Former President Bill Clinton was jokingly called the “first black president” by author Toni Morrison. Maybe it was because he was “cool” in a way that former presidents never were or maybe it was because he advocated policies that were meant to help disenfranchised African-American voters.
Newsweek magazine, in the spirit of Ms. Morrison, has heralded President Barack Obama has the country's “first gay president” on this week's cover after the president announced last week his "evolution" on same-sex marriage rights.
In case you were hiding under a rock, Obama now supports marriage equality for gay and lesbian couples. The president made the announcement last week in an interview with ABC News.
Does your family accept your sexuality? Do your friends and co-workers? If the answer is no, and there was a pill that would cure them of that prejudice, would you give it to them? I’m sure most would say yes and the possibility of such a pill is not science fiction.
British researchers have been studying the issue of racism and found that a common heart disease drug seems to lower racist attitudes as well as blood pressure. The study was conducted at Oxford University where volunteers were divided into two groups. One was given the drug Propranolol while the other took a placebo. Propranolol is a beta blocker used to treat blood pressure, but can also be used in managing panic and anxiety disorders.
In one test, the groups were asked to sort pictures of black and white faces into categories along with positive and negative words. In another, they were asked to report how warm they felt towards certain groups, including blacks and Muslims.
The nature of internet content and how it's shared across the web makes it hard to predict what stories will catch the public's attention and truly go "viral." In 2011, dozens of articles from GA Voice were picked up and cited in national and international publications and hundreds more were shared on social networks like Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr.
Some 500,000 visitors came to our website in 2011 and viewed our content more than 1.8 million times.
Here are the top 10 most-viewed GA Voice web stories of the year: