Mark's Blog
A collection of various stories and pieces I have written. The topics are somewhat random and wide-ranging, which is perhaps a reflection of my own somewhat random thought process as an author.
Pitch Black: Introduction
· 12 min read
Madison Avenue is afraid of the dark. In this introduction to Pitch Black, Mark S. Robinson traces the history of Black advertising — from invisibility to cultural dominance — and explains why this story needed to be told.
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How to be a Superhero
· 4 min read
Martin Luther King Day January 21st 2013 — I read an interesting fact in the news just the other day. No. I read a very disturbing fact in...
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What happens when you tell folks they're racist?
· 6 min read
(That wasn't a rhetorical question.) I take it as a good thing and as a measure of meaningful progress that white people absolutely lose...
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The 2nd Amendment doesn't say that
· 6 min read
Our nation has a bad case of amnesia about our history of gun regulation legislation. And the media should be doing a much better job of...
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Losing a Facebook Friend
· 5 min read
I think about how empty my life would be without Erica.
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Being A Father
· 3 min read
When I first met my wife, I discovered for the first time someone that was my equal. But when my son was born, I was suddenly staring into the face of someone who was — without any doubt — greater than me.
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Sunday morning ennui
· 6 min read
Despite the fact that it's the weekend and I'm entitled to sleep a little later, I get up every Sunday morning to watch the weekly news-talk shows. I don't always leave satisfied, but I come back every Sunday.
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A Night at Red Lobster
· 2 min read
OK, OK, I know. It's my fault. What was I doing at Red Lobster? I'm sorry, but the commercials really make you wanna go and I hadn't been in a while...
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No, I won't be nice
· 2 min read
Bill Maher says it's okay to hate Donald Trump, but not okay to hate the people who support him. That sounds very high-minded. Here's why that's just plain wrong.
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What is Black
· 3 min read
I have been black all my life — right from birth — and yet after 63 years I am no closer to having a workable, defensible definition of what it is to be black.
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Non-Stop Travel
· 7 min read
For 45 years, I worked in the advertising business. What I learned — and what became a useful and valuable life lesson — was that if you do something often enough, you find that you can do almost anything. The impossible soon becomes routine.
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