Author: Destiny Philips

BET has announced the return of the Black + Iconic Soirée, scheduled for Saturday, May 23, 2026, at MGM National Harbor in Oxon Hill, Maryland. The event, now an established fixture on BET’s cultural calendar, continues its focus on honoring the intersection of Black and LGBTQ+ identities, bringing together advocates, artists and community leaders for an evening built around recognition and storytelling. Laverne Cox leads the night Emmy-nominated actress, producer and advocate Laverne Cox will serve as host for this year’s soirée. Cox brings a history of visibility and cultural advocacy to the role, and her presence as host aligns…

Qualcomm had a trading session on Thursday that most chip companies rarely see. Shares jumped as much as 15% before settling into a gain of around 8% to 9% by midday. Volume hit 17.9 million shares, double the stock’s 20-day average for that hour, as investors moved quickly to reprice a company that suddenly looks like it is building something bigger than its smartphone roots suggest. Three things moved the stock The first and most immediate catalyst was a timeline shift on a custom AI chip deal. On April 30, Qualcomm confirmed an agreement to develop custom AI silicon for…

IREN Ltd. shares moved higher Thursday morning as investors prepared for the company’s fiscal third-quarter earnings report, due after the close of markets. The numbers will be the first real look at whether its costly, fast-moving shift from bitcoin mining to AI infrastructure is paying off. A transformation built on speed The company has spent the better part of the past year stacking deals and making announcements at a pace that has left analysts scrambling to keep up. IREN now describes itself as an integrated AI cloud platform, combining large-scale data center capacity, owned energy infrastructure and, following its latest…

Lentils have been cultivated for more than 10,000 years, placing them among the earliest crops ever domesticated by humans. They appear in ancient texts, fed populations across the Middle East and South Asia for millennia, and remain central to traditional cooking in those regions today. That kind of longevity is not accidental. Lentils survived because they work, as a food source, as a protein, and increasingly, as a subject of serious nutritional research. In Western countries, lentils spent decades living in the shadow of animal proteins. That is changing. As more people shift toward plant-based eating, lentils are showing up…

When Black Noir Two arrived in season 4 of The Boys, the biggest departure from his predecessor was the simplest one. He could speak. That single change opened the door to something the original version of the character never had, a genuine dramatic arc with room for personality, vulnerability, and the kind of slow-burn relationship that the show rarely lets breathe. The person on the other end of that relationship was the Deep, played by Chace Crawford. Together, the two formed one of the final season’s most unexpectedly watchable pairings. Both characters had been sidelined within Vought. Both were trying…

Blue Cross Blue Shield is beginning to distribute money from a $2.67 billion settlement this month, closing out a legal fight that started in 2013. The class-action lawsuit named more than 30 affiliated Blue Cross Blue Shield companies as defendants, accusing them of coordinating to divide geographic markets among themselves rather than competing for customers. Plaintiffs argued that arrangement violated federal antitrust law and drove up health insurance premiums for policyholders across the country. The insurers denied those allegations throughout the proceedings and maintained their practices had no effect on what customers paid. The case never went to a verdict.…

On the morning of May 2, 2026, Clayton County International Park in Georgia became the site of something worth documenting. Four hundred and twenty older adults gathered outdoors, warmed up, and proceeded to break a Guinness World Record for the world’s largest core fitness lesson. The previous record had stood since 2018, when 298 participants completed the class that set the benchmark. The group that showed up for Mayfest 2026 cleared that number by more than 40%. The achievement was part of Mayfest 2026, a two-day celebration organized by Clayton County Senior Services under the theme Aging Gracefully. Living Fully.…

A book shaped by the moment Love Tiffany D. Cross enters the literary space with Love, Me, a work that speaks directly to Black women navigating a complicated social and cultural climate. The book arrives at a time when conversations about race, identity and belonging continue to shift, often leaving Black women carrying both visibility and neglect in equal measure. The project does not attempt distance. It leans into lived experience, drawing from the emotional and structural realities that define daily life for many. Cross frames the narrative around endurance, while also questioning what it means to give and receive…

Three people are dead and a British national is in intensive care in South Africa after a suspected hantavirus outbreak aboard the MV Hondius, a polar expedition cruise ship currently sailing through the Atlantic Ocean. The World Health Organization confirmed Sunday that one case had been laboratory verified, with five additional suspected cases under active investigation. The ship departed Ushuaia, Argentina, on March 20 and was scheduled to reach Cape Verde on May 4. What happened to the three people who died The first victim was a 70-year-old passenger who developed symptoms and died while still on board. His body…

Two teenage boys were shot and killed and 10 other people were injured early Saturday morning at an apartment complex in Amarillo, Texas. The Amarillo Police Department responded to South Coulter Street just before 2 a.m. on May 2, 2026, after reports of gunfire at a gathering that investigators say was deliberately targeted. The two suspects who carried out the attack have not been apprehended. What police say happened before the shooting The evening began at a separate location, where a party was already underway. At some point during the night, several individuals were asked to leave. Rather than departing…