The Atlanta in 2026 isn't the Atlanta of 1996. Stop Telling Me Where You Went To Highschool I'm a transplant from Brooklyn, NY. I chose to live in Atlanta. I invest here. I vote here. I advocate here. And I am exhausted of candidates acting like telling me they went to “Doug” or “Mays” is a governing philosophy. It’s not.
There was a time when invoking your Atlanta high school carried real political weight. It signaled generational roots, community ties and lived experience in legacy neighborhoods. For longtime residents, those names still carry pride and history. That Matters. I Get It. But here’s what also matters: Atlanta has changed.
Most voters are not from here. They moved here for opportunity, for culture, for work, for family and for possibility. They are renters in Midtown, homeowners in Southwest, entrepreneurs on the BeltLine, young professionals who graduated from schools outside of APS. They do not have an emotional attachment to your alumni status. And they shouldn’t have to.
Being from here is not a policy position. When candidates lead with “I’m Atlanta born and raised,” what I hear is a substitute for substance. I want to hear about housing affordability. I want to hear about infrastructure that actually works. I want to hear how you plan to address public safety without slogans. I want specifics on taxes, zoning, small business support, transit, and equitable development. Nostalgia is not a viable plan.
As a voter advocate and communications professional. I engage with individuals daily who feel unseen in campaign messaging. They are deeply invested in this city’s future, but they are not part of the “old guard” networks. When campaigns center their identity around who they went to school with thirty years ago, they are speaking to a shrinking slice of the electorate.
And let’s be honest... Even among longtime residents, shared high school history does not automatically translate to trust. Voters have matured. They’ve seen enough administrations come and go. They’re not impressed by biography alone. They want competence. They want accountability. They want results. Atlanta today requires coalition building that crosses geography, generation, income level and origin.
The city is too dynamic, too complex, too economically and culturally layered for insider shorthand to carry an election. If you grew up here, that’s great. Tell us how that perspective informs your solutions. Being from here is not enough. Having deep family ties is not enough. Knowing the “right” people is not enough. What is your housing strategy? What is your infrastructure plan?
How will you balance development with displacement? How will you make city government more efficient? How will you build coalitions across a city that no longer fits into old political boxes? This is not a class reunion.This is not a family inheritance. This is not a nostalgia tour. It’s a municipal election.
Atlanta deserves leaders who understand its history - but are not hiding behind it. This city is growing, diversifying, and demanding more from those who seek to lead it. We are not voting for nostalgia. We are not voting for last names. We are not voting for who you stood beside decades ago. We are voting for competence, clarity, courage, and measurable plans. Atlanta’s future should not be inherited. It should be earned.
Legacy Is Not a Caption: Let us Stop Reducing The Legacy of Jesse Jackson to a Social Media Post
As tributes pour in for Rev. Jesse Jackson, timelines are filled with carefully curated photos, polished captions, and recycled quotes about justice and equality. And while honoring his life is appropriate, necessary even, we must be honest about something uncomfortable.
Let this not be the moment where elected officials and candidates casually invoke his name for optics. Rev. Jackson’s life was not aesthetic. It was disruptive. It was inconvenient to power. It demanded courage in rooms where silence was easier and safer. He challenged systems, confronted hypocrisy, and organized communities long before hashtags made advocacy trendy.
Yet too often, the same individuals now posting glowing tributes are conspicuously absent when real work is required. Organizations like Lift Every Vote & Rise routinely call on public officials to stand with us in voter advocacy efforts, from educating communities on important issues during elections to showing up for meaningful engagement with constituents on off-election cycles. The response is frequently muted. The urgency disappears. The calendars suddenly fill.
But when a civil rights giant’s name trends, everyone finds time. Legacy is not something you borrow for a caption. It is something you honor through action.
Rev. Jackson understood that civic participation is not seasonal. It is not activated only during election cycles or memorial moments. It is sustained, strategic, and often unglamorous. It requires showing up to community meetings that won’t make the news. It means answering calls from grassroots leaders when there is no political advantage attached. It means risking comfort for conviction.
If you truly stand on his shoulders, then stand up when it counts. Stand up when voting rights are quietly weakened. Stand up when community organizations need partnership, not platitudes. Stand up when expanding access costs you political capital.
Posting is easy. Proximity to power is easy. Invoking Rev. Jackson’s name is easy. Continuing his work is not. If we are going to honor him, let it be through measurable commitment, through visible partnership with grassroots advocates and through consistent presence in communities beyond photo opportunities.
Rev. Jesse Jackson’s legacy is not a social media strategy. It is a standard. And that standard demands more than words.
The Insulting Myth That Black People Do Not Have ID To Vote
The liberal left is once again pushing a tired narrative…
Black people cannot obtain identification to vote. The notion is insulting and it is not factual. The false narrative assumes incompetence where there is resilience. It assumes helplessness where there is history. It reduces a community that has navigated redlining, literacy tests, poll taxes, and outright terror into people who somehow cannot navigate the Department of Motor Vehicles in 2026.
Black voters are not fragile. We are not incapable. And we are certainly not unaware of what it takes to participate in elections. Suggesting that Black adults broadly lack identification is not advocacy. It is condescension dressed up as protection. And again… It’s a lie.
In Georgia, where voter ID laws have been in place for years, turnout among Black voters has not disappeared. In fact, we’ve witnessed record-breaking participation in cycles like 2020 and 2022. That reality alone dismantles the narrative that voter ID laws equate to Black voter erasure.
If there is a true concern about civic participation, there should be a broader focus on expanding access to information, improving voter education and delivering viable outreach. Black voters are thoughtful, strategic, and fully capable of navigating civic processes.
Black voters do not need to be rescued. We need to be respected. Do not build political arguments on the premise that we are incapable of securing identification. That is not advocacy - it is arrogance. It is easier to cast us as victims than to engage us as voters with standards.
We are not confused. We are not helpless. And we are not obligated to reward anyone who diminishes our capacity in the name of protecting it.
White Liberal Women And Their Selective Outrage... What It Really Means
White liberal women are often positioned as the backbone of progressive politics. They vote blue. They organize book clubs around justice. Protest ICE in their communities. They show up loudly when their rights are on the line. However, when Black communities face harm—real, ongoing, systemic harm—the silence is hard to miss. This silence isn’t about a lack of information. It’s about selective outrage.
When police violence claims another Black life, when Black women die at alarming rates during childbirth, when voter suppression quietly targets Black neighborhoods, the response from many white liberal women is muted or nonexistent. No urgency. No sustained attention. No consistent action. And yet, these same women are often the loudest voices in the room when issues feel personal, familiar, or immediately threatening to them.
White liberal women can opt in and out of justice conversations at will as their whiteness still functions as a shield. They can support Black causes abstractly while benefiting from the very systems they claim to oppose. And when Black women name that contradiction, the response is often defensiveness rather than reflection. Far too often Black women are labeled "Angry", Divisive" or “Too Political.” Meanwhile, the real issue of ongoing racial harm gets pushed aside to protect white comfort.
Selective outrage has consequences. Policies stall, harm continues and Black communities are gaslit into believing their experiences are exaggerated or inconvenient. And the burden of pushing for justice is once again placed on those already carrying the heaviest burdens.
As a Black woman, I am not asking for guilt, nor for silence disguised as respect. I am asking for consistency when it’s inconvenient, courage when it costs you something, and action when no one is watching. Solidarity is not a performance and justice is not a mood. If allyship disappears the moment comfort is threatened, it was never allyship at all.