Throughout history there have been black people who have played mammies, all sorts of offensive images, who didn't mind doing it.

The hoodies themselves aren't criminal. White people wear hoodies all the time!

When they say accountability, they mean surveillance and standardization.

Part of what we have to do is not just keep ignorant people away from the polls. We have to actually change the structural realities that make people make bad choices beyond their ignorance or what have you.

Nothing lasts forever, whether it's Greece, Rome or the British Empire. It doesn't mean that America has to end. The country could be reshaped and reimagined in a way that is even more democratic and less imperial in nature. We're trying to radically reshape the nation in ways that are more just and fairer. That's what I mean when I say that empires eventually fall. I'm not calling for the end of America. I'm just calling for a reimagination of its democratic possibilities.

We live in a world where black humanity is a relatively new idea.

For me, self-care is a lesson I'm still learning. But it begins with space away from the heaviness of life. I now take time to play, laugh, and, every once in awhile, sleep.