Embrace Boston

The Loving v. Virginia decision of 1967, which struck down bans on in*******al marriage and relationships, has changed the face of the American family. And not just for cis-het couples, either. Loving also paved the way for Obergefell v. Hodges, which guaranteed same-sex couples the right to marry.

Today, 20% of all married couples in the United States identify as in*******al or interethnic, with more than 30% of those couples identifying as same-sex.

This Pride Month, we celebrate the legacy of Loving and the right to love and marry whomever we choose.

Last weekend marked 105 years since the Tulsa Race Massacre destroyed Greenwood’s “Black Wall Street” district and killed as many as 300 people. But the trauma to Tulsa’s Black community didn’t stop there.

Tulsa Mayor Monroe Nichols has committed to a $105 million reparations package for descendants of the massacre’s survivors, and this data from the National Bureau of Economic Research helps explain why. The destruction of the thriving Greenwood community has led to a century of systemic disinvestment and decreased home ownership among Black Tulsans. That includes Lessie Benningfield Randle, the last known survivor of the massacre, whose family lost homes both to the massacre and then later to Tulsa’s racist urban development policies.

These statistics and Randle’s story remind us that we can’t right the wrongs of our past without intentional action.