Wednesday, April 22, 2015
Monday, September 8, 2014
The Economist's review of my book reveals how white people still refuse to believe black people about being black
This is what happens when racism goes viral. This is why, somehow, it still can
In 1845, Frederick Douglass, a fugitive from slavery, joined dozens of white passengers on the British ship Cambria in New York harbor. Somewhere out on the Atlantic, the other passengers discovered that the African American activist in their midst had just published a sensational autobiography. They convinced the captain to host a sort of salon, wherein Douglass would tell them his life story. But when the young black man stood up to talk, a group of Southern slaveholders, on their way to Britain for vacation or business or both, confronted him. Every time Douglass said something about what it was like to be enslaved, they shouted him down: Lies! Lies! Slaves were treated well, insisted the slaveholders; after all, they said, the masters remained financially interested in the health of their human property.
In a review of my book about slavery and capitalism published the other day, the Economist treated it the same way that the tourist enslavers treated the testimony of Frederick Douglass on that slave-era ship long ago. In doing so, the Economist revealed just how many white people remain reluctant to believe black people about the experience of being black.
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Friday, January 10, 2014
Duchess of Cambridge topless pictures: photographer investigated
An unnamed second photographer faces formal scrutiny under French invasion of privacy laws
A photographer suspected of taking topless photographs of the Duchess of Cambridge while she was on holiday in the south of France has been placed under formal investigation, according to AFP.
The unnamed photographer is the latest of several media figures to be investigated for invasion of privacy in France after pictures were published in September last year of Prince William and his wife sunbathing on a balcony in a private property in the south of France.
The editor of the French magazine Closer, Laurence Pieau, had already been placed under formal investigation earlier this month, Agence France Presse reported.
In April, the head of the publisher of the French edition of Closer magazine, named as Ernesto Mauri, and another photographer suspected of taking pictures of the holidaying royal couple were put under investigation, the last step in France before being charged.
The topless photos emerged last September, and most British outlets refused to publish them in the wake of the Leveson report. French Closer did publish them and St James's Palace launched legal proceedings against the magazine, one of the first instances of a case like this involving the royal family in modern times. The complaint from St James's Palace sparked a criminal investigation in France.
The Duke and Duchess launched criminal proceedings against the photographer under France's strict privacy laws. A French court granted them an injunction in September preventing Closer from publishing further shots of Kate sunbathing topless. The pictures were apparently taken on the terrace of a guest house during a brief holiday in France last year.
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