Man, I'm so psyched to announce our two newest editorial hires:
Thandisizwe Chimurenga, otherwise known as "Thandi" (silent "h", rhymes with
"Fonzi" with a "d" "Blondie"), is a Los Angeles-based writer where she hosts a weekly news and public affairs radio show on the Pacifica Network, writes for several local publications, and is the author of No Doubt: The Murder(s) of Oscar Grant.
She has also contributed to several anthologies: Killing Trayvons: An Anthology of American Violence (2014); and Fertile Ground: Memories and Visions(1996); as well as the forthcoming Black Power Encyclopedia; Why Don't The Poor Rise Up?; Hands Up, Don't Shoot: Essays on the Racialization of Murder; and Who Do You Serve, Who Do You Protect: Police Violence and Resistance in the United States, all scheduled for publication in 2016.
You can learn more about her here:
My hope is that I have written something that will not only give people food for thought but also move them to some type of practical, concrete action. My hope is that people will understand that the blind support that “Dick and Jane” give to the police is nothing more than support for white supremacy – plain and simple, and it has absolutely nothing to do with intention but absolutely everything to do with impact. The legal arena cannot be our sole venue for pursuing and exacting change and justice because the law is not on our side and it never has been. Occasional trials and rulings in our favor don’t change that and Ida B. Wells told us that more than one hundred years ago.
You can read some of her previous writings
here, and can follow here on Twitter at
@idabeewells.
Vann R. Newkirk II hails from the other side of the country, in Silver Spring, MD. The North Carolina native was formerly a policy and data analyst at the Kaiser Family Foundation focusing on health coverage for disadvantaged populations. He has been a freelance journalist and blogger, and is one of the most prominent Black Lives Matter voices on Twitter as
@FiveFifths. He is a co-founder of
Seven Scribes with fellow Daily Kos writer Josie Duffy. And if you want to get a sense of just how amazing a writer he is,
read this.
If you want to write, write. You are a writer. You were made for this time. You are a master of this world, and if you hail from the global underclass or advocate for them, your voice is one of defiance. Most importantly, if you do not tell your truth, there are so few people in this world who will. And this nation and this world cannot change without truth; they cannot become more perfect places without those truths. So we do write to change the world.
Both Thandi and Vann bring an incredible amount of talent and passion to our site, and I couldn't be happier to welcome them aboard. With their presence, Daily Kos has become stronger overnight.