Noose Nuisance

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


tupac.jpg

So now a noose around a Tupac Shakur statue. Yawn.

Where’s that Yankee exceptionalism and entrepreneurial spirit y’all believe exists only in you? Get fresh, white people ‘cuz we’re starting to suspect that this tired act is pure attention getting. I got five bucks that says these geniuses have black friends and listen to hip hop. And Tupac Shakur?

Exactly which Negroes do you think will get fired up about that; most my age will harrumph, “That boy with the head scarf on and all them tattoos, so called ‘rapping’ ’bout nothin’ but bitches and hoes? Well, they shouldn’t a done it but that boy shoulda pulled his pants up on his behind.” Y’all don’t even know how to strike fear in our hearts anymore, the kind that made us abandon entire regions and neighborhoods in our own hometowns after dark. How sad when the Great White Man, flailing in his growing impotence, finds a way to make blacks put the noose in perspective: Noose, defending hip hop? Noose. Hip hop. Hmmm. What else is in the paper today? There’s a reason why I’m only receiving outraged emails from sites like Thug Life Army and Allhiphop.com. My, how the mighty have fallen.

The only fun we get to have with morons like this is picturing these knuckle-draggers (it takes at least four such simians to work up the courage of an actual human) hitting wikipedia to figure out how to get a noose right. Dude. Was it over then under, or, like, around?

The statue was on the site of the Tupac Amaru Shakur Center For the Arts. The Arts. How about taking the time to remix Don Imus’s comments with this guy’s and set up a few speakers? What are you—lazy? Not too bright?

Or maybe just pointless, too lame to leverage the only thing you had going for you—skin privilege—into the windfall that it still is. If only you weren’t so lazy and stupid. Ah, oh yeah: cowards.

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate