With the new year comes a new mindset, at least according to Lizzo. 

The About Damn Time singer took to Twitter over the weekend to talk to her followers about cancel culture and why she thinks that phrase is being misused. According to Insider, the term became  popular around 2017 and has been used to publicly shun particular “celebrities, brands, companies, and or concepts.” 

In a tweet shared on Jan. 8, Lizzo explained that she feels people have lost sight of what “cancel culture” actually means because of how trendy has become.

Expressing the reason she’s bringing it up, she said it was something in her “heart.” The 34-year-old wrote, “This may be a random time to say this, but it’s on my heart.. cancel culture is appropriation. There was real outrage from truly marginalized people, and now it’s become trendy, misused, and misdirected.”

This may be a random time to say this but it’s on my heart.. cancel culture is appropriation.

There was real outrage from truly marginalized people and now it’s become trendy, misused and misdirected.

I hope we can phase out of this & focus our outrage on the real problems.

— FOLLOW @YITTY (@lizzo) January 8, 2023

Lizzo wrapped up the tweet by stating she hoped that people could start focusing on real-life issues and place their outrage on things that matter. She said, “I hope we can phase out of this & focus our outrage on the real problems.” As the vocalist’s followers viewed the post, opinions regarding the tweet were mixed.

I don't want people to be canceled. I want people to be *held accountable* and to receive consequences according to the bad action/crime that they did. Is this too much to ask? 😅😭

— Kayla B. (@kayla_27) January 8, 2023

One social media user expressed that they aren’t for people getting canceled. However, they would like those parties that have done “bad actions” or “crimes” to be held accountable. The response read, “I don’t want people to be canceled. I want people to be *held accountable* and to receive consequences according to the bad action/crime that they did. Is this too much to ask?”

https://twitter.com/LeenonLee/status/1612246852346478592

At the same time, another person agreed with Lizzo that the phrase cancel culture had lost its significance. They said, “That’s a really great take. I hadn’t thought to look at it like that. And it’s very, very true. The power has gone out of it, and that’s a real loss for marginalized peoples. Brings ‘triggered’ to mind. That’s a very real thing for people with trauma histories. Now it’s a joke.”

https://twitter.com/Teri66859313/status/1612143624933855235

A third Twitter user shared that cancel culture is used to help hold people accountable, just like boycotting. The post read, “I don’t support anything I don’t agree with..period. Whether others feel the same or not is irrelevant. Cancel culture is just a popular term now, there has always been some form of folks attempting to hold others accountable..eg boycotting, etc.”

Since then, Lizzo has yet to follow up on the viral post.

The story of the U.K.’s first Black police officer is coming to the big screen.

Variety reports in an exclusive report that Revelation Films has been given the rights to the autobiography of Norwell Roberts, titled I Am Norwell Roberts. The book, published last June, tells Roberts’ story of joining the Metropolitan Police force in 1967. He became a light of “acceptance” and was looked at as a “change” in Britain. It hit the top 10 on the Amazon charts.

In May 2022, the 76-year-old reminisced with the Daily Mail on how it wasn’t easy being the first Black police officer during those times. “I often find myself disagreeing with people who say Britain is as racist as ever,” Roberts said.

“Anyone who says that has no idea how bad it was to live as a black person in London back then.”

Revelation Films Founder Tony Carne says this film will be important, given the studio’s history. He is referring to its production of the movie about Terrence Higgins, one of the first people in the U.K. to die of an AIDS-related illness. Carne told Variety its only right to do another film based on a British icon.

“It is one of the most inspiring stories we’ve had the honor to develop.”

The film will be a documentary-style feature with plans on extending to script. For the audience to better understand his struggles, producers will use photos, music, and archived news. It will also highlight other key events in the U.K.’s Black community, foreshadowing things that occurred in his life and his 30-year career.

In an op-ed for the Daily Mail, the award-winning retired officer says he was “staggered” by some of the events that occurred during his career’s early stages but knows it could have been anyone.

“In spite of everything, I’m glad it was me.”

There’s been no announcement of the film’s release date.

Pittsburgh Steelers player, Alex Highsmith, apologized for what many considered a classless act from him and a teammate, barely a week after Buffalo Bills player, Damar Hamlin, suffered a cardiac arrest on the football field.

The Buffalo News reported that at the conclusion of the Steelers game against the Cleveland Browns on Sunday, Highsmith sacked the opposing quarterback, Deshaun Watson. In the aftermath of the play, the linebacker remained on his back on the ground. One of Highsmith’s teammates, defensive end DeMarvin Leal, walked over and placed both hands on his chest, seemingly pretending to perform CPR on the linebacker.

Football fans were instantly offended. Many fans took to Twitter to discuss the players’ actions and express their dismay towards Highsmith and Leal behavior.

According to The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Steelers linebacker admitted that the timing wasn’t right and he erred in making the move that he and his teammates had done countless times before.

“I just don’t want people to think of me that way and think I was doing anything [intentionally],” Highsmith told the media outlet. “Because I would never, ever, ever, ever want to do that intentionally, and I never ever would do that.”

“I just want people to know that I have nothing but love for Damar and his family,” Highsmith said. “When that happened, I was shook for a couple days. Me and my wife, we were watching the game, we immediately saw it and intentionally started praying, intentionally prayed for him, his parents, the doctors, the nurses. Because me and her, we’re both followers of Christ. We both believe that prayer is powerful, and I’m just thankful for the miraculous work God has done with Damar’s life. I just want people to know that there was nothing intentional about that. It was never planned, none of that.”

Classless Steelers with the CPR celebration pic.twitter.com/PT0hSPgwGN

— Ben Tylka (@tylkabm) January 8, 2023

Nicki Minaj’s husband Kenneth Petty tried to have his name removed from New York’s sex offender list, but was denied.

Recent paperwork from Brooklyn Federal Court revealed Petty’s failed attempt to have his name taken off the registry, The Daily News reported. Petty was convicted of attempted rape in 1995 for sexually assaulting a 16-year-old girl the prior year.

A lawsuit filed in Brooklyn Federal Court claimed Petty never got the chance to argue being labeled a medium-risk sex offender. His lawyer, Alan Gerson, says Petty wasn’t aware of a 2004 hearing to challenge his status and claims his signature was forged on a document regarding the proceeding.

At the time of the hearing, Petty was serving seven years in state prison after pleading guilty to first-degree murder. However, a court transcript claimed that Petty was present for the hearing and agreed to be listed as a level 2 sex offender.

“We’re not going to contest it,” Petty’s lawyer at the time, Jennifer Michaelson, said in the Dec. 14, 2004 hearing in Queens Supreme Court, according to the court transcript. “I have spoken to the defendant and I’ve explained to him what’s happening here and he is satisfied with the Level 2.”

Public records show Petty wasn’t in state prison until 2006, after his manslaughter conviction in a 2002 homicide. However, Petty’s lawyer claims he was being held on Rikers Island at the time of the 2004 hearing.

On Thursday, Petty requested that his lawsuit be withdrawn. Petty’s lawyer expects the case to be formally withdrawn “in the next week or two.”

Now, lawyers for Petty claim he was young at the time of the hearing and likely confused about whether or not he actually was in attendance or what the hearing was for.

“We were just going according to his statement, what he’s telling us, that he wasn’t present,” Israel Dov, a paralegal at Gershon’s firm said. “He still says that he wasn’t there and maybe someone is putting this together just to get him. I don’t think that he purposely lied to us. I just believe maybe he forgot.”

Last July, Petty was sentenced to three years probation and one year of home confinement for failing to register as a sex offender when he relocated to California to be with his rap superstar wife, The L.A. Times reported.

Nicki Minaj has stood by her husband, despite the criticism she’s received for being married to a registered sex offender. In 2018, she seemingly defended her husband’s on Instagram in a comment that said, “He was 15, she was 16 … in a relationship. But go awf Internet.”

• Diversity, Equality, Inclusion

by Sharelle B. McNair

January 10, 2023

Meet Candice Alcaraz: Wyandotte County’s First Black Female District Court Judge

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At just 32 years old, Candice Alcaraz is already making history. Alcaraz was sworn in on Monday as the first ever Black female district court judge in Wyandotte County, KS.

She fought a good fight during her campaign and beat out incumbent Judge Wes Griffin, receiving 68.8% of the countywide vote in November, according to The Kansas City Beacon. Alcaraz decided to run after noticing that none of the county’s district judges before her looked like her. She remembered going to the third floor of the courthouse and seeing all the judges’ photos. “When I first looked up there, I said, ‘This is nice, but nobody up there is like me.'”

In a county where the judge says the “criminal justice system is mostly white and run by a set of unwritten rules,” she thanked the people she met by going old school and knocking on doors. Alcaraz told KCUR many of them said they had never been approached by a judge running for office.

The former assistant district attorney left her role last week and will begin her historic new role today. Her goal with becoming a judge was to give the courtroom a “more community-oriented perspective” and use community service for sentencing. She is hoping that, in doing so, the judicial system can build on rehabilitation and crime prevention over focusing on punishment, telling The Beacon, “We need to repair society just as much as we are repairing the victims in our cases.”

Being ready for duty, Alcaraz is reminded of the colleagues who told her running was a mistake. They advised her that it’s frowned upon to challenge an incumbent, and sitting judges usually run unopposed in their elections.

“No one is going to tell me when it is my time,” Alcaraz said. “I do not believe in that. Because it can be your time whenever you choose it, not someone else.”

This Black whiskey blender faced racial discrimination at her previous company, leading her towards a mission to make change in the whiskey industry.

After parting ways with the Bulleit distillery in Shelbyville, KY, where she spent several years blending and creating, Alabama A&M University alumna, Eboni Major, one of the first Black female whiskey blenders in the U.S., has released her own bourbon and is building her own company.

According to Robb Report, Major has released her first whiskey since she left Bulleit Bourbon after filing a lawsuit in spring 2022 against parent company Diageo.

As previously reported by BLACK ENTERPRISE, Major filed the lawsuit, alleging unlawful discrimination, disparate treatment, and retaliation.

Major had just released the award-winning Bulleit Blenders’ Select that she produced at the company. However, her new whiskey, the Dread River Master Series, has been produced with Dread River Distilling Co.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Dread River Distilling Co. (@dreadriverco)

Imbibe Magazine reported that Major’s experiences have led her to build her own company, Major Spirits. Although the company is in its early stages, she has committed to amplifying inclusion and equity.

“I want to be able to nurture talent and inspire people and give them tools for whatever success they need,” the Birmingham, AL native said.

Major said she has been approached by Black women students from her alma mater seeking advice on how to break into the whiskey industry.

“[I remember] what it’s like to be in their shoes and to want to enter something but not know how,” Major said. “Making sure that I bring those women along my journey to build Major Spirits is probably the most important thing to me. Not to say, ‘Okay, in three years I’ll come back and I’ll help you out.’ No—I have to take the time now.”

As Major moves along with plans for her company, she has developed a partnership with blender and distiller, Marianne Eaves, where she will be serving as creative director of whiskey company Eaves Blind.

Major has also been named as one of Imbibe Magazine’s 75 People to Watch in 2023.

Reportedly, the lawsuit against Diageo was dismissed and the dispute has been moved to arbitration.

The new, extremely limited, Dread River Master Series whiskey is available now to preorder for $115.

Tyler Perry‘s dreams and aspirations of expanding his corporation appear to be coming to fruition sooner than later. The mogul reportedly acquired additional acres for Tyler Perry Studios. The film production studio opened in 2019 in Atlanta, Georgia, and is currently 330 acres. According to Atlanta Business Chronicle, Perry recently purchased an additional 37 acres for $8.4 million.

The publication states that the 53-year-old plans to add restaurants, shopping, and entertainment centers with the new space. This news comes almost two years after Perry and Bishop T.D. Jakes announced that they were approved to buy 132 acres at Fort McPherson. 

As previously reported by Black Enterprise, Perry would receive 37 acres, while Jakes would get the other 94 acres. Perry said in a statement released to Deadline on June 17, 2021, “Today is a good day. I’m grateful for the opportunity this gives Tyler Perry Studios to extend our footprint in Atlanta and create more opportunities for the people of southwest Atlanta with restaurants, entertainment venues, and other business opportunities.”

The actor added that aside from his project, he plans to collaborate with Jakes on the pastor’s efforts to build affordable housing for families in lower-income communities.

In December 2022, Jakes revealed the other plans he wanted to do with the remaining acres aside from creating affordable housing, which included grocery stores and pharmacies. During the 2022 Hope Global Forums, Jakes claimed this idea came about after looking at the property and noticing that there were no grocery stores nearby but instead things that keep struggling people in poverty.

He said, “The neighborhood behind it is stuck between Tyler Perry Studios and Microsoft, and I can’t find a grocery store in miles. I can’t find a cup of coffee for miles. I can find payday loans places … they target the impoverished for the desperation they have to have money. You can find liquor stores, you can get a Magnum Gold, you can get strip clubs, you can get a whole lot of stuff, but you cannot get a cup of coffee.”

Since then, no additional information regarding Perry and Jake’s projects has been released.

Shanquella Robinson would have been 26 on Monday, Jan. 9 however, instead of turning up and blowing candles out, her family was releasing balloons at her grave site last Sunday.

It’s been almost three months since Shanquella’s tragic death and her family is still looking for answers and an arrest. Her mother, Salamondra Robinson, remembered the 25 birthdays she did get to spend with her daughter. “She would tell you what she wanted for her birthday and that’s what we’d go buy,” her mother told The Charlotte Observer. “She’s smiling down on us.”

Shanquella’s death drew national attention after she was found unresponsive on Oct. 29 while on vacation with friends in Cabo, Mexico. A viral video circulated on social media of a person, believed to be Robinson, being beaten by an accompanying person on the trip. Another person on the trip with her called for help, and a doctor gave Shanquella CPR but was unable to revive her. Less than 15 minutes later, she was declared dead at 3 p.m.

Mario Black of the Million Youth March of Charlotte and Salisbury told The Charlotte Observer that Shanquella won’t properly “rest” until justice is served. “I want to see justice served for this family and for her, so she can rest.”

The FBI and authorities in Mexico have both launched investigations. Officials in Baja California Sur, Mexico said that an arrest warrant has been issued and femicide charges filed against an unnamed female suspect. However, since then, there’s been no confirmation of any of her travel partners being in custody or even been processed for extradition from the United States.

Police records obtained by The Charlotte Observer, including a Spanish to English-translated death certificate, and the stories her family heard from Robinson’s travel companions, conflict on how Robinson died. Her mother said those on the trip with her claimed “she wasn’t feeling well” or she had alcohol poisoning. The reports listed the the cause of death as severe spinal cord injury and atlas luxation.

In the meantime, loved ones are left with final memories of the Charlotte-based hair stylist. Robinson’s cousin, Patrice McMurray, was texting Robinson while she was away in Mexico. She said her death “still doesn’t feel real.” McMurray said she is confident that justice will be served for her cousin, and is happy supporters are still saying her name. “This shows she’s having an impact even though she’s physically not here.”

Several new outlets including the Rolling Stone and The Charlotte Observer have been unable to reach those that were on the trip with Shanquella. Some have since deactivated social media accounts and email addresses.

Dr. Dre doesn’t play when it comes to his music. So it’s no surprise he sent Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) a cease-and-desist letter after she used his song on Twitter.

Celebrating the House speaker win for Kevin McCarthy, Greene took to Twitter, posting a slow-motion video of herself to Dre and Snoop Dogg’s iconic “Still D.R.E.” She captioned the video saying “it’s time to begin.. and they can’t stop what’s coming.”

The west coast legend was not amused. He released a statement, reported by TMZ. “I don’t license my music to politicians, especially someone as divisive and hateful as this one.” The letter, obtained by The L.A. Times, accused Greene of “wrongfully exploiting this work through the various social media outlets to promote [her] divisive and hateful political agenda.” His legal team claimed that “Greene’s use of “Still D.R.E.” constitutes copyright infringement and that the rapper “has not, and will never, grant [Greene] permission to broadcast or disseminate any of his music.”

Since then, the video has been removed from her Twitter page and she’s been locked out of her account. The Georgia representative flipped it on Dre, telling TMZ she “appreciates the creative chord progression,” but she would “never play your words of violence against women and police officers, and your glorification of thug life and drugs.”

Regardless, the cease-and-desist letter requested confirmation that she had agreed with the request, before 5 p.m. on Wednesday. “We’re writing because we think an actual lawmaker should be making laws not breaking laws, especially those embodied in the constitution by the founding fathers,” the letter said.

This isn’t the first time the controversial politician has been restricted from her Twitter account. Just last year, her personal account was permanently suspended after violating the company’s policy regarding Covid-19 misinformation. Since Elon Musk has taken over, she’s back on the site full-time.

https://twitter.com/RepMTG/status/1612552535902154752?s=20&t=qCx7Qe0-BNETC3n_2Rc2lw

Still mocking the Dr. Dre situation, Greene screenshot the TMZ report, posting it Monday, using “The next episode,” the title of a different Dr. Dre song,” as the caption.

Laura Knights, Founder and CEO of Knights Consulting LLC, has launched the research-based Black Woman Leading® professional development program to address the unique needs of Black women leaders.

The program is a virtual learning experience to help mid-career Black women leaders strengthen leadership skills, share and process workplace experiences, and create action plans to meet professional goals.

The three core focus areas addressed in the program are 1) leadership and career development; 2) mental wellness and self-care; and 3) relationship management in the workplace. The program hosts two cohorts per year beginning in August and January.

With over 18 years of experience developing personal and professional development programs, Knights compared her insights from coaching Black women leaders with research detailing their negative workplace experiences and was inspired to create the program. Prior to starting her consulting firm, she served as the only African American woman in senior leadership in a university setting, so she was familiar with the unique isolation that many female leaders face.

Recent research documents this experience well. The State of Black Women in Corporate America report indicates that Black women are having the worst experience of all at work (Lean In, McKinsey & Company 2020), as they are often underpaid, underrepresented in leadership roles, and experience more discrimination. Likewise, the Black Women Thriving Report (Every Level Leadership, 2022) indicated that 88% of Black women report having experienced burnout as a result of unclear job expectations, negative workplace environments, lack of opportunities for advancement, and bad relationships with their managers.

Despite these obstacles, the research indicates that women of color are still motivated to seek higher leadership roles in their organizations. “The data clearly supports the need for unique responses to address the unique needs of women like myself in the workplace. Black Woman Leading® was launched as a timely response to address these issues,” said Knights. Unlike other programs, this one addresses both the professional development and mental wellness components needed to support Black women’s holistic growth.

“Despite negative experiences, our participants still want to grow and develop. But, they want to be honest about the experience they are having when strategizing their next career moves. This concept was created to provide a safe space for our participants to center their experiences as they learn, heal, and grow in their leadership capacity,” said Knights.

As an extension of the program, Knights has also launched a podcast, also called Black Woman Leading, to amplify these conversations that address the holistic needs of women leaders in the workplace who fit this demographic. The brand will host its first in-person retreat called Black Woman Leading LIVE! in May 2023 in Clearwater Beach, FL.

Learn more about the program:
http://blackwomanleading.com/program/

Learn more about the retreat:
https://blackwomanleading.com/retreat/

Listen to the podcast:
https://blackwomanleading.com/podcast/

About
Black Woman Leading® is a research-backed virtual small group learning for mid-career women leaders and managers. The program includes a number of components including completion of a customized leadership development plan with supporting relationship management strategy, individual coaching sessions, group learning sessions, masterminding, a DISC leadership assessment and debrief report, community connection events, access to a vault of on-demand mini-trainings to support learning, and a ticket to an in-person retreat. The parent company of the program is Knights Consulting LLC.