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She Reported The News And Fought To Change It: Honoring Ida B. Wells At 163

info@blaqly.com — Wed, 16 Jul 2025 17:41:48 +0000

Source: Interim Archives / Getty

Today would have been the 163rd birthday of journalist and civil rights activist Ida B. Wells.

I think about the defining journalism of Ida B. Wells most often when I find myself ensnared by the clickbait that makes up so much of the coverage about Black people and Black life in America. There’s nothing wrong with the escapism of that writing. We need the respite, Lord knows. But we also need–and deserve–so much more.

We deserve the whole of our lives documented truthfully. We deserve to know the everyday of our stories, including the real and often hard on-the-ground stories, the ones that we want so badly to end, but the ones we will only be able to end if we know the truth and the power that comes in working together in the name of that truth, in the name of our deepest need for freedoms that have never been the regular feature of Black America’s lives.

Ida B. Wells, born into slavery in Holly Springs, Mississippi on July 16th 1862, anchored us almost single-handedly to that truth. Beginning at least by 1890, Wells made it her mission to accurately document the terrorism of lynching in America. “The people must know,” she said, “before they can act, and there is no educator to compare with the press.”

Ida B. Wells’ Home In Chicago Source: Raymond Boyd / Getty

Wells published her own pamphlets, including Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in all its Phases and The Red Record, co-owned and reported her own newspaper, Memphis Free Speech and Headlight, and eventually her work was carried in Black-owned papers across the nation.

Wells not only recorded the fact that human beings were being killed, but also ensured that Americans knew that the dead were not, as characterized by white America, people guilty of crimes for which they were deserving of death. Their crime was the fact of their humanity, their lives and breaths, their dreams and labors, their loves.

Moreover, Wells applied sociological reasoning–science–to the occurrences of lynching, naming them as acts of terror that targeted Black people because whites feared the competition that newly freed and free-born African Americans might pose. African Americans, after all, did the work and knew the land better than the whites who’d become so accustomed to giving orders, rather than by understanding the details of those orders.

RELATED CONTENT: Ida B. Wells Now Has Her Own Barbie Doll

Source: ANASTASIIA SOLOVEVA / Getty

The appreciation we have today for the vile and varied presentations of white supremacy can be traced back to many of our ancestors, Ida B. Wells chief among them. Every time we protest, through tears, the loss of another loved one to the white supremacy that drives the deadly actions of police and their civil counterparts, we are leaning upon the work Ida Wells committed her life to.

But had white America–and even some Black men—had their way, we would never have known her name, let alone her work to end lynching, often produced alone and regularly under threat of death. White mobs destroyed her newspaper’s office in 1892.

And as the scholar Paula Giddings who wrote Wells’ award-winning biography, Ida: A Sword Among Lions noted, she “was surprised and disappointed to find that, despite her pioneering role as an anti-lynching activist and a founder of the NAACP, her name was not included in a contemporary Black history text by Carter G. Woodson, the ‘Father of Negro History.’”

But none of these acts deterred her. “Through journalism,” Wells declared, she found her truest self. And in her discovery of herself, she allowed us, generations on, to also discover ourselves. We who are journalists in particular walk a road paved for us by Wells, for whom there were no mirrors, no roadmaps, no examples to follow.

There were no computers, no central databases tracking police killings, no images of brutally slain young people like Emmett Till or Michael Brown to pull up and refer to. Wells—investigator, journalist, publisher, repository and archivist—was the thing itself. Telling the stories of us that are written with the sharp edges of our shattered hearts, Ida B. Wells was her own encyclopedia–and now ours.

We are her heirs.

Source: The Washington Post / Getty

And over more than two-and-a-half decades in journalism, I have seen that inheritance displayed by us with stunning beauty in the pages of Essence, the New York Times, Ebony, the Washington Post, and here, at iOneDigital, where my colleague and friend, Kirsten West Savali is vice-president. I came to know Kirsten nearly 10 years ago through her powerful bylines about how Black Americans experience race in this country. Her work made me refer to her as the Ida B. Wells of our time. She was covering the intricacies and unspoken stories of our lives, no one wanted to tell. Black lives mattered to her before and after the hashtag and movement.

For this story, West Savali offered that,

Ida B. Wells-Barnett taught me that not only can I be both righteous and rigorous, but that, as a Black woman writer from Mississippi, I have a duty to be. She is the blueprint for those of us who write and report on white supremacy, sexual and state violence, and modern-day lynchings carried out by police officers across this nation

There is an image of her I love. In it, she’s holding onto her books—her paper and pen at the ready. Her eyes are tired, but focused. She’s willing us to keep going. Keep telling our stories. Keep digging, keep fighting, keep doing the work.

Her great-granddaughter, Michelle Duster, once shared with me that her matriarch was tough because she had to be—because she loved her people that much. What an honor it is not just to learn from the inimitable and brave Ida B. Wells-Barnett, but to celebrate her entire life, and her deep, unyielding love for us.

Which is why today, July 16th, the day of her birth 163 years ago, should be a day we mark on calendars, a day when we take a moment to acknowledge that we are here, in part, because she was there.

RELATED CONTENT: Historic Ida B. Wells Statue Unveiled In Downtown Memphis
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#SayHerName: Saniyah Cheatham’s Family Hires Attorney Ben Crump To Investigate Teen’s Death In NYPD Custody

info@blaqly.com — Wed, 16 Jul 2025 17:24:41 +0000

Earlier this month, an 18-year-old Black woman was arrested in the Bronx. Hours later, authorities found her unconscious in her holding cell, and she ultimately died. According to a medical examiner, the teen died by suicide after hanging herself with her sweater, but her family isn’t buying it, and they’ve hired famed civil attorney Ben Crump to see them through their pursuit of transparency and justice.

Source: Thomasina Cheatham via Facebook / Thomasina Cheatham via Facebook

According to Gothamist, Bronx native Saniyah Cheatham was pronounced dead on July 5, after she was taken to Lincoln Hospital from the New York Police Department’s 41st Precinct stationhouse in Longwood, where multiple officers performed CPR on her while waiting for an ambulance to arrive. It’s unclear what the circumstances were surrounding Cheatham’s arrest, but the New York Times reported last week that she was booked on an assault charge.

On Monday, the Cheatham’s family, joined by Crump, held a press conference outside the stationhouse, where they accused authorities of being less than forthcoming with information on Cheatham’s death outside of the ruling that she killed herself. Crump said during the conference that he planned on “exploring every possible legal remedy to get to the truth.”

“It is a hypocritical dynamic where you have the video, you know what happened, but you’re gonna make this family have to go through all kinds of hoops and hurdles to find out what happened to their daughter,” he said.

Cheatham’s family previously denied statements made by Bronx police officials that the teen hanged herself — statements that, according to the Times, were made before the medical examiner made an official cause of death ruling. Her mother, Thomasina Cheatham, said her daughter was in good spirits on the Fourth of July, the day she was arrested, when she was at a barbecue with relatives. Thomasina also noted that she was not wearing a sweater at the time as it was July.

“ I just want to know what happened to Saniyah,” Thomasina said Monday, describing her daughter as “bright, independent, smart and outgoing.”

“That was my only daughter and she didn’t deserve this.”

Now, the family seems to be more open to the possibility that Cheatham, indeed, hung herself in her cell, but there’s still the issue of the jail surveillance video that they’re reportedly not being allowed to see.

“We’re not saying it’s impossible, but it does make you scratch your head,” Crump said. “It is not adding up to the family. That’s why they want to see the video.”

Crump’s office also released the following statement on Sunday:

“Saniyah Cheatham was an 18-year-old with her whole life ahead of her. I commend her mother, Thomasina, for her courage in standing up to demand the truth. How could this happen to a young woman in police custody? Why wasn’t her safety ensured by those charged with her care? No mother should be left in the dark after her child dies in police custody. We demand full transparency and accountability for this grieving family.”

Cheatham’s case is eerily similar to that of Sandra Bland, who was found dead in her jail cell in Waller County, Texas, in 2015, after a confrontation with a police officer during a traffic stop.

When Black people die under mysterious circumstances, especially while in the custody of law enforcement, and family and community members are told it was a suicide, it’s unreasonable to expect it to be accepted without full and swift transparency.

Rest well, Saniyah Cheatham, and may you and your family receive justice.

If you or someone you know is considering suicide, please contact the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline by dialing 988, text “STRENGTH” to the Crisis Text Line at 741741 or go to 988lifeline.org.
The post #SayHerName: Saniyah Cheatham’s Family Hires Attorney Ben Crump To Investigate Teen’s Death In NYPD Custody appeared first on Bossip.

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‘TIME II’ Isn’t Just a Sequel—It’s A War Cry For Black Families Still Caught in the System [Exclusive]

info@blaqly.com — Wed, 16 Jul 2025 16:08:51 +0000

Source: Courtesy of Fox and Rob Rich

On Juneteenth 2025, the story that shook audiences to their core in the Oscar-nominated documentary TIME found its continuation in a new film, TIME II: Unfinished Business. Directed by Sibil Richardson—known widely as Fox—the follow-up to Garrett Bradley’s acclaimed 2020 work is bigger than a sequel. It’s a cinematic campaign, an archive, and a political call to action.

This new chapter follows Fox and her husband, Robert Richardson (Rob), as they return to the battleground of Louisiana’s carceral system. While TIME chronicled the family’s 21-year fight to bring Rob home, TIME II confronts the heartbreak, resistance, and strategy that emerge in their mission to free their nephew and co-defendant, still imprisoned in the same system that tried to steal Rob’s life.Ontario, the couple’s nephew, was arrested alongside Rob during the same incident in 1997. While Rob was granted clemency in 2018 after serving 21 years, Ontario remains incarcerated—serving an even longer sentence under Louisiana’s notoriously harsh sentencing laws. His continued imprisonment is at the heart of TIME II: Unfinished Business, which reframes the narrative from personal victory to collective accountability. “When Rob came home from prison, we had no idea how we would be able to secure [Ontario’s] freedom,” Fox said. “But we knew it would be imminent.

RELATED CONTENT: The Gate Of The Exonerated Is Justice Realized

(L to R) Ontario and Rob / Source: Courtesy of Fox and Rob Rich

“This film… we consider it a movement,” Fox told MadameNoire in an exclusive interview. “Unlike many documentaries that you see when others are telling our stories, one, this film is led by the formerly incarcerated. It is my directorial debut. This was an opportunity for us to tell our story.”

Freedom ain’t a fairytale.

Fox and Rob’s story is deeply personal. In 1997, financial devastation pushed the couple to make a desperate decision: they robbed a credit union in an attempt to recover the savings lost when a business deal collapsed. Rob was sentenced to 61 years, despite agreeing to an 18-year plea deal. Fox, newly released from a short prison stint herself, picked up a camera and began documenting the moments their children would otherwise have to navigate without their father.

That raw footage became the emotional foundation for TIME, a project that catapulted their story to global attention. But Fox was clear in our interview: TIME II was necessary because the fight wasn’t over.

“When many people thought that what had happened already was enough,” she explained, “for me as the director on this project, it was about really… we owe [audiences] to share how did we get Rob out? How did he come home? How did his liberation come about?”

What the sequel makes plain is that liberation isn’t passive. “Freedom is not a fairytale, and freedom ain’t free,” Fox emphasized. “It was about really being able to show people what we did with freedom.”

That understanding became the heartbeat of the film and the engine behind the couple’s latest mission: the #TimeIIWatch campaign. They set out with a goal to mobilize 1 million people to watch the film and engage in a new movement for freedom.

Louisiana, the carceral capital.

In the national conversation about mass incarceration, Louisiana is a far cry from a footnote. It’s a headline.

As of 2022, Louisiana had the highest rate of imprisonment in the U.S., housing more than 27,000 people in its state prisons—a 4.7% increase from 2021, and significantly above the national average according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics. Black people made up nearly 32% of the national prison population, despite being only 13% of the general population.

Fox and Rob’s home state is emblematic of the problem. The U.S. may hold just 5% of the world’s population, but it cages nearly 25% of its prisoners according to the Prison Policy Initiative. Within that, Black Americans are incarcerated at nearly five times the rate of white Americans according to The Sentencing Project.

So when Fox says that TIME II is a call to action, she means it in every sense. “We garnered an understanding that to be free is to free others,” she said. “To launch this Campaign for Freedom—this movement, which is more than just a film—we put together these tools from our 30 years of being justice involved.”

Through their nonprofit, Rich Family Ministries, Fox and Rob provide participatory defense training, empowering families to advocate in courtrooms and communities alike. “We practice a model called participatory defense,” Fox said. “That model is 1 out of 40 hubs across the country doing this work of teaching justice-involved families legal awareness as a best form of defense.”

Truth-telling as resistance.

There are creative risks, and then there are risks that come with telling the truth—especially when you’re still under surveillance.

“Our risk came from what we were exposing,” Fox admitted. “When you begin to be a truth-teller and speak truth to power… you put yourself in harm’s way.”

That danger is not abstract. Rob is still on 40 years of parole. Yet, both are unapologetic about their storytelling. “We took that and we flipped it and said, no, I’m gonna serve as a warning sign,” Fox said. “As a symbol of what freedom really means.”

Their filmmaking is about legacy. “I hope that my voice would resonate on to other generations through this media that lasts into perpetuity,” Fox told MadameNoire. “So today we’re looking at 30 years, and another 30 years, I’ll be 85. That’ll be 60 years of archiving the new form of slavery in America through one family’s journey.”

The post ‘TIME II’ Isn’t Just a Sequel—It’s A War Cry For Black Families Still Caught in the System [Exclusive] appeared first on MadameNoire.

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‘Love & Marriage Huntsville’ Exclusive Clip: Trisha Wonders ‘Who Invited Marquez?!’

info@blaqly.com — Wed, 16 Jul 2025 15:52:11 +0000

OWN’s top-rated reality hit, Love & Marriage: Huntsville, returns Saturday for its milestone 10th season, and we’ve got an exclusive clip of (even more) drama brewing between Tricia and her ex.

Source: Love & Marriage: Huntsville / OWN

Premiering Saturday, July 19 at 8/7c, the long-running series that keeps Huntsville in headlines is ready to shake the table with fresh faces, fiery confrontations and emotional growth. Once again, the series follows a lively group of longtime friends and frenemies with strong personalities and strong opinions who live in Huntsville, Alabama. This season marks the first without Melody Rogers, who announced her departure in January.

Returning this season are Martell Holt…