Medical racism is a large problem impacting people of color and spreading this knowledge will help everyone get the treatment they need and deserve. 

Following the Civil War, the 14th amendment gave Black Americans the right to vote. Yet even today, voter suppression disproportionately impacts communities of color. Learn how Jim Crow-era tactics of poll taxes and literacy voting tests are being replaced with modern-day suppression through restrictions on polling places, voter ID requirements, and the guise of voter fraud.

As international organizations and governments become increasingly concerned about the current climate crisis, a stark truth has emerged: our global predicament is no longer limited to environmental calamity, but has direct impacts on social equity and justice as well. As we grapple with the multidimensional consequences of a swiftly warming Earth, it becomes more and more evident that the burden of climate change falls disproportionately on marginalized communities throughout the world.

If, in the current era of tense political division, normalized racism, and record hate crime frequency, you feel you’re living in a cataclysmic déjà vu reality, you’re not alone. The past decade has been marked by strong parallels with the tumultuous landscape of 1960s America, and it’s more important than ever to revisit the events, lessons, and impacts of the civil rights movement. 

For many Americans, doing so most often evokes the work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Rosa Parks, and other famous figures. However, it’s impossible to take in the whole picture of the movement without understanding the key role of the Black Panther Party within it, especially given how little many Americans know about this group or its efforts to drive racial justice in concrete ways.

As we journey through the Panthers' history, we uncover a story of resilience and revolution, of confrontation and community service. The Black Panther Party's impact extended far beyond the streets of Oakland where it was founded, igniting a nationwide movement that confronted the very foundations of American society. Their legacy, often misunderstood and misrepresented, is a testament to their profound influence on the civil rights movement and beyond.

November is National Native American Heritage Month (also called American Indian and Alaska Native Heritage Month), and it’s a time to celebrate the rich cultures, traditions, and histories of Indigenous Americans. It’s also an opportunity to learn and educate others about the challenges Native communities face today, including issues related to land sovereignty and food decolonization.

Here’s what you should know about the history of the month, what land sovereignty and food decolonization are and how they’re related, and ways American society can address these challenges.

Art and music have long been powerful media for social change. They can challenge the status quo, inspire empathy, and even catalyze movements. One of the most impactful things socially conscious music and art forms can do is to promote anti-racism. Here’s how various forms and genres, particularly rap and hip hop, can be instrumental in spreading anti-racist messages.

Each year from September 15 to October 15, millions of Americans celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month. It’s a great time of year to learn about what it means to be Hispanic (itself a complicated label) and take time out to recognize the achievements Hispanic communities have made in the US and the world. Here’s what you need to know about this important month.

Despite heightened public awareness around systemic racial inequalities, much of which was galvanized by the murder of George Floyd in 2020, there are now equally escalating challenges to efforts aimed at improving diversity, equity, and inclusion in the workplace. Here are some of the biggest barriers to DEI efforts in corporate America today.

On Thursday, June 29th, 2023, the United States Supreme Court ruled that affirmative action college admissions policies are unconstitutional. As a result of the ruling that began with the cases of the University of North Carolina (UNC) and Harvard University, the race-conscious policies that had been in place for about half a century are now banned in all American colleges and universities, public and private.

Rather than implementing equity-driven “race-conscious” admissions processes, schools will be forced to shift toward “race-neutral” ones in a nation that, even in the twenty-first century, remains decidedly non-neutral about perpetuating forms of racial injustice.

The Tuskegee Experiment, also known as the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment, was a deeply racist and unethical clinical research study that took place between 1932 and 1972 in Tuskegee, Alabama, under the auspices of the United States Public Health Service (USPHS). In medical circles, it is referred to as the USPHS Syphilis Study at Tuskegee. In essence, the study investigated the natural progression of untreated syphilis in African American men. 

Despite its name, the study involved neither experimentation nor treatment. Instead, it was an observational study that aimed to document the effects of untreated syphilis on the human body. The study was highly controversial and is now widely regarded as one of the most egregious examples of unethical medical research in modern history.

On June 17, 2021, President Biden signed a bill making June 19th—known as Juneteenth—a federal holiday. Although Juneteenth has been celebrated in African American communities since its inception over a century and a half ago, many white Americans only learned about it recently. If you’re among those still learning about the holiday and you’re not sure exactly what it’s about, keep reading. Here’s what everyone needs to know about Juneteenth history and the Juneteenth federal holiday

Many Americans think of antisemitism (bias against or hatred toward Jewish people) as being more or less limited to the Holocaust in Germany and, recently, the incendiary remarks of a few polarizing public figures. This isn’t altogether surprising, given that American antisemitism isn’t typically well covered in our nation’s schools and colleges. Yet the US has a long and well-documented history of anti-Jewish rhetoric, policies, and violence, many of which stem from the same baseless sources of fear and rage that motivated the Nazis.

March 8 is International Women’s Day, and it’s an excellent time to illuminate the continuing unequal burdens women of all races face with regard to careers and caregiving. The economic and psychological harms of this, along with injustices suffered by other marginalized groups, have been starkly revealed and worsened by the pandemic. Here’s how previously existing disparities combined with the pandemic have caused major setbacks for women’s equality.

At some point in grade school, millions of American students learn about the life and writings of Frederick Douglass, who became famous for his work as an abolitionist. This introduction often happens as part of Black History Month learning units. In fact, February was chosen as Black History Month because it’s the birth month of both Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln. Yet, the interests and accomplishments of the author best known for Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave go well beyond the abolitionist movement.

Apart from general familiarity with the federal observance of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday in January and a few lines from his “I Have a Dream” speech, many Americans understand relatively little about the views of the nation’s most celebrated civil rights leader. In order to properly value his legacy and prevent his ideas from being misrepresented—now more than ever since the civil rights movement began—it’s essential to educate ourselves about exactly how Dr. King envisioned the US becoming a unified, peaceful, and anti-racist nation.

Here’s what Americans of all political leanings need to know about Dr. King and what it means to be a political moderate versus an extremist for love, or, in other terms, non-racist versus anti-racist.

Many Americans have either long been aware of or have recently learned about deeply rooted forms of structural racism in our national systems, policies, and legislation. Just one major example of this is the ways in which racism and healthcare are intertwined and how racism in medicine negatively impacts the health and life expectancy of people of color. Here are some essential things to know about the origins of systemic racism in healthcare and how this worsens health outcomes for already-vulnerable communities of color.

Americans have long been familiar with the concept of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) as a means of counteracting racism in the workplace and elsewhere. Efforts toward promoting DEI originated in the 1960s civil rights movement, and our understanding of diversity is constantly expanding into more and more aspects of human identity and experience. Yet as many have only newly begun to realize, racial inequities are still embedded in the fabric of society, which is reflected in the workplace. In short, DEI has not addressed the systemic nature of racism.

If you’re interested in how political rhetoric works or consume your news through certain social media platforms, you may have heard of replacement theory (not to be confused with critical race theory). Americans who are encountering this ideology for the first time may understandably be wondering what exactly it is and does. Here’s what you need to know about replacement theory and how it harms Latinx immigrants and refugees to the US, among other marginalized groups.

In recent years, many forms of racial injustice—including economic disadvantages—long endured by Black Americans have reemerged in the national spotlight. Throughout the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement and the pandemic, there have been calls to support Black-owned businesses and learn about the human and financial losses in events like the Tulsa massacre. Yet little attention has been given to the current barriers that Black entrepreneurs (especially Black women entrepreneurs) face in launching and maintaining a successful business.

Thriving Black business ownership is an important key to bringing about greater material equity for Black individuals and communities nationwide, and yet many factors continue to hinder progress in this regard. Here are some of the major obstacles Black Americans encounter in launching and running a business.

For those following the major civil rights debates across deepening ideological rifts in America, it’s difficult to ignore the evangelical church as a major political faction. white evangelical Christians in particular have largely entrenched themselves as ultra right-wing voters. In the 2016 election, this group made up 46% of Donald Trump’s supporters and has become known for its enmity toward equality for women, people of color, LGBTQ+ communities, immigrants, and other marginalized groups.

What may be more difficult to grasp is this group’s precise religious identity and how evangelical right-wing politics came to have so much national influence. The evangelical church is in fact a decentralized mix of mainstream and non-denominational Christian churches that share 4 main elements of evangelism. white evangelical churches have a well-documented history of racist beliefs and practices, as (to a lesser-known and less homogenous extent) do mainline white Protestant churches and the Catholic Church.