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“Dear Fellow White People”: An Appeal For Sustained Discomfort
*First posted on UMCLead.com on Feb. 10, 2015. Revised and updated… still unapologetic. #BlackLivesMatter makes a lot of white people uncomfortable. The impulse of many is to soothe us. Please don’t. We need sustained discomfort. There are a lot of people in this nation who have been very uncomfortable for a very long time. Those of…
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The Postmortem Prosecution of Sandra Bland
On February 2, 2016, the world finally got to hear some of the “investigation” interviews concerning the death of Sandra Bland. In audio obtained from the state of Texas and released by the Bland family and their attorneys, an investigator asks inmates who had been in cells close to Sandra nothing of substance beyond repeated…
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Sandra Bland Believed in You
*Cover photo by Lamarcus Feggins, @differentworldimages On January 14, 2015, a bold, brilliant, 28 year old African American woman held a phone up in front of her face and began to speak. “Hey, y’all… so… I don’t know where to look…” she said with a smile that could charm the sting off a bee. Rarely has…
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Congresswoman to DOJ: Investigate Death of Sandra Bland
On December 22, 2015, a politician told the truth. You may not have heard about it. It did not make headlines. Truth, especially the kind that makes people uncomfortable, is not quite as appealing for the news to cover as a white man with a famously pompadour-style comb-over insulting people to the cheers of his fans.…
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The Eyes Behind Us: Final Day of Sandra Bland Grand Jury
*This is the blog you write when your writing pen and your phone are your only form of defense while walking amongst armed men and women, and you hope that somehow those tools can make the people you care about safer. In the third floor Courtroom of the Waller County Courthouse, the Grand Jury finished their discussion…
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The Whistling Sheriff: Sandra Bland Grand Jury
“It wasn’t me. It was her! It was her!,” Sheriff R. Glenn Smith joked, pointing at Officer L. Watts, a female, African American Officer on his force. It was individuals like Officer Watts that Sheriff Smith had referred to repeatedly in the media when arguing that there could not have been any racial component in…
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Pry It Loose: Sandra Bland Civil Trial
“Let me know if I need to pry it loose,” Judge David Hittner said at the December 17th status hearing for the Civil Trial brought by the family of Sandra Bland. “Pry it loose.” It must have been the third time at least that he had used that particular combination of words in his remarks…
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Why You’ve Never Heard Me Say Sandra Bland Was Murdered
You’ve never heard me say that Sandra Bland was murdered. Words are precious to me. I handle them with care. I work with poets who shuffle them around like puzzle pieces on a table until they find just the right fit. I was raised by a man who took the half-page permission slips that my…
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The Creeping Fear of Waller County
There are few vehicles in the world that I am more familiar with than the Waller County Sheriff’s truck. In the 80 consecutive days that we sat in vigil for Sandra Bland outside the Waller County Jail, I lost count of how many times we saw it parked around the side of the building for…
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Open Letter To the Sheriff of Waller County
Dear sir, Last night, for the first time, I looked at one of the articles that was written after you told me to “go back to the Church of Satan that you run.” At the time, I’ll be honest, I was aware that there was a good deal of media taking place around your comments…
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Hannah Adair Bonner 