Michelle Obama just keeps giving us more reasons to love her—mostly because of her innate empathy (you should try it, it’s delicious) and her increasing transparency since leaving the White House and publishing her instantly bestselling 2018 memoir, Becoming. In her newly launched Michelle Obama Podcast, she’s…Read more...

Georgia governor and unofficial Donald Trump butt-wiper Brian Kemp signed a proposal into law Wednesday that basically treats police officers as a protected class because white conservatives have convinced themselves that “blue” people are actually an oppressed minority. What’s worse is that the bill was pushed by…Read more...

I believe it was fabled author Damon Young who once stated that “white people won’t save you.” But just in case you’re unclear on their utter willingness to condemn us all to the fiery depths of hell, allow me to enlighten you.Read more...

Want to keep track of all the folks participating in The Root Institute virtual conference this year? Here’s a handy guide of the who’s-who joining in the conversations this year.Read more...

A free pair of Bose headphones with your next iPhone purchase at Visible, a rare discount on Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker for Nintendo Switch, an Amazon Gold Box deal on Carfidant auto cleaning solutions, a trio of plush dog toys, an LED suction light 4-pack, and an Ella Paradis G-Spot Hero vibrator lead Thursday’s…Read more...

I’m calling it now: Oprah Winfrey is going to win the Nobel Peace Prize.Read more...

On the same day that LeBron James said the NBA won’t miss Trump as a viewer, apparently Facebook and Twitter kept that same energy about Melania’s baby daddy and his campaign being on their platforms.Read more...

Migos member Takeoff has been accused of nonconsensual “forceful sexual intercourse,” according to a civil lawsuit filed in Los Angeles on Wednesday. A woman identified only as “Jane Doe” alleges that the rapper, whose legal name is Kirshnik Khari Ball, raped her during an Encino, Calif., house party on June 22 of…Read more...

What is at stake during the 2020 elections?Read more...

Prosecutors in Georgia have requested that the bond order be revoked for the former Atlanta police officer who fatally shot Rayshard Brooks in June after finding out he recently took a vacation to Florida without getting permission.Read more...

Remember in June when Quaker Oats announced that it would be removing the Aunt Jemima brand from its product line and white people—including one very sad Karen of the Becky variety—had a whole meltdown about it and adamantly denied the racist origins of the caricature? Well, it took less than two months for a white…Read more...

The family of a teenage boy in York, Pa., is upset after he was told to remove his Black Lives Matter face mask before walking at his high school graduation.Read more...

In March, a group of Black Lives Matter activists knocked on the door of L.A. County District Attorney Jackie Lacey’s home to invite her to a community meeting. Her husband, David Lacey, is now facing gun charges for pulling a pistol out on the activists.Read more...

It’s difficult to understand where you’re going—or how far you’ve come—without reflecting on the past. That’s why GirlTrek, the largest health movement for Black women and girls in America with 820,000 members and counting, is once again treating us to another season of its highly inspiring #BlackHistoryBootCamp! The…Read more...

In the perpetual and cumulative colostomy bag that is 2020, the “I can’t make this shit up” cornucopia of crazy just runneth over.

College football is in a precarious situation.Read more...

[I shouldn’t have to say this given that this is about the SERIES FINALE, but SPOILER ALERT. ALL THE SPOILERS ARE PRESENT.]Read more...

Ta-Nehisi Coates, the acclaimed author of the National Book Award-winning Between the World and Me, is helping Vanity Fair interpret the world we unexpectedly find ourselves living in now. On Tuesday, the magazine’s Editor-in-Chief Radhika Jones announced that Coates is the guest editor of the September issue, “a…Read more...

Tommy expected applause.

While walking through some mud at Moraine State Park last weekend, I thought about how “mud” is one of those perfect words that fits exactly what it is. Mud looks and acts and feels and smells exactly like something we should call “mud.” It would make no sense if the word for mud was something fancier sounding, like…Read more...

Trump doesn’t watch the NBA. In fact, when asked what the NBA stands for, Trump said, “Apparently not the anthem” and then punched Jared Kushner in the round balls.

An Ohio health commissioner who has called for racism to be recognized as a public health crisis amid the pandemic recently received a visit from the Ghost of White Supremacist Past when a decades-old photo of him wearing blackface was unearthed.Read more...

“This might be the most important book I’ve ever chosen for my book club,” said Oprah Winfrey of Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents. The latest from the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and author of The Warmth of Other Suns was released on Tuesday on Apple Books, among other booksellers.Read more...

After years of criticism regarding her decision to play Nina Simone in the 2016 biopic about her life, Zoe Saldana is opening up about her regrets playing the iconic musician and activist.Read more...

The best thing about the NBA restart is that outside of the Washington Wizards—and whatever towering pile of chimpanzee shit that the Brooklyn Nets trot out—every team is legit. So every single game has the very real potential to keep us on the edge of our seats and become headline news.

When it comes to depicting the prejudices of historical time periods, most video games sidestep the issue. They avoid acknowledging that these prejudices existed or don’t emphasize them.

There has been plenty of discussion about whether prison is more about rehabilitation, punishment or keeping society safe. However, for Black people especially, it often seems like there’s a fourth option: Prison is about throwing undesirable people away.Read more...

I’m going to need God, Jay-Z, his friend Ty Ty, John Legend, all of the Kardashians, including the recluse boy one, Adidas and Dave Chappelle to put an end to this “Kanye West for President” campaign.

Lena Waithe is never not working. The 36-year-old writer, showrunner, producer and actress is reportedly working on a new drama series centered around open marriages.Read more...

Sometimes a stone, a sling and immaculate aim are enough.

When are y’all gonna stop acting like these WNBA players ain’t with the shits?Read more...

Prospective students at Brooklyn’s Long Island University (LIU) will have the chance to learn from some of the best in business, music, sports and more, thanks to the college’s new partnership with Roc Nation. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the Jay-Z-owned entertainment company is working with LIU for a new…Read more...

“It is weird?” I asked, in a message I copied and pasted to several people through text, on Gchat, and in Facebook Messenger, six weeks ago. The question was a followup to a revelation I also shared with the same people: I’d recently discovered, while finally seriously researching potential therapists—after telling…Read more...

1 Case of Wine For Home Red Blend | $95 | Meh

The enormousness of the crisis brought on by COVID-19 cannot be overstated. Cases and deaths are steadily rising in multiple states, as are unemployment numbers. Despite the continued severity of the crisis, Congress has stalled on passing a new relief bill and as the federal moratorium on evictions ends, millions of…Read more...

The right to vote is one that has been fought over, died over and challenged again and again, as it was expanded to include African Americans and women after being something only for those who were white and male. While Fair Fight’s Stacey Abrams admitted in our interview that voting is not a catch-all solution to all…Read more...

Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley is “Black with a capital ‘B’ and a woman with a capital ‘W’” (as she profoundly said in a TEDx Talk). A light in these dark times, Rep. Pressley offers hope for those who may have lost faith in our country’s leaders. She moves through the world fearlessly, despite unrelenting forces of…Read more...

A group of community leaders in Illinois are working with a state lawmaker to abolish the current history curriculum in their local school districts because they believe it leads to “white privilege and a racist society.”Read more...

If you were lucky enough to witness the rise of hip hop from its genesis *raises hand*, then you know there is a “before,” and an “after.” Specifically, there was hip hop before it met and married the world of fashion, and hip hop after its union, in which the era of Kangols, Adidas, 8-Ball jackets and bamboo earrings…Read more...

In Omaha, Neb., a Black man was held at gunpoint even though he didn’t commit any crime—he just “fit the description.”Read more...

Rep. Ayanna Pressley is a history-making Black woman.

Parishioners at a Texas church were shocked to discover their parking lot filled with crimson-necked, pickup-truck-driving, Confederate flag-waving MAGA cyclists who had hoodwinked the house of worship into hosting a Blue Lives Matter rally on Communion Sunday.Read more...

On Friday, The Root reported that the city of Tulsa made a decision last week to remove the Black Lives Matter mural painted on a street in the district where the Black Wall Street race riot occurred in 1921. They made the decision because someone requested that a “Back the Blue” mural be painted in the city as a…Read more...

It’s happening! A gathering of the minds—from politics featuring Stacey Abrams and Ayanna Pressley to entertainment and culture with Ava DuVernay and Lee Daniels to health and wealth with Taraji P. Henson and Cory Booker to social justice with Tarana Burke of #MeToo. It’s time to sit down and talk about how we can…Read more...

August has only just begun, but the 2020 September issues are beginning to debut; each with its own approach to our newly socially distant, racially reawakened reality. (At this point, last September feels like another lifetime, doesn’t it?). Case in point: While a few August covers may have sparked controversy over…Read more...

Biblical scholars, theologians and people who have common sense are dragging a right-wing celebrity you’ve never heard of who claimed that white privilege didn’t stop federal law enforcement officers from killing a popular protest organizer from Nazareth who died with his hands up after a confidential informant named…Read more...

She already told us she was a savage, but never lets us forget she’s a star. After blessing fans, followers and waitlists everywhere with the release of Fenty Skin last week, Rihanna’s got her Fenty Maison heel on our necks once again, as the cover girl for the always anticipated September issue of Harper’s Bazaar—on…Read more...

Since the May 25 death of George Floyd, we’ve learned that the original footage filmed by bystanders that we all have seen—and that kicked off the largest Black Lives Matter movement the world has ever seen—was just the tip of the iceberg. Since then, audio transcripts taken from the body cameras of two of the…Read more...

A new Samuel L. Jackson project is coming our way, and it’s something pretty different from the tough-talking acting legend.Read more...

I’m as petty as the next man. I once made a cashier at the grocery store walk away from her register because of my pettiness. It’s a long story but just know that I was right. So I totally understand pettiness, but there are levels to this shit and no one is as petty as the president. This bama’s petty is off the…Read more...