BlackLight 2020 is here!

Walk the walk with us, as we enter our fourth year

Hi there, and welcome (again) to The Universe. Here’s how I feel about the first part of this year:

Moving on! I have some longer writing in the pipeline (and by pipeline, I mean my brain, or the part of my brain that does the background thinking while the rest watches old episode of Catfish the TV Show), but I’m sending a quick update because I’m very excited. Why am I excited?

Because it’s February, and that means it’s time for BlackLight!

BlackLight is a project that my fellow nerds (Brian Nord, Renee Hłožek, Lauren Biron) and I have been doing every February since 2016: every Black History Month, we collect and curate resources on the Black experience in America. We began BlackLight as a kind of curriculum for people to self-educate about racism, so that when you or your friend or your dad or whoever says “why are Black people mad that all the new legal weed shops in Chicago are owned by white people”, well, there’s a post for that. If you’re a white person who came back from vacation with cornrows and can’t understand why people are giving you side-eye, there’s a post for that. When people tell you that stricter ID requirements are necessary for voting because of mythical widespread voter fraud, there’s a post for that too. You get the idea!

This year, we’re taking some of our running themes from the blog, and turning them into zines (small pamphlets). We will have an issue each week, each dealing with a different theme. Inside them, you’ll find information (including links to learn more), questions for reflection, and suggestions for action. They’re free to download, print, and distribute! Check out this post to download them, and for more info on how we hope you’ll put them to good use.

And stay tuned, I promise I’ll send you something about aliens soon :) In the meantime, please enjoy this lovely painting of civil rights activist Ralph Abernathy (by Robert Templeton); Reverend Abernathy led a march of several hundred people to the Apollo 11 launch in 1969, where he met with NASA administrator Thomas Paine, and questioned the expenditure on space in light of poverty facing so many people. Read more on space.com: “Hundreds Demonstrated Against Poverty at Apollo 11 Moon Launch”.