In the Mix with Aaliyah Miller

Was Bruce Jenner’s interview with Diane Sawyer a game changer for the transgender community? I’ve been asking myself that question since I’ve seen the headlines. I can’t definitely say yes or no. Although I didn’t watch the much anticipated interview I’ve been following the media coverage leading up to it as well as the post-coverage. What's a positive take away? People are talking about transgender issues. Since 2013, Google has seen a spike in the interest over headlines that include the term transgender. While some may not like this new attention, it also doesn’t seem to be an issue going away easily either. The narrative is slowly changing, but a negative takeaway is that mainstream media coverage still has too many conversations filled with ridicule and disgust towards transgendered individuals. There remains a lack of empathy and education about transgender individuals. As a society we need to stop ignoring the “pink elephant” in the room and pretending t...

While we love to share and praise each other in social media the space has also proven to be an effective tool where "hateration" spreads like wild fire. "Public shaming" aka #socialshaming via social media is taking hold in a big way. Granted it's not really a new phenomenon. We have plenty of examples from history. One example that comes to mind is Nathanial Hawthorne's novel, " The Scarlett Letter ." I even think the crucifixion of Jesus can be considered an example too.   However, thanks to social and our 24-7  news cycle, public shaming on social media has the power to take an everyday person an make them an instant celebrity, potentially black list the person, make them a pariah, and in some cases ruin their professional life as well as their personal relationships. All this takes place within 24 hours or less. Yikes. A recent victim to an instantaneous rise and fall would be Trevor Noah , last week the South African comedian was getting...