On The Vine: This is community
I’ve been back in Kansas City for over a year now, spending that time — in and (slightly) out of the throes of pandemic anxiety — desperate for community.
It snuck up on me over the weekend while waiting for the plant doctor at Paradise to repot my partner’s plants.
A beautiful thick white magazine, the words “ByDesign” as bold as my awe, hammered across the top. Honestly I don’t think I’d ever seen such a beautiful magazine with such a beautiful image of such a beautiful Black woman in such a beautiful state of introspection.
Every flip of the page gave way to a sensation of Black beauty, soul, creativity and vulnerability.
Y’all, I gasped when, after frantically searching for where this magazine came from, I learned it’s a product of Kansas City.
I had no idea this was happening in Kansas City, a place that for so many years prior I had been fleeing in search of a feeling that come to find out blossomed out of the cracks of the concrete.
“It is a conversation. It is heart-felt. It is home,” reads a recent Instagram post promoting ByDesign’s upcoming issue. “Don’t treat this issue like any magazine. This is worth collecting. This is worth holding on to forever. This is your story. Your experience.”
This is my community.
ByDesign is hosting its “HPPY PPL” pop up Friday night to celebrate the launch of the magazine’s latest issue: good drinks, good music, good art, good community.
Around the block
Buck O’Neil finally elected to Baseball Hall of Fame
John Jordan “Buck” O’Neil, the Kansas City Monarchs star player and manager who was passed over for the National Baseball Hall of Fame shortly before his death in 2006, was elected to the hall on Sunday, The Star’s Lynn Worthy writes...
The first Black coach in Major League Baseball, O’Neil spent the majority of his life connected to the game.
He began his playing days as a semi-professional player on the barnstorming circuit before he earned his way into the Negro American League, where he played first base for multiple clubs, but primarily the Kansas City Monarchs.
He registered a career batting average of .288 and batted .300 or better in four seasons. He played in three All-Star Games as well as two Negro World Series despite having his career interrupted for two years during World War II when he joined the U.S. Navy.
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‘A win for Kansas City’: Council passes tenant’s right to counsel. Here’s why it matters
Beyond the block
Actor Jussie Smollett found guilty of lying to police in hate crime hoax
Former “Empire” — also “The Mighty Ducks” — actor Jussie Smollett was found guilty Thursday on five of the six felony counts of disorderly conduct for falsely reporting to Chicago police in 2019 that he was the victim of a hate crime.
Omar Jimenez, Steve Almasy, Bill Kirkos and Ashley Killough report for CNN:
Smollett appeared rigid after the verdict was read in court late in the afternoon. He did not move and was seen gazing straight ahead. His fingers were interlaced and his hands were on the table. He didn’t look at his family or the judge, instead focusing in the direction of the jury.
A disorderly conduct charge for a false crime report is a Class 4 felony and punishable by up to three years in prison and a $25,000 fine. Cook County Judge James Linn will have discretion in imposing a concurrent or consecutive sentence for each count at a later date.
Special prosecutor Dan Webb said at a news conference that he was proud of the jury.
“Mr. Smollett would not have lost this case as he did today unless the jury found that he lied to them,” he said. “The fact that he came up with a completely ridiculous story to explain his misconduct did not apparently have an impact on the jury’s verdict.”
Here, check this too...
These NYC kids have written the history of an overlooked Black female composer
‘This challenge is urgent’: Kamala Harris holds summit to address pregnancy-related deaths
Ethiopia war: UN halts food aid in two towns after warehouses looted
They fled hundreds of miles to escape war in Ethiopia. But they fear it wasn’t far enough.
For the culture
Black and Nonbinary Actors See Representation Gains During Pandemic: Study
According to research from Variety Business Intelligence, representation for Black and nonbinary actors increased significantly in TV and film since the start of the pandemic.
Variety’s Williams Earl writes:
It found that Black talent logged the highest rate of representation gains in episodic TV and film across racial and ethnic lines. Among the gender and LGBTQ breakdowns examined, nonbinary talent logged the biggest overall gains.
The “Entertainment Diversity Progress Report” is part of a larger VBI initiative to create unbiased databases to better track diversity, equity and inclusion goals. Among other highlights from the study:
During the pandemic period, 70.5% of series released during had a Black series regular, up notably 65.8% pre-pandemic. The number of films released with Black talent also increased (58.7% vs. 56.1%)
This one’s for you too...
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This story was originally published December 10, 2021 at 11:44 AM.