LeRon Barton

This originally appeared on The Good Men Project My days and nights are consumed by one thing: how to make it pop. There is not a moment that goes by that I am not thinking about how to get my writing and myself in front of people. It is a constant cycle of ideas, triumphs, failures, out-of-the-box thoughts, and strategies. There is another word for it: The Grind. The Grind requires anyone who is an entrepreneur or has an idea and wants to see it come to fruition to work…

This originally appeared on Glide.org When I learned that the California Parole for Non-Violent Criminals and Juvenile Court Trial Requirements Initiative, otherwise known as Prop 57, would be on the ballot this November, my curiosity was immediately piqued. I am a writer who has published essays on the destruction of mass incarceration. I am a co-chair of the Glide Memorial Church Racial Justice Group, a team devoted to fighting racism/white supremacy. Most importantly, I am a Black man in America. I see the importance of Prop 57. In a report…

This originally appeared on The Good Men Project  Recently I was invited to participate in an online forum about race in America. Three other guests and I were discussing the murder of Mario Woods by the San Francisco Police Department, the Bundy Oregon occupation, and the lack of African Americans in Silicon Valley. As we talked about the issues and the reasoning behind them, one of the guests said, “The reason why the Bundy family has not been arrested, more Blacks are not working at dotcom’s, and Woods was murdered…