“Health care reform law helps 1.3 million minority young adults obtain health insurance”

Though the Affordable Care Act has its limits (it doesn’t cover undocumented immigrants, it only extends health care for young adults whose parents have an existing health care plan – to name a few), it has made a big difference. Hopefully universal health care will be a reality for Americans one day. 

Taken from: http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2012pres/03/20120307a.html

March 7, 2012

New data released today by Health and Human Services shows that the Affordable Care Act has extended health insurance to a substantial number of racial and ethnic minorities nationwide. The health care reform law allows young adults to stay on their parents’ insurance plans through age 26.

The data, based on combined estimates from the National Health Interview Survey and the Current Population Survey, indicate that approximately 736,000 Latinos, 410, 000 Blacks, 97,000 Asian Americans, and 29,000 American Indian/Alaska Natives have gained coverage because of the law.

Highlighted in an HHS issue brief, the data coincides with a research letter also published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). “As a result of the Affordable Care Act, we are making strides in giving every American regardless of race or ethnicity a fair shot at quality, affordable health coverage,” said HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. “Because of the law, more and more young adults can breathe a little easier knowing they have health coverage.”

The studies released today provide the first estimates of the law’s effects on young adults in minority groups.  “These results show that the Affordable Care Act has already made a real difference in the lives of young adults, and that the benefits have occurred for Americans across racial and ethnic lines,” said Richard Kronick, Ph.D., HHS deputy assistant secretary for planning and evaluation, and one of the study’s authors.  “The Affordable Care Act has helped give millions of young adults – white and black, Latino and Asian – the security of health insurance as they begin to build their careers and their families.”

“Shonda Rhimes on why TV has so few African-American leads”

Taken from: http://omg.yahoo.com/news/shonda-rhimes-why-tv-few-african-american-leads-021720580.html

January 10, 2012

Why does network television have so few African-American lead actors? The team behind ABC’s “Scandal,” the only current network series with an African-American lead, has a few ideas.

Creator Shonda Rhimes, who cast Kerry Washington as a Washington, D.C., crisis PR expert, said the country has been ready for African-American leads for years. She referenced Diahann Carroll’s lead turn on “Julia” more than four decades ago. The problem, she said, is that “people have failed to cast the actors that they should have been casting.” Rhimes and the cast spoke during a panel Tuesday at the Television Critics Association winter press tour.

After decades of African-Americans leading some of television’s biggest shows — including “The Cosby Show” — series have increasingly featured African-American actors only in multi-racial casts that appeal to as many demographics as possible.

Laurence Fishburne was the key character on “CSI” before he departed at the end of last season, but even his show was an ensemble. NBC’s “Undercovers,” with two African-American leads, was quickly canceled last season.

“Scandal” co-star Columbus Short said minorities have been marginalized on television, and that he hopes Washington’s work on “Scandal” will encourage more colorblind casting. ”I think there’s a way people want to perceive people of color,” he said. “This is what they are, this is how they work, this is how we accept them. Which is a completely gross overassumption of people. And I think this show… tells the story of people. It has nothing to do with color.”

“Perceptions of discrimination a black and white story”

Taken from: http://inamerica.blogs.cnn.com/2011/12/12/perceptions-of-discrimination-a-black-and-white-story/?hpt=us_bn1

December 12, 2011

(CNN) - A study that examines three years of opinion survey data says that black and white Americans are still miles apart regarding their perceptions of equality or inequality among blacks and whites. It identifies racial bias among whites as a potential reason for that difference in perception.

“Post-Racial? Americans and Race in the Age of Obama,” released Monday by the nonprofit Greenlining Institute, found a link between white survey respondents’ perception of blacks and whether they believed discrimination to be a major problem in today’s society.

When asked how much discrimination currently exists in America, 56.4% of black respondents said there was “a lot.” Among Latinos, 26.9% gave that answer. About the same amount – 26% – of respondents who reported their race as “other” said that. But only 16% of white respondents said they thought “a lot” of discrimination existed in today’s America. The majority of white respondents said there was either “some” (44.4%) or “a little” (39.5%) discrimination.

White people who said there was “some” or “a little” discrimination were more likely to agree with statements such as “Irish, Italians, Jewish and many other minorities overcame prejudice and worked their way up. Blacks should do the same without any special favors,” and, “It’s really just a matter of some people not trying hard enough; if blacks would only try harder they could be just as well off as whites.”

The Greenlining Institute study analyzed data from the American National Election Panel Survey (ANES) conducted by the University of Michigan and Stanford University, as well as census data. The ANES researchers spoke with a representative sample of about 1,800 Americans on 12 occasions between January 2008 and July 2010. Greenlining is a nonprofit policy and leadership institute whose stated goal is to work for economic and racial equality. ”Americans are diversifying and if we want to keep ahead and keep America going forward, we have to acknowledge these disparities. If we don’t, it makes it hard to tackle them,” said Dr. Daniel Byrd, the Greenlining Institute’s research director and the study’s primary author.

Tim Wise is anti-racist essayist and activist whose work often deals with white responses to racism.  He says that white disbelief in black claims of discrimination is nothing new – and that white people need to take a closer look at why so many people of color believe they are subject to prejudice.

“I think they need to reflect on why there’s such a division,” said Wise, who is white. “There’s only two ways you can interpret it: You can either interpret that [black people] are insane and borderline neurotic, that they don’t know their own life; or you could look at it and say maybe black people do know their own life, and maybe it’s worth listening to them about it.”

Among the study’s other findings:

• Although 62% of white people questioned in the survey believed that blacks’  level of health was about the same as their own, only 43.8% of blacks agreed. But according to statistical data from the National Center for Health Statistics and the Office of Minority Health, there are definite disparities in health and health care.  As of 2007, white life expectancy at birth was 4.8 years higher than for blacks.  The infant mortality rate among black women was almost two and a half times higher than for white women. The asthma rate among black children is double that of white children.
• More than two-thirds of black people surveyed (67%) believed that black people in general make less money than whites. But the majority of whites (59%) believed that they made about the same. According to U.S. Department of Labor statistics, blacks’ median weekly earnings were as much as $500 less than the median earnings of whites between 2009 and 2011.
• Another question asked who the U.S. government treated better: blacks or whites. Twenty-eight percent of whites believed that blacks were treated better, and 63% thought the races were treated about equally. But only 1 percent of blacks thought they were treated better, and most blacks believed that whites either received better treatment  (56.4%) or were treated about the same by the federal government (42.5%).

Why is there such a gap between how much discrimination is reported by blacks versus how much is believed to exist by whites? Wise says that the reason why whites don’t know or don’t acknowledge the racism or discrimination experienced by blacks and other people of color is because they don’t have to know or acknowledge it.

“No matter what I want to do with my life, to demonstrate that I know the reality of people of color is not going to be on the test,” Wise said. “But for people of color to get a job, any job, they’re going to have to know the things that white folks in those fields think are valuable pieces of information. People of color have to know white knowledge, white wisdom, and what their experience is, but white people don’t have to know the experiences of people of color.”

“Alabama’s immigration law: Jim Crow revisited”

Taken from: http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/17/opinion/trumka-king-civil-rights-alabama/index.html?hpt=us_t2

November 17, 2011

Editor’s note: Martin Luther King III is president and chief executive officer of The King Center in Atlanta. Richard Trumka is president of the AFL-CIO.

(CNN) – It is one of the painful ironies of our time that in the same season Martin Luther King Jr.’s memory is finally honored with a memorial in our nation’s capital, the state where he began to lead the civil rights movement is once more the center of an ugly conflict over racial injustice.

The passage of Alabama’s anti-immigrant legislation, HB 56, invokes inhumanity reminiscent of the Jim Crow South. And the police state it has created is equally cruel.

If the law stands, children will be denied admission to public schools if they can’t prove their citizenship, and schools will be turned into enforcement operations. Poor people of color will be ripped from their families if they are caught in public without their papers in order. Samaritans and people of conscience who employ, harbor or help undocumented workers will be severely punished. Already, opportunistic corrections firms are standing by to pocket money off prejudice and terrified families are selling off their meager possessions and fleeing the state.

Our immigration system is broken, but our answer as a nation cannot be to terrorize and criminalize families. Our immigration policy must be consistent with our core values and our moral obligation to treat all people with dignity and respect. For all the differences that divide us, we are in this together. In these harsh economic times, we are more than ever wearing the “single garment of destiny” of which King wrote in his ”Letter From Birmingham Jail.”

When communities suffer discrimination and degradation, we all suffer. When some citizens are denied fair treatment, we are all denied. When any group of workers can be underpaid and overworked, all workers are victimized. When families are threatened if they dare organize or speak out, America is threatened. ”Sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust in its application,” King also wrote in “Letter From Birmingham Jail,” where he was imprisoned for nonviolent civil disobedience. Much about our nation’s immigration practices echoes that observation.

We call on President Barack Obama to oppose and terminate all programs — including collaboration between state and local law enforcement and the Department of Homeland Security — that result in racial profiling and target immigrant communities. Our focus should be on comprehensive immigration reform. And we must focus simultaneously on fixing our broken economy, an economy that is forcing 99% of the people to compete for a smaller and smaller piece of the receding American Dream.

We also hope the good and righteous people of Alabama will rise up, oppose and repeal the abomination that is HB 56. Theirs is the state where our historic civil rights movement began, where King and his followers developed a model of nonviolent activism that changed not only Birmingham and Alabama and the South, but our entire nation.

This week, a delegation of African American labor and civil rights leaders are visiting Alabama to support Latino families who face hostilities all too familiar to what King saw in 1963. Perhaps the ugly problems in Alabama can once again play a part in building a new understanding about the strains of division that weaken the fabric of society for all of us.

“What sayeth the stars? Not enough minorities in Hollywood”

Taken from: http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/08/showbiz/hollywood-walk-of-fame-minorities/index.html?hpt=hp_t3

November 8, 2011

On Tuesday, recording artist Shakira will become the first Colombian to get her name on a monument to the globe’s entertainment industry: the Hollywood Walk of Fame. As the latest celebrity to get a terrazzo star, trimmed with bronze, on the sidewalks of Hollywood, Shakira joins a small but growing rank of minority performers making a dent in an overall industry that some criticize as not inviting enough to African-Americans, Latinos and Asians.

In fact, of the 2,354 stars on Hollywood sidewalks, only 3.4% of them belong to Hispanics such as Shakira, a CNN analysis shows. The figure is 5.1% for African-Americans and a mere 0.4% for Asians, according to an analysis of the stars on the Walk of Fame. Those figures fall short when compared with those minorities’ representation in the nation’s overall population: 16% for Hispanics, 13% for African-Americans, and about 5% for Asians.

To be sure, the Walk of Fame functions as a commercial attraction and publicity device, but given the international attention it receives whenever a prominent artist such as Shakira receives a star, the Walk is also a major indicator of industry trends and success. Hollywood analysts say they aren’t surprised at how the Walk lacks minorities, though its sponsor and operator, the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce, says it has been working hard to improve diversity in an attraction that stretches for blocks throughout Hollywood. ”The numbers are low,” said Andrew Weaver, an Indiana University assistant professor in the department of telecommunications, an expert in race and media. “The Walk of Fame reflects what we’re seeing in Hollywood in general.” Hollywood’s overall shortcomings in including more minorities — and representing them as more than stereotypes — are a longstanding problem and has been roundly decried by minority advocacy groups and many performers.

Still, the chamber says its committee that selects star honorees balances numerous factors in its annual process, including race, gender, nationality, genre of performance, and industry type. The 2,354 stars on the Walk line both sides of Hollywood Boulevard and Vine Street — the heart of Hollywood — and the chamber’s annual 24 or so induction ceremonies are broadcast around the world. ”We are equal opportunity star givers!” Leron Gubler, president and CEO of the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce, said in a written response to questions from CNN. The stars honor celebrities in five categories: motion pictures, television, radio, recording and live theater/performance. ”The committee tries to select candidates from each of the five categories, so with all of the different factors as well as the make up of who has been nominated, it is a challenge to balance all factors,” Gubler said. ”Since day one we have encouraged minorities to apply,” Gubler said about the Walk, which opened in 1961. “When the Walk of Fame was created some of the first stars included Anna May Wong, Dolores Del Rio, Cantinflas, Hattie McDaniel and many others. The committee does try to ensure that minorities are represented in the selections, but there is no set mandatory ratio.”

Indeed, a CNN analysis bears out Gubler’s assertions and shows an upward trend of minority representation on the Walk over recent decades. Latinos grew from 1.9% in 1980, 2.2% in 1990, 2.8% in 2000, to 3.2% in 2010. African-Americans showed similar growth: 1.6% in 1980, 2.3% in 1990, 4.7% in 2000, and 5.1% in 2010. Asians posted marginal increases: 0.20% in 1980, 0.22% in 1990, 0.41% in 2000, and 0.43% in 2010.

On one level, the Walk of Fame is a marketing tool. “The Hollywood Walk of Fame is undoubtedly one of the most successful marketing ideas ever produced,” the chamber touts on its website. The marketing aspect — in which a celeb sometimes gets a star timed with the release of a new project — is partly reflected in how the chamber requires a $30,000 “sponsorship fee,” often paid by a studio, recording label or even a group of fans, chamber officials said. The fee is for the lifetime maintenance of the star, its production, a replica plaque, and ceremony costs, officials said. ”Of course, it’s a promotional tool. That’s why studios and networks look for it,” said Hollywood publicist Michael Levine.

Still, the selection process is a serious-minded affair, according to the Walk’s gatekeepers. A star is awarded after a lengthy process in which hundreds of nomination applications are sent to the Hollywood chamber, and then its Walk of Fame committee selects the winners, with the approval of the chamber’s board of directors. The names also are submitted to the city of Los Angeles’ Board of Public Works Department. Sometimes, several annual nominations must be made before a nominee finally receives a star, chamber officials said.

The chamber has other criteria for who gets a star: professional achievement, longevity of five years or more, contributions to the community, and the guarantee that the celebrity will attend the dedication ceremony if selected. An honoree also has to agree to be nominated, which may be a factor in why not all major celebrities have a star. Some notable A-listers without one include Clint Eastwood, George Clooney, Al Pacino, George Lucas, Robert Redford, and Denzel Washington.

By the end of 2011 — with a few more minority celebrities scheduled to be honored later this year — the Walk of Fame will have 77 stars overall given to Latinos, 119 stars to African-Americans or African-American ensembles (three of those performers — Nat “King” Cole, Lena Horne, and Sarah Vaughn — have a second star, but they are counted only once), and only 10 stars to Asians, according to the chamber.

When asked about the dearth of Asian artists on the Walk of Fame, Gubler stated: “There have been relatively few nominations for Asian entertainers. Someone has to be nominated by a sponsor in order to be considered with a star. The issue must be pursued by a nominator. The committee can only consider from the pool of candidates that have been nominated.”

A recent decade-by-decade analysis of the stars on the Walk of Fame shows that the 1990s were a boom decade for African-Americans, when 49 stars were awarded to them. During the 1980s, they secured 24 stars. From 2000 to the end of 2011, the number will be 22. Latinos, however, have prospered from 2000 to the end of 2011: 19 stars were awarded, including six this year alone, according to a CNN analysis. That compares with 18 during the 1990s and 11 during the 1980s. Only one Asian — actor Philip Ahn, who played wise Master Kan in the TV series “Kung Fu” — received a star in the 1980s. Five Asians received stars in the 1990s, but only one (Jackie Chan) was placed on the Walk from 2000 to now, a CNN analysis shows.

It was the recent success of Latinos that caught the attention of several Hollywood analysts. That trend comes as the 2010 U.S. Census put the burgeoning Latino population at the nation’s No. 2 group for the first time ever, surpassing African-Americans. On Tuesday, two-time Grammy and seven-time Latin Grammy winner Shakira Isabel Mebarak Ripoll — known professionally as Shakira — will receive a star for her accomplishments as a singer, songwriter, musician, record producer, dancer and philanthropist, the chamber said.

It’s no secret that studios and record labels alike are hoping to find additional revenues in the rapidly growing Latino market. ”One of the ways to get Latinos into the movie theaters is getting Latino stars,” said Steven Ross, a University of Southern California history professor and author of “Hollywood Left and Right: How Movie Stars Shaped American Politics.” ”Hollywood is also thinking about global markets — Central American and Latin markets. A majority of Hollywood revenue is coming from international revenue. It’s a much more significant part, more important to the studios’ bottom line now that it ever has been before,” Ross said.

Still, Ross wasn’t surprised by the low minority representation on the Walk of Fame, he said. ”It’s probably appropriate to the history of Hollywood, which has mainly been playing to (a) mainstream audience — which is a white audience,” Ross said. “Just remember, this is not the consciousness-raising industry. This is the money-making industry. They will always follow the money trail. If they see more Latinos going to movies, they’ll feature more Latino stars.”

In the end, that reality may put more minorities in Hollywood — and on its Walk of Fame. ”Very simple,” Ross said. “More minority audiences, more minority stars.”