Stephen Cohen/Getty Images for Maxim

Well, things seem to be coming together quite nicely for quarterback Robert Griffin III.

The Washington Redskins superstar made quite the noise in his rookie season with a quiet storm presence who took charge of the football field during the regular and post-season. Well, that is, of course, until he was badly injured and could no longer play.

But having been in the off season for some time, Griffin has had time to plan for something big: his wedding day.

According to his mother, Griffin plans to marry his fiancée Rebecca Liddicoat this July.

E! Online reports that RGIII’s mom told Washington D.C. television station WTTG that Liddicoat and Griffin will be jumping the broom on July 6th in Virginia.

Apparently, a wedding registry has been created at Bed, Bath & Beyond for the couple and it coincides with the July 6th date his mother revealed.

The couple has allegedly been together since high school and were engaged back in 2010.  Griffin had his college teammate play the guitar while he made his speech in front of family and friends before getting down on one knee.

Maybe he’ll cut his hair in preparation for the ceremony. I mean…it’d be nice.

Congrats to the couple! Hopefully, the summer wedding will bring even more excitement to his game for the 2013-2014 football season!

AP Photo/Ann Heisenfelt

Everyone makes mistakes, but one young man’s mistake, fueled by alcohol and a neighborhood with way too many identical homes, cost him his life.

Caleb Gordley was like most 16-year-olds. He wanted to have fun. But when his parents grounded him for not cleaning his room, the young man sneaked out of his home in Lourdan County to kick it with his friends. According to the Washington Post, in the early hours of Sunday morning after having some drinks with friends and partying the night before, Gordley tried to sneak back into his home in the hopes that his parents wouldn’t catch him, and even had his friends help him enter his home using a back window.

Unfortunately for Gordley, he entered the wrong house. According to reports, homes on Gordley’s block all have a similar brick construction and often have similar features on the inside. Caleb Gordley’s father, Shawn Gordley, told the Washington Post that the neighbor’s house that Caleb found himself in had the same carpet and staircase and gate around the back. The Gordleys had just moved into the neighborhood less than a year ago. As Caleb walked through the wrong house, the homeowner was alarmed when he heard his burglar alarm go off. According to The Huffington Post, he called police, grabbed his gun and headed downstairs, where he encountered Caleb. The homeowner later told police he fired off a warning shot, but the young man didn’t leave. He shot Caleb after the fact, killing him.

When my boyfriend shared this story with me last night, we both found it to be incredibly sad, but he was more mad. “Why didn’t he shoot him in the leg!? Why do people with guns in this country shoot to kill instead of just shooting to incapacitate?” I could see where he was coming from, but I couldn’t help but wonder what I would have done in such a situation, if I was the homeowner and there was a man in my home at 2 a.m. with my family and I inside. Even my boyfriend said that someone coming in to hurt his family he would take out before they had the chance to hurt him or anyone else, but then my question was, that early in the morning, in a dark house, can you really differentiate what someone’s motives are? Especially when they shouldn’t be in your home in the first place? It’s a truly terrible situation to be in, and even Caleb’s parents aren’t even sure what they would have done if something like that happened to them. “I don’t even blame the gentleman. I don’t know what I would have done,” says Jennea Gordley, the victim’s mother. According to the Huffington Post, no arrests have been made of the shooter and no charges have been filed even though the case is still under review.

The young man was mostly known for being a good student, and staying out of trouble at school. Caleb was a junior at his local high school and a pretty popular young man and strong athlete. His classmates and teammates have been mourning his death this week and his family continues to try and make sense of their loss. But they do recognize that their time with him was a blessing. According to Caleb’s father, there were complications with his birth that almost threatened the life of Jeannea and Caleb, but they both made it.

“We got 16 1/2 awesome years out of this young man. We could have had none.”

JLN Photography/WENN

Producer and “rapper” Timbaland has had enough and he’s not taking it anymore.

According to TMZ, Tim filed a lawsuit last month against American Home Assurance Company for $1.8 million dollars because they have refused to cover the claim of a watch that went missing in 2010.

Timbaland says he paid more than $50,000 in May 2010 to take out an insurance policy that would cover quite a bit of expensive items, including a watch from Jacob the Jeweler. The watch was 18k white gold and draped in over 30 carats of diamonds.

Some kind of way, the watch went missing in August 2010.  At that time, Tim was allegedly so upset about it being gone he got his family worked up and they called the police saying they thought he might commit suicide.  While Tim told police once they arrived that he was never going to do that, he did tell them that he thought someone he knew stole the watch.

The police started an investigation but it never went anywhere.

But now in the lawsuit against AHA, Timbaland says he thinks his young daughter picked it up and “played with it until she got bored and discarded it somewhere.”

While the value of the watch has not been revealed, the $1.8 million covers the cost of the watch, interest  and Tim’s lawyer fees.

There’s been no word from the insurance company as to why they won’t cover the claim.

Oh, the problems of the one percent nation.  All I have is a little Michael Kors watch and I guard it as though the plans to change the world are sitting under the face.

Hopefully, all of this will be settled soon.

AP Photo/Steve Helber

African-American firsts are still happening, even at this late date. Virginia Democrats just elected the state’s first African-American party chair.

A House of Delegates member from Alexandria became chairwoman of the Democratic Party in Virginia, and not only is she the first African American to chair that state’s Democratic party. She is actually the first African American to lead any major political party in Virginia.

Del. Charniele Herring (D-Alexandria) was elected at the party’s Central Committee Meeting in Williamsburg on Saturday, which was attended by many of the candidates seeking the Democratic nomination for lieutenant governor and attorney general. Herring didn’t waste time in calling the party to action.

“The one thing we can’t do is relax. We’ve got to start now to get voters engaged,” said Herring, reports The Washington Post.

It looks like Democrats in that state will have an uphill battle. “History does not favor Democrats going into 2013. In every Virginia gubernatorial election since 1977, Virginia has reversed its support for governor in the years following the presidential election. In 2009, Republicans swept the races for governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general. And Virginia has not had a Democratic attorney general in nearly 20 years,” writes the newspaper.

Gov. Bob McDonnell is currently in office. He campaigned for Mitt Romney and other Republicans who ran for office this past election cycle. According to a separate Washington Post article, he enjoys a good deal of popularity in his state, including among women and black voters.

Herring has a plan. She announced she will continue to focus on voter registration and turnout efforts, which she says will be critical for a Democratic win.

Herring, a lawyer by profession, is a graduate of George Mason University and Catholic University Columbus School of Law. She was elected to the General Assembly in January 2009 in a special election to fill the vacated seat for the 46th House District. She also serves as the Democratic Whip in the House of Delegates and was chair of the Legislative Reproductive Health Caucus. Through her work with the latter, Herring has been outspoken on the Republican legislation passed last session that requires women to undergo an ultrasound before being allowed to have an abortion.

Source: BlackVoices.com

From BlackVoices

Gabby Douglas is really big in her hometown. Really big and painted on a wall.

The gold-medal-winning gymnast has a giant mural painted in her honor in Virginia Beach, Va. And she loves it.

“WOW!!! This is amazing!! (hashtag)so honored,” Douglas tweeted Friday from the Olympics in London, where the 16-year-old gymnast won two gold medals at the Summer Games.

The mural shows Douglas holding a gold medal with an American flag backdrop. It says “Way to go Gabby.”

Check out more pics of Gabby’s mural on BlackVoices.com.

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Source: theobamadiary.com

It’s not every day that you get the chance to meet the First Lady of the United States but Sydney Trapp took full advantage of her opportunity when Michelle Obama visited Mom’s Apple Pie Company in Occoquan, VA, yesterday.

Initially, the 6-year-old seemed to be running away from the first lady when she entered the small shop but what she was really doing was grabbing her violin to play what I think was a quick snippet of “Gloria in excelsis Deo.” Mrs. Obama told the young girl she was “awesome” and her mother had the smartphone running to capture the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity first-hand.

Check out the clip of the sweet moment here.

Brande Victorian is a blogger and culture writer in New York City. Follower her on Twitter at @be_vic.

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Source: Black Americans

In you’re not black enough if you don’t sound like you stepped out of a rap video news, a ninth grader in Fairfax County,Virginia’s blackness was questioned when he didn’t read a poem to his teacher’s liking in class.

George C. Marshall student Jordan Shumate said he was reading Langston Hughes’ Ballad of the Landlord aloud in class when the teacher interrupted him and told him to read “blacker.”

 “She told me, ‘Blacker, Jordan — c’mon, blacker. I thought you were black,’ ” the 14-year-old told The Washington Post.

Jordan said when he refused to continuing reading, his teacher, Marilyn Bart, picked up where he left off, demonstrating what she meant by “blacker.”

“She sounded like a maid in the 1960s,” Jordan said. “She read the poem like a slave, basically.”

Jodan said he later asked the teacher whether she thinks all black people speak that way and was reprimanded for talking out of turn. When he told his mother, Nicole Cober Page, what happened she complained to school administrators, saying if the teacher thought the poem should be delivered in a Southern dialect, she could have said so without referring to race.

Principal Jay Pearson told The Washington Post the school is investigating Ms. Bart, who has been with Fairfax Schools since 1990, and they are taking the matter very seriously.

Jordan also mentioned another incident that didn’t sit well with him recently. He said in preparation for reading literature about the Holocaust, Ms. Bart had been showing photographs to illustrate common stereotypes about different groups of people during the week. One day she showed an image of grape soda and asked him to explain its meaning.

“I do know the stereotypes,” Jordan said, “but she could change the questions so I’m not like the king of black people.”

Sounds like someone needs diversity training—at the very least.

How do you think this teacher’s actions should be handled?

Brande Victorian is a blogger and culture writer in New York City. Follower her on Twitter at @be_vic.

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Brittany Rose

By Makula Dunbar

If you’re a recent college grad, you probably know that the job market isn’t in the least what it was promised to be just a few years ago.  Establishing an ideal career for many can be tough, overwhelming and seemingly undefined in terms of time.

For Brittany Rose, founder of More Than Cheer — a recreational sports management company — taking the chance of being whisked into the unemployment madness wasn’t an option. In 2008, while she was a sophomore at Virginia Commonwealth University she launched More Than Cheer,which was her sole business then.

The Cheerleading Business Formation

“Personally I really enjoy helping people and working with youth. I wanted to create a lifestyle where I could have financial freedom and time to spend with my family — when I have one,” said Rose. “I found entrepreneurship was the only way that I could provide that for others and myself.”

More Than Cheer offers classes and training in the areas of dance, cheerleading, tumbling and gymnastics. Personal development is also one of the company’s specialties.

At just 23, Rose says running a business at times is very stressful. However for her, getting it off the ground was the easy part.

It’s only a matter of time before the GOP gets their wish of making abortions illegal in the state of Virgina. Yesterday, the House passed two of the most stringent anti-abortion bills that have been seen in a long time, including one that says a person’s rights begin as soon as sperm and egg unite.

In a 66-32 vote, Bob Marshall’s Personhood at Conception bill was passed, followed by another bill requiring transvaginal ultrasounds before women are allowed to abort a baby. That item went through with a 63-36 vote.

In her opposition of the bill, Tarina Keene of NARAL Pro-Choice Virginia, said, “The General Assembly is dangerously close to making Virginia the first state in the country to grant personhood rights to fertilized eggs,” and she’s right. The bill will now go to the Senate which already passed a companion to Del. Kathy Byron’s ultrasound measure. While there is no legislation in the Senate that mirrors the personhood bill, Sen. Bill Stanley, won passage on Tuesday of a measure that would permit wrongful death civil lawsuits against those who kill a fetus.

Totally disregarding the variety of circumstances that lead women to seek abortions, Del. Todd Gilbert had no sympathy for any of it:

“We hear the same song over there. The very tragic human notes that are often touched upon involve extreme examples. But in the vast majority of these cases, these are matters of lifestyle convenience.”

Although he later apologized for his remarks, but it’s clear from the passage of these measures that most in his party agree with him.

Del. Eileen Filler-Corn, although initially defeated, said she’s determined to fight these restrictive bills.

“I cannot sit quietly today and do nothing while this body decides what rights will be stripped away from my daughter and others in regard to their own health,” she said. “I do not want to see a day when the only option for women and men to obtain the contraception of their choice is to leave our state and go to (Washington,) D.C. or to Maryland.”

The state appears to be extremely close to making that a reality; hopefully other states won’t follow suit.

What do you think about these bills? Are you surprised they were passed?

Brande Victorian is a blogger and culture writer in New York City. Follower her on Twitter at @be_vic.

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It’s rare that anyone would boo a children’s dance recital but that’s exactly what Jackie Carter, mother of a Kenwood Middle School girl in Arlington, VA, did when the Bowen McCauley Dance Company performed “Little Rabbit, Where’s Your Mammy?” Now, she faces up to one year in jail for her actions.

Jackie first saw the performance involving a white kid and his black mammy singing and dancing to the tune of “Little Rabbit” on the morning of April 29, 2011. She immediately reached out to school officials and the founder of the dance company with no success to discuss the skit which she said was “racist and offensive to African-Americans and African American women especially.” That afternoon, she returned for another performance during which she stood up and booed and also handed out letters of protest. When Jackie returned to see yet another performance  April 30 and began booing, she said she was attacked by Bowen McCauley staff members who began hitting her, blocking her from returning to her seat, and pulling her in different directions. Jackie was subsequently arrested and charged with disorderly conduct, a Class 1 misdemeanor which carries a penalty of up to one year in jail and a $2,500 fine. She told Afro her actions were justified:

“The principal told me the Bowen McCauley Dance Company was a partner of the school, therefore, he was not going to challenge it. They left me with no choice.”

The school principal continued to defend the skit in a letter to Kenwood parents on May 2 as well, writing:

“The word ‘mammy’ used in the song is a colloquial affectionate term for mother or grandmother and was used historically and still today in some areas by both African and White Americans, especially in the south. I recognize that the term mammy is sometimes viewed as an offensive term for a Black nursemaid in the southern U.S.”

Jackie, a long-time and well-known stage director in the DC area, isn’t buying it, and neither should anyone else. She wrote that the mammy scene centers on the image of the slave birthing women used as wet-nurses and “the many other unspeakable crimes committed against their enslaved minds, souls and bodies,” therefore it should not be performed. The school may not have listened but Jackie will have another chance to defend her point of view and her actions at her next hearing April 23.

I can’t call this one. Do you think Jackie deserves jail time for disrupting the recital? Were her actions justified?

Brande Victorian is a blogger and culture writer in New York City. Follower her on Twitter at @be_vic.

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