Strange Fruit

A class called "White Racism" started this semester at Florida Gulf Coast University. Its professor, Dr. Ted Thornhill, started getting angry messages and phone calls quickly after the class was announced. Campus police sat in on the class the first week, to watch out for disruptions. Thornhill had gotten message calling him the n-word, and saying things like, "You're what's wrong with this country." But he says the students in the 50-person class seem eager and engaged with the material. Ted Thornhill joins us this week to talk about the class he's teaching, how it fits into his larger sociology work, and how he and his students are dealing with the backlash. And Doc and Jai unpack the Aziz Ansari story from a queer perspective. What can straight, cis people learn from the ways gay and trans people talk about sex, desire, and consent?

This week on Strange Fruit, Louisville activist Talesha Wilson joins us for a news roundup, including Oprah's Golden Globes speech and whether we want her to run for president. We also talk about H&M's racist hoodie and why you need black people on your marketing and design team. And finally, some facts: This is our 227th episode. '227' has one of the best TV theme songs of all time. Ergo, we devote a large portion of this week's show to which black shows have the best theme songs - old school and contemporary.

Happy 2018, y'all! This week we're joined by one of Doc's former students, Chelsie Griffin. Chelsie is now a teacher herself - of 5th graders in Louisiana's Ascension Parish. In her district, corporal punishment is still allowed in school. Chelsie and Doc talk about discipline techniques that work - and don't work - in their respective classrooms. And we all tackle the issue of physical punishment in black households. We also share some hair-raising stories from this past New Year's Eve, and talk about whether resolutions are worth making.

We love the show 'This Is Us.' We also love writer and podcast host Jenn Jackson. So when she wrote a piece calling out 'This Is Us' for what she calls "Black elitism" and anti-blackness, we had to sit up and take notice. Jenn Jackson joins us on this week's show to tell us what she means... and remind us that all our faves are problematic. http://watercoolerconvos.com/2017/12/06/gotta-talk-randalls-classism-patriarchal-behavior-us/

It started with a viral video of Keaton Jones, an 11-year-old boy in knoxville, tennessee. In the video, he's crying and talking about how he was bullied at school. After his mom posted the footage online, celebrities supported him and people started fundraising for his family. It only took a day or two for more of the story to come out: Keaton's mom's motives were called into question, and her old facebook posts showed her posing with confederate flags. This week on Strange Fruit we talk about the post and the backlash. Author Arielle Newton joins us to unpack why why empathy seems to be automatic for white kids, but not so quick for children of color. (http://racebaitr.com/2017/12/12/keaton-jones-black-children-white-sup/#) And we'll also chat with George Johnson about his recent piece, "Fear of the State, Fear of My Home: To Be Black and Queer in America" (https://www.theroot.com/fear-of-the-state-fear-of-my-home-to-be-black-and-que-1821141920?utm_medium=sharefromsite&utm_source=The_Root_facebook)

This week we talk with Tabais Olajuawon about his recent essay, "We Are Not Yours: I’m tired of white women’s racial-sexual terrorism of my BlaQueer body" (https://blackyouthproject.com/im-tired-of-white-womens-racial-sexual-terrorism-of-my-blaqueer/) And we meet Phillipe Cunningham, a special education teacher and black trans man who was just elected to the city council in Minneapolis. (https://www.advocate.com/politics/2017/11/08/trans-man-has-also-been-elected-minneapolis-city-council)

During the 2016 election, when it seemed inevitable the U.S. was on the verge of electing our first woman president, white women covered Susan B. Anthony's grave with "I Voted" stickers.  A nice thought, but it was also white women who helped elect Trump. He got 53% of the white woman vote.  Also, Susan B. Anthony once said she'd rather cut off her right arm than demand votes for "the Negro and not the woman." (Hey SBA - there are black women too.) Evette Dionne, senior culture editor of Bitch Media, joins us this week to talk about the history of white women in the political sphere. She draws a line between suffragettes who left black women behind, to white women of today's #metoo movement leaving behind victims of color.

We know being black in America affects lots of aspects of life. You're likely to make less money than a white person doing the same job. Your kids are more likely to get a harsher punishment at school than a white kid who misbehaved the same way. But a new op-ed by Emory University Professor Benjamin Reiss says there's a disparity at play that you might not even have thought about: sleep. Turns out, race shapes our sleep - and the reasons stretch deep into our country's history. Reiss joins us this week to explain why, and what we can do about it. We also check in with Minneapolis City Council member Andrea Jenkins. Her election victory last month made her the first openly transgender woman of color to be elected to public office. And we'll check in with Jessica Bellamy from Kentuckians for the Commonwealth. They're having a black trivia fundraiser on December 7, and Jessica stopped by to try to stump us with some sample questions!

Our bodies are labelled from the moment we're born, when we're assigned a sex and gender. From that point on, a million stereotypes and expectations are projected on to them. Even in the gay community, where we might not expect heteronormative gender roles to be re-enforced, sometimes our body type determines what "type" of lover people expect us to be. Slender and femme? She probably dates butch women. Tall and muscular? He must be a top. Why is it that we expect people who look a certain way to take on a certain role in the relationship, and in bed? We talk about it this week with Sieta Saudades, who recently wrote a piece for the Black Youth Project called, "We need to talk about gay men using body types to conform to heteronormative gender roles." You can read it here: https://blackyouthproject.com/we-need-to-talk-about-gay-men-using-body-types-conform-heteronormativity/ Also this week, Jai insinuates that Doc likes pumpkin pie better than sweet potato pie because she's from Michigan. Chaos ensues. And Intern Brandon leaves the nest! Find out what grade we gave him and what his plans are after graduation.

A trio of tight-knit auto workers in 2008 always have each other's backs. They're family, operating under the watchful eye of Faye, a butch factory worker-turned-mother figure to the skeleton crew. But this is 2008. The auto industry. And Detroit. So you can probably guess things won't be idyllic for long. Playwright Dominique Morisseau tells the story of what happens to their relationships when rumors circulate that the factory will close. The show is called "Skeleton Crew," and it's running at Actors Theatre of Louisville until Dec. 10. Actor Madelyn Porter, who plays Faye, and the show's director Steve Broadnax join us on this week's show to talk about the story, and what it has to teach us about blue-collar America. And a special guest joins us for Juicy Fruit this week! Levi Haines first discovered Strange Fruit while he was hiking the Pacific Crest Trail through the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range. He sent us a message that he'd listened to over a hundred hours of our show and it kept him feeling connected to his Louisville home.  Levi is in town now between hikes, and we couldn't resist inviting him to the studio! We think you'll love this intrepid fruitcake as much as we do, and you'll be just as amazed at the hiking feat he has planned next.