Edited by Mara Meyers
This week we’ve got some hard truths about the risks of online harassment, lots of brave and diverse voices standing strong for LGBT rights, and the realization that we may have flying cars (literally) before we have equal pay. We’ve also changed the title of our weekly round-up from The Weekly FRESHness to something we thought fit a little better: The Weekly ReFRESH. Hope you enjoy!
What we’ve been checking out…
In Mic’s new video series “Flip The Script,” Liz Plank investigates fashion’s diversity problem. (Otherwise known as the complete lack of people of color on the runway and from nearly all advertisements in pretty much every fashion magazine ever.)
This week’s kudos goes to national LGBT organization, The Victory Fund, for breaking the mold of white gay male leaders and named its first black female president.
A recent study finds that women will be paid the same as men by 2058. What will happen before then? Oh, just the invention of flying cars, trips to Mars, and a 3D printer that will create an artificial heart.
We have a couple of must-watch videos from the TED2015 Conference last week. The first is ‘A tale of two Americas’ from Anand Gridharadas, whose powerful talk proves that inequality is so much bigger than just the 1% vs. the 99%. The second is from Monica Lewinsky, who broke her silence to discuss the extreme dangers of online shaming.
A TV critic says that there are too many “ethnic” actors on television and it makes us want to barf.
But then we saw Kerry Washington’s speech at the GLAAD awards and all was well in the world again.
What’s new from the FRESH crew…
Although folks still insist we live in a “post-racial” America, Brittney Cooper cautions against the millennial generation’s “paradox of [racial] progress” in her piece on PBS.
Aaron Hurst candidly discusses the ways he deals with change, our “economic evolution,” and why his daughter’s lemonade stand has made her a brilliant business leader.
Although he has been exiled, tortured, and threatened with his life, Bisi Alimi still bravely asserts that “he is not a victim”.
Mychal Denzel Smith asks us all a very tough question: where in America are black people safe from racism?
In this interview with The University of Chicago Magazine, Michael Murphy reminds us that “design is never neutral. It either helps people or hurts people”.
It is no surprise that many people, specifically women, suffer persistent harassment on social media. But the reasons behind this may have more to do with who sits in the board room than who sits behind the computer. Julie Zeilinger explains in her latest Mic article, where she also features FRESH speaker Jamia Wilson, who works on this issue.
