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Tim Wise, one of the nations most prominent anti-racism activists and educators, presented at Emporia State University on Thursday. His presentation focused on social justice and equity.

Wise is the author of seven books, including his highly-acclaimed memoir, White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son, which was adapted into a 2013 documentary. His latest book, Under the Affluence: Shaming the Poor, Praising the Rich and Sacrificing the Future of America, was published in 2015.

The importance of looking at history when considering race relations and equity in the United States was a focus of his talk. Wise said white Americans typically wants black Americans to move on when it comes to the history of slavery, mainly because that history doesnt present a positive image of white Americans yet they dont want to move on from other bits of history that do present a positive image.

White Americans in particular are very quick to tell people of color that talk about the past to quickly say to them, Why do you have to bring that up? That was a long time ago, why cant we move on? Why cant we get over it, Wise said. Now this, I beg to remind you, is precious coming from white people because there is nobody on this earth that loves the past more than the white man.

We absolutely adore the past worship it. Thats why the Tea Party said they wanted it back and it does not point to the future. They believe the past is this splendid place. White folks love the past but they just love the pretty part for us the part that makes us special, that makes us feel better. We just dont want to be burdened with the less-pretty parts. The parts that people of color occasionally bring up.

Wise said if one does not understand the history and what came before there is no way to understand social inequality. He said this can be seen in regards to the Black Lives Matter movement.

If we dont understand the historical significance of police interactions with the black community, then the uprising on behalf of the Black Lives Matter movement will not make sense to you, Wise said. It will seem outrageous to you. Because people rising and expressing anger with police, if police have all been people that come to your neighborhood to get the cat out of the tree or take little Billy on a ride in their car to show him what a great job policing could be, it doesnt make sense. That is not the black experience with law enforcement.

When people get defensive of the Black Lives Matter movement and respond with all lives matter, Wise said that isnt acceptable because, in our country, all lives have not historically mattered. Our country has said all lives matter, but actions have told people of color that all does not include them.

When people say black lives matter we get defensive and say, Well what about us? Dont our lives matter? Dont all lives matter, Wise said. We have a long history in white America of saying all but not meaning it. Thomas Jefferson said, All men are created equal and endowed by their creator to certain inalienable rights among these including life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, but when he said it he owned over 200 human beings, so we know he did not mean it. In the 1880s when the first version of the Pledge of Allegiance was written and updated again in 1920 and 1954 every version ended with liberty and justice for all. That was written at a time when we didnt mean it. So when we say all lives matter and we have a history of not really believing our own hype and our own rhetoric saying all while marginalizing millions we are going to have to forgive black folks for reminding us all meant something else for a couple hundred years.

Wise ended his presentation by taking questions from the audience. During that time he encouraged those in attendance to continue having the discussions and to continue to advocate for change.

Earlier in the day, ESU released the recently approved Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Plan for the university. Work on the plan began in the fall of 2015 when the University Diversity and Inclusion Alliance was formed. The alliance consists of more than 50 students, faculty, staff and community members.

The alliance was guided by co-chairs Gary Wyatt, associate provost and director of the Honors College and Jason Brooks, assistant dean of students for diversity, equity and inclusion. The alliance was charged with reviewing university practices and organization structures as well as analyzing data and researching best practices.

By April 2016, the draft plan was completed and shared throughout the university and community. Input was requested and incorporated into the final plan published on Thursday.

The process for gathering input on the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Plan was comprehensive and provided many opportunities for discussion and feedback, ESU President Allison D. Garrett said in her letter to campus.

ESU administrators have already implemented the following elements of the plan.

Appointed a Title IX investigator;

Created and filled the Assistant Dean of Students for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion position;

Increased diversity initiatives within the curricular and co-curricular experiences;

Created thematic learning communities in residence halls;

Enhanced marketing materials; and

Signed the NCAA diversity pledge.

A next step, Garrett said, is to incorporate the new University Diversity and Inclusion Alliance into the universitys governance structure. A work team also will develop core cultural competencies to ensure our students graduate with the skills necessary to live and work effectively as members of a diverse, global community.

ESUs Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Plan is available online at http://www.emporia.edu/president/diversity-and-inclusion.

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'Wise' words | ESU | emporiagazette.com - Emporia Gazette

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Part-crime scene investigation, part-RPG, Call of Cthulhu is primarily concerned with detailing and emulating the writings of H.P Lovecraft upon which it is based. Over the course of our most recent showing of the game - a 20 minute guided demo - we were presented with eyeless monsters, paintings acting as doorways to alternative dimensions, murder scenes in which children seem to have been the victims and a decrepit mansion that wouldnt feel out of place in Resident Evil or a Dracula movie.

The inspiration for the games rules and workings comes from the official board game of the same name, a pen-and-paper RPG in the Dungeons and Dragons ilk, first released in 1981. As a result, this is a game that prioritises reading and listening for clues just as much as it wants you to act upon them.

As detective Edward Pierce youre sent on a job to find out the truth behind the death of a world famous artist and her family, the whole group of which resided on the isolated island that makes up Call of Cthulhus setting. Its a windy, rocky place that seems to be cloaked in constant night. Lanterns barely cut through the darkness, with crows and ravens creating silhouettes against the sky, creating the sense that youre always being watched. Visually, it has a trademark Lovecraftian identity splashed all over it.

Perhaps the most interesting of Cthulhus design directions is the questioning of Pierces sanity. As the story progress and he begins to delve deeper into the mystery behind the unexplained deaths, he, and the player, are forced to question whether or not what he sees is actually representative of reality.

Developer Cyanide, most famous for Blood Bowl and Styx: Master of Shadows, is keen to point out at every opportunity that insanity in Cthulhu isnt about whether or not youre losing your mind, its about whether what your eyes are communicating to your mind is real or not. How well the sense of not knowing if what youre seeing is actual reality or not, and combining this with making sure the player feels as though theyre able to impact proceedings, will go a long way to determining Cthulhus quality and impact.

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Sanity plays a part in the moment-to-moment gameplay, too. One scene sees Pierce hiding from a monster, his comparatively feeble physical standing giving him no chance of survival in a direct encounter. Stealth is his best tool here, as it is in every other encounter, but the matter of hiding is complicated by a sanity meter that decreases when hes in the presence of monsters that he doesnt believe should be part of his reality.

The longer you spend close to a monster, even when hidden, the further your sanity meter is going to deplete. If it exhausts itself entirely youre hit with the game over screen.

Over the course of the story Pierce develops phobias for certain situations and things, the example demonstrated to us being claustrophobia. This makes hiding even more perilous as it further limits the number of safe spaces; those closets that were once a haven now being just as maddening as the monsters roaming between them. The system is somewhat similar to that used in Frictional Games Amnesia: A Dark Descent, which was itself inspired, in part, by the writing of H.P. Lovecraft.

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Survive Call of Cthulhu by Slowing Down and Understanding Your ... - IGN

According to the Ottawa County District Attorney Kenny Wright, the Jan. 7 shooting death of Travis Edward Baker by Ottawa County Sheriff Jeremy Floyd was justified by the evidence.

MIAMI Justified. According to the Ottawa County District Attorney Kenny Wright, the Jan. 7 shooting death of Travis Edward Baker, 42, of Fairland, by Ottawa County Sheriff Jeremy Floyd was justified by the evidence. Baker was a suspect in an attempted burglary and larceny of a 1979 GMC truck and an ATV from a Fairland home and was shot and killed within miles after he fled and during a subsequent search and pursuit by law enforcement.

The evidence demonstrates that Mr. Baker's actions directly threatened the life of Sheriff Floyd and the other law enforcement officers present, Wright wrote in a letter of clearance released Thursday. Sheriff Floyd had no reasonable alternative in the situation other than the use of deadly force to end the threat.

Wright's decision came after reviewing the findings of the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation Special Agent Chris Leamon's case report received on Jan. 20.

On Jan. 23 Wright received an updated DVD from Leamon containing recordings of radio traffic, photographs, and audio and video recordings related to the investigation.

Wright also reviewed a narrative report from Ottawa County Sheriff's Detective Holli Goforth on Feb. 7 and the OSBI crime scene investigation report on Feb. 8 and determined the investigation is thorough and complete.

Newly elected Sheriff Floyd had been in office just six days when the shooting death occurred.

According to Wright, the evidence presented by Leamon's investigation determined on Jan. 7 around 1 p.m a 1979 GMC truck was located on the side of the road about two miles from where it had been stolen. The area had been recently plagued by multiple residential and vehicle burglaries and thefts.

Shortly after the Ottawa County Sheriff's Office (OCSO) received a report of a homeowner shooting at a white male who had broken into his residence and was running through a pasture two to three miles from where the truck had been discovered, the DA states in his letter. The suspect was reported to be possibly armed with firearms stolen from the home.

According to the investigation, the OCSO requested additional units from surrounding agencies and the Oklahoma Highway Patrol deployed a fixed-wing aircraft to assist and establish a perimeter to search for the suspect. A civilian caught the suspect burglarizing another vehicle a short time later and the suspect then fled on foot. A witness to the burglary was shown a photograph of Baker and identified him as the burglar.

At approximately 2:45 p.m. Baker stole a Dodge truck from another residence in the area. The owner saw the theft and engaged in a vehicle pursuit, but lost sight.

The Dodge truck was abandoned and located in the woods two miles away. The truck's owner told law enforcement he had left a 9mm pistol inside the vehicle with a loaded magazine.

Law enforcement was not able to locate the pistol in the truck, Wright wrote.

Law enforcement officers attempted to stop a speeding yellow truck a short time later, according to Wright, and the driver attempted to elude officers and drove into the woods and crashed. Officers surrounded the area and pursued the fleeing suspect into the woods

They also observed that the suspect was in possession of a firearm, Wright wrote in the letter.

OHP's aircraft was able to spot Baker and directed officers to the area where it appeared he would exit the woods where Floyd was located.

According to Wright, Floyd parked his vehicle and on foot approached a residence, and when he came around the residence he encountered Baker, the suspect matching the description they had been tracking all day.

The Sheriff further states that Mr. Baker was pointing a firearm at him. The Sheriff fired one round from a 12-gauge shotgun and gave commands for Mr. Baker to drop the gun. Mr. Baker did not drop the gun and, three to four seconds later, the Sheriff fired a second round from the shotgun. The Sheriff states that Mr. Baker fell backward onto the ground and dropped the pistol, Wright wrote.

Baker was quickly secured, officers observed a gunshot wound to the chest of Baker and immediately provided emergency medical attention.

Despite the emergency medical efforts to save his life, Mr. Baker died at the scene, the DA states in his letter.

Wright reports Floyd's statement is corroborated by witness OHP Trooper Jeff Laue, two consistent law enforcement dash camera videos that captured parts of the incident, and the consistent findings of the OSBI crime scene investigation.

In my opinion as the District Attorney for the 13th District of Oklahoma, based on the evidence after a complete and thorough investigation, that Sheriff Jeremy Floyd's actions of January 7, 2017, which resulted in the death of Travis Edward Baker were justified. The evidence demonstrates that Mr. Baker's actions directly threatened the life of Sheriff Floyd and the other law enforcement officers present. Sheriff Floyd had no reasonable alternative in the situation other than the use of deadly force to end the threat, Wright wrote.

Sheriff Floyd responded to the news by press release.

I want to make it clear that it is our goal at the sheriff's office to provide safety to everyone in the county and bring peace and prosperity to all, Floyd wrote in the release. To make the decision of using deadly force does not come easy, but it is necessary when no other action can be performed, and immediate life-threatening danger effects an officer or someone else.

"Officer involved shootings has many hurdles of emotions and struggles that directly relates to the shooting that the officer will encounter. No officer can prepare him or herself with the aftermath experience but with proper training, faith, a positive mindset, and great support, healing from the emotional roller coaster becomes easier. My heart goes out to Mr. Bakers family, and I pray that they find comfort and peace.

Floyd thanked the agencies and officers assisting, I want to thank the OHP, Wyandotte Nation Tribal Police, Quapaw Marshals, GRDA, Fairland Police, Delaware County Sheriff's Office, Bernice Police Department, BIA, and Eastern Shawnee Tribal Police for their honorable support and assistance. I also want to thank the OSBI for their thorough investigation, and most importantly I want to thank my staff with the Ottawa County Sheriffs Office for their dedicated team work and honorable commitment to the people of Ottawa County."

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DA rules on Baker shooting death by Sheriff - Miami News Record

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Judge Robarts veto of Trumps travel ban notwithstanding, there is not the slightest question but that the president, in his sole discretion, can choose to admit or exclude any foreigners he likes, based on the interests of the United States.

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The Clinton administration used the executive branchs broad power over immigration to send a 6-year-old boy back to a communist dictatorship. The courts were completely powerless to stop him.

As explained by the federal appellate court that ruled on Elian Gonzalezs asylum application: It is the duty of the Congress and of the executive branch to exercise political will, and in no context is the executive branch entitled to more deference than in the context of foreign affairs, which includes immigration.

The court acknowledged that Elian might well be subjected to re-education, communist indoctrination and political manipulation. (Then again, so would enrolling him at Sidwell Friends.) It didnt matter! Sending little boys back to communist dictatorships was the policy of the Clinton administration.

The Obama administrations immigration policy was to ensure that millions of poverty-stricken foreigners would come here and help turn our country into a Mexican version of Pakistan.

When Arizona merely tried to enforce the federal immigration laws being ignored by the Obama administration, the entire media erupted in rage at this incursion into the majestic power of the president over immigration. They said it was like living in Nazi Germany!

The most reviled section of the act, melodramatically called the Papers Please law, was upheld by the Supreme Court. But the other parts, allowing state officials to enforce federal immigration laws, were ruled unconstitutional. A presidents policy choice to ignore immigration laws supersedes a states right to enforce them.

The court conceded that hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens were arrested in Arizona each year, that they were responsible for a disproportionate share of serious crime, and that illegals constituted nearly 6 percent of Arizonas population.

But Arizona was powerless to enforce laws on the books if those laws happened to be about immigration. The presidents authority over immigration is absolute and exclusive, as part of his authority over foreign policy.

To review:

When the presidents immigration policy is to promote international communism: The president wins.

When the presidents immigration policy is to transform America into a different country: The president wins.

But when the presidents immigration policy is to protect Americans: Some piss-ant judge announces that his authority exceeds that of the president.

This is exactly what I warned you about inAdios, America: The Lefts Plan to Turn Our Country into a Third World Hellhole.NothingTrump does will be met with such massive resistance as his immigration policies.

The left used to attack America by spying for Stalin, aiding our enemies, murdering cops and blowing up buildings. But, then liberals realized, its so much more effective to just do away with America altogether!

Teddy Kennedy gave them their chance with the 1965 immigration act. Since then, weve been taking in more than a million immigrants a year, 90 percent from comically primitive cultures. They like the welfare, but have very little interest in adopting the rest of our culture.

In many parts of the country, youre already not living in America. Just a few more years, and the transformation will be complete. There will be a North American landmass known as the United States, but it wont be our country.

The only thing that stands between America and oblivion is a total immigration moratorium. We are well past the point of quick fixes as Judge Robarts delusional ruling proves.

The judiciary, both political parties, the media, Hollywood, corporate America and approximately 1 million lobbying groups are all working frantically to bring the hardest cases to our shores. Left-wing traitors, who used to honeymoon in Cuba and fight with peasant revolutionaries in Peru, toil away, late into the night, to ensure that genocidal Rwandans can move to America and immediately start collecting food stamps, Medicaid and Social Security.

No matter how clearly laws are written, government bureaucrats connive to import people from countries that a majority of Americans would not want to visit, much less become. Federal judges issue lunatic rulings to ensure that there will never be a pause in the transformation of America.

Congress could write laws requiring immigrants to pay taxes, learn English, forgo welfare and have good moral character. It could write laws giving the president authority to exclude aliens in the public interest.

Except it already has. Those laws were swept away by INS officials, federal judges and Democratic administrations under ferocious pressure from America-hating, left-wing groups.

The country will not be safe until the following outfits are out of business:

The ACLUs Immigrants Rights Project; the National Immigration Forum; the National Immigration Law Center; the National Immigration Project of the National Lawyers Guild; the National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights; the Office of Migration and Refugee Services; the American Immigration Law Foundation; the American Immigration Lawyers Association; the Border Information and Outreach Service; Atlas: DIY; the Catholic Legal Immigration Network; the Clearinghouse for Immigrant Education; the Farmworker Justice Fund; Grantmakers Concerned with Immigrants and Refugees; the Immigrant Legal Resource Center; the International Center for Migration, Ethnicity and Citizenship; the Lesbian and Gay Immigration Rights Task Force; the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service; the National Association for Bilingual Education; the National Clearinghouse on Agricultural Guest Worker Issues; the National Coalition for Dignity and Amnesty for Undocumented Immigrants; the National Coalition for Haitian Rights; the National Council of La Raza; and the National Farm Worker Ministry.

And thats only a small fraction of the anti-American immigration groups assiduously dragging the Third World to our shores while you were busy working.

Look at that list look at Judge Robarts ruling! and ask yourself: Is it possible that anything short of a total immigration moratorium can save this country? Only when there is no immigration to bellyache about will these nuts be forced to think of a new wayto destroy America.

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Ann Coulter: A Maniac Is Running Our Foreign Policy! (It's Not Trump) - Breitbart News

Take a peek at the bestseller lists and its clear that people are grappling with President Trump by reading things they might not have otherwise. As of this morning, George Orwells 1984 is No. 3 on Amazons list of bestselling books and Margaret Atwoods The Handmaids Tale at No. 8. But in this time of filter bubbles and Blue Feed, Red Feed, its important to stretch beyond dystopian fiction (and Facebook) to get an idea of what the side opposite to yours thinks.

The Guardian a newspaper whose owner is dedicated to remaining faithful to its liberal tradition is aiming to do that in part with a column, Burst Your Bubble, that lists five conservative articles worth reading to expand your thinking each week.

Burst Your Bubble is written by Jason Wilson, a U.S.-based freelance journalist whos spent years immersing himself in conservative media as part of writing about the right, including for the left-wing site Alternet. Its difficult for news consumers of all kinds now to construct themselves a media diet that features high-quality information and considered commentary, he said. Guardian readers lean left, but they really are curious about what conservatives are thinking and doing, he says, and he sees his column as a service for those who dont have a lot of time or energy to curate that sort of stream of conservative ideas for themselves.

For each article he includes in his column, Wilson includes context on the author, some background on why you should read the story, and an excerpt. Heres an entry from the January 26 column, for instance:

President Trump, Be Wary of a Mexican Backlash

Publication: National Review

Author: Jos Crdenas served in foreign policy positions in the Bush administration. Until recently, it was probably difficult for people on the left to imagine a worse pedigree. But he does know Latin America, and this article sounds a warning.

Why you should read it: Almost nowhere in the mainstream press have we seen a discussion of the way that the election of Trump has affected his bete noire, Mexico. Crdenas has an ideological revulsion for leftwing populists such as Andr Manuel Lpez Obrador, but his point still stands: Trumps policies and posturing may have the unintended consequence of electing a government that is actively hostile to him, and to US power.

If you read Burst Your Bubble regularly (and the column has become quite popular on The Guardians site, Wilson said), youll notice that many of the same news outlets and authors National Review, Commentary, Reason, The American Conservative, New York Times columnist Ross Douthat, The Atlantics David Frum keep popping up. While those are not ideologically monolithic, they are broadly highbrow conservative publications struggling with the reality that a candidate that a lot of them attacked during the election is now the president, Wilson said. Its perhaps these types of articles that are most satisfying for liberals to read, so I asked Wilson whether the strong presence of #NeverTrump conservatives defeats the columns point (though there are certainly plenty of articles to enrage liberals as well).

Selecting the right content for the column has been a challenge, he said, and one of the reasons that he tends to rely on fairly established outlets is that a lot of the new outlets on the right are more sensational, more of a tabloid style, with more tabloid-style values. (A couple examples he cited: Heat Street and Twitchy.) A lot of newer conservative commentators Tomi Lahren, Tommy Sotomayor have risen to popularity not through traditional media channels but through social media and popular YouTube clips. These are interesting, distinctive voices, Wilson said, but they probably arent the kind of things that he is going to direct Guardian readers which perhaps illustrates the degree to which ones filter bubble can be as much about format and tone as ideology or partisanship.

Were trying to show people that there are thoughtful conservatives, conservatives who are critical of Trump, and their criticism may take different forms from the progressive side, but its nonetheless interesting and productive and useful to see those kinds of criticisms being made, he said.

(As for white nationalist sites like Stormfront, were not gonna send people there. I read that stuff, but its not particularly productive to send our readers to that sort of thingand anyway, the really extreme sites are very much the minority.)

When I asked Wilson if hed actually changed his mind about any political issue through all the reading hes done if hed come around to the right-leaning view on an argument he struggled to think of an instance. Hes clearly not a Trump supporter; he said that his reading and research have at least made him less existentially frightened about Trump as a political figure because hes quite isolated, and it just wasnt like that in the Bush yearsit lets you put Trump in perspective.

If theres one thing he has changed his mind about, he said, its that hes come to see that many of the conservatives whose writing he cites just inhabit a completely different value system from people on the left. Its useful to be exposed to that because it gets across the idea that the divergence in values in this country is real and persistent. It doesnt mean that conservatives are stupid or hoodwinked. It just means that human values really do diverge, and thats something that we find increasingly difficult to negotiate in our policies.

Its that divergence that has made consensus and compromise so difficult, he says: We turn our political opponents into monsters and kind of dehumanize them, he said, and he hopes his column can change that. Were always going to disagree, and some of those disagreements are going to be quite vituperative. But if we see our opponents as people who disagree with us, but have, in other ways, pretty similar lives and pretty similar limitations to us, I think that helps us engage with politics in a more realistic way.

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With Burst Your Bubble, The Guardian pushes readers beyond their political news boundaries - Nieman Journalism Lab at Harvard