Category: Perspectives

Among the great strengths of our university are the bonds that hold us together. During troubling times, we call on each other for support and look for opportunities to grow.

Young people nowadays would stand to benefit from those of us with resources to listen to them, and to employ our assets in accord with their interests.

Brown’s death has become a marker: shorthand for an array of urban and suburban ills.

What we are experiencing is an American problem; we are in dire need of civility to move us to resolution.

The seemingly innate biases so many of us carry have not eroded — they still abound in our daily lives and the world around us.

The stakes are high for Marvel and journalist Ta-Nehisi Coates to do Black Panther well.

Stand up for righteousness. Stand up for justice. Stand up for truth, knowing that we all will be free one day.

A discussion on the intersectionality of #BlackLivesMatter, living and teaching in St. Louis a year after Mike Brown’s killing.

It is important for us to consider long-term goals. But it is also clear we need emergency intervention.

There are many Fergusons on the horizon. Herein lies America’s challenge, as well as her opportunity.

The issues that affect us may be different, but no deed is too small if everyone is contributing to improve the world we live in.

Hopeless situations need not stay that way. But meaningful change requires more than structural fixes, legal fights, and opinion pieces.

Together, [my son] and I got him and me through his teen years, the years that Michael Brown would not live through.

The choice of voting procedure can have a profound impact on whether an elected body is representative of its constituency.

No one should have to teach their children this in the USA.

We must demand just, fair and compassionate treatment for all youth.

How do I prepare a jewel of five years for a lifetime of society that is not prepared for him?

The Black Lives Matter movement is calling for fundamental change. But all elites are offering is tepid reform.

Ferguson continues to work toward healing and define common goals, in many cases with the help of religious leaders and institutions.

Pursuing justice requires more than reading, lamenting, writing, and speaking.

The public forum is essential to our democratic experiment.

It is important to restore both fairness and the appearance of fairness to the grand jury process.

To the world, it seemed as if Ferguson and St. Louis were rapidly descending into hell.

The knowledge, passion and commitment of our students, faculty and staff are needed now, more than ever.

We stand for justice by engaging the spectrum of political action.

Local faith leaders want unity for all people.

The single most important question St. Louis faces is: “What now?”

The law that structures our society kills people. Some of the people it kills are innocent.

Challenging racism requires more than just changing the actions of individual political agents.

Giving “all” of the evidence to the grand jury without any recommendation from the prosecutor presents at least two potential problems.

Our law school stands ready to help build a stronger and greater community.

What is happening in our region today must be connected to history.

The conclusion of the Mosaic Project provides us the opportunity to measure our progress.

The prudent thing to do at this point is to let an actual jury decide this case.

Too often in news outlets protesters are portrayed as violent cartoons.

No matter what the grand jury decides, there is every reason for us to trust in this grand jury.

A look at the health and well-being of African Americans in St. Louis and policies that could create positive change.

Can Ferguson take this tragic moment and turn it into an opportunity to stand as a model municipality?

A reflection on Michael Brown and the role of victimization in American culture and politics.

Now is an appropriate moment to carefully consider the complex relationship between violence and protest.

Why must black people and black communities always prove themselves worthy of receiving justice?

Justice, like so much of what happens in America, has two faces.

While it seems an unlikely landmark, the QT has achieved cultural significance.

My great fear is that we won’t use this tragedy to make progress on changing what must be changed.

How we deploy technologies matters at least as much as whether we deploy them.

The events of the last several weeks are not academic abstractions to me.

I’m hoping that we can move beyond rallies and rhetoric to bring about real change.

We don’t need peace right now—we need unrest.

We had no idea how timely the release of our findings would prove to be.

Michael Brown’s death and the resulting situation in Ferguson is not an anomaly to be brushed aside.