On The Sources We Are Trained To Trust

When writing about the Super Bowl halftime show, it felt extra important to note the people we are learning from

When sourcing our recent post on Uncle Sam from the Kendrick Lamar Halftime show, we realized our primary sources were nontraditional sources, and wanted to use this moment to explain why we have long trusted Black voices and expertise, to help us navigate a world grounded in systemic inequities and injustices.

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A lot of the sources we’re using in this post about the halftime show are Black people with critical expertise, insights, and perspectives—each rooted in evidence and experience. And yet, we know that when Black people share their knowledge, their credibility is often questioned—sometimes outright dismissed—regardless of their qualifications.

If your brain’s first reaction is to doubt or discredit these voices, trust me, babes—same. When we first started this work 4.5 years ago, that was my default too. Like many of us, I was trained to trust “official” sources first—academic journals, news articles, experts with a string of degrees behind their name (especially white ones). This is something I had to unlearn.

I have an undergraduate degree, a masters from a research intensive university in Canada. I was taught that expertise is only valid when backed by institutions—degrees, titles, peer review. And while credentials can matter, they’re not the sole markers of knowledge. If anything, we should be questioning who gets to define expertise in the first place. Because here’s the truth: all sources carry bias. Research is biased. Media is biased. People are biased. Algorithms, AI tools—everything reflects the biases of the people who built them.

Now, let’s be clear—this isn’t about treating every voice on the internet as equally credible. Not everyone with an opinion is an expert. There’s a massive difference between an armchair expert—someone who shares surface-level takes without real experience or knowledge—and the kind of expertise we’re talking about here.