Black Tie Lounge

Breaking news last week was that Zeta Tau Alpha won the Sprite Step Off Competition receiving $100,000 to donate to scholarships for the chapter. After winning it was made public that after a scoring discrepancy between the first and second place winners has been identified the second place winners, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, would recieve the same amount. I'm blown by the controversy around it. I took some time and looked at the videos of each contestant that made it to the final round and to me it is clear why ZTA won. Those white girls stepped they tail off and represented from start to finish. Mind you, the video I linked you all to does not show full performances for the other frats but yo them chicks brought it. I don't read news stories as much as I do the comments. It is good to see those that agree with me but it's shocking how ignorant some people are. Of course the majority of the comments had to deal with race. I found a lot of comments about how stepping is

It is what it is. Enjoy! Last but not least, you can say what you want about this video but this mug had me crying. Read the comments while you are at it.

I have about 60 million thoughts in my head but here is one. While on duty at the youth center waiting for the kids to show up to our Saturday session I caught an interview on C-Span's Washington Journal with Michelle Alexander ,former ACLU Director of Racial Justice. I never turn to C-Span and I'm not even sure why I tuned in, but she was showcasing her new book The New Jim Crow , which she argues that mass incarceration in the form of the War on Drugs has replaced Jim Crow just as Jim Crow replaced slavery in the past. The War on Drugs has disproporationately targeted young black males in the inner city, labeled them as felons and subsequently denied them the right to vote, access to education, employment, housing, and public benefits. The issue here is that ridiculous mass proportions of black males, which constitute much of the prision populations, are incarcerated have hardly any record of violence but are instead labeled a felon because of marijuanna possession. She draws

I'm doing research so that I can buy a new car while I listen to music. I had the urge to rock to Halo which then lead me to wanna hear One Republic's first album, Dreaming Out Loud , the album with Apologize that Timbaland Remixed to put on his album Shock Value. Here's the connection between Beyonce and One Republic: Ryan Teder, the band's front man wrote Halo. I'm a musician so I pay attention to these kinds of things. The same guy also worked with Kelly Clarkson on her single entitled Already Gone , which gained controversy because of it's melodic similarities with Halo . Both are very great songs but that's not what I want to talk about. So from listening to Halo , to listening to tracks off One Republic's first album, I got the urge to check out their latest album Waking Up . These guys have a serious gift for creating music and titles that reference a greater significance in life. I love it! So I stumble upon the track Secrets and I'm geeki

So I've taken a significant interest in marriage over the past couple of years. I say this primarily because a good amount of my friends are married or engaged. I'm pretty sure that at the rate I'm going I'll be the last one to tie the knot but it is what it is. It's one thing to have an interest and dream, but it is another thing to have an interest and seek out wisdom or observe. The more I read and talk to others about marriage the more I realize that it's more of a character adjustment than anything else. This character adjustment piece I have never really worked on with past girlfriends. That's probably the reason they are my ex's now. Observing my mother and father interact taught me a very good lesson in character adjustment. So I'm at home for a bit and I wake up to find that my mother took the glass covering off of the stove in an attempt to clean behind it. She meant well but she removed it in such a way that she forgot how to put it back

Ever since I heard this song I believed in this brotha . Peep this and tell me what it makes you think about.

That they do! Why is it that all you have to do is throw a little kid in something and it automatically becomes more entertaining than before. I mean for real, think about how many videos are on YouTube of people singing or dancing. Put a kid in those same videos and the appeal automatically doubles. Think I'm joking, check the views and the comments. In working at this youth center with school age children, I've come to the conclusion that there needs to be some form of government-regulated test, module, or something as a way to barr all those parents that have no business raising children from doing so. Honestly!! Say what you want. A good majority of these kids would be so much better if their moma or daddy weren't the moma or daddy. Now a days kids don't have daddy's, which is really sad but for most of those men it's probably a good thing that they aren't around because they'd be the ones barred if there was ever federal regulation on child bearing.