All Digitocracy

Media & Diversity

ASNE reverses itself, releases diversity figures for many individual U.S. newsrooms

by

Decision to withhold the data prompted a backlash

New ASNE President Mizell Stewart III says its member organizations remain committed to diversity hiring.

New ASNE President Mizell Stewart III says its member organizations remain committed to diversity hiring.

In a policy reversal, The American Society of News Editors has released diversity figures for individual U.S. newsrooms.

New ASNE President Mizell Stewart III said the organization decided that “the need for transparency outweighed a good-faith effort to improve response rates on the annual survey.” Stewart is vice president for news operations at Gannett and the USA Today Network. In a statement he said:

“The ASNE survey is seen in the industry as an important tool to measure newsroom diversity. Its value is diminished without highlighting progress, or recognizing the lack thereof, at the individual newsroom level.”

On Sept. 9, ASNE released its annual Newsroom Employment Diversity Survey but did not release percentages of minority staffing for individual newsrooms. ASNE hoped more news organizations would participate in the overall diversity survey if their individual hiring numbers were not disclosed. Some media organizations have admitted being embarrassed by their inability to hire more women and minorities.

The decision not to disclose specific diversity figures caused an uproar in media circles, prompting the reversal. Still, Stewart said in a statement that “fewer than 20” news organizations requested that their figures not be released. He said their request is being honored.

The association is releasing the figures for 733 other news organizations. The list is available on the ASNE website.

Marley Dias, the 11-year-old middle-schooler behind #1000BlackGirlBooks, lands a dream job at Elle

by

She’s an editor-in-residence for Elle.com, which is backing Marley Mag, a zine of her very own.

Marley Dias is living large in her new role at Elle.com

Marley Dias is living large in her new role at Elle.com

When Marley Dias started her #1000BlackGirlBooks social media campaign to collect books featuring black girls as main characters, she didn’t expect to exceed her goal of a thousand books. Dias, an Essex County middle-schooler, came up with the campaign after becoming frustrated with the lack of black, female main characters in books she had to read… [Read more…]

One graph can explain Donald Trump’s inept outreach to African Americans, yet the media isn’t telling the whole story

by

There is no secret to the campaign strategy of Donald Trump. He simply has not been asked the right questions to reveal it.

Few African-Americans are embracing Donald Trump's economic strategies even though journalists are failing to point out the shortcomings.

Few African Americans are embracing Donald Trump’s economic strategies even though journalists are failing to point out the shortcomings in detail.

It’s clear that Donald Trump isn’t interested in African American support. One economic graph reveals why.

Despite appallingly low business productivity output, entrepreneurial growth among both Hispanic and Black Americans leads the nation. Among black women entrepreneurs, in particular, there’s been a 322% increase since 1997. Yet, out of 2.6 million businesses created, 2.5 million are sole proprietors with zero employees. Of the remaining 100,000 with employees, only 14,000 businesses produce revenues over $1M annually. President Obama has sought ways of increasing entrepreneurial success among minority and women populations and opened doors throughout his tenure.

Despite appallingly low business productivity output, entrepreneurial growth among both Hispanic and Black Americans leads the nation. Among black women entrepreneurs, in particular, there’s been a 322% increase since 1997. Yet, out of 2.6 million businesses created, 2.5 million are sole proprietors with zero employees. Of the remaining 100,000 with employees, only 14,000 businesses produce revenues over $1M annually. President Obama has sought ways of increasing entrepreneurial success among minority and women populations and opened doors throughout his tenure.

What isn’t quite clear is why Trump has so little interest in disrupting the voting bloc Secretary Hillary Clinton has secured across the landscape of African Americans.

Equally unclear is why Trump can hold a virtually all-white rally in Jackson, Mississippi, which has an 80 percent African American population, and not receive any questions from journalists about the chronic economic and social conditions of black residents in the capital city of Mississippi, which amount to economic apartheid.

What is abundantly clear, however, is Trump’s visit to Jackson defines the entire strategy for his campaign. As a businessman, Trump claims he is keenly aware of the economic conditions of the country. And he may be.

The plight of African Americans in Jackson, MS is an excellent barometer of the systemic economic divides nationwide along racial fault lines. This is an arena in which Trump has pulled the wool over the eyes of journalists at all levels, local, regional and national.

There’s only one economic graphic anyone needs to see to fully understand why Trump has marginal interest in courting the votes of Asian Americans and Hispanic Americans. And with even a cursory glance at this one chart, it’s easy to see why Trump has zero interest in the African American vote.

AMERICAN APARTHEID

Under a president Trump, America would likely pursue a course of economic apartheid, in which nearly all of the means of producing wealth, power and influence in America would remain under control of white Americans, just as it was a mere 50 years ago.

Ironically, with demographic shifts leading toward a minority majority nation by mid-century, coupled with the fastest rate of entrepreneurial growth occurring among Hispanic and black populations, Trump and Secretary Clinton have both ignored an easy win in the argument over who would be better for minority populations with regard to the economy and jobs. Both candidates have ignored the single most important looming economic question: Who will create the jobs of tomorrow?

JOB CREATION CRISIS

16a65gahryjsk7zv_iwttna-jpeg-1

I asked this important question in a previous commentary, One Economic Question That Could Decide the Next President. I provided detailed data on why business productivity and job-creation among Americans of color is the most important issue the nation must address. Still, neither Hillary Clinton nor Donald Trump have addressed this question. And unless they are repeatedly asked to do so by journalists, there’s likely no chance they will wade into these tumultuous waters.

Yet, America is currently facing an entrepreneurial crisis. Today, more businesses close each year than are being created. This means fewer jobs. The speed at which technology startups can accelerate and become job-producers is amazing, but there simply aren’t enough successful scalable startups to overcome the deficit in business closures and job losses.

Naturally, an entrepreneurship crisis would require an intentional focus on investing in developing a more robust entrepreneurial pipeline within existing growth sectors, such as minorities and women. Yet, there has been no national discourse on this issue and no plan by either candidate to address it.

SEPARATE AND UNEQUAL ECONOMIC STRATEGIES

Meanwhile, Clinton and Trump both suggest they can grow the economy and jobs with strategies that focus entirely on investing in the white-dominated private business sector through government tax incentives to lure jobs from overseas and other measures that also inure to the benefit of white-owned corporations and mature small businesses, leaving the entrepreneurial pipeline among nonwhites to languish unnoticed.

Minority populations fear such strategies. Throughout the economic growth of America, wherein the white-dominated business landscape has benefited tremendously, African Americans have continued to endure unemployment rates that are nearly twice the rate of white unemployment regardless of the level of education. All the evidence shows that regardless of the economic growth of the white private sector, communities of color will continue to suffer disproportionately. The solution is to empower underrepresented populations to compete in the private business sector as job creators.

Black American unemployment remains nearly twice the rate of whites regardless of the level of education attainment.

Black American unemployment remains nearly twice the rate of whites regardless of the level of education attainment.

IMPACT JOURNALISM

There is no secret to the campaign strategy of Donald Trump. He simply has not been asked the right questions to reveal it. As we head down the home stretch, my hope is to see journalists conduct due diligence on data that induce questions about how the candidates will build a more inclusive America, with greater economic opportunity and shared prosperity for all.

I hope to see a line of relentless questioning that compel the candidates to address issues that empower underrepresented populations to be more productive in the private business sector and assume a larger role in producing a greater share of GDP productivity and more jobs. In building a 21st century inclusive landscape, it cannot be a mirror image of the past exclusionary policies and practices established by white supremacists and sustained by white privilege. We must transition our economic landscape to invest in all of America’s extraordinarily talented multicultural and multiracial populations.

The nation relies upon journalists who are privileged to ask the candidates questions, to frame the issues of the economy and jobs around strategies for an economic evolution, if there ever is to be one.

0ke7ufpq0kbny_q3rMike Green is Co-founder, ScaleUp Partners LLC; Consultant: Inclusive Innovation Ecosystems, Regional Competitiveness and Empowering Underrepresented Populations

Boston Globe’s story, ‘Being white, and a minority, in Georgia’ influences image of Latinos as dirty, loud lawbreakers

by

Too often, Latinos are portrayed in the media as the reason for what ails America.

A used car lot on Norcross, Ga., flies both U.S. and Mexican flags -- to the disappointment of many residents uncomfortable with immigration. Photo credit: Boston Globe

A used car lot in Norcross, Ga., flies both U.S. and Mexican flags — to the disappointment of many residents uncomfortable with immigration. Photo credit: Boston Globe

Reporters are supposed to be impartial and paint a well-rounded picture when writing their stories. This means reporting and getting as much information as possible to present the facts.

A recent article in the Boston Globe set out to find out why white, middle-class people are supporting Donald Trump. The article, “Being white, and a minority, in Georgia” written by Annie Linskey, answered the question – many long-time residents felt recent Latino immigrants were taking over their community.

But the way the story was written – the lack of context – was a source of consternation for some.

Monica Rhor, a Houston-based journalist and narrative writer, voiced her concerns about the story’s lack of context.

“I think the idea for the story – a look at why support for Trump is strong in that area and who Trump supporters are — is valid,” said Rhor, who previously worked at the Boston Globe as an immigration reporter. “But to me, the story lacked context. It allowed people to disparage Latino immigrants and to blame all their perceived troubles on that community without offering any real evidence to support or refute that. As a result, the story appeared to validate the image of Latinos as dirty, loud lawbreakers.”

Marisol Bello, a former journalist at USA Today and now a senior writer at the Center for Community Change, a national social justice organization, agreed that the piece is a completely valid and important story. However, the lack of context was the biggest issue with the story, Bello said.

“The problem with this story was that it gave voice to what these voters said including a very high level of bigotry and fear and anxiety about these “newcomers” without ever providing any context about what they were saying about these immigrants. The story would have benefited from more Latino immigrant voices among the new arrivals specifically,” Bello said.

This lack of proper context is not new — and it continues. Also this week, Internet controversy erupted when Philly.com published a story about a white family that enrolled their two sons in a virtually all-black elementary school in Philadelphia. Some readers thought the author of the story seemed amazed that the white kids seemed happy with their new surroundings and quickly made friends.

When the context on such articles is wrong, it can reinforce stereotypes, such as with Latino immigrants in Georgia.

Jillian Báez, assistant professor and graduate studies coordinator in the department of media culture at College of Staten Island-CUNY, said although the Boston Globe writer did explain why Norcross is an attractive town for immigrants, the reader is given little context to the myriad reasons why Latino immigrants are leaving their home countries.

“These reasons shift depending on the country of origin and can include war, political repression, and/or dire economic conditions,” Báez said.

In the article, Linskey quotes resident James Bell as saying that Latinos who live in the neighborhood don’t care about their property. He goes on to describe overflowing garbage cans and litter in the streets. Linskey appears to take him at his word and apparently did not go to the neighborhood to verify for herself what Bell described.

Bello also found this troubling.

“The story never challenges these really bigoted ideas by these residents,” Bello said. “Like this whole exchange: ‘The Latinos just throw it in your face. They’re here for the money. They don’t want to be American,’ Bell said. ‘They don’t care about America.’”

Linskey quoted two Latinos in the article – one an immigrant from Colombia who arrived in the community in 1999 and who now owns a construction business. The other was a Cuban immigrant who ran for local public office in 2010. Neither could be classified as recent immigrants.

Báez also noted the choice of Latinos that Linskey chose to interview.

“The immigrant sources selected are not representative of the larger Latina/o immigrant community in Georgia in terms of ethnicity and class. Most of the Latina/o immigrants in that area are Mexican from a poor or working class background. One source is a Colombian immigrant who came to the U.S. in 1999 on a student visa. The source mentioned later in the article is Cuban and had enough cultural capital to run as an elected official. However, none of the sources is reflective of the larger Latina/o immigrant community–none are Mexican or overtly economically disadvantaged. In this way, the author flattens differences amongst immigrants,” Báez said.

Linskey starts her article describing a Latino man selling coconuts out of the back of his pickup,
but he is never interviewed. He seems to fit the profile of the recent immigrant to Norcross.

“On Twitter, she said she tried to talk to the coconut vendor but he would not talk to her. Yet she used him as an image representing the negative side of change in the opening and closing scenes. I wonder if she speaks Spanish? I suspect not,” Rhor said.

But there is another overarching theme that emerged from the reporting and execution of this article – would these concerns and issues been avoided had there been more diversity in the newsroom?

“This story points to the very critical need for why you need more journalists of color, editor and reporters, in the newsroom,” Bello said.

Added Rhor, “I think it’s important to note that this is just one example of why diverse voices are needed in newsrooms, and how lack of diversity can lead to inaccurate portrayals of communities of color.”

Building ESPN’s The UnDefeated

by

Overserving the underserved: The Undefeated’s first 121 days

theundefeated2

The UnDefeated panel at the Online News Association Conference. Photo courtesy Tracie Powell

On May 17th, ESPN’s long-awaited vertical aimed at attracting an African-American audience finally went live. And after serving up pieces examining the civil disobedience of San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick, the social consciousness of former Chicago Bulls guard Michael Jordan and even hosting an old-school town hall meeting on gun violence in Chicago, the vertical is giving ESPN an audience that it had never had before.

“We are like peanut butter and chocolate and they like it,” Raina Kelley, The Undefeated’s managing editor said Wednesday about the website’s first 121 days. She told panel attendees at the Online News Association’s annual conference in Denver that the first two months have been a whirlwind.

First proposed in 2013, conversation about The Undefeated had degenerated into trash talk after it failed to launch. Then sportswriter Jason Whitlock, the initial lead editor, was removed from the project and later left ESPN. The vertical’s future remained in limbo until ESPN persuaded Kevin Merida to leave his role as managing editor of The Washington Post to lead the project. Merida then asked Kelley, former deputy editor of ESPN The Magazine, to come aboard as managing editor.

Although Kelley made it clear that The Undefeated’s goal is to help ESPN grow its overall audience, the editorial team is focused on producing critical conversations for the website’s largely African-American following through a mix of traditional long-form enterprise stories, creative video storytelling, podcasts, playlists and town hall meetings.

“I don’t know what the first Undefeated would have been but for me and Kevin, our mission is to cover the intersection of race, sports and culture,” Kelley said. “We felt there was a hunger for that conversation.”

Although off to a great start, The Undefeated is experiencing an interesting conundrum: With so much good content, editors are still struggling to figure out how much of it to deliver to readers, and in what way.

But one thing editors are sure about: They know who their audience is. The Undefeated isn’t trying to be that site that does the “Jesse Williams” is a genius story. Kelley said black people already know Williams is a genius. But on top of that. “He didn’t say anything that hadn’t already been said by others,” Kelley said. “And it’s not like he’s in the league of a Muhammad Ali or Martin Luther King. He’s not that special yet. So we wouldn’t even do that story. We’d do a quick piece on it being Jesse’s birthday, but we wouldn’t do that ‘who knew Jesse Williams was a genius piece.’ We know who our audience is. We wouldn’t go there.”

In addition to changing the way reporting has been done on household name athletes such as Serena Williams and Michael Jordan, the Undefeated, with its coverage on HBCU athletics and culture, also is looking to expand national conversations to include more than the “one hundred fifty Black people you need to know to know about,” Kelley says.

“To be blunt, we are a group of people who have felt systematically underserved, unsatisfied and frustrated,” Kelley said. “I wanted to create a site that had the stuff I wanted to see. I wanted a playlist for my cookout. It gave us an opportunity to feel and express those feelings in a slightly different way.”

The Undefeated’s editors have ambitious storytelling goals, which include incorporating traditional reporting along with technology to reach its audience.

Describing the various ways in the past that African-Americans have enlisted in the effort to tell stories, Kelley says, “We will do all of these methods, up to and including quilts.”

The effort includes meeting African-Americans where they are technologically. The site’s editors are creating content compatible with all digital devices while also exploring the types of technologies most frequently used in African-American homes.

“The format is in the challenge,” Latoya Peterson, Undefeated deputy digital editor of innovation said. “Since African-Americans are more likely to own streaming media like the Xbox or the PlayStation over the AppleTV, then our approach has to do with making a business case for looking at a way to produce our content those platforms.”

And despite the impact technology such as tweets and user-generated content has had on traditional newsgathering, the editors say that an important part of their editorial strategy will be getting out talking to their audiences face-to-face. For example, staff writer Justin Tinsley produces a podcast which has him going out to HBCUs to speak with college students. There was also the gun violence town hall meeting — another example of face-to-face interaction.

“You don’t want people to think that you are just keyboard thugging all day,” Tinsley said, adding that he really wants to go out to see what’s on the mind of college students.

“I think we want to show people that we are paying attention to you and your world and we are not stopping when it gets difficult,” culture editor Danyel Smith said.

“We know that you are underserved and we want to over serve.”

Transgender actress Jen Richards cast in season 5 of ‘Nashville’ on CMT

by

The Emmy nominee will be CMT’s first trans character.

Transgender actress Jen Richards will star in a recurring role as physical therapist Allyson Del Lago.

Transgender actress Jen Richards will star in a recurring role as physical therapist Allyson Del Lago.

Country Music Television announced on Tuesday that transgender actress Jen Richards has been cast in the upcoming season of the nighttime soap Nashville.

Richards, who was recently nominated for an Emmy for her web series Her Story, will play Allyson Del Lago, “a tough but understanding physical therapist who helps a series regular through one of their most difficult challenges,” New Now Next wrote.

Later this fall, Richards will also appear alongside Laverne Cox in the CBS legal drama Doubt and in addition to acting, she was named a 2016 Outfest Screenwriting Lab Fellow for her feature script “Any Given Day,” and is the co-producer of the docu-series More Than T.

Richards’ casting marks the first trans character on a CMT show and the first out transgender actor on the network, a combination that isn’t seen often. Historically, Hollywood has been prone to cast cisgender male actors to play trans female characters such as Jeffrey Tambor (Transparent), Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club) and Eddie Redmayne (The Danish Girl). A fact that has upset many trans advocates and allies including Richards, who recently took to Twitter to express her disdain that Matt Bomer (American Horror Story) has been cast as a trans sexworker in the upcoming film Anything.

And while it’s important to note that trans actors such as Laverne Cox (Orange Is The New Black and Doubt), Alexandra Billings and Trace Lysette (Transparent) and Scott Turner Schofield (The Bold And The Beautiful), are playing trans on the small screen, trans visibility, regardless of who is playing the role, is still sorely lacking. A recent GLAAD report “Where We Are On TV” found that between 2015-2016 out of the 271 regular and recurring LGBT characters in scripted broadcast, cable and streaming programs, only seven were transgender with only one transgender man. 

Nashville debuts on Thursday, January 5, 2017, at 9/8c.

Blavity, the ‘Black Buzzfeed’ for millennials, to raise $1 million and launch redesign

by

CEO and Co-founder Morgan DeBaun opens up about the future of her site at TechCrunch Disrupt SF.

Blavity co-founder and CEO Morgan DeBaun says the company is building a new "lifestyle platform" for black millennials.

Blavity co-founder and CEO Morgan DeBaun says the company is building a new “lifestyle platform.”

At TechCrunch Disrupt SF it was announced that Blavity, the Black Buzzfeed for millenials, is raising a million dollars and has recently launched a new redesign.

During a one-on-one talk, CEO and co-founder Morgan DeBaun opened up that the journey of raising seed money has been “hot and not so hot at the same time,” but that when it comes to investors, they are looking for people who “get it.”

“You can tell [in] the first five minutes in a conversation with an investor if they understand and agree with the kind of premise that Blavity is built on which is that black people influence culture, that they’re underrepresented in tech and consumer tech products and therefore we have a blue ocean opportunity to really build something interesting for an audience that is incredibly influential in our culture,” she said.

The CEO also stressed that despite the lack of diversity in the tech world, Blavity has black investors such as Charles King and Microventures, an aspect that is crucial to their principles.

“That’s part of how we have designed our team and that includes our advisors to make sure that it’s reflective of what we care about,” she stressed.

In terms of the site’s redesign, DeBaun explained that Blavity was initially on WordPress, but when they saw how often readers were furthering the conversation in the comments section, they decided to take it a step forward and build a platform that would truly enhance that experience.

“Also most of our users are on a mobile device, about 80 percent of them, are visiting us on a web version of the site, so we needed to update it so that it was a cleaner smarter version and then enable people to create content without having to go through the editorial team to get up on the site,” she added.

Being one of few black female leaders of a start-up, DeBaun opened up about how “delighted” she was to be on this stage for the first time and how much it mattered to her, especially since when she first created Blavity over two years ago, she applied for the TechCrunch Disrupt scholarship and was declined.

“Being visible is part of any startup life,” she said. “You want to get press, you want people to know what you’re working on. If you want to be a thought leader, you want to be seen. For Blavity specifically, part of what we do is educate and inform as a media company it’s important that people know who I am.”

“The thing about diversity in general and in startup diversity is that a lot of my DMS and messages are from people who are inspired by seeing an all-black start up by a black founding team and me as a black female leader, so it definitely means a lot,” DeBaun concluded.

Scroll down once you click the link to watch DeBaun’s interview here.

Ohio University Removes Roger Ailes’ Name From Newsroom

by

Source: Athens News Ohio University President Roderick McDavis announced at Faculty Senate Monday evening that the university will remove former Fox News CEO Roger Ailes’ name from the entrance to a WOUB Public Media newsroom in Athens. McDavis said the university will return the $500,000 donation that Ailes gave to OU to fund renovation of a… [Read more…]

How to tell Southern girls’ unique stories

by

Advance Local media groups, AL.com and NOLA.com, offer Southern girls opportunity to define themselves

The Southern Girls Project features girls such as Tianna Harris, 10. Harris is the captain of the Adeeva Tigerettes dance team. Photo credit: Sharon Steinmann/al.com

The Southern Girls Project features girls such as Tianna Harris, 10. Harris is the captain of the Adeeva Tigerettes dance team in Mobile, Alabama. Photo credit: Sharon Steinmann/al.com

Stereotypes of Southern girls are abundant: Southern belles sipping tea, girls wearing tight Daisy Dukes and others who are close-minded, intolerant and have views that are frozen in time.

The stereotypes that people have about Southern girls are boundless. But how do Southern girls define themselves?

A group of women journalists living and working in the South wanted to find out so they started The Southern Girls Project, a multiplatform, multimedia journalism initiative spearheaded by journalists at al.com and nola.com that taps Southern girls as the experts and sources for authentic storytelling about the reality of their lives and the issues they face.

“We’re trying to reflect girls as who they are,” said Michelle Holmes, vice president of content for the Alabama Media Group. “Stereotypes have come up: short shorts, debutantes. We’re not trying to invalidate that experience. We’re just trying to look at them broadly, take a sophisticated approach that is more complicated. We just are looking to reflect who girls are.”

There’s a general lack of representation of girls in American media and especially of girls in the South where issues like poverty and education are particularly important in areas like the Alabama Black Belt and the Mississippi Delta, Holmes said.

The Southern Girls Project is important because stereotypes of the South sometimes seem so strong that they restrict the choices of Southern girls, said Jessa Wylie, a 17-year-old senior from Huntsville, Ala. who participated in the project.

“I live in Huntsville and there’s more to us than sweet tea and cowboys,” said Wylie who aspires to be a neurosurgeon. “I think it’s ridiculous to designate one area of the nation as dumber because we are capable of doing anything anyone else can do and we might do it with more hospitality.”

Stories about Wylie and other girls are published by two Southern media outlets in Alabama and Louisiana owned by Advance Local. Stories for this on-going multimedia journalism project are published across platforms including newspapers, video and social media including Instagram and Tumblr.

The Southern Girls Project launched in June but before reporting started months earlier, journalists spent time talking to girls about what’s important to them, said Rebecca Walker, managing producer at the Alabama Media Group.

“We set out to listen to girls first,” she said. “We’ve asked girls to tell us what the stories are. As early as February we began seeking out individual girls and groups. We just said we don’t feel like anyone listens to girls. We listened to them.”

Some of the stories published by the project include a balance of fun and serious content including stories about a roller derby league and a transgender girl from Mobile, Alabama who moved to New York City.

The girls involved in the project are talking about their own experiences and that is resulting in some solid and important journalism, said Shauna Stuart, a digital journalist and who works on the project.

“A Muslim girl from Birmingham talks about how her religion plays a part in her life. She talks about how Southern hospitality is part of her religion,” she said. “It’s really cool to see the young ladies talk about what’s important to them. We’re not giving them a voice. They already have that. We’re amplifying them.”

The producers of the project also hope to amplify Southern girls’ stories by collaborating with other journalists, storytellers, academics, artists and media outlets that are interested in documenting their stories.

Producers of The Southern Girls Project are finding that the girls’ beliefs are revealing social and cultural shifts among this generation of Southern women, Walker said.

“It’s really interesting to me, the willingness of this generation of Southern girls to be more accepting,” she said. “Some of the more conservative religious girls are calling for equality for their friends who are gay and transgender. I didn’t realize how much the world had changed in the last 15 to 20 years. Girls in the Bible Belt are changing the dialogue.”

To collaborate with The Southern Girls Project email southerngirlsproject@al.com or fill out this form.

How to talk to black people in eight easy lessons

by

Leonard Pitts Jr. offers a guide for politicians — and the media — on “How to Talk to Black People in Eight Easy Lessons.”

Talking to black people should not be hard.

Talking to black people should not be hard.

Today’s column is presented as a public service.

It is for serious politicians both Democratic and Republican — and also for Donald Trump. The urgent need for this service has been painfully obvious for many years and never more so than today. So, let’s get right to it. This is: How to Talk to Black People in Eight Easy Lessons.

1. Go where we are.

You’d think that was pretty obvious. Then you remember Mr. Trump purporting to speak to black people whilst addressing audiences whose aggregate melanin wouldn’t fill a Dixie cup.

2. Don’t act as if going where we are requires machetes and a supply line.

“Some have said that I’m either brave or crazy to be here,” Republican Sen. Rand Paul once told a black audience. He said this at Howard University, which is about 15 minutes from the White House. They have cell service there and everything.

3. Stop confusing the NAACP with the Nation of Islam.

Donald Trump recently snubbed an invitation to address the venerable civil rights group. Bob Dole once did, too, claiming they were trying to “set me up.” Right. Because the NAACP has such a long history of incendiary rhetoric. As one of its founders, the great scholar W.E.B. DuBois, never really said, “I’m ’bout to bust a cap on these honkies if they don’t give me my freedom.”

4. Don’t use Ebonics unless you are fluent.

I still have nightmares about Hillary Clinton crying out, “I don’t feel no ways tired” in that black church in Selma. Stick to Ivorybonics. Most of us are bilingual.

5. Don’t make a CP time joke unless you are a CP.

When candidate Obama sauntered onstage about 15 minutes after the start time of a black journalists’ event and quipped, “I want to apologize for being a little bit late — but you guys keep on asking whether I’m black enough,” it was cool and funny. When Bill de Blasio joked in a scripted exchange with Hillary Clinton about running on “CP Time” — “cautious politician time” — it was, well, not.

6. Don’t make a slavery joke, period.

Joe Biden once warned a black audience that Republicans are “going to put y’all back in chains.” Can you imagine him warning a Jewish crowd how the GOP is “going to put y’all back in the gas chambers”? Can you imagine how offensive that would be?

7. Don’t talk to the black people in your head.

This is what Donald Trump was doing when he told black people they lived in the suburbs of hell and had nothing to lose by voting for him. He was speaking, not to black people, but to black people as he imagines them to be, based on lurid media imagery and zero actual experience. In this, he was much like Bill O’Reilly, in whose world black folks all have tattoos on their foreheads.

8. Know what you don’t know.

“I’m here to learn,” said Mr. Trump at a black church in Detroit a few days ago. It was a powerful expression of humility — or would have been, had it been said by someone who wasn’t an OG of the birther movement, a serial re-tweeter of supremacist filth and the star of David Duke’s bromantic fantasies. Still, he had the right idea. Politicians too often purport to lecture us about us without having the faintest idea who we even are.

The truth is, How to Talk to Black People isn’t all that difficult.

The candidate who wants African-American support should pretend black folks are experts on our own issues and experiences — because we are. He should learn those issues, tap that experience, formulate some thoughtful ideas in response. Then he should do what he would for anyone else: Ask for our vote. Tell us what he’d do if he got it.

Leonard Pitts is a columnist for The Miami Herald; his email is lpitts@miamiherald.com.