community,” Billings says, “and the world is good again for her.”

The dozens of hats that appear in “Crowns” have their own unique histories — some known, some lost forever — as most of them are real hats that belonged to real women.

The “vast majority” of hats in Theatre Lawrence’s inventory have been donated over the years, says Jane Pennington, the theater’s longtime costume designer.

“We made some of the specialty hats,” but most of the best period pieces “have come from Grandma’s closet,” she says, describing a typical process where people go through a relative’s closet, come across a fancy hat, recognize that it’s too special to throw out, and donate it to the theater instead.

“We’ve become the guardians of many families’ heirlooms,” says Pennington, who’s more than happy to give the ornate toppers a second life and a chance to be admired anew.

“Crowns” opens Friday at 4660 Bauer Farm Drive and will have multiple performances through Oct. 1. For information about tickets, call 785-843-SHOW (7469) or go online at theatrelawrence.com.

After the Oct. 1 performance, the theater will host a panel discussion with Billings; the Rev. Rachel Williams-Glenn, pastor of Lawrence’s St. Luke AME Church; and Amber Sellers, a Lawrence city commissioner.

Sellers was a vocal proponent of the recently passed municipal ordinance known as the CROWN Act, which stands for Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair. The ordinance makes it illegal to discriminate based on natural hairstyles such as braids, afros, bantu knots, cornrows, curls, locs, twists or hair that is tightly coiled or tightly curled.

“This is culture to us,” Sellers said ahead of the City Commission’s unanimous vote last month. “This is us showing the world our history and celebrating where we come from, who we are. The CROWN Act has that value to it — it allows us to wear our crown in all of its wonderful glory.”

photo by: Courtesy of Theatre Lawrence

Janine Colter as Jeanette in Theatre Lawrence’s production of “Crowns”

photo by: Courtesy of Theatre Lawrence

Gay Glenn as Wanda in Theatre Lawrence’s production of “Crowns”

photo by: Courtesy of Theatre Lawrence

Kimberly Allen as Velma in Theatre Lawrence’s production of “Crowns”

photo by: Courtesy of Theatre Lawrence

Andrea Billings-Graham as Mabel in Theatre Lawrence’s production of “Crowns”

photo by: Courtesy of Theatre Lawrence

Lynda Anders as Mother Shaw in Theatre Lawrence’s production of “Crowns”

photo by: Courtesy of Theatre Lawrence

Joseph Washington-Brown as Man in Theatre Lawrence’s production of “Crowns”

RankTribe™ Black Business Directory News – Arts & Entertainment

Opinion: Maren Morris’s powerful farewell to country music

Opinion by Nicole Hemmer

(CNN) — A small town, coated in ash, melting under the intense heat of a roaring fire. The sign greeting visitors — an American flag flapping next to the message “Welcome to our perfect small town, from sunrise to sundown” — disappearing beneath the smoke and embers.

That image closes the video for Maren Morris’s new EP “The Bridge,” the two-song release that marks her farewell to country music. “I do the best I can,” she sings on “Get the Hell Out of Here,” adding, “But the more I hang around, the less I give a damn.” Her indictment of country music, charted in two cleverly crafted country songs, is one of alienation and disaffection, of an industry too broken to be saved (“The rot at the root is the root of the problem,” she sings in the EP’s other song, “The Tree”).

The powerful farewell by Morris, a chart-topping, multi-award-winning country singer, comes at a moment when the politics of country music are front-page news. Jason Aldean’s “Try That In a Small Town,” an ode to vigilante violence, brought renewed attention to the genre’s deep cultural conservatism and racism, while Oliver Anthony’s “Rich Men North of Richmond” carried an antigovernment message so valuable to the right that Fox News used it as part of the opening question in the first Republican presidential primary debate in August — to the consternation of Anthony himself, who said, “It’s aggravating seeing people on conservative news try to identify with me, like I’m one of them.”

But the obsession over Aldean and Anthony has overshadowed a broader battle happening in the country music industry, between those seeking to deepen the industry’s ties to right-wing politics and those seeking to carve out a place for a more inclusive, more representative — and more historically rooted — version of Americana, folk and country music. Morris, who is firmly in that second camp, has been part of the fight to redefine country, and even as she leaves, remains part of broadening the genre’s boundaries.

That fight, of course, is not new. Talking to the Los Angeles Times in what was essentially her exit interview from country music, Morris talked about the “fear-mongering about getting Dixie Chick-ed” — a reference to the collusion of the industry to end all airplay for the group now known as The Chicks after lead singer Natalie Maines criticized then-President George W. Bush over the Iraq War in 2003. But sharply political moments like that have tended to crowd out the more structural conservatism of the industry, as well as the progressive country voices challenging that conservatism.

Part of that structural conservatism has been a longstanding commitment within the industry, from gatekeepers like Billboard and radio conglomerates, to keeping the country charts White — see, for instance, the efforts to keep one of the most popular country songs of the past decade, Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road,” off the Billboard Country charts.

Elsewhere, in 2021, Holly G, a Black country music fan who often felt isolated, even unsafe, at concerts where there were few other Black fans, founded the Black Opry. It quickly became a network for Black artists and fans, giving rise to the touring Black Opry Revue. The Black Opry, which both celebrates the Black roots of country, folk and Americana and creates a community for Black country, has given rise to a competing vision of country music that is deeply rooted in the genres’ shared histories.

As Lil Nas X shows, queer voices, too, have struggled to find a place in the country music industry. Although there is a long tradition of queer country artists, there has been little room for them in mainstream country, especially as it took a turn toward straight, White masculinity in the 1970s and 1980s.

Much of this industry, and some of its biggest stars, still support anti-LGBTQ politics. Jason Aldean amplified anti-trans comments made by his wife, remarks that prompted Morris to publicly call her out for transphobia. Country stars Travis Tritt and John Rich have boycotted Bud Light after the company sent a six pack of beers to a trans influencer. But that, too, has been contested in recent years. Morris joined other artists to host “Love Rising” in Nashville earlier this year, to protest proposed laws attacking drag queens and trans people. And country star Kelsea Ballerini performed with drag queens at this year’s CMT awards as part of that ongoing protest.

Not all of the industry’s conservatism comes from decades-long exclusion. In recent years, mainstream country has pushed out women artists. According to a study of country music radio play, women artists represented 33% of songs in 2000. That already paltry number shrank to just 11% by 2018. With women’s voices dying out on country radio, Morris joined Brandi Carlile, Natalie Hemby and Amanda Shires to form The Highwomen, an all-woman supergroup whose song “Crowded Table” won the 2021 Grammy for best country song of the year. For Morris, it wasn’t enough to treat “the rot at the root”; The Highwomen were a challenge to the industry, but could not, by themselves, transform it.

Talking about the “conservatism of country music” is, in some ways, part of the problem. It conflates country music with the country music industry, the interconnected corporate structures that determine who gets signed, what albums get airtime, what songs get charted. Do stations play Aldean’s “Try That in a Small Town,” or do they opt for Allison Russell’s “Eve Was Black,” a lyrical challenge to White supremacy? Do they have that option, or do the industry leaders who offer the contracts and push the albums make that decision for them? (And for that matter, does Russell, a queer Black artist and trans rights activist, even want to share airspace with Aldean?)

For Morris, the music and the marketing have been difficult to separate. “The last few records,” she told the Los Angeles Times, “that’s always been in the back of my mind: Will this work in the country music universe?” And the more she saw of the industry that constructed that universe, the less she wanted to be part of it. But the progressive project within country music will continue — it’s far too broad and well-rooted to do otherwise. And who knows? One day, Morris may return. As she sings in “Get the Hell Out of Here” — “I don’t know what I’m doin’ / Don’t know what I’m tryin’ to find / My only resolution is I’m allowed to change my mind.”

Her only request: that the country music industry changes itself first.

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Jackie Copeland, former head of the Lewis Museum, dies

Jacqueline “Jackie” Copeland, the former executive director of the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African American History & Culture, and a longtime, passionate advocate for the visual arts, died Wednesday at Mercy Medical Center of complications from cancer. She was 76.

“Throughout her life, she not only curated art but also cultivated love, forged friendships and nurtured knowledge within us all. As an award-winning museum educator, cherished colleague, devoted mother, loving wife, and guardian of African-American art, her legacy shines brightly,” Copeland’s family said in a statement to The Baltimore Sun.

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Copeland, who most recently was chair of the Maryland State Arts Council, spent three decades working for major museums nationwide and studying every aspect of how successful arts institutions operate. She took over leadership of the Lewis Museum in 2019.

At the time Copeland described her appointment as “the capstone of my career because it brings together my passion for the community and my passion for art and history.”

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A talented and innovative curator, Copeland spent three decades working for some of the largest museums in the U.S., including a 15-year stint at the Walters Art Museum, where she was co-director of education and 10 years at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis.

Copeland was instrumental in getting the once-ailing Lewis Museum back on track over her tenure. But after 18 months as executive director, Copeland said she resigned after “the board told me it wanted to go in a different direction with the museum’s leadership.”

In 2021 she became chairwoman of the Maryland State Arts Council, which during the pandemic awarded more than $12 million in emergency funds to more than 1,600 artists and cultural groups.

The acclaimed photographer Dawoud Bey, wrote in a social media post that Copeland was a “tireless and brilliant culture and institutional worker” with whom he had collaborated twice — once at the Walker, and once at the Walters.

“Jackie was a real advocate for making the museum space a more inclusive one for young people and others often excluded from the institutional equation,” Bey wrote.

RankTribe™ Black Business Directory News – Arts & Entertainment

Coming soon to a presidency near you: Deep State 2025 autocracy. Or maybe not

If there can be humor in the destructive politics of today, it must surely be in the way in which several Republican presidential candidates are tripping over themselves trying to avoid criticizing Donald J. Trump Jr., the frontrunner A couple of them have indeed flatly rejected Trump’s suitability for being a candidate, much less president again, but others are urging Americans to forget the past and move on.

Trump himself has no intention to move on, brushing aside accusations of malignant narcissism, abusive misogyny, blatant lying and what should be a legal nightmare that includes criminal indictments totaling 91 counts, including instigating an insurrection. He tells his tens of millions of supporters, “They’re not coming after me. They’re coming after you. And if we don’t stop them, you will no longer have a country.” Still claiming the 2020 election was stolen from him -and them — he promises, “I am your revenge.”

Such rhetoric sustains the former president’s campaign which, unlike what happened in the 2016 election, he does not need foreign interference to succeed, such as what Russia and Israel provided, as James Bamford details in his new book “Spyfail.” Now, Trump’s popularity among Republican voters, according to the polls, is such that he does not even bother to attend candidate debates or produce a coherent agenda. He is obviously convinced that the ethnic grievance which he has marshaled in his followers and his first-term record term are a winning combination.

So, while others want to let bygones be bygones, Trump leaves little doubt that, for him, as it was for Antonio in William Shakespeare’s “The Tempest,” the reality is “what’s past is prologue.” And he makes clear what he expects to come next.

In a campaign website video which journalist Spencer Ackerman cited in The Nation, Trump declared, “The State Department, the defense bureaucracy, the intelligence services and all the rest need to be completely overhauled and reconstituted to fire the Deep Staters and put America First.”

He intends “to consolidate dictatorial power within the White House. Through dubious assertions of presidential authority and the removal of civil service protections, Trump intends to ‘identify the pockets of independence’ within the executive branch ‘and seize them,’” Ackerman said, citing a mid-July New York Times interview with Trump’s former budget director Russell T. Vought.

“But Trump’s rhetoric is not just the revenge fantasy of someone under multiple indictments nor is it merely a cynical harnessing of right-wing bloodthirst,” Ackerman argues. “As president, Trump didn’t have a problem with the existence of a so-called deep state; his problem was a deep state he didn’t control.”

The path to such control has already been paved for a second Trump presidency, as detailed in a 1,000-page handbook that his allies have compiled. It is called Project 2025, which is headed, of course, by the conservative Heritage Foundation, with input from former Trump administration officials, according to Associated Press reporter Lisa Mascaro. The objective “is to have the civic infrastructure in place on Day One to commandeer, reshape and do away with what Republicans deride as the ‘deep state’ bureaucracy, in part by firing as many as 50,000 federal workers,” Mascaro reported.

Such action will “avoid the pitfalls of Trump’s first years in office, when the Republican president’s team was ill-prepared, his Cabinet nominees had trouble winning Senate confirmation and policies were met with resistance — by law-premacy suppress or attempt to erase our history. Wenner not only bulldozed over the “true” masters of rock and roll, but also curbed white women. Stevie Nicks is not intelligent enough to articulate the embodiment of rock and roll culture for Wenner? Carole King and Joni Mitchell cannot have an ‘intellectual’ conversation about their successful songwriting careers and how it shaped the culture of rock and roll? No Carly Simon? Carly Simon is the daughter of the publishing magnet that co-founded Simon and Schuster? Carly Simon is not intellectual enough to articulate the breadth of rock and roll? What were the two requirements to be included in Jann Wenner’s book again? Oh. white and male. In Wenner’s mind, only White men are articulate and intellectual.

Rolling Stone magazine and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame moved quickly to distance themselves from their co-founder’s absurd statements. Monday the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame moved to dismiss Wenner from its board of directors by simply stating in a press release “Jann Wenner has been removed from the Board of Directors of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation.” No other comment was offered. Rolling Stone magazine said in a statement the same day that the views of Wenner “do not represent the values and practices of today’s Rolling Stone.” Note “today’s Rolling Stone” because that part of the statement is a key one. Yes. Rolling Stone magazine became the centralized element in rock and roll that helped to overlook and /or exclude the contributions of Black artists and women from the genre. Rolling Stone was not unlike other magazines of the time that did not feature Black American musical artists or Black artists of the Diaspora, or even Black / African / Caribbean adjacent genres. That is makers, government workers and even Trump’s own appointees who refused to bend or break protocol or, in some cases, violate laws, to achieve his goals,” Mascaro said.

“We need to flood the zone with conservatives. This is a clarion call to come to Washington. People need to lay down their tools and step aside from their professional life and say, ‘This is my lifetime moment to serve’,” Paul Dans, director of the ambitiously named 2025 Presidential Transition Project and a former Trump administration official, told Mascaro. To that end, Project 2025 operatives have already launched a drive to recruit candidates for the expected federal job openings, Mascaro reported.

The plan hinges on reactivation of a Trump-era executive order “to reclassify tens of thousands of the two million federal employees as essentially at-will workers who could more easily be fired.” President Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. rescinded that order when he took office in 2021, Mascaro noted. Biden officials expect he will move to block Project 2025 but, of course, that will not prevent Trump from overturning that decision.

To overcome possible Senate opposition to partisan appointees, they will be given acting positions “as was done during the [first] Trump administration to bypass the Senate confirmation process.” That will mean having to “play hardball a little more than we did with Congress,” said John McEntee, a former Trump aide and a Project 2025 team member.

“The ideas contained in Heritage’s coffee table-ready book are both ambitious and parochial,” Mascaro wrote about Project 25. They comprise “a mix of longstanding conservative policies and stark, head-turning proposals that gained prominence in the Trump era. … Chapter by chapter, the pages offer a how-to manual for the next president, similar to one Heritage produced 50 years ago ahead of the Ronald Reagan administration,” Mascaro reported.

According to the Project 2025 website, “It is not enough for conservatives to win elections. If we are going to rescue the country from the grip of the radical Left, we need both a governing agenda and the right people in place, ready to carry this agenda out on Day One of the next conservative Administration.”

The former president and his allies are, therefore, obviously unconcerned at possible criticism over creating a wholly partisan new “deep state.” They are very public about how they will go about undermining the checks and balances of American democracy. Such is their level of confidence that voters will not stop them.

After all, they are aware that this is probably the last opportunity they will have to further consolidate power, which has been in the hands of European Americans since the founding of the republic and which changing demographics and continuing waves of refugees are now threatening. It cannot be emphasized too much that, under all the politicking, the intention is to finally election-proof their hold on the country for the foreseeable future.

They are busily engaged in political chicanery to make it difficult to vote and confront their manipulation of the undemocratic Electoral College that helps a small minority of the country dominate the vast majority. And they have stacked the U.S. Supreme Court with an unstoppable conservative majority willing to do their bidding.

When Trump tells his supporters that, if they do not vote for him, they will “no longer have a country,” he knows exactly what he is saying. So do they also, especially the “Confederate wing” of the Republican Party, as activist Paul Rieckhoff recently described them on MSNBC’s “Reid Out” show hosted by Joy Reid. They cling to the supposed existential threat of the “Great Replacement” to the exclusion of anything else, especially in the South, regardless of that region’s appalling record on poverty and other quality-of-life issues, including literacy.

So, once again, it comes down to deciding whether the United States is a European American or a multiracial country, monoethnic or polyethnic. It is an easy decision. The country was never monoethnic, not with the presence of Indigenous peoples and enslaved Africans, and a dwindling European American population now totals 58.9 percent of the nation, the Census reported. That will decline to 47.9 percent, a minority, by 2050 – in less than 30 years — the Pew Research Center predicts. That is exactly why electing Trump and implementing Project 2025 matters so much to those who are behind it and why opponents can be expected to do their best to ensure there is no second presidential term for him.

RankTribe™ Black Business Directory News – Arts & Entertainment

8 things to do in Portland this weekend | Sept. 22-24

This week you’ve got Black Artist of Oregon exhibit, Rose City Comic Con, Fiesta Latina, Portland Oktoberfest and more.

PORTLAND, Oregon — As we officially fall into rainy fall days in the Rose City this weekend, there are many toasty indoor (and of course outdoor) events and across the city. 

This weekend brings a multitude of events across the Rose City; you’ve got Black Artist of Oregon exhibit at the Portland Art Museum, Rose City Comic Con, Fiesta Latina, The Fall Kite Festival, Portland Oktoberfest and more to look forward to. Here is our list of 8 things to do.

Rose City Comic Con

When: Sept. 22-24, Various times
Where: Oregon Convention Center, 777 Northeast Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, Portland, Ore.
What’s going on: Portland’s premier pop culture and convention is back for another year. Rose City Comic Con is a family friendly three-day celebration of comics, gaming, scientific fiction, cosplay, anime, and various fandoms you can think of. There will be multiple guest appearances, including Ugly Betty star Rebecca Romijn.  Avatar, Avengers, Star Trek, and Guardians of the Galaxy star, Zoe Saldana. Bring the whole family and get your geek on.

More information and tickets

Fiesta Latina

When: Sept. 23, Noon to 4 p.m.
Where: North Clackamas Park, 8 Northwest 6th Avenue, Portland, Ore.
What’s going on: Sept. 15 to Oct. 15 is National Hispanic Heritage Month, an annual celebration honoring and recognizing the influence, history, culture, and achievements of the Hispanic community in the United States. North Clackamas Parks & Recreation District is putting on, “Fiesta Latina en el Parque,” a family friendly community event, open to all. There will be food, live music, kids activities, vendors, games, performances and dancing free for all.

More information and tickets

Black Artists of Oregon exhibit

When: Now-March 17, 2024
Where: The Portland Art Museum, 1219 Southwest Park Avenue, Portland, Ore.
What’s going on: The Portland Art Museum has a new exhibit called Black Artist of Oregon, that highlights the Black diasporic experience specifically within the Pacific Northwest. This exhibition is the first of its kind to consider the work of Black artists collectively in Oregon. Visitors will experience work by Black artists across many decades and generations. The exhibit is open now until March 17, 2024.

More information and tickets

The Fall Kite Festival

When: Sept. 23-24
Where: D River State Recreation Site, 101 US-101, Lincoln City, Ore.
What’s going on: If you enjoy bird watching or being in the outdoors, this festival might be what you need. The Fall Kite Festival is an annual, free event held at the D River State Recreation Site on the beach. It’s a longstanding two-day event with professional kite fliers flying colorful kites with different shapes in the sky. Attendees are welcome to fly their own kites at other locations on the beach. There will be multiple food vendors and dogs are welcomed.

More information and tickets

Portland Oktoberfest

When: Sept. 22-23, Various times
Where: Pioneer Courthouse Square, 8 Northwest 6th Avenue, Portland, Ore.
What’s going on: Attention all Portlanders, Oktoberfest have landed in the Rose City! The festival will be taking place in the heart of the city, at Pioneer Courthouse Square. The event will have over multiple vendors, German food, costume contests, a photo booth, drinks, live music, a mechanical bull, and more. The festival does require tickets for entrance, ranging from $10 to $25 depending on the package you select. If you’re 21 or over, come and celebrate the fusion of Portland and Germany’s Oktoberfest traditions.

More information and tickets

The Maize at the Pumpkin Patch

When: Now-Oct. 31
Where: The Pumpkin Patch on Sauvie Island, 16511 Northwest Gillihan Road, Portland, Ore.
What’s going on: It’s that time again, fall time! And nothing screams fall family fun like a corn maze and a pumpkin patch. This year The Maize is turning 25. It opened last weekend on Sauvie Island and will remain open through Halloween. Grab your pumpkin spice lattes and head on over to The Maize to kickstart fall before the official start of the season.

More information and tickets

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Chapman “Swift Watch”

When: September (one hour before sunset)
Where: Chapman Elementary School, 1445 Northwest 26th Avenue, Portland, Ore.
What’s going on: The swifts are back, and they’re early this year. All month long, around sunset, you can sit out and watch the speedy little birds swarm through the sky before funneling down the chimney at Chapman Elementary School. The viewing draws crowds of people to the Northwest Portland site. Experts say the swifts are following a 30-year migration pattern that includes Chapman’s chimney.

More information

RELATED: ‘A quintessential Portland activity’: September brings ‘Swift Watch’ back to Chapman Elementary in Northwest Portland

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Dahlia Festival

When: Now-Sept. 30
Where: Swan Island Dahlias, 995 Northwest 22nd Avenue, Canby, Ore.
What’s going on: Ever dreamt of walking on a rainbow? Here’s your chance. The annual Dahlia Festival is underway in Canby with almost 40 acres of stunning dahlias, featuring over 370 dahlia varities. The festival also features picnic tables, food carts, live music on the weekend, classes and more. Admission and parking are free. 

More information

RELATED: Concert tours, performing arts shows and more coming to Portland in 2023

Sabinna Pierre is the curator of “Things To Do” for KGW’s digital platforms. Know of an event you’d like to see featured? Let her know! Email her at SPierre@kgw.com. Follow Sabinna on Instagram @SincerelyBinna.

RankTribe™ Black Business Directory News – Arts & Entertainment

Jann Wenner is what happens when privilege distorts reality

So much for the virtue of staying silent.

Several public figures have stepped in it recently by oversharing or making moves they simply didn’t have to make. The list has become so long that it feels less like they’ve committed a series of unforced errors and more like an entire unforced era.

The complete rundown includes a mystifying “you could have just stayed home” moment from Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert, who had to be removed from a performance of Beetlejuice for disruptive behavior. Drew Barrymore and Bill Maher each incensed fans when they announced they would be crossing the picket line and restarting their talk shows just as the Hollywood strikes pass Day 100. (They ultimately both changed their minds after backlash.) That ’70s Show actors Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis also absolutely did not have to write character letters in support of their former co-star and convicted rapist Danny Masterson, nor post a video response to the entirely predictable backlash.

Then there’s Russell Brand, who faces multiple allegations of violent sexual assault. But it’s not Brand who is on this list: That honor goes to Anna Khachiyan, co-host of the popular (and contentiously “dirtbag left”-ish) podcast Red Scare, who responded to the allegations against Brand by tweeting, “Lol lmao I stand with Brand obviously,” prompting handwringing among her fanbase about the dirtbag left’s apparent hypocritical love of itself and its own proximity to power. Khachiyan has since doubled down repeatedly.

What all of these incidents have in common is a kind of tone-deaf self-assuredness that comes when a person’s level of societal insulation from criticism is so cushiony, so velvety and soft, that it becomes part of their worldview. These are the mishaps that result when so many people have affirmed a person over the years that that person starts to believe that if they want to do a thing, that thing must be right and justified — because they’re the one doing it, and they’re a good, correct person.

To see the full extent of this limited worldview on display, let us look at the coup de grace of les erreurs du mois — the remarkable, jaw-droppingly obtuse decision of Rolling Stone co-founder Jann Wenner to include zero Black artists or women in his forthcoming book, meant to represent the depth and breadth of Wenner’s career and his place in the legacy of rock and roll. The book, titled The Masters, releases September 26, and features seven interviews with rock legends like Bruce Springsteen and Bob Dylan. What speaks louder than the interviews themselves are the breathtaking gaps in Wenner’s concept of “mastery” and who is capable of attaining it.

New York Times columnist David Marchese grilled Wenner this past weekend about his choice to spend a career that spanned five decades refusing to interview women and Black artists. (“I read [other] interviews with them,” Wenner told Marchese.) His myopic vision cuts a giant swath through the legacy of 20th- and 21st-century rock, omitting everyone from Jimi Hendrix to Cyndi Lauper. As Marchese notes, Wenner self-effacingly writes that Black and female creators simply weren’t part of his “zeitgeist,” as if that justifies his unwillingness to include them.

Consider what “zeitgeist” Wenner experienced. Rolling Stone was founded in 1967, and Wenner served as its editorial director until 2019. He also co-created the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and was its “public face” until his retirement as chair in 2020. (After the Times interview, he was immediately ousted from his ongoing role on the Hall of Fame’s board.) It’s hard to overstate just how much of a rock industry insider Wenner was; he was close friends with the Rolling Stones and with most of the people he interviewed over the years. He didn’t just glimpse artistic genius, he hobnobbed with it on the daily.

Though he writes of a personal zeitgeist that differed, perhaps, from everyone else’s, it’s more accurate to say that Wenner was more directly responsible than any other person on earth for curating the broader musical zeitgeist for half a century.

Yet, somehow, Wenner did not recognize a single Black artist as a “master,” despite rock music being born from Black culture, despite the work of artists like Stevie Wonder and Prince. Nor could he acknowledge a single female artist, despite living through the eras of Tapestry and Blue, Rumours, Whitney, Jagged Little Pill, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, 1989, and Lemonade. In the interview, he instead suggested that Black artists and women simply weren’t “articulate” about the craft.

“Insofar as the women, just none of them were as articulate enough on this intellectual level,” he told Marchese. “The people I interviewed were the kind of philosophers of rock. Of Black artists … I mean, they just didn’t articulate at that level.”

In a statement issued Saturday evening, Wenner apologized, saying: “In my interview with the New York Times I made comments that diminished the contributions, genius and impact of Black and women artists and I apologize wholeheartedly for those remarks.” Rolling Stone has since issued a somewhat rote statement distancing itself from Wenner.

Wenner didn’t simply bumble into this mess. He chose, for decades, to erase women and Black musicians and creators from his circle of interests, both personally and as a journalist and editor. Then he chose to reify that disinterest with an entire book in which he glibly dismissed more than half of humanity as unworthy of his attention — and then he chose to tell the Times that he only dismissed them because they were all inarticulate, shallow thinkers.

It’s been easy in recent years to write Rolling Stone off as merely a boomer’s guide to the cultural mainstream — bumbling and hopelessly out of touch because all the white men who ran it were. All those times you read the magazine and felt as though its “best-of” lists were hopelessly outdated or missing obvious cultural influencers and game-changers? All of those endlessly white male Rolling Stone covers with few Black artists or hip-hop artists in sight, and female artists on the cover only when they were hypersexualized? It was fairly easy to write off all of that erasure as institutional obsolescence and malaise, brought about by too many backward-focused men at the top, who were too fixated on “masters” of the past to recognize the cutting-edge artists of the here and now.

Yet Wenner just said the quiet part out loud: It wasn’t cluelessness, nor was it an oversight. It was intentional dismissal and disrespect underpinned not just by entrenched racism and misogyny, but also by Wenner’s breathtaking arrogance and insulation from critique.

What’s almost more staggering is the fact that no one told him not to. Apparently, not one person along the food chain of his book publication process — not agents nor editors nor friendly readers — successfully represented to him the reality that The Masters would be a harmful piece of cultural curation, that it would unmask him as a bigot, taint his legacy, and tarnish the reputation of Rolling Stone and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Wenner could have published a different collection that showcased a broader variety and depth of writing and journalism. He could have chosen to reflect on his decades of erasure, published the collection alongside a mea culpa, and set about making efforts to change the industry he helped codify for decades. None of these things happened, and the still-defiant apology he issued hasn’t helped; in it, he blames “badly chosen words” for the scandal and not the fact that he spent 50 years refusing to interview Black artists and women.

This was not simply an unforced error, a one-off, or, on a larger scale, a case of celebrities simultaneously having bad weeks.

Wenner spent those 50 years in a dismissive bubble because he could. Each of our hall of shamers this past month made their choices because they could — because power has given them a distorted sense that they were wholly justified in their entitlement and actions.

Take, for example, Ashton Kutcher’s apology when resigning from Thorn, the anti-human trafficking organization he co-founded, in the wake of his character letter for Masterson. The letter “is yet another painful instance of questioning victims,” he wrote. None of this occurred to Kutcher before he publicly defended a rapist because he existed in a self-affirming bubble so thick that not even a dart as obvious as “believe women” could puncture it. Khachiyan, too, seems to have spent so long in a contrarian environment that her reliance on convoluted rhetorical intellectualism feels knee-jerk. She can’t even snap out of it long enough to acknowledge the seriousness of the allegations against Brand.

Celebrity and fame have functioned like cocoons for each of these public figures, swaddling them from everyday (and fairly obvious) discourse about the issues into which they are wading, and from the very concept of self-reflection. They can’t see that their disconnect from reality is a problem — but that’s also because they can’t fathom the degree to which they have created their own reality, from Boebert’s political conspiracy theories and extremism to Maher’s increasingly right-leaning mistrust of government and science.

None of these perceptions exist in a vacuum, but they are created out of strikingly similar bubbles of power and influence. That’s not unique to this week, or this month, or this cultural moment at all. Ironically, this unforced era just reminds us mostly that there is no unforced era: The world was ever thus.

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RankTribe™ Black Business Directory News – Arts & Entertainment

How Racism Shapes Black Motherhood in U.S

Being a mom is hard. Being a Black mom is especially hard. A new study from North Carolina State University underscores the ways that being a Black mother in the United States involves navigating aspects of parenthood that are explicitly tied to dealing with anti-Black racism.

“All mothers experience stress; but Black mothers in the U.S. experience additional stresses specifically related to parenting and racism,” says Mia Brantley, author of the study and an assistant professor of sociology at NC State. “That has consequences for the health and well-being of Black mothers. If we want to develop ways to support Black moms and Black families, we need to have a deeper understanding of the challenges facing Black mothers – and how Black mothers respond to those challenges.”

For this qualitative study, Brantley conducted in-depth interviews with 35 Black mothers from across the U.S. All of the study participants had at least one child between the ages of 10 and 24. The interviews were designed to collect information about how Black women think about motherhood and mothering, as well as how Black mothers feel race and racism influences both their parenting and the lives of their children.

“There is a broad understanding that motherhood is, while rewarding, also a demanding responsibility,” Brantley says. “This study found that, while Black mothers share many of the same concerns as other mothers, Black motherhood is distinct. That’s because – in addition to wanting their children to succeed – Black mothers also take steps to both protect their children from racism and help their children learn to navigate a society where they will experience anti-Black racism.”

Brantley categorizes the ways racism affects Black motherhood into three areas: protective mothering, resistance mothering and encumbered mothering.

Protective mothering refers to practices designed to help Black children avoid racism. Specifically, Black mothers will often restrict children’s activities or behaviors in an attempt to reduce the likelihood that that their children – particularly sons – will face racist comments or actions. Black mothers also take steps to encourage agency – particularly for daughters – so that their children feel able to stand up for themselves.

Resistance mothering refers to efforts to promote positive self-image, with the goal of combatting racist stereotypes their children encounter outside of the home. These activities might include educating children about Black artists, leaders and accomplishments.

“Resistance mothering is really about empowering Black children and parents, so that they take pride in themselves and their culture,” Brantley says.

Encumbered mothering refers to the fact that Black mothers feel the need to be constantly hyperaware of the risks that racism poses to their children.

“Black mothers report that they are unable to fully enjoy and celebrate the accomplishments of their children, because they can’t ‘turn off’ their fears about how racist behavior may affect their kids,” Brantley says. “Black mothers feel that they always have to deal with preconceived notions about Black mothers and children, and that society essentially gives Black women no room for error.

“We talk about motherhood as universal, but all mothers do not experience motherhood in the same way,” Brantley says. “Black women face stresses that are unique to their experiences as mothers – stresses that continue into their children’s adulthood. While Black mothers are taking steps to protect their children, the stress of doing so may carry costs for the health and well-being of Black women.

“This study gives us a framework for understanding, studying and talking about Black motherhood. And, hopefully, that gives us a starting point for a more in-depth analysis of the toll that motherhood takes on Black women, and how we – as a society – can do more to support these women.”

The study, “Can’t Just Send Our Children Out: Intensive Motherwork and Experiences of Black Motherhood,” is published in the Journal of Social Problems. The work was done with support from the National Institute of Aging under grant number 5R01AG069251-02; the Ohio State University Institute for Population Research; and a University of South Carolina SPARC grant.

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Portland artist Eatcho wants you to make discoveries in the details

It’s hard to take just a quick glance at the work of Mehran Heard. His illustrations and paintings include so many characters, details and images, winding through and wrapping around each other, you feel compelled to dive in and explore. And that’s all by design. Heard wants to take you on a journey.

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“And once you come to your own discovery, you kind of own it personally,” he says. “You’re like, ‘that’s mine, I took the work and effort to find that weird creature in that corner that’s saying something to me.’ The viewer can have their own personal little romance.”

Heard, who also goes by the artist moniker Eatcho, works in many mediums including painting, illustration, comics and textile art. His new mixed media piece titled “Mothers” is part of the Portland Art Museum’s current show, Black Artists of Oregon, which runs through March 17, 2024.

"Mothers," 2023, mixed media, by Mehran Heard. Currently on view at the Portland Art Museum's exhibition, Black Artists of Oregon.

“Mothers,” 2023, mixed media, by Mehran Heard. Currently on view at the Portland Art Museum’s exhibition, Black Artists of Oregon.

Eric Slade / OPB

Heard’s also a prolific muralist, creating huge, colorful pieces throughout Portland. One of his most celebrated murals, at the corner of Northeast Alberta Street and Martin Luther King Jr Boulevard, is titled “Until We Get There.” The 10 feet by 17 feet mural shows “a world where, in the hands of the youth, we can get at least closer to Babylon and the utopia that we search for,” he says.

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"Until We Get There," a 2018 mural by Mehran Heard, at the corner of Northeast Alberta Street and Martin Luther King Jr Boulevard in Portland.

“Until We Get There,” a 2018 mural by Mehran Heard, at the corner of Northeast Alberta Street and Martin Luther King Jr Boulevard in Portland.

Eric Slade / OPB

Heard grew up in Clovis, California, outside Fresno. One day, at the age of 5, he was watching a Mickey Mouse cartoon on TV with a friend of his mom. As the cartoon played, the friend started sketching Mickey Mouse on a piece of paper as young Heard looked on in awe.

“And I realized right there, everything outside you can take in” and draw it yourself. “And when he showed me that — I was done. I was like, ‘oh, I get it.’ And so I’ve just been drawing ever since then.”

Later, at age 19, he and a friend were creating an elaborate 3 a.m. sidewalk chalk art installation, outside his former grade school. As they drew, a dental battle emerged: “Doctor Hygiene versus Commander Cavity,” Mehran explains.

“And they’re fighting and Dr. Hygiene says, ‘you better eat your veggies.’ And I misspelled it. I was so tired.” “Eat your veggies” became “eatcho veggies.” “And I say, ‘I’m gonna make that my street name.’” And it stuck — he’s been Eatcho ever since.

Heard continues to make work in whatever medium feels right at the moment, creating his elaborately detailed pieces that reveal an intricate web of life. No matter what the creation, Heard hopes his work inspires viewers to look deeper and to be inspired by the wonder of the natural world.

“I constantly want to remind people about how magical this is. We’re actually all collectively creating magic.”

To watch more Oregon Art Beat stories on artists featured in the Black Artists of Oregon exhibition, visit OPB’s YouTube channel.

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