🫰 The Finger Heart, my favorite emoticon ( meaning love but cute)
Issue #196: Until you know what you know, 6 days
by Harris Sockel
"Man, what do you think about Kamala Harris?" Luc Olinga asked his barber a few weeks ago.
Olinga is a French-American investigative journalist born and raised in Cameroon. He is interviewing Black men about how to plan voting during the tour swing states across the U.S., sharing observations about the media. “Earlier this year, he felt through email that ‘Black male voters, especially young Black men (with a 19-year-old son), are becoming more skeptical about supporting the Democratic Party.’”
A New York Times/Siena College poll earlier this month found that Trump's support is growing among Black and Hispanic voters. In response, Harris wrote a “opportunity agenda” for Black people. She wrote a 9-page single-spaced document promising money (in the form of forgivable loans for entrepreneurs and aspiring homeowners).
A few weeks ago, Barack Obama stopped by to bluntly talk to Black people about what he saw as a lack of enthusiasm for Harris at Harris's campaign office in Pittsburgh. “As president, she’s a woman,” he said.
Olinga asked his barber, “ Did you see that clip? What did you think?”
His barber, Byron, responded, “Man, why are you lecturing me? Stop it, man… When he was president, he didn’t do much for us Black people. You know what I mean.”
Byron continued:
- “Man, we would look weak with her. Other countries would laugh at us.
A moment of silence.
He seemed to struggle with his own biases and stereotypes.
- “Man, she’s the lesser of two evils. She’s not going to take away rights and stuff that already exist,” he said. “Trump wants to take away rights.”
Some might write this off as unfortunate, but Olinga argues, as he does in another story, that it’s our way of refusing to see what’s beneath the surface. […] These young people think their voices don’t matter. They want equality between men and women, but they think it’s expressed by sacrificing men today.
There’s more to explore in Olinga’s mid profile. And I wonder: what is one thing you think or feel about this election that isn’t reflected elsewhere? What are the deeper issues that seem to make people hesitant to discuss in this election?
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Scott Lamb & Carly Rose Gillis edited and produced this.
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