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The Power of "I deserve this"

Authenticity lessons from the WNBA ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

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Is your landlord a robot?

Plus: heroes of a post-Roe world ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

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The Perfect Juneteenth Party

Six Black women describe what freedom feels like

By Rebecca Carroll

Juneteenth belongs to Blackness. Whatever we might know about it as a newly declared national holiday, commemorating the date when enslaved people were free to become citizens and keep their families intact, it is the Blackness of this day in history that reverberates most. And at its core, Blackness will always be about imagining life and joy into existence. 

We asked a handful of Black women we admire to describe what a perfect Juneteenth celebration would look like.   

Brandee Younger's two grandmothers with friends. Courtesy of Brandee Younger

My ideal Juneteenth is…

“Fully experiencing pure joy”

My beautiful grandmother, Caressa, was part of the Great Migration. She moved up north around 1924, and built a life for herself on Long Island. After church on Sundays, she’d drive into Harlem just to people-watch. She loved the sharp outfits, the fancy cars, the laughs and greetings exchanged on crowded sidewalks— a “Good day!” here,  an "Alright now!" there.

My perfect Juneteenth would bring her, my great-aunt Carrie-Bell, my sister, and generations of maternal ancestors to New Orleans. We’d spend the day on the porch of a grand old Esplanade Avenue home in rocking chairs, nestled among lush plants, iced tea in hand, watching the world go by just as my grandmother once did in Harlem.

The streets would be alive with music, color, laughter and possibility. We’d watch people in what I like to call their “gadabout season”—talking, eating, dancing, joyful in every step. At some point, Aunt Carrie-Bell would remind us to “keep the doors open,” and we’d do just that: remain open to one another, open to joy, open to possibility. A reminder, or perhaps a demand, to move through the world with a softness and freedom.

Finally, generations of Black women with nothing to carry.  That’s my ideal Juneteenth.

—Brandee Younger, harpist, composer and educator

 

The Black Tea party burlap sack from a 2020 Juneteenth celebration in Oakland. (Courtesy of Natalie Baszile)

My ideal Juneteenth is…

An atmosphere pulsing with hope and possibility

The year before Juneteenth became a national holiday, I celebrated June 19th in Oakland, California, where I moved from San Francisco in 2020. My husband, an attorney for more than 25 years at that point, was getting restless. He took the same bus to and from work every day, ate at the same lunch spots, saw the same people. “I want to do something different,” he said. “I need to switch things up.” At the same time, we’d both noticed how much San Francisco had changed. Too many tech bros. Too much traffic. So many creative people had been priced out of the city. But worst of all, San Francisco’s Black population had dwindled to less than five percent. The place felt sterile and homogenous, void of culture and flavor.

For years, we’d heard folks rave about Oakland. “Oakland is cool,” they’d say. “Oakland is creative.” Our last child had gone off to college and we were empty nesters, suddenly free to move wherever we chose. So when my husband pitched the idea of moving across the bridge, I agreed.

Oakland pulled out all the stops when Juneteenth became a federal holiday in 2021. Thousands of people came out to celebrate, gathering around Lake Merritt, the Oakland’s version of Central Park, to picnic and barbecue in the grass. From the tents set up along the sidewalk, merchants peddled Louisiana hot links and vegan soul food, roasted coffee, handmade jewelry and bolts of African mud cloth. 

People roller-skated and line-danced. A Black equestrian club paraded their horses down the middle of the street. The air was spiced with incense and weed. The atmosphere pulsed with hope and possibility. The vibe was relaxed and easy. The mood, one of unbridled joy, Black pride, love and community.

Everyone was your cousin. Everyone was family. I don’t have to imagine my perfect Juneteenth because that day, I experienced it.

—Natalie Baszile, Author of Queen Sugar, and Friends and Family

 

Kemi Ilesanmi (center) with her sister (left) and mother (right) in front of the Harriet Tubman mural in Cambridge, Maryland. (Courtesy of Kemi Ilesanmi)

My ideal Juneteenth is…

Drinking red Kool-Aid on sacred ground

I imagine my perfect Juneteenth celebration taking place in eastern Maryland, my home state. I’m in Dorchester County to be exact, Harriet Tubman’s place of birth and where she first imagined freedom—stubbornly, prophetically, and communally. This is sacred ground. On the side of the Harriet Tubman Museum and Educational Center in Cambridge, Maryland, there is a beautiful and periodically-viral mural that depicts Ms. Harriet with her hand outstretched to catch us, hold us, and guide us across time and tribulations. I can see a joyous group of Black people gathered there to honor her vision for us all to be free and whole. We are dancing, singing, laughing, and playing as we drink red Kool-Aid on sacred ground. Because trouble don’t last always. Ashe.

—Kemi Ilesanmi, diaspora arts builder

 

My ideal Juneteenth is…

A day filled with flowers, rich history, and loved ones

My ideal Juneteenth celebration is centered on food and fellowship. I’m welcoming friends and family, and we’ve chosen a theme for the day (because no Black family gathering is complete without a theme!) We’d select a vibrant color that would reflect both pride and celebration. Our favorite songs are playing all day, and I’ve decorated the house with fresh flowers inspired by the incredible flower wagons that were once part of historic Juneteenth parades. 

I love to cook, so I’d have fun prepping the recipes passed down through generations: the meat for barbecue and fried fish, then getting to work carefully washing fresh collards, frying cabbage, and peeling potatoes for my homemade potato salad, and prepping my secret recipe candied yams. I’d make my whipped cream pound cake and peach pie, praying that the texture and consistency of both are just right, fretting over perfection just like my mother and grandmothers once did. During the celebration, our meal would be loud and boisterous; food, laughter, music, and conversations would become imprinted on the hearts of my guests because food fuels connection and memory.

For me, the perfect Juneteenth is a celebration of heritage, resilience, and the bonds that unite generations. Juneteenth always makes me grateful and leaves me feeling deeply connected to the legacy we carry forward.

—Dr. Blair E. Kelley, scholar and author of Black Freedom: A Visual History of Juneteenth and Emancipation Days 

 

My ideal Juneteenth is…

A party in the park where “we just keep dancing”

The most perfect Juneteenth happens in Fort Greene Park. House music pumps through the speakers as a sea of bodies sway in sync. Just as the day becomes almost too hot, the sky opens up and rain pours down. It smells of wet pavement, sweat, and incense. Nobody runs. We just keep dancing. The music continues, the crowd cheers. And then the sun comes out again. There is nothing more powerful than a collective intention, and when the intention is joy and pride and celebration and veneration, nothing can go wrong. 

—Satchel Lee, photographer and filmmaker

 

My ideal Juneteenth is…

Getting a signal that family is freedom

I know little to nothing about my Black birthfather beyond what the white people who cast him out of my life told me. None of it was good, and most of it was racist. He died before I could fully see him separate from the way whiteness had described him to me, but I think about him all the time. I have just two pictures of him, both from when he was in his late twenties. I did meet him, finally, at an Au Bon Pain in Cambridge, Massachusetts, 23 years after those photos were taken. He looked nothing like the man in the pictures. Time, loneliness, being unhoused, out of steady work, health issues, and just being a Black man in America had all visibly aged him. 

Rebecca Carroll's birthfather in Boston, Massachusetts, circa 1969. (Courtesy of Rebecca Carroll)

I saw him two more times after that, before moving to New York to start my life and career. Memorably, the second of the two, and the last time I saw him alive, we met at a restaurant in Cambridge that played jazz and afro-funk music at night. This time my then-boyfriend came with me. It was around Christmastime, and my birthfather had come with gifts he almost certainly could not have afforded. But the sheer joy in his face as he gave them to us was like a beacon in the dark crowd. 

And I realized that his generosity made him feel free. Free from the way he had been mischaracterized by whiteness. Free from the shame of being banished from his infant daughter’s life without comment or question. Free from the constant, dull ache he described from growing up in foster care and government housing, without any family at all. Now he had family. And family was freedom.     

In the program from my birthfather’s memorial service, it was written that “he cherished the memory of a daughter.” My most perfect Juneteenth celebration would be to get some sort of signal, on June 19th, that his memory of me is wrapped in the freedom he felt when he bestowed those Christmas gifts, and knew that he had finally found family. 

—Rebecca Carroll, editor-at-large, The Meteor

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Three Questions About...Animal Sex

Perrin Roosevelt Ireland’s new book about nature’s “horndogs” is a wild and feminist ride.

By Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson

Did you know that climate change is causing the albatross divorce rate to spike? Or that lionesses have sex 100 times when in heat? Perrin Roosevelt Ireland’s new illustrated book, Poking the Squid: What We Can Learn From Animal Sex, will teach you everything you had no idea you didn’t know about how non-humans do it. Ireland is an artist and environmentalist whose book is an utterly delightful journey through the animal kingdom, brought to life with her effusive watercolor drawings. We asked Ireland about animals’ pleasure, sexual orientation, and gender behavior—and how these things intertwine with feminist and queer theory. (They do!)

One of the things I most appreciate about this book is how scientifically rigorous it is. You interviewed more than 50 scientists, and read hundreds of peer-reviewed papers. What’s the wildest thing you learned while researching? 

We could do more rigorous reassessing of evolutionary theories, specifically sexual selection theory. For example, Kaya Tombak, an evolutionary biologist, said to me that we've never actually studied whether egg cells are more energetically intensive to make in the body than sperm cells. 

We assume the animal that makes eggs is more invested in the fate of the offspring, wants to have sex less frequently, and is going to energetically protect her body. Victorians were the ones generating the initial theory that, like Darwin, sets up these gender roles that we repeat and replicate and project onto animals: female animals that are coy, less interested in sex, and want to take care of babies. And you have males that want to wander the globe and shoot their shot because sperm's easy to make. This set of assumptions comes up over and over again in the way we talk about animals. So I started asking each of the researchers whether [those assumptions] had been assessed in [the species they study]. And often they would say, "No, and I don't even know how you would design that experiment."

Monkey throuple anyone? (Courtesy of Perrin Roosevelt Ireland)

One theme of the book is that earlier researchers were also blinded by their own heteronormativity. Then, over time, we’ve learned that actually there is incredible sexual diversity across the animal kingdom. So what can humans learn from animal sex? More specifically, what can we learn from animals about how to have better sex? 

I think we can learn that sexual diversity is biodiversity, that “all God's critters got a place in the choir.” Animals don't kill each other when they change sex countless times across a lifetime [as some fish and amphibians do]. They don't harm each other or remove each other from communities if they're carrying a multiplicity of sexes in one body [as banana slugs and earthworms do]. They are partaking of pleasure without judgment. And they are sexual geniuses. Life has come up with astoundingly inspiring ways to keep making more of itself.

And I love the “better” question because better for who? What works for me, what is better for me, might not be for another animal, given what they need in their evolutionary history and for their species to thrive. Like, dolphins can teach us better oral sex because they are echolocating on each other's genitalia. And dolphins can access frequencies far beyond the scope of human hearing. So we can't even imagine how pleasurable that might be. And then you pair that with more recent developments of understanding how innervated and complex the dolphin clitoris is and how large it is, and that's quite a compelling combination.

My first exposure to your work was being charmed by your deadpan Instagram videos where you hula hoop while explaining the sexual behaviors of various species. But before that, you worked at the Natural Resource Defense Council for a decade, and the majority of what you post on social media is about habitat conservation. Help us connect these dots between animal sexual diversity and conservation. 

It's pretty hard to be an animal lover during a sixth mass extinction. Part of why I talk a lot about animals to people is to not be alone with that. It's so excruciating to me every day. And I can't talk about my joy in finding out how much sex a lioness has when she’s in heat, which is so fun, without talking about habitat loss and climate change. We are currently making impossible the kinkery we celebrate in this book. I can't talk about albatross monogamy without talking about how much plastic they're living in. I can't talk about a 50-pound elephant dick without talking about how the savanna's gone. I can't talk about seal lesbian relationships without talking about how fur seals got listed as endangered after this book went to the printer.

The environmental movement's communication for my whole lifetime has been about loss, about despair, about stemming tides of harm, and not as much focused on the beautiful world we want. How do I invite people in, in a planetary crisis, to this sense of resilience and ability to act from a place of love? I just want to provide people an opportunity to get a giggle and then take an action on behalf of the horndogs that they most admire in the book.

 


Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson is a marine biologist, teacher, and author of What If We Get It Right?: Visions of Climate Futures.

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A Bipartisan Attack on Women

Plus: lessons from nature's "horndogs" ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

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In Peru, a High-Stakes Election for Women

BY LORENA PROCHAZKA

Women’s rights under attack. Hard-won gains rolled back. A political agenda moving steadily backward. Sounds familiar? As Donald Trump’s administration chips away at women’s freedoms in the United States, women inhabit a similar battlefield a few thousand miles to the south in Peru, where I am based as a journalist. Heading into the final stretch of a deeply polarizing presidential election, we find ourselves stuck between a rock and a hard place.

After a chaotic first round, the runoff has come down to an unexpected contender and an infamous veteran, respectively: leftist Roberto Sánchez and right-wing Keiko Fujimori. After initially trailing Sánchez, Fujimori—a woman—has clawed back to a lead of around 30,000 votes. Though the race remains open, with 99% of ballots counted, each update makes it more likely that Fujimori, who has run four times, will finally win.

At first glance, the candidates couldn’t seem more different: Fujimori’s Fuerza Popular (FP) carries a legacy of human rights violations linked to her father, president-turned-dictator Alberto Fujimori. Sánchez’s Juntos por el Perú (JP) promises to defend human rights while positioning the candidate as heir of socialist ex-president Pedro Castillo. 

But here’s the rub: Neither party appears to have women’s interests at heart. Peru is following a global trend of setbacks in women’s rights amid rising conservative pressures, but in our case the trend pops up across the political spectrum. As former Minister for Women and Vulnerable Populations Marcela Huaita tells The Meteor, those advocating for human rights are "no longer pursuing a progressive agenda, but one of resistance.” 

Presidential candidate Keiko Fujimori speaks to the press after the release of the first quick-count results (Photo by Klebher Vasquez/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Peru is already at a point where reports of femicide have increased, and thousands of sexual abuse cases have gone unpunished. To make matters worse, current president José María Balcázar has defended child marriage and normalized sexual relationships between teachers and students. 

Huaita sees “no ground for optimism.” We already know what FP stands for, she points out: It opposes same-sex marriage, abortion even in the case of rape, and comprehensive sex education, which FP charges will “homosexualize” children. FP has a natural ally in ultra-conservative Renovación Popular (RP). Together, they’re just one vote away from a Senate majority. And RP passed a law that eliminates “gender perspective”—a framework used to address gender inequality, gender-based violence, and sexual and gender diversity. 

It's not just a matter of rhetoric: This law removes the concept of gender from all legislation, obscuring how gender-based power dynamics drive violence and discrimination, Huaita explains. It limits access to comprehensive sexual education, health and reproductive rights; it means even more impunity for abusers and less support for survivors. It also sends an important institutional message: Women are not a priority.  

The new administration will decide whether to preserve or dismantle the “gender perspective” framework. But it’s not as if a Sánchez presidency would have necessarily saved the project: Both Fujimori’s and leftist Castillo’s party supported the law eliminating it. 

And Peru’s left has not always aligned with progressive positions on gender issues. For instance, Pedro Castillo opposed the gender-equality approach in education. Sánchez, who claims to be his political heir, has sent mixed signals on women’s rights. After criticism over the absence of gender-focused policies during his first campaign, he presented a revised government plan expanding on them. But just a day earlier, he had signed a commitment to an evangelical church emphasizing "family, life, and religious freedom.” His political friendships also raise some questions. Ricardo Belmont, president of the OBRAS party, which backed Sánchez ahead of the runoff, stated that “legalizing abortion will allow me to shoot anyone who accesses it.” Meanwhile, Antauro Humala, leader of a radical nationalist-socialist movement—once a close ally whom Sánchez has since distanced himself from—is openly homophobic.

Peru’s women had a bad candidate and a worse candidate to choose for president—and it looks like the worse candidate has won. But no matter what comes next, it’s clear they’ll have to wage a battle for women’s rights on their own terms, regardless of political party.

 


Lorena Prochazka is a journalist and documentary producer at Pacha Films. She specializes in documentary research, development and production of human-centered stories across Latin America.

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This "stupid" journalist did some math

Trump's freak outs, by the numbers ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

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Let's Take This Outside

The never-ending work to diversify the great outdoors 

By Shannon Melero 

Rockland State Park, nestled in Upper Nyack, New York, was a summertime staple of my youth. Every year, my family would pile into a car with coolers, chairs, bags of charcoal, and enough groceries to feed a small army and make the hourlong sojourn from the Bronx first thing in the morning to secure a spot on the grass. Location was everything. We needed a flat surface to set up games and blankets, but also had to be close to one of the grills the park provided, and most importantly, we needed to be a reasonable walking distance from the park’s massive pool. 

I didn’t realize it at the time, but those trips to Rockland were my first introduction to the great outdoors, a relationship which years later would blossom into a love of hiking and staring at trees. 

Shannon's family at Rockland State Park in 2016. (Courtesy of Cindy Melero)

What made Rockland such a comfort was that everywhere I looked, I saw families that mirrored my own. Huge groups of Latine and Black people gathered around decaying wooden picnic tables, laying out tubs of familiar foods our matriarchs had cooked the night before—potato salads; three different preparations of rice; pork; and pasteles, all of which would be handed out at dinnertime. Rockland was a full-day experience from sunup to dusk.

But like many outdoor locales that attracted urbanites of color, Rockland State Park was segregated up until the late 1950s, so the fact that I saw so many families of color in one area wasn’t mere happenstance. It was, historically speaking, where we had been gathering all along. 

The idea of “public lands” goes back as far as the 1780s, when states began ceding land rights to the newly formed federal government. Since that time, the idea of who gets to be outside, where, and when has been racially inflected. While the restrictions have now changed—anyone can travel or pay a fee and go to any national or state park—their impact lingers. In 2025, outdoor publication The Trek found that 96% of long-distance hikers on the Appalachian Trail were white. Meanwhile, the Trump administration has enacted its own efforts to make the outdoors white again. 

“I always say that white people were really onto something when they invented the great outdoors and then gatekept it,” Chevon Linear, co-founder of Black People Outside, tells me. Chevon, who goes by Chevy, is warm and inviting, even through the computer screen that separates us. Chevy was a Girl Scout as a child but notes that, “The outdoors were really deemed as ‘white people shit.’” It’s a common term we use when referring to the outdoors, and while it’s often said in a joking manner, it’s a genuine phenomenon. For much of American history, going outside for leisure was a privilege—a prohibitively expensive one that has now become a trillion-dollar industry by catering mostly to white, affluent outdoor enthusiasts. 

Chevy and Kameron at Hocking State Park in Logan, Ohio. (Courtesy of Black People Outside)

Chevy founded Black People Outside with her fiancé, Kameron Stanton, after an impromptu trip to Grand Teton, a national park in Wyoming, six years ago. The couple, who had never camped before, traveled with one of Chevy’s friends, who loaned them all of the gear they needed. Kameron called the experience “spectacular.” 

“The true dark night sky, the energy from everyone around you…everyone was just so nice,” he recalls. “And it's like, dang, outdoors got everyone acting friendly.” 

For Chevy, who had traveled all over the world before the pandemic, that night in Grand Teton sparked a calling. “Just seeing the stars, I was crying,” she recalls. “I had never seen the sky like that. It was truly quiet and I’d never heard it so quiet before.” But what she didn’t see were many other Black people. “I’m from Chicago, so I’m used to seeing Black people everywhere I turn,” she says. Witnessing the beauty of nature and the profound silence that brought her peace. She knew she had to share the experience with more people. 

“I just feel like we have these irrational fears about the outdoors because of our past,” Chevy says. “As Black people, we were outside because we were escaping, running through the woods for survival. It wasn’t for joy.”  

As Chevy and Kameron embarked on their mission, forming what would eventually become Black People Outside, they came across the same barriers that many communities of color face: limited access to green spaces, high costs, and that age-old idea that going outside was just more white people shit. Then, as with so many things, there’s the barrier of representation. In 2018, a writer at the University of Toronto described advertising around the outdoors as “visual apartheid.” Chevy, at least, had the Girl Scouts when she was young, but Kameron says he had no sense of Black people in the outdoors at all until he reached adulthood. “I remember growing up watching TV, the only people that was on there hiking and being outside and skiing…was white people and Dora [the Explorer],” he says. “She was in the streets with the backpack, and I was there with her. But the reality is Black people [not seeing themselves represented] contributes to the disconnect that we sometimes have with nature.”

Chevy and Kameron refer to all of these as invisible barriers, most of which they’ve been able to overcome through educational programming, community outreach, and working with brands to provide gear to those without. But one additional extremely visible barrier has many outdoors people reconsidering their plans for the summer: the Trump administration. 

In his second term, Trump rolled out massive budget cuts to the National Park Service, changed admission costs for non-U.S. citizens, and relaxed hunting regulations, which puts both forest animals and backcountry hikers in more danger. Then there are the non-park-related factors that have made it more difficult than usual to just go outside as a person of color—ICE, emboldened white supremacists, and most recently, gas prices. Outside isn’t just reverting to white people shit; it’s turning into wealthy white people shit. 

The founders of Black People Outside, though, refuse to flinch. 

Kam and Chevy hiking El Yunque in Rio Grande, Puerto Rico. (Photo by Jean Charles)

“I’m gonna do what I wanna do and go where I wanna go, and I want our people to have that same energy,” Linear says. “National parks are not the only place to recreate. We still have state parks, we have county parks. We are going to be outside.” For Linear, it’s not a euphemism or a business slogan; it’s a fact. She will not be pushed back indoors, and she is adamant that no other outdoorsperson feels alone or unsafe. 

Although Chevy, Kameron, and I are speaking with each other for an interview and are complete strangers, our mutual love of the outdoors creates a level of comfort. I share with them stories of hiking with my daughter. We laugh about the time I misread a map and had to scramble down an enormous rock with a one-year-old on my back and my mother —who vows she will never do that trail with me again—yelling at me for dragging her out to the wilderness. I relay my fears and discomfort over what this summer may hold as I try to go outside with my daughter, to create the same kinds of core memories my mother made for me all those years ago at Rockland State Park, before I ever had to wonder if the hiker next to me questioned if I belonged on a trail. 

“You have to attack ignorance with your presence,” Kameron says. “Ain’t nothing going to change if you end up hiding.” 

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The Make America Married Again Era

Plus: wtf Graham Platner ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

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Welcome to the Childcare Thunderdome

Plus: you must see this movie ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

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