On The Vine: It’s capital ‘B’ Black
I want to tell y’all about a letter I received a while back. It arrived in my mailbox at The Kansas City Star offices not even a month into my being here. It shocked me both because I didn’t expect anyone to know of me or know how to reach me, and because I never really considered a way to reach me would be by handwritten letter. Mail — I’ve come to believe — is for bills and wedding invitations, and even then.
But here was this letter, addressed to me, written in shaky all caps script, and asking simply: Why is Black capitalized in the pages of The Star and not white? Is this equity?
Have you seen that illustration of a dad and his two sons, each one shorter than the last, trying to watch a baseball game over a fence? Each of the them, including the father who would have no trouble seeing over the fence, is given a box on which to stand. That represents equality. Yet, the smaller boy still can’t see. In the next panel of the illustration, the eldest boy has a box to see over the fence and the father has given his box to the smaller boy, his youngest son, giving him two boxes and allowing him to see over the fence just like the rest. That is equity.
That, in quite different (possibly clearer, definitely more radical) words, is what I wrote back to the individual who took the time to write me. The capital Black is meant to recognize communities of the African diaspora displaced and stripped of a history and culture. It honors the culture, as Black individuals, that we’ve fought to (re)discover and carve out for ourselves, and it recognizes the prejudices, injustices and oppression we inherit because of something as silly as the color of our skin.
I bring up this letter because, well, the other day I spoke with a group of kids and teachers from Burke Academy in the Hickman Mills school district about race, equity and journalism, as well as The Star’s promise. And I’ve received and responded to emails from readers of this newsletter. I’ve had conversations in my five months here with a multitude of people on the subject of race and equity.
The point is, while the job is to write this newsletter, work with and edit the fine journalists at The Star, and push our coverage forward, it’s all worthless if we aren’t connecting. If we can’t have conversations, learn from each other and aspire to a better — more informed, just, compassionate — world then I really don’t know what we’re even doing.
But I’ve gone on too long. Let’s chop it up.
Got a question, recommendation or just want to say hey? Email me at cewilliams@kcstar.com
Around the block
One of a kind: Friends, colleagues remember what made Terez Paylor so special
Damn. We lost a real one this week. Terez Paylor was beloved. I never got the opportunity to work with Terez, but as someone who grew up around The Star, I knew the brother. A talent, a light, a real one.
In collecting stories and memories of Terez, Sam McDowell wrote:
He loved what he did. You could see it in his work. In his mock draft. In his All-Juice teams. He had a wide smile and infectious laugh. When you heard it, you had to join in, even if you had absolutely no idea what had gotten him. I can hear the laugh as I’m typing this. It’s about all that can make me smile today. You’ll be so missed, my friend.
When you asked Terez for advice, he didn’t simply oblige; he’d break into a full motivational speech, a la Al Pacino in Any Given Sunday. God, he’d love that reference.
To know Terez professionally was to be influenced by his work ethic and sheer passion for what he did. I’ve worked harder every day since that trip to Lexington. That’s forever part of his legacy.
To know Terez personally was to be surrounded by joy and laughter. It felt impossible — impossible — to be in a bad mood when you were in his presence.
We had that privilege. You all should, too. Here is a collection of our favorite stories, memories and impressions of Terez.
Musings on Terez...
- Mourning the passing of our friend Terez, who leaves us with so many loving memories
On the beauty and joy of Terez Paylor, a teammate who will always be in our hearts
A fellow beat writer pays tribute to ‘little brother’ and range buddy Terez Paylor
‘A passion for my people’: Owner of rare Kansas City bookstore highlights Black words
Willa Robinson began her collection of books in the 1970s at age 18. The books she seeks out are Black — they are about Black people and Black experiences, and written by Black authors.
To walk into her bookshop, located at 1734 E. 63rd St. in Kansas City’s Citadel neighborhood, is to be engulfed in the history, culture and passion of the African diaspora. On a recent chilly Tuesday, the resonance of Hank Crawford’s saxophone pulled reporter Luke Nozika down the hallway and into her stacks.
“What you have to bring to it, though, is the history that Willa is standing in; she’s standing in a history where people have been lynched, people have been killed, where people have died for the right to read,” W. Paul Coates, founder of the Black Classic Press based in Baltimore said. “Her act of book selling is part of a resistive act of Black resistance that has gone on for the last 200 years or more.”
And because people so often ask, if you’re looking for a book to read during Black History Month, Robinson’s favorite is Isabel Wilkerson’s “The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration.” I’m currently reading “Caste.”
In case you missed it...
- A story on Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes, a Black man as the face of the NFL and Kansas City
Nick Green, KCATA manager who ensured ‘everything went right on the street,’ dies at 92
‘Not just about hair,’ Kansas lawmaker proposes ban on hairstyle based discrimination
Hartzler seeks to reduce relief to Black and other minority farmers in Biden stimulus
White JoCo teacher’s Mahomes Afro wig isn’t quite blackface, but it’s a terrible look
I’m tired. I’m tired of fighting the same old, dusty, tired battles.
Toriano Porter wrote this piece about a Shawnee Mission East High School teacher who, for Jersey Day during spirit week, wore some kind of Patrick Mahomes Afro wig — some kind because apparently there’s argument about whether it was merchandised, because that matters. *sigh*
The controversy around the wig was late to hit me, only really coming to my attention after seeing (white) people on Twitter tell Toriano that it wasn’t racist, you’re making too much out of it Toriano, we’re honoring him Toriano, Mahomes is half white, and so on... *sigh*
I don’t want to argue how racist it is. I’m tired. But I feel like for the past three weeks, at least, I have in some fashion or another talked about the sacred nature of Black hair. There is so much (literal) pain, joy, heartache and history in Black hair. And to be honest, if you don’t know that, or understand that, yet you want to argue your appropriation isn’t racist, well, that just might be the problem.
And then there’s this from a previous newsletter:
Patrick Mahomes is a lot of things to a lot of people. To me — other than the man who could decide whether the Bills make the Super Bowl for the first time since... better we don’t talk about it — he is a Black quarterback. Yeah, yeah, I already know what some of y’all are thinking: Patrick Mahomes is arguably the best quarterback in the NFL, why does it matter if he’s Black. Well, I heard fans boo that first game of the season during the moment of silence. Mahomes led that gesture, after leading the team to its first Super Bowl in 50 years. I could continue making my point, but let’s move on.
Beyond the block
Album sales surge for Morgan Wallen after racist comment
Gotta be honest, I have no idea who Morgan Wallen is. Never heard of this man. But it seems he’s become quite popular for casually spewing racist epithets.
Following a night out partying in Nashville (no comment), Wallen was caught on camera and audio yelling nigga, or nigger, either one, I’m not quite sure it matters much the difference. And now, seemingly because of that, and the backlash he’s rightfully received, fans of his are buying up more of more of his latest album. Well, if it quacks like a duck.
(A quick note: I use nigger when someone has called me or someone else such because, well, it is shocking and I believe saying “the n-word” does more harm than the word itself by sugar coating it, diluting it, stripping away the impact it had/has.)
Wallen apologized, for what it’s worth, saying: “I’m embarrassed and sorry. I used an unacceptable and inappropriate racial slur that I wish I could take back. There are no excuses to use this type of language, ever. I want to sincerely apologize for using the word. I promise to do better.”
At least there’s Jason Isbell, who said on Twitter he’ll donate all the songwriting royalties from a song he wrote for Wallen’s album to the Nashville chapter of the NAACP.
In case you missed it...
- The brave, forgotten Kansas lunch counter sit-in that helped change America
The U.S. Is Seeing a Massive Spike in Anti-Asian Hate Crimes
Kidnapped 10-year-old saved by 2 sanitation workers on pickup route
Mary Wilson, an Original Member of the Supremes, Dies at 76
The Supremes were one of the biggest musical groups in the world in the 1960s, a key to the success and icon status of Motown Records. The Supremes were classy, masterly and trailblazers. Mary Wilson, who died earlier this week, helped etch The Supremes in history.
Derrick Bryson Taylor wrote for The New York Times:
The influence the Supremes had on Black girls and women across America in the 1960s was undeniable. “You never saw anything like it in the 1960s — three women of color who were totally empowered, creative, imaginative,” Oprah Winfrey was quoted as saying in “Diana Ross: A Biography” (2007), by J. Randy Taraborrelli.
“We, the Supremes, can’t take all the credit,” Ms. Wilson told The Guardian in 2019. “The writers and producers at Motown gave us the music and sound that people loved. And then there was the glamour. My whole life is like a dream. I tell you — if I were not a Supreme, I would want to be a Supreme.”
Check out...
For the culture
This week, The Star’s Mará Rose Williams is hopping on the vine to bring y’all some culture news. I said we’d have guests. Mará is the education reporter here at The Star and has been a journalist for some 40 years. She was also the woman behind The Star’s “Truth in Black and white” project that gained so much attention. She’s the real ish. Take it away Mará!
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Watch out for: “Judas and the Black Messiah”
Keeping with the 60s theme, albeit this next notable piece of entertainment is a lot heavier on the side of drama, truth and protest, “Judas and the Black Messiah,” a film about the Black Panther leader Fred Hampton is premiering in theaters and on HBO Max Friday.
The film, co-written and directed by Shaka King, chronicles the life of the dynamic Chicago-based activist, who was 21 when he was killed by police in a 1969 raid. It stars Daniel Kaluuya as Hampton. You might remember Kaluuya, 31, from his break-out role as the teary-eyed brother heading for The Sunken Place in Jordan Peele’s “Get Out” and as W’Kabi of the Border Tribe and close friend to T’Challa in “Black Panther.” Oh yeah, and as Slim opposite Odie Turner-Smith’s Queen in Lena Waithe and Melina Matsoukas’ “Queen & Slim.”
In this latest, Hampton, chairman of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party and founder of a multicultural “rainbow coalition” advocating for poor Black and Hispanic communities, clashes with William O’Neal who was recruited by the FBI to infiltrate the organization. O’Neal is played by LaKeith Stanfield, also of “Get Out.”
About the film’s power, Stanfield told the Associated Press, “Being Black in America means that your history is, by and large, misrepresented or not represented at all. … So the only way that we’re able to pass down our stories oftentimes is through storytelling. I’m grateful for that.”
Did y’all see this?...
Kansas City to welcome back Broadway shows this fall, starting with “Hamilton”
So here’s your shot to get in the room; that is to get into the theater audience when Broadway’s “Hamilton” returns to Kansas City in the fall.
The Kansas City Broadway Series is planning to return after 18 months of a pandemic-induced theater vacuum. What better way to get things going again than the still worldwide phenomenon “Hamilton,” brought to New York’s Broadway stage by Lin-Manual Miranda in 2015 with a predominantly POC (that’s people of color) cast. It won 11 Tony Awards and that’s sick because it’s just one less than “The Producers,” which holds the record for the most ever.
The hip hop musical production about our nation’s youngest founding father will open a nine-show 2021-22 season Sept. 28-Oct. 10 at the Music Hall. COVID-19 put a stop to the series’ final two shows of 2019-20 and its entire 2020-21 season.
The last time “Hamilton,” was in our neck of the woods, 2019, it sold out 2,400 seats for three weeks. This time it gets a two-week run. Season ticket holders get first dibs, starting now.
From one musical phenomenon to another, next summer, June 21-26, 2022, the production “Ain’t Too Proud,” hits the Music Hall stage with the story about the rise of arguably R&B’s most iconic male singing group, The Temptations. This jam takes music loving theater goers back: on a journey from Detroit’s 1960s Motown to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The musical set box-office records in 2019.
Among the other 2021-22 offerings is “Wicked” which will run Jan. 5-23. The rest are “Tootsie,” “Mean Girls,” “Jesus Christ Superstar,” “Fiddler on the Roof,” “Stomp” and “An Officer and a Gentleman.”
Rock Hall of Fame: Jay-Z, Foo Fighters, Iron Maiden, Tina Turner Lead Nominees
Since we mentioned the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the list for the class of 2021 includes some real surprises like Tina Turner, Chaka Khan and Dionne Warwick. How is it possible that those three divas hadn’t been put through that celebrated door decades ago?
Tina’s “Proud Mary,” probably one of the most widely recognized songs there is, Chaka’s “I’m Every Woman,” and Warwick’s “I Say a Little Prayer,” alone could have made them hall-of-famers. But on top of that they each have an extensive musical repertoire that includes chart-topping song after song.
Clearly a prerequisite for making the list of nominees since included on it are Jay-Z, Foo Fighters, Mary J. Blige, Iron Maiden, the Go-Go’s, Rage Against the Machine, Kate Bush, Devo, Carole King, Fela Kuti, LL Cool J, New York Dolls and Todd Rundgren.
The top vote getters are being announced in May. Induction is in the fall.
That’s all she wrote!
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This story was originally published February 11, 2021 at 12:42 PM.
