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We received quite a few comments in response to our stories on Michigan’s high ranking in weed sales and the closing of former Ferndale hot spot the Emory.
Michigan rises to No. 2 in marijuana sales per resident Just drive on the roads and you’ll know. Can’t go a mile without smelling nothing but skunk.
—Tim Karaptian, Facebook
Ever wonder why the NFL draft was so popular? The first city that was recreational-friendly.
—David Picklesimer, Facebook
The Emory is closing at the end of the year They let that place go downhill. Last time I was there they wouldn’t even give us ketchup.
—Rebecca Jacokes, Facebook
Sad in a way but they just let it slowly rot ... or wear out. The booths, the floor, etc., just looked like they didn’t wanna invest anything into it.
—Matt Verbaan, Facebook
Sound off: letters@metrotimes.com
NEWS & VIEWS
Mary Sheffield announces bid for Detroit mayor, promising equity and opportunity
Detroit City Council President Mary Sheffield announced Tuesday that she’s running for mayor, positioning herself as a champion for equity and inclusive growth in a city where economic disparities persist.
Her announcement comes less than a month after Mayor Mike Duggan revealed he would not seek a fourth term, leaving the door open for new leadership in 2025.
“For me, it’s such an important time in Detroit, especially with the mayor departing,” Sheffield said in an exclusive interview with Metro Times. “I‘ve had
the opportunity to listen over the last 11 years, and I’ve done so much great work on the council with the help of so many people. Now it’s about having a greater impact, a bigger reach. I want to make sure that we build upon the growth and the progress so that the city’s prosperity touches more residents, businesses, and neighborhoods.”
Sheffield, 37, has served on the City Council for 11 years and has become a leading advocate for affordable housing, tenants rights, neighborhood development, property tax reform, and a clean environment. As council president, she
has been a vocal critic of inequitable investment strategies, calling for a shift away from tax incentives for downtown developers and toward policies that directly benefit Detroit’s most vulnerable residents.
In fact, Sheffield says she supports a downtown entertainment tax that would create enough revenue to reduce property taxes for residents.
“We know that the property taxes are way too high in Detroit,” Sheffield says.
“I want to create real structural property tax reforms so that there’s less of a need for businesses to ask for abatements. We
have to make sure this is more equitable.”
Sheffield says the tax plans are serious to her.
“It’s long-term, and it’s something I’m very passionate about, and it’s going to be a priority for me,” she says.
Her announcement marks a historic moment. If elected, Sheffield would become the first woman to serve as Detroit’s mayor.
She’s no stranger to making history.
At 26, Sheffield became the youngest person ever elected to Detroit City Council and later its youngest council
Detroit City Council President Mary Sheffield has served on Council for 11 years and has become a leading advocate for affordable housing, tenants rights, and property tax reform. CITY OF DETROIT
president.
Sheffield says her campaign will focus on creating a more equitable Detroit by prioritizing affordable housing, economic development that benefits longtime residents, and policies to keep families in their homes. Nearly half of Detroiters rent their homes, and rising housing costs have forced many to leave the city. Sheffield has pledged to make housing a cornerstone of her administration.
“We need more opportunities for homeownership and not just investing in rental properties,” she says.
Sheffield has also been a leading voice against overassessments of property taxes, which disproportionately impact lower-income residents. Earlier this year, she called for a moratorium on home foreclosures after a study revealed that homes valued under $35,000 were often illegally overassessed, putting many residents at risk of losing their houses.
In addition, Sheffield has opposed city policies that restrict access to public spaces, such as the closure of parks during fireworks celebrations, arguing that such measures disproportionately impact residents in underserved neighborhoods.
Sheffield’s campaign builds on a career dedicated to addressing systemic inequities. During her tenure on the council, she spearheaded efforts to pass Detroit’s first inclusionary housing ordinance, requiring developers who receive public subsidies to reserve a portion of their units for lower-income residents. She also championed a measure to provide free legal representation to lowerincome residents facing eviction.
Her campaign’s motto is, “Together we can, together we will.”
“When we’re united, there’s nothing we can’t achieve,” Sheffield says. “We need a Detroit where everyone has reached their potential.”
Sheffield has not shied away from taking on powerful interests. In 2023, she was the lone vote against $615 million in tax incentives for a massive downtown development project led by billionaires Stephen Ross and the Ilitch family. While she supports economic revitalization, Sheffield has repeatedly called for investments that prioritize Detroiters who have lived through decades of disinvestment.
“I really try to take each project on its face, case by case, to be able to really look at what the return on investment is and to see if the tax abatement is necessary,” Sheffield says. “It’s about making sure that there’s a tangible benefit to Detroiters and that businesses in Detroit are involved.”
Sheffield credits her family’s legacy of activism for inspiring her passion for public service. Her father, Horace Sheffield III, is a longtime pastor and activist, while her late mother was an
educator and nurse. Her grandfather, Horace Sheffield Jr., played a pivotal role in organizing the historic 1941 Ford River Rouge strike that led to the automaker recognizing the United Auto Workers.
As her campaign gets underway, Sheffield says she’ll focus on listening to residents’ concerns through a series of community conversations.
“I’m excited about the potential of what Detroit can be,” Sheffield says. “I believe our best days are ahead of us. I’m extremely inspired by what we’ve done. [But] there’s still so much work that needs to be done.”
Sheffield will likely face many opponents. Among others who have already announced their intentions to run for mayor are City Councilman Fred Durhall III, former Councilwoman Saunteel Jenkins, and ex-businessman Joel Haashiim.
—Steve Neavling
The Emory is closing at the end of the year
Downtown Ferndale eatery the Emory is closing its doors at the end of the month, according to an announcement on social media last Friday.
Long known for its craft beers and burgers, the restaurant, located at Nine Mile and Woodward, has been a sibling to nearby hot spots the WAB
and the Loving Touch since 2007.
“We’ve loved seeing the city grow and seeing our staff evolve and move on to do amazing things,” the Emory posted. “And at the end of 2024, we’ll be writing [our] last chapter.”
“This will leave a hole in my heart,” Ferndale resident Laura Mikulski wrote on the Emory’s Facebook page.
“My husband and I were there so often that it became a regular part of our lives, and we had our wedding rehearsal dinner there. After having our daughter, this was one of the few places we went to knowing that we’d be able to wrangle her in a booth and have a comfortable, quiet night out. Thank you for all the memories (and
all the turkey burgers).”
“My husband and I had our first date at The Emory in 2015,” added longtime patron Stephanie Bell. “We have now been married for 6.5 years and have two beautiful daughters. Grateful for the role The Emory played in starting our relationship!”
—Dave Mesrey
The former Ferndale hot spot is closing its doors at the end of 2024. FACEBOOK
NEWS & VIEWS
Opinion Protect Michigan families before trifecta ends
By Branden Snyder
As Michigan Democrats are set to lose their trifecta in mere weeks, we need our leaders to act with courage and urgency now to protect our communities. The next two weeks of the legislative session represent our last chance to pass laws that uplift working families across the state. If we fail to act now, January will bring political deadlock — and with it, the loss of critical opportunities to fight for Michiganders’ rights for the next two years.
The results of this past election make it clear that working people want policies that help themselves and their families. According to exit polls, Michigan voters cared most about two issues: the state of democracy, followed closely by the economy. Americans everywhere feel like the cost of a good life keeps rising, and Michiganders are no exception. As longtime community organizers, we’ve heard this from all families, regardless of their political affiliation. It’s too expensive to live: rent, medical care, childcare, transportation, and groceries are emptying our bank accounts, plunging some of us into precarity or debt.
Donald Trump’s administration
will likely prioritize the enrichment of billionaires over the livelihoods of our working people. As a result, Michigan’s Democratic majority has just a few weeks left to shore up our economic protections before it’s too late.
Fortunately, there’s a solution: a slate of bills in the state legislature that would empower working families across Michigan. These proposals include homeowner and renter protections, paid family leave to be there for our loved ones when it matters most, closing corporate tax loopholes to ensure corporations pay their fair share, and making it easier for all working people to obtain driver’s licenses.
Michiganders can’t wait for an affordable life. As housing costs continue to rise, Michigan renters urgently need protections to ensure safe, affordable, and stable housing. SB 801 and SB 900-903 will establish essential housing protections such as the Tenants’ Right to Organize to help our communities come together, organize, and fight for what they deserve. Passing HB 4410-4412 and SB 265-267 will allow all Michiganders to access driver’s licenses, regardless of immigration status. This
will make living in Michigan safe, dignified, and fair for us all. Finally, all Michiganders deserve access to a strong paid family-leave program so that we can all take care of our own health, provide care for a loved one, or welcome a new child, without the risk of losing a job or sacrificing savings. Let’s ensure SB 332-333 passes, providing up to 15 weeks of paid leave for families in times of need.
We have a plan to pay for all these public services, and more. Michigan’s working families already pay their fair share — it’s time that wealthy corporations do, too. Large corporations like Walmart, Target, and Home Depot have convinced Michigan’s Tax Tribunal to let them pay lower property taxes. We reject this skirting of responsibility and evasion of law that only deepens the pockets of the ultra wealthy, at a cost to the rest of us. HB 5865-5868 will close these tax loopholes and hold big corporations accountable, ensuring they contribute to our state’s prosperity. Even after a contentious election, it’s clear that people are united by issues that matter in their daily lives — goodpaying jobs, vibrant neighborhoods,
and strong communities — not by party. It is politicians’ jobs to prioritize our needs, and we deserve leaders who will stand by their convictions, protect our rights, and deliver the services our families deserve. No matter our political party or voting record, we all want to be able to take care of the people we love, live in a home we can afford, and get to work easily and back home to our families safely. Together, we can make this dream a reality.
Across Michigan, people are uniting across race and place to demand a livable state for all. In our lawmakers’ final weeks in session, let’s make sure they use their position to work for us, not for their corporate donors. This is our last opportunity to use a Democratic trifecta in favor of the will of the people; we need action on the bills that matter to working families before we’re at a standstill. Passing bold legislation now will ensure Michiganders have the stability, support, and opportunity they need to thrive for years to come.
Branden Snyder is state director of We Make Michigan and the former executive director of Detroit Action.
Branden Snyder says a slate of bills in the state Legislature would empower working families across Michigan.
NEWS & VIEWS
National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation began as a metro Detroit story
By Bill Shea
They don’t teach you in journalism school about what to do when Caitlyn Jenner calls you at midnight from Australia while you’re violently stoned on a 20-mg edible.
In my 30 years in the news business, I’ve learned most lessons the hard way, such as when mercurial celebrities phone you unexpectedly a day early for an interview after you’ve gobbled weed to help you sleep, your brain will snap into something like that of a functioning journalist as a professional survival mechanism.
I was able to take down Jenner’s words and not burst out manically laughing when she’d occasionally dip into musty boomer MAGA drivel. I am, after all, a total professional. Also, I attended a third-rate state college that didn’t have a formal journalism school, so I had to learn all this shit on the fly to survive.
Still, that automatic preservation instinct has served me well over the decades in this terribly fun and awfully shitty business. Not because I was blitzed all the time — I didn’t get stoned until my mid-40s, and thank you for that mental health life preserver, Michigan voters — but because you never know what’s going to happen day-to-day or even hour-to-hour in journalism. I’ve been tear-gassed, shot at, and personally lied to by Donald Trump in my career.
If you’d told me a dozen years ago that I’d be filling in for the venerable Joe Lapointe as a columnist for the Detroit Metro Times, I’d have scoffed at the audacity of such a notion. But a personal political satori — sparked by living and working in downtown Detroit, and learning from and listening to Detroiters — catapulted me from being a dull, replacement-level moderate Republican to becoming a dull Leftist union organizer, social democrat, wealth-spreading radical anti-fascist who sympathizes with Robespierre
and Smedley Butler rather than with William F. Buckley Jr. and whatever monstrosity passes for an intellectual today on the Right.
My life being a self-inflicted minor Greek tragedy, the capricious and rapacious Gods of Shareholder Value looked unfavorably on that ideological metamorphosis, and I found myself among the score of journalists defenestrated by the New York Times-owned Athletic in June 2023 after several years of writing about culture, politics, diversity and equity, economics, technology, and media in sports.
It may be a dusty, shopworn cliché to say that getting laid off was the best thing to happen to me — I’ve been privileged to have had some monumentally fun experiences in my life as a globetrotting degenerate Bohemian libertine — but getting laid off did permit me the time and space to do some things for myself that I found impossible while working in corporate journalism.
For example, I’ve been working on a madcap near-future satire novel that’s my only remaining life goal, and I launched billshea.com, a free essay site (I loathe the word blog) that gives me a platform to write what I want without some corporate drone editor telling me I cannot describe Donald Trump as an “enfeebled senile and lazy fascist dipshit” and “a racist sexpest” who is surrounding himself with “a dismal 4chan imperial court of malicious, corrupt eunuchs and vindictive suppli-
cants from the impacted bowels of the MAGA Cinematic Universe” who are gleefully trying to “turn America into Ayn Rand’s Confederate Gilead.”
I guess I wrote that here, too. Vive le Metro Times!
The freedom to be critical and write what I believe in, without being shackled to impossibly bullshit notions of anodyne both-sider objectivity, is sweet freedom and relief. I can write what I believe, fairly and with my bias honestly in the forefront, without fear of losing my health insurance.
So that’s what I’m doing on my personal site, and here to a lesser and more polite degree for the next few weeks. Wrapping up the year being a secondstring Joe Lapointe ain’t too bad.
I do have more to share than my white-hot political contempt for Trump and his weird Silicon Valley anti-democracy oligarch cronies, and the cancerous totalitarian-bent white nationalist MAGA cult that’s poisoning our republic with its vicious medieval peasant stupidity and fear.
Lest you think I’m a boring scold, I do have my pleasures. Christmas, for example. I’m a militant atheist and appreciate the December holiday more for its Saturnalia and Yule roots, but I love Christmas music and movies — National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation most of all because it’s basically a documentary of my Midwestern upbringing in the late 1970s through the end of the ’80s. I was Rusty; now I’m Clark. And maybe Eddie.
It wasn’t that long ago that I learned that the story upon which the movie is based (“Christmas ’59” in the December 1980 issue of National Lampoon magazine) takes place in Grosse Pointe — and not in suburban Chicago like in the film. And the Griswold family name is taken from Detroit’s Griswold Street. The story and later screenplay were written by Lansing-born John Hughes, best known for writing and directing classics such as Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, and Planes, Trains and Automobiles. Hughes, who died in 2009 at age 59, grew up in Grosse Pointe, and that’s why you see Alan Ruck’s Cameron Frye wearing a No. 9 Gordie Howe jersey in Hughes’ masterpiece, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. This is per Hughes’ son James, who in a great Q&A published on The Henry Ford museum’s blog a few years ago, recounted the many metro Detroit links to his father’s work.
Next week, I’ll tackle the cherished tradition of the absurdly wealthy capitalist tycoons, all screeching “no socialism” in metro Detroit and elsewhere, demanding public handouts for their private-sector projects, aka “MOM, THE BILLIONAIRES NEED MONEY AGAIN!”
Sign up for Bill Shea’s free, dolphin-safe, hand-crafted, artisanal, Americanmade, gluten-free, free-range, smallbatch, unexpurgated, openly biased, middle-aged radical pinko Beatnik essay site at billshea.com.
Shea sounds off
Christmas 59 by John Hughes
BILL SHEA
STATE OF THE FREE PRESS 2025
The story being censored could be yours (whether you know it or not)!
By Paul Rosenberg | Random
Lengths News
With any “Top 10” list, there’s a natural tendency to look first at number one, and neither I nor Project Censored would discourage you from doing that, when it comes to their annual list of the top censored stories of the year. This year, the top story is about workplace deaths and injuries — with striking racial disparities, particularly for much-maligned foreign-born workers. Injury rates for Southern service workers — predominantly Black — are especially alarming, 87% in one year, according to one poll.
Sensationalized deaths and injuries make the news all the time, but workplace deaths and injuries (nearly 6,000, and 2.8 million, respectively in a year) are another matter altogether. They’re a nonstory, even when advocates strive to shine a light on them.
But this pattern of what’s deemed newsworthy and what isn’t leads to a deep point. In the introduction to the list, Project Censored associate director Andy Lee Roth writes that “readers can only appreciate the full significance of the Project’s annual listing of important
but underreported stories by stepping back to perceive deeper, less obvious patterns of omission in corporate news coverage.” And I couldn’t agree more.
This has always been a theme of mine as long as I’ve been reviewing their lists, because the patterns of what’s being blocked out of the public conversation are the clearest way of seeing the censoring process at work — the process that Project Censored founder Carl Jensen described as “the suppression of information, whether purposeful or not, by any method … that prevents the public
from fully knowing what is happening in its society.”
It’s not just that somehow all the news assignment editors in America overlooked this or that story. Where there are patterns of omission so consistently, year after year, they can only be explained by systemic biases rooted in the interests of particularly powerful special interests. What’s more, in addition to patterns of omission in the stories as a whole, one can also find intersecting patterns within individual stories. The above description of the top story is an example: race, class,
With Joe Biden about to abandon ship and Donald Trump ready to return to the bully pulpit next month, how will the mainstream media cover Trump’s second act?
region, citizenship status, and more are all involved.
At a big-picture level, there are three dealing with cyber issues and four that are each clearly dealing with the environment, corporate misconduct, harm to consumers, and race. Or perhaps I should say seven dealing with race, the more I think about what “clearly” means. Two of the four stories I counted as dealing with race involved global environmental issues, which almost always have an obvious racial component, while a third, “Abortion Services Censored on Social Platforms Globally,” disproportionately impacts minorities in the U.S., as well globally. Those I counted as “clearly” with no problem. But another three are pretty damn clear, too, with a moment’s thought. For example, story number seven, “Military Personnel Target Gen Z Recruits with Lurid Social Media Tactics,” clearly involves cyber deception of social media consumers with the aim of luring them into a dangerous workplace from which they cannot simply resign once they realize they’ve been lied to or conned. But in addition to cyber, consumer, and workplace harm, the target audience and resulting recruits are undoubtedly disproportionately non-white,
though that’s not explicitly dwelt on.
The same could be said for two other stories: “New Federal Rule Limits Transcript Withholding by Colleges and Universities” and “Controversial Acquitted-Conduct Sentencing Challenged by U.S. Commission.” Anything involving education or the criminal-justice system is bound to involve disproportionate harm to minorities, as statistics invariably show. In fact, all 10 could well reflect this reality. But that’s enough to make my point clear.
I’m dwelling on race because it’s important, but also because it’s easily highlighted in this context. But there are other hidden connections to be found in these stories, as well. I’ll leave those as an exercise for the reader, as they say in the trade. But the point is, as you do more than just simply read these stories — as you reflect on them, on why they’re censored, whose stories they are, what harms are being suffered, whose humanity is being denied — you’ll find yourself seeing the world more from the point of view of those being excluded from the news, and from the point of view that you’re interconnected with them at the
1. THOUSANDS KILLED AND INJURED ON THE JOB, WITH SIGNIFICANT RACIAL DISPARITIES IN DEATHS AND INJURIES
Working in America is becoming more dangerous, especially for minorities, according to recent studies reported on by Truthout and Peoples Dispatch, while the same isn’t true for other developed nations.
Workplace fatalities increased 5.7% in the 2021-2022 period covered by the Bureau of Labor Statistics or BLS’s Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries, Tyler Walicek reported for Truthout. “Nearly 6,000 U.S. workers died on the job,” he wrote — a 10-year high — while “a startling total of 2.8 million were injured or sickened,” according to another BLS report.
The racial disparities were sharp. The average workplace death rate was 3.7 deaths per hundred thousand full-time workers, but it was 24.3% higher (4.6 deaths) for Latiné workers and 13.5% higher (4.2 deaths) for Black workers. The majority of Latiné deaths (63.5%) were of foreign-born workers, and 40% of those were in construction. “It’s not
hard to imagine that communication lapses between workers on an active construction site could feasibly create dangerous situations,” Walicek noted.
Transportation incidents were the highest cause of fatalities within both groups. Violence and other injuries by persons or animals were second highest for Black workers; for Hispanic or Latiné workers it was falls, slips, or trips. Black people and women were particularly likely to be homicide victims. Black people represented 13.4% of all fatalities, but 33.4% of homicide fatalities — more than twice the base rate. Women represented 8.1% of all fatalities, but 15.3% of homicide fatalities — a little less than twice the base rate.
The non-fatal injury rate for service workers in the South, particularly workers of color, is also alarmingly high, according to an April 5, 2023, report by Peoples Dispatch summarizing findings from a March 2023 survey by the Strategic Organizing Center. The poll of 347 workers, most of whom were Black, “found that a shocking 87% were injured on the job in the last year,” they reported. In addition, “More than half of survey respondents reported observing serious health and safety standard [violations] at work,” and “most workers worried about their personal safety on the job, most believe that their employer prioritizes profit over safety, most do not raise safety issues for fear of retaliation, and the vast majority (72%) believe that their employer’s attitude ‘places customer satisfaction above worker safety.’”
“Compared to other developed countries, the United States consistently underperforms in providing workers with on-the-job safety,” Project Censored notes. “Walicek [argues] that this is a direct consequence of ‘the diminution of worker power and regulatory oversight’ in the United States.” U.S. workplace fatality rates exceeded those in the UK, Canada, Australia, and much of Europe, according to a 2021 assessment by the consulting firm Arinite Health and Safety, Walicek reports.
“Workers are increasingly organizing to fight back against hazardous working conditions,” Project Censored notes, citing a civil rights complaint against South Carolina’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration filed by members of the recently formed Union of Southern Service Workers “for failing to protect Black workers from hazardous working conditions,” as reported by the Post and Courier of Charleston, South Carolina. The USSW complaint alleged that “from 2018 to 2022, SC OSHA conducted no programmed inspections in the food/ beverage and general merchandise industries, and only one such inspection in the food services and warehousing industries.”
On April 4, 2023, when it filed the complaint, USSW went on a one-day strike in Georgia and the Carolinas to expose unsafe working conditions in the service industry. It marked the anniversary of Martin Luther King’s assassination while supporting a sanitation workers strike in Memphis, Tennessee. Then on Dec. 7, USSW sent a petition to federal OSHA requesting that it revoke South Carolina’s state OSHA plan “because the Plan has failed to maintain an effective enforcement program.”
Neither the BLS findings nor the conflict between the USSW and SC OSHA have received much corporate media coverage. The BLS fatalities report was released in December 2023, with no U.S. daily newspaper coverage when Project Censored’s analysis was done. There was a story on the Minnesota findings by Fox in Minneapolis-St. Paul the month the report was released. And a full story on Green Bay ABC affiliate WBAY on April 12, 2024, “as part of its coverage of ‘Work Zone Safety Awareness Week,’” Project Censored notes.
“Corporate coverage of the conflict between the USSW and SC OSHA has also been scant,” they wrote. While independent nonprofits like DC Report “have consistently paid more attention,” there were but two corporate examples cited covering the second action: Associated Press and Bloomberg Law, but neither addressed the issue of racial disparities. In conclusion, Project Censored notes, “The corporate media’s refusal to cover the harsh realities of workplace deaths and injuries — and the obvious racial disparities in who is hurt and killed on the job — makes the task of organizing to address occupational safety at a national level that much more difficult.”
2. A “VICIOUS CIRCLE” OF CLIMATE DEBT TRAPS WORLD’S MOST VULNERABLE NATIONS
Low-income countries who contributed virtually nothing to the climate crisis are caught in a pattern described as a “climate debt trap” in a September 2023 World Resources Institute report authored by Natalia Alayza, Valerie Laxton, and Carolyn Neunuebel.
“After years of pandemic, a global
ANSON STEVENS-BOLLEN
recession, and intensifying droughts, floods, and other climate change impacts, many developing countries are operating on increasingly tight budgets and at risk of defaulting on loans,” they wrote. “High-interest rates, short repayment periods, and … the coexistence of multiple crises (like a pandemic paired with natural disasters) can all make it difficult for governments to meet their debt servicing obligations.”
“Global standards for climate resilience require immense national budgets,” Project Censored notes. “Developing countries borrow from international creditors, and as debt piles up, governments are unable to pay for essential needs, including public health programs, food security, and climate protections.”
In fact, The Guardian ran a story describing how global South nations are “forced to invest in fossil fuel projects to repay debts,” a process critics have characterized as a “new form of colonialism.” They cited a report from anti-debt campaigners Debt Justice and partners, which found that “the debt owed by global south countries has increased by 150% since 2011, and 54 countries are in a debt crisis, having to spend five times more on repayments than on addressing the climate crisis.”
Like the climate crisis itself, the climate debt trap was foreseeable in advance. “A prescient report published by Dissent in 2013, Andrew Ross’s “Climate Debt Denial,” provides a stark reminder that the climate debt trap now highlighted by the World Resources Institute and others was predictable more than a decade ago,” Project Censored notes. But that report highlighted much earlier warnings and efforts to address the problem.
The concept of an ecological debt owed to the global South for the resource exploitation that fueled the global North’s development was first introduced “in the lead-up to the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro,” Ross noted. Subsequently, “The Kyoto Protocol laid the groundwork for such claims in 1997 by including the idea of ‘common but differentiated responsibilities’ among nations, but climate activists did not fully take up the call for debt justice until the Copenhagen summit in 2009.” Prior to that summit, in 2008, NASA climatologist James Hansen estimated the U.S. historical carbon debt at 27.5% of the world total, $31,035 per capita.
While a “loss and damage” fund “to assist developing countries that are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change” was established at the 2022 Climate Summit, its current commitments ($800 million) fall far short of the $100 billion more each year by 2030 that the 14 developing countries on the fund’s board have argued for. Some
estimates place the figure much higher, “at around $400 billion,” according to a Euronews story last June.
The climate debt trap “has received limited news coverage,” Project Censored notes. Aside from The Guardian, “independent news coverage has been limited to outlets that specialize in climate news.” Neither of the two corporate media examples it cited approached it from debtor countries’ point of view. In May 2023, Bloomberg’s “analysis catered to the financial interests of international investors,” while a December 2023 New York Times report “focused primarily on defaults to the United States and China, with less focus on how poorer countries will combat deficits, especially as climate change escalates.”
3. SALTWATER INTRUSION THREATENS U.S. FRESHWATER SUPPLIES
Sea-level rise is an easy-to-grasp consequence of global warming, but the most immediate threat it poses — saltwater intrusion into freshwater systems — has only received sporadic localized treatment in the corporate press. “In fall 2023, saltwater traveling from the Gulf of Mexico up the Mississippi River infiltrated the freshwater systems of the [Delta] region, contaminating drinking and agricultural water supplies as well as inland ecosystems,” Project Censored notes. “This crisis prompted a scramble to supply potable water to the region and motivated local and federal officials to issue emergency declarations.”
While outlets like Time, CNN, and CBS News covered the saltwater intrusion at the time, they “focused almost exclusively on the threat to coastal Louisiana,” but “a pair of articles published in October 2023 by Delaney Nolan for The Guardian and [hydrogeologist] Holly Michael for The Conversation highlighted the escalating threat of saltwater intrusion across the United States and beyond.”
“Deep below our feet, along every coast, runs the salt line: the zone where fresh inland water meets salty seawater,” Nolan wrote. “That line naturally shifts back and forth all the time, and weather events like floods and storms can push it further out. But rising seas are gradually drawing the salt line in,” he warned. “In Miami, the salt line is creeping inland by
about 330 feet per year. Severe drought — as the Gulf Coast and Midwest have been experiencing this year — draw the salt line even further in.”
“Seawater intrusion into groundwater is happening all over the world, but perhaps the most threatened places are communities on low-lying islands,” such as the Marshall Islands, which are “predicted to be uninhabitable by the end of the century,” Michael wrote. Here in the U.S., “Experts said the threat was widespread but they were especially concerned about cities in Louisiana, Florida, the Northeast, and California,” Nolan reported.
“Fresh water is essential for drinking, irrigation, and healthy ecosystems,” Michael wrote. “When seawater moves inland, the salt it contains can wreak havoc on farmlands, ecosystems, lives, and livelihoods.” For example, “Drinking water that contains even 2% seawater can increase blood pressure and stress kidneys. If saltwater gets into supply lines, it can corrode pipes and produce toxic disinfection by-products in water treatment plants. Seawater intrusion reduces the life span of roads, bridges, and other infrastructure.”
While Time, CNN, and CBS News focused narrowly on coastal Louisiana, Project Censored notes that some news outlets, “including Fox Weather and Axios,” misreported the threat as “only temporary rather than a long-term problem.” More generally, “corporate media typically treat saltwater intrusion as a localized issue affecting specific coastal regions,” they wrote. “Aside from a brief article in Forbes acknowledging the growing problem for coastal regions in the U.S. and around the world, corporate media have largely resisted portraying saltwater intrusion as a more widespread and escalating consequence of climate change.”
4. NATURAL GAS INDUSTRY HID HEALTH AND CLIMATE RISKS OF GAS STOVES
While gas stoves erupted as a culture war issue in 2023, reporting by Vox and NPR (in partnership with the Climate Investigations Center) revealed a multi-decade campaign by the natural-gas industry using the tobacco industry’s tactics to discredit evidence of harm, thwart regu-
lation, and promote the use of gas stoves. While gas stoves are a health hazard, the amount of gas used isn’t that much, but “house builders and real estate agents say many buyers demand a gas stove,” which makes it more likely they’ll use more high-volume appliances, “such as a furnace, water heater, and clothes dryer,” NPR explained. “That’s why some in the industry consider the stove a ‘gateway appliance.’”
In a series of articles for Vox, environmental journalist Rebecca Leber “documented how the gas utility industry used strategies previously employed by the tobacco industry to avoid regulation and undermine scientific evidence establishing the harmful health and climate effects of gas stoves,” Project Censored reports.
“The basic scientific understanding of why gas stoves are a problem for health and the climate is on solid footing,” Leber wrote. “It’s also common sense. When you have a fire in the house, you need somewhere for all that smoke to go. Combust natural gas, and it’s not just smoke you need to worry about. There are dozens of other pollutants, including the greenhouse gas methane, that also fill the air.”
The concerns aren’t new. “Even in the early 1900s, the natural-gas industry knew it had a problem with the gas stove,” Leber recounts. It was cleaner than coal or wood — its main competition at the time, “but new competition was on the horizon from electric stoves.” They avoided scrutiny for generations, but, “40 years ago, the federal government seemed to be on the brink of regulating the gas stove,” she wrote.
“Everything was on the table, from an outright ban to a modification of the Clean Air Act to address indoor air pollution.” The gas industry fought back with a successful multiprong attack that’s being mounted again today. “Some of the defenders of the gas stove are the same consultants who have defended tobacco and chemicals industries in litigation over health problems.”
Documents obtained by NPR and CIC tell a similar story. The industry “focused on convincing consumers and regulators that cooking with gas is as risk-free as cooking with electricity,” they reported. “As the scientific evidence grew over time about the health effects from gas stoves, the industry used a playbook echoing the one that tobacco companies employed for decades to fend off regulation. The gas utility industry relied on some of the same strategies, researchers, and public relations firms.”
“I think it’s way past the time that we were doing something about gas stoves,” says Dr. Bernard Goldstein, who began researching the subject in the 1970s. “It has taken almost 50 years since the dis-
covery of negative effects on children of nitrogen dioxide from gas stoves to begin preventive action,” he told NPR. “We should not wait any longer.”
“By covering gas stoves as a culture war controversy, corporate media have ignored the outsize role of the naturalgas industry in influencing science, regulation, and consumer choice,” Project Censored reports. Instead, they’ve focused on individual actions, local moves to phase out gas hookups for new buildings, and right-wing culture war opposition to improving home appliance safety and efficiency, including the GOP House-passed “Hands Off Our Home Appliances Act.”
5. ABORTION SERVICES CENSORED ON SOCIAL PLATFORMS GLOBALLY
On the first national election day after Dobbs, PlanC, a nonprofit that provides information about access to the abortion pill, posted a TikTok video encouraging people to vote to protect reproductive rights. Almost immediately, its account was suddenly banned. This was but one example of a worldwide cross-platform pattern.
“Access to online information about abortion is increasingly under threat both in the United States and around the world,” the Women’s Media Center reported in November 2023. “Both domestic and international reproductive health rights and justice organizations have reported facing censorship of their websites on social media platforms, including Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok, as well as on Google.”
The governments of South Korea, Turkey, and Spain have also blocked the website of Women on Web, which provides online abortion services and information in over 200 countries. At the same time, abortion disinformation for fake abortion clinics remains widespread.
“Women’s rights advocacy groups are calling the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade the catalyst for the suppression of reproductive health information on social media,” Project Censored reports. “Hashtags for #mifepristone and #misoprostol, two drugs used in medical abortions, were hidden on Instagram after the Dobbs decision, the WMC
reported,” as part of a wider pattern.
Within weeks of the decision, U.S. senators Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) wrote to Meta, Ars Technica reported, questioning what the company was doing to stop abortion censorship on their platforms.
“The senators also took issue with censorship of health care workers, Ars Technica wrote, “including a temporary account suspension of an ‘organization dedicated to informing people in the United States about their abortion rights.’”
“U.S. state legislatures are currently considering banning access to telehealth abortion care,” Project Censored reports.
“Furthermore, CNN reported that ‘at the end of 2023, nine states where abortion remained legal still had restricted telehealth abortions in some way.’”
There are similar censorship problems with Meta and Google worldwide, according to a March 2024 report by the Center for Countering Digital Hate and MSI Reproductive Choices, which provides contraception and abortion services in 37 countries. This sparked a Guardian article by Weronika Strzyżyńska.
“In Africa, Facebook is the go-to place for reproductive health information for many women,” MSI’s global marketing manager, Whitney Chinogwenya, told the Guardian. “We deal with everything from menopause to menstruation, but we find that all our content is censored.”
She explained that “Meta viewed reproductive health content through ‘an American lens,’” the Guardian reported, “applying socially conservative U.S. values to posts published in countries with progressive policies, such as South Africa, where abortion on request is legal in the first 20 weeks of pregnancy.”
Abortion disinformation is also a threat — particularly the promotion of “crisis pregnancy centers,” or CPCs, which masquerade as reproductive healthcare clinics but discourage, rather than provide, abortion services. WMC reported on a June 2023 CCDH report, which “found that CPCs spent over $10 million on Google Search ads for their clinics over the past two years.” Google claimed to have “removed particular ads,” said Callum Hood, CCDH’s head of research, “but they did not take action on the systemic issues with fake clinic ads.”
“Women’s rights organizations and reproductive health advocates have been forced to squander scarce resources fighting this sort of disinformation online,” Project Censored reports, which has gotten some coverage, but as of June 2024, “corporate coverage of abortion censorship has been limited.” The sole CNN story it cited ran immediately after the Dobbs decision, before most of the problems fully emerged. “There appeared to be more corporate media focus
20 December 11-17, 2024 | metrotimes.com
on abortion disinformation rather than censorship,” they added. “Independent reporting from Jezebel, and Reproaction via Medium, have done more to draw attention to this issue.”
6. GLOBAL FOREST PROTECTION GOALS AT RISK
The UN’s goal to end deforestation by 2030 is unlikely to be met, according to the 2023 annual Forest Declaration Assessment, Olivia Rosane reported for Common Dreams in October 2023. The goal was announced to great fanfare at the 2021 UN summit in Glasgow, but the failure of follow-through has received almost no notice.
That same month, the World Wildlife Fund issued its first Forest Pathways Report, in which it warned:
The two largest tropical forests are at risk of reaching tipping points. This would release billions of [tons] of carbon and have devastating consequences for the millions of people who depend on the stability of their ecosystems. It would also have a global impact on our climate and catastrophic effects on biodiversity.
The problem is money, according to the report. “We are investing in activities that are harmful for forests at far higher rates than we are investing in activities that are beneficial for forests,” the coordinator of the report, Erin Matson, told Common Dreams. To meet the UN’s 2030 goal would require $460 billion annually, according to the report, but only $2.2 billion is being invested. Meanwhile, more than 100 times as much public finance is “committed to activities that have the potential to drive deforestation or forest degradation,” known as “gray” finance, the report explained.
While the overall picture is dark, not all countries are failing. “Well over 50 countries are on track to eliminate deforestation within their borders by 2030,” the report noted.
As the report’s lead author, Mary Gagen, noted in an article published by The Conversation, “Global forest loss in 2022 was 6.6 million hectares, an area about the size of Ireland. That’s 21% more than the amount that would keep us on track to meet the target of zero deforestation by 2030, agreed [to] in Glasgow.” At 33% over the necessary target, loss of tropical rainforests was “even more pronounced,” Gagen reported.
In her article, Gagen emphasized four key recommendations: (1) Accelerate the recognition of Indigenous peoples and local communities’ right to own and manage their lands, territories, and resources. (2) Provide more money, both public and private, to support sustainable forest economies. (3) Reform the rules of global trade that harm forests, getting deforesting commodities out of global supply chains, and removing barriers to forest-friendly goods, and (4) Shift toward nature-based and bio economies.
Corporate media in the U.S. ignored both reports, though one story in The Washington Post discussed the subject the month after both reports were issued, but “made no direct reference to either of them,” Project Censored reports. In contrast, “International outlets, including Germany’s DW and France 24, a stateowned television network, did produce substantive reports based on the Forest Declaration Assessment.”
7. MILITARY PERSONNEL TARGET GEN Z RECRUITS WITH LURID SOCIAL MEDIA TACTICS
“If the military was a great, honorable profession, then they wouldn’t need to spend $6 billion a year bribing people to join,” journalist and Army veteran Rosa del Duca explains. Nonetheless, 2022 was the worst year for recruitment since 1973, when the draft was abolished. That’s the background to the story Alan MacLeod reported for MintPress News about the military, “using e-girls to recruit Gen Z into service.”
While MacLeod also examines the Army’s sponsoring of YouTube stars — male and female — to “join” for a day as part of whole spectrum of social media efforts, his main subject is Army Psychological Operations Specialist Hailey Lujan, whose online videos feature “sexually suggestive content alongside subtle (and sometimes not-so-subtle) calls to join up,” Macleod reports. “The 21-yearold makes content extolling the fun of Army life to her 731,000 TikTok followers. ‘Don’t go to college — become a farmer or a soldier instead,’ she instructs viewers in a recent video. ‘Just some advice for the younger people: If you’re not doing school, it’s OK. I dropped out of college, and I’m doing great.”
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Project Censored notes, “Lujan’s videos seemingly violate the code of conduct of the image-conscious U.S. military, and it is unclear what role the military has in producing Lujan’s content.” But that ambiguity is part of the allure.
“There are many active-duty service members with large social media followings, but what makes Lujan stand out is her offbeat, Gen-Z style humor and how she leans into the idea that she is a military propaganda operation,” Macleod writes. “With videos titled ‘My handlers made me post this,’ “’Not endorsed by the DoD :3’ or ‘most wholesome fedpost’, she revels in layers of irony and appears to enjoy the whole ‘am I or aren’t I’ question that people in her replies and mentions constantly debate.”
“I can’t believe she’s getting away with posting some of this stuff,” del Duca said in an interview with MintPress News. “Everyone learns in boot camp that when you are in uniform, you cannot act unprofessionally, or you get in deep trouble.” The Defense Department didn’t respond when MacLeod reached out for clarification.
“Lujan is not the only online military influencer, but her overt use of her sensuality and her constant encouragement of her followers to enlist make her noteworthy,” Project Censored reports. “She is using her femininity to recruit legions of lustful teens into an institution with an infamous record of sexism and sexual assault against female soldiers.” MacLeod added.
“The branches of the U.S. military are no stranger to partnerships with entertainment giants that traditionally engage viewers from all walks of life — as in armed forces’ partnerships with the National Football League,” Project Censored reports. “But this new attempt to appeal to niche youth audiences has not been scrutinized.”
“It is now well-established (if not well-known) that the Department of Defense also fields a giant clandestine army of at least 60,000 people whose job it is to influence public opinion, the majority doing so from their keyboards,” MacLeod reported, adding that a 2021 Newsweek exposé “warned that this troll army was likely breaking both domestic and international law.”
As of May 2024, Project Censored reported “no new coverage on this specific instance” that appears to take such lawbreaking to a new level.
8. NEW FEDERAL RULE LIMITS TRANSCRIPT WITHHOLDING BY COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES
More than six million students have “stranded credits” due to the practice of colleges and universities withholding students’ transcripts to force them to repay loan debts. But a new federal Department of Education regulation will make withholding more difficult, Sarah Butrymowicz and Meredith Kolodner reported for The Hechinger Report in December 2023. Transcript withholding “has become a growing worry for state and federal regulators,” they wrote. “Critics say that it makes it harder for students to earn a degree or get a job, which would allow them to earn enough to pay back their debts. But the system of oversight is patchwork; no single federal agency bans it, state rules vary, and there are significant challenges with monitoring the practice.”
The rule, which went into effect in July 2024, was part of a package also intended to “strengthen the U.S. Department of Education’s ability to protect students and taxpayers from the negative effects of sudden college closures,” the DOE said in a press release. Specifically, it prevents withholding a transcript for terms in which a student received federal financial aid and paid off the balance for the term.
“As Katherine Knott reported for Inside Higher Education ... the new policy is part of a set of regulations intended to enhance the DOE’s oversight of institutions by providing additional tools to hold all colleges accountable,” Project Censored explains. “But these protections do not apply to institutions that accept no federal student aid, including many for-profit colleges.” However, “the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is also investigating transcript withholding, which the Bureau has deemed abusive because the practice is ‘designed to gain leverage over borrowers and coerce them into making payments.’”
“It’s a huge step forward, and it’s really going to benefit a lot of people,” Martin Kurzweil, an official at consulting firm Ithaka S+R, told Knott. The firm first identified the problem in a paper three years ago. He called the decision “stunning,” given it was just three years since his firm identified the problem. “That’s lightning speed in policy terms,” he told Knott. “It speaks to the salience of this is-
December 11-17, 2024 | metrotimes.com
sue and unfairness in transcript withholding. I commend the Education Department for taking this so seriously.”
Practically, it’s essentially a national ban, he added. “I suspect that for a lot of institutions, it’ll be more trouble than it’s worth to try to carve off a term that was completed but not fully paid for. It’ll be administratively difficult.”
Another expert, Edward Conroy, a senior policy adviser at the New America think tank, told The Hechinger Report something similar: that it probably helps all students, not just the ones getting federal aid. “It wouldn’t completely surprise me if one of the institutional reactions was, ‘We’re just going to stop doing this, period,’” Conroy said. “The number of students who are paying completely out of pocket isn’t that big; you don’t want to have separate administrative systems.”
This has already been seen at the state level, The Hechinger Report noted:
For instance, in 2022, Colorado passed a law prohibiting withholding transcripts from students requesting them for several reasons, including needing to provide it to an employer, another college, or the military. Carl Einhaus, a senior director at the Colorado Department of Education, says that most institutions found it too burdensome to differentiate between which transcript requests were required by law to be honored and which weren’t and have opted to grant all requests.
Corporate news coverage has been limited, as of May 2024, Project Censored reports. There’s been only limited corporate news coverage of the transcriptwithholding rule. When the rule package was announced in October 2023, The Washington Post published a substantive report on the package, emphasizing the protections from sudden college closures, but only briefly noted the issue of transcript withholding. Early reporting in U.S. News & World Report and The New York Times (in a partnership with The Hechinger Report) did cover the issue. But the government’s response has gone virtually unnoticed.
9. CONTROVERSIAL ACQUITTEDCONDUCT SENTENCING CHALLENGED BY U.S. COMMISSION
You might be surprised — even
shocked — to learn that federal judges can determine defendants’ sentences based on charges they’ve been acquitted of by a jury. But in April 2024, the United States Sentencing Commission (USSC), a bipartisan panel that creates guidelines for the federal judiciary, voted to end the practice as it applies to “calculating a sentence range under the federal guidelines.”
The change will significantly limit federal judges’ use of acquittedconduct sentencing, as the legal news service Law360 and Reason magazine reported. The commission voted unanimously “to prohibit judges from using acquitted conduct to increase the sentences of defendants who receive mixed verdicts at trial,” Stewart Bishop reported for Law360, but was “divided” on whether its proposal ought to apply retroactively. There are still narrow circumstances where such conduct can be considered — if it underlies a charge the defendant is found guilty of, as well as the acquitted crime. Acquitted conduct had been allowed under a lower standard — if the judge found the charges more likely truth than not, rather than the jury’s standard of “beyond a reasonable doubt.”
It’s “a practice that has drawn condemnation from a wide range of civil liberties groups, lawmakers, and jurists,” C.J. Ciaramella reported for Reason, which in turn has “raised defendants’ scores under the federal sentencing guidelines, leading to significantly longer prison sentences.”
But now, “Not guilty means not guilty,” chair of the USSC, U.S. District Judge Carlton W. Reeves, said in a press release. “By enshrining this basic fact within the federal sentencing guidelines, the Commission is taking an important step to protect the credibility of our courts and criminal justice system.”
Project Censored reports that “acquitted-conduct sentencing partly explains why two Black men from Virginia, Terence Richardson and Ferrone Claiborne, have been serving life sentences for the murder of police officer Allen Gibson in 1998, despite being found not guilty by a federal jury in 2001,” a case whose reconsideration has been reported on repeatedly by Meg O’Connor at The Appeal.
The initial travesty of justice in this case was that police hid exonerating evidence from the pair’s original attorneys, and because of that, they pleaded guilty to lesser state charges. That was then used to give
them life sentences in federal court, even though they were acquitted of murder in that trial. An evidentiary hearing was ordered by the Virginia Supreme Court in February 2024, and the judge in that hearing allowed some new evidence to be introduced — but not all of it. Still, it’s possible that Richardson could be released from prison.
There’s been little corporate media coverage. Project Censored cited one story in Bloomberg Law, but nothing in The New York Times nor The Washington Post as of June 2024. In addition, “Richardson’s and Claiborne’s cases have received nearly no national coverage by corporate outlets,” except for a March 2023 BET report, “which addressed coerced confessions but not acquitted-conduct sentencing.”
10. GENERATIVE AI APPS RAISE SERIOUS SECURITY CONCERNS
Generative artificial intelligence (AI) apps carry considerable risks, some poorly understood, which can result in exposing sensitive data and exposing organizations to attacks from bad actors. In response, both government and businesses have taken steps to limit or even block AI access to data.
Congress “only permits lawmakers and staff to access ChatGPT Plus, a paid version of the app with enhanced privacy features, and forbids them from using other AI apps or pasting blocks of text that have not already been made public into the program,” Project Censored reports. A follow-up regulation banned the use of Microsoft’s Copilot AI on government-issued devices. And the National Archives and Records Administration is even more restrictive. In May 2024, it “completely prohibited employees from using ChatGPT at work and blocked all access to the app on agency computers.”
What’s more, “Samsung decided to ban its employees’ use of generative AI apps (and develop its own AI ap -
plication) in May 2023 after some users accidentally leaked sensitive data via ChatGPT,” Priya Singh reported for Business Today in April 2024.
Programs such as ChatGPT and Copilot are built by a training process that collects and organizes data that can be regurgitated in response to just a snippet of text. They are then “aligned” with an added layer of training to produce helpful output — which is what ordinary users normally see.
But something as simple as asking ChatGPT to repeat a word endlessly can cause it to break alignment and reveal potentially sensitive data, Tiernan Ray reported for ZDNet in December 2023. Researchers from Google’s DeepMind AI research lab found that ChatGPT “could also be manipulated to reproduce individuals’ names, phone numbers, and addresses, which is a violation of privacy with potentially serious consequences,” Ray reported. “With our limited budget of $200 USD, we extracted over 10,000 unique examples,” the researchers wrote. “However, an adversary who spends more money to query the ChatGPT API could likely extract far more data.”
And while training data itself can hold sensitive information, users are constantly adding new sensitive data that can also be exposed. In an article for tech news site ZDNet, Eileen Yu cited a survey of some 11,500 employees in the U.S., Europe (France, Germany, and the UK), and Asia (Australia, China, Japan, Singapore, South Korea), which found that “57 percent of employees used public generative AI tools in the office at least once weekly, with 22.3 percent using the technology daily,” and that “31 percent of employees polled admitted entering sensitive information such as addresses and banking details for customers, confidential HR data, and proprietary company information into publicly accessible AI programs (and another 5 percent were unsure if they had done so).”
“Corporate media have given a lot of breathless coverage to the existential threat to humanity allegedly posed by AI,” Project Censored notes.“Yet these outlets have been far less attentive to AI apps’ documented data security risks and vulnerability to hackers, issues that have been given exhaustive coverage by smaller, tech-focused news outlets.”
Paul Rosenberg is a California-based writer/activist, senior editor for Random Lengths News, and a columnist for Al Jazeera English and Salon.
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WHAT’S GOING ON
Select events happening in metro Detroit this week. Be sure to check venue websites before all events for the latest information. Add your event to our online calendar: metrotimes.com/ AddEvent.
MUSIC
Wednesday Dec 11
Live/Concert
Goblin 7 pm; Pike Room, 1 S. Saginaw, Pontiac; $45-$75.
Matt Lorusso Trio & Special Guests 8-11 pm; Northern Lights Lounge, 660 W. Baltimore St., Detroit; no cover.
Karaoke/Open Mic
Continuing This Week Karaoke/ Open Mic
Offbeat KARAOKE with Robby Rob 9 pm; Third Street Detroit, 4626 Third St., Detroit;
Thursday Dec 12
Live/Concert
Bert’s Music Cafe & The Preservation of Jazz ft 2nd Thursdays, ft. The Jerome Clark Trio 6-10 pm; Bert’s Music Cafe, 2458 Brush St., Detroit, MI; $15.00.
Dueling Pianos: An Interactive Entertainment Experience 8 pm-midnight; AXIS Lounge, 1777 3rd St., Detroit;
Gregory Porter 7:30 pm; Detroit Opera House, 1526 Broadway St., Detroit; John D. Lamb in Concert 7 pm; The Hawk Theatre, 29995 W 12 Mile Rd, Farmington Hills;
Mars Red Sky, Howling Giant 7 pm; Sanctuary Detroit, 2932 Caniff St., Hamtramck; $15.
Maysa : Sponsored by Coleman A Young Foundation 8 pm; Sound Board, 2901 Grand River Ave., Detroit; $47-$58.
The Dead South 7 pm; The Fillmore, 2115 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $33-$73.
The Pietasters wsg John Bunkley And The Insights and The Dirty Notion 7 pm; Small’s, 10339 Conant St., Hamtramck; $20.
DJ/Dance
DRAG NIGHT IN THE LOUNGE w/ Auntie Chanel & Beau x Handler 8 pm; Bowlero Lanes & Lounge, 4209 Coolidge Hwy., Royal Oak; 0. Karaoke/Open Mic
Continuing This Week Karaoke/
Open Mic
DARE-U-OKE 9 pm-midnight; Northern Lights Lounge, 660 W. Baltimore St., Detroit; no cover.
Drag Queen Karaoke 8 pm-2 am; Woodward Avenue Brewers, 22646 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; no cover.
Friday Dec 13
Live/Concert
A Holiday Story from Uncle Butch 8 pm; Saint Andrew’s Hall, 431 E. Congress St., Detroit;
Billy Davis Rhythm Machine Band + DJ Michael Ross 9 pm; Bowlero Lanes & Lounge, 4209 Coolidge Hwy., Royal Oak;
Bop to the Top Presents Jingle Bop - Ages 18+ 8:30 pm; The Fillmore, 2115 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $3-$30.
Choir! Choir! Choir! Un-Silent Night: An EPIC Holiday SingAlong 8 pm; Flagstar Strand Theatre for the Performing Arts, 12 N. Saginaw St., Pontiac; $20-$40.
David Graham & the Eskimo Brothers 7-11 pm; New Dodge Lounge, 8850 Joseph Campau Ave., Hamtramck; 10.
Deaf And Loud Holiday Show 8 pm; The Loving Touch, 22634 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; $10.
The Farmington Chorus: Do You Want to Build a Snowman? 8 pm; The Hawk Theatre, 29995 W 12 Mile Rd, Farmington Hills;
Finality • Hate Unbound •
Supreme Mystic • Amongst Enemies • Theandric 7:30 pm; The Token Lounge, 28949 Joy Rd., Westland; $15.
Halloween the Heavy Metal Horror Show 8 pm; Diamondback Music Hall, 49345 S. Interstate 94 Service Dr., Belleville; $20.
Jeezy 6:30 pm; Detroit Masonic Temple Library, 500 Temple St, Detroit; Magic Bag presents: Gary Ho Ho Hoey’s Rockin’ Holiday Show 7 pm; Magic Bag, 22920 Woodward Ave., Ferndale;
Mannheim Steamroller Christmas 8 pm; Fox Theatre, 2211 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $25-$85.
Negative Approach, Cloud Rat, Snafu, Manic Outburst, Wounded Touch 7 pm; Sanctuary Detroit, 2932 Caniff St., Hamtramck; $20. Prometon, Solar Monolith, Vam-
pire Cowgirl hosted by Reware Vintage & KS-AVC 7 pm; Reware Vintage, 2965 12 Mile Road, Suite 200, Berkley; $15 suggested donation, all to the performers.
Saved By The 90s 8 pm; Emerald Theatre, 31 N. Walnut St., Mount Clemens; $15-$200.
Stayin’ Alive - A Tribute to The Bee Gees 7:30 pm; Royal Oak Music Theatre, 318 W. Fourth St., Royal Oak; The Bunny the Bear 7 pm; Harpo’s, 14238 Harper Avenue, Detroit; $15.
The Farmington Chorus: Do You Want to Build a Snowman? 4 pm; The Hawk Theatre, 29995 W 12 Mile Rd, Farmington Hills;
DJ/Dance
Ann Arbor Ecstatic Dance second Friday of every month, 7:30-10:30 pm; Ringstar Studio, 3907 Varsity Dr, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48108, Ann Arbor; $25-40 ($5 discount for cash).
Saturday Dec 14 Live/Concert
The Farmington Chorus: Do You Want to Build a Snowman? 8 pm; The Hawk Theatre, 29995 W 12 Mile Rd, Farmington Hills; Armadeus Electric Quartet 8 pm; The Music Hall, 350 Madison Ave., Detroit; $59-$219.
Black Swan Dive Bomb w/ Genderfuck + DJ Ryan Gimpert 9 pm; Bowlero Lanes & Lounge, 4209 Coolidge Hwy., Royal Oak; 0.
Completely Unchained - The Ultimate Tribute to Van Halen 7:30 pm; The Token Lounge, 28949 Joy Rd., Westland; $15-$80.
COUNTRY -For a- CLAUS - RYAN JAY & The Wrecking Krew wsg Julia Rose and Julian Joel 7 pm; District 142, 142 Maple St., Wyandotte; $10.
Easy Action, Against the Grain, Edison Hollow, Winds of Neptune, Mazinga 7 pm; Sanctuary Detroit, 2932 Caniff St., Hamtramck; $20. Emo Night Brooklyn (18+) 8 pm; Saint Andrew’s Hall, 431 E. Congress St., Detroit; $18-$25.
The Farmington Chorus: Do You Want to Build a Snowman? 4 pm; The Hawk Theatre, 29995 W 12 Mile Rd, Farmington Hills; Holiday Brass: Detroit 11 am-1 pm; St. Matthews & St. Joseph Episcopal Church, 8850 Woodward Ave, Detroit;
$30.00.
Kash Doll 7 pm; Cathedral Theatre at the Masonic Temple, 500 Temple St., Detroit;
Laidback Luke: Under/Ground (3 Hour Set) 9 pm; Magic Stick, 4120 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $20-$25.
Machine Girl 7 pm; Pike Room, 1 S. Saginaw, Pontiac; $30.
MEGA 80S UGLY SWEATER AND SPEEDO PARTY 7 pm; Magic Bag, 22920 Woodward Ave., Ferndale; $20.
Saddle Up Country Dance Party Feat. Dirt Road to Nowhere 8 & 9 pm; Diamondback Music Hall, 49345 S. Interstate 94 Service Dr., Belleville; $10-$20.
The Grand Finale 8 pm; Fox Theatre, 2211 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $79-$205.
DJ/Dance
Stirling’s birthday soirée 8 pm-2 am; Northern Lights Lounge, 660 W. Baltimore St., Detroit; $10.
Sunday Dec 15
Live/Concert
Crown Magnetar, Extermination Dismemberment, The Extortionist, Larcenia Roe, For I Am Genocide 6 pm; Sanctuary Detroit, 2932 Caniff St., Hamtramck; $18.
Dave Koz and Friends Christmas Tour 2024 7:30 pm; The Music Hall, 350 Madison Ave., Detroit; $55-$85.
An Irish Christmas from Corktown, a celebration of Irish & American Christmas traditions, featuring Katie Else 3-5 pm; Saint John’s Resort, 44045 Five Mile Rd., Plymouth; $20-.
Living Room Jazz Night @ Shinola Hotel 5-8 pm; Shinola Hotel, 1400 Woodward Ave., Detroit;
Once Upon a December Eve 7 pm; The Hawk Theatre, 29995 W 12 Mile Rd, Farmington Hills;
Phil Ogilvie’s Rhythm Kings 5-8 pm; Zal Gaz Grotto Club, 2070 W. Stadium Blvd., Ann Arbor; no cover (tip jar for the band).
Saint Levant: DEIRA Tour 7 pm; Saint Andrew’s Hall, 431 E. Congress St., Detroit; $23.
Shakira - Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran - World Tour 7:30 pm; Little Caesars Arena, 2645 Woodward Ave., Detroit; $99.50-$349.50.
Monday Dec 16
Live/Concert
Moonlander, Broderick Jones 7 pm; Sanctuary Detroit, 2932 Caniff St., Hamtramck; $15.
The Preservation of Jazz Monday Night Music Series Presents “Tribute to Prince starring ft. The M.U.T.H.A.F.U.N.K.A.’s 7-10 pm; Aretha’s Jazz Cafe, 350 Madison St., Detroit; 35.00.
The Preservation of Jazz Monday Night Music Series Presents: A Tribute to Reggae Music Featuring Roots Vibrations 7-10 pm; Aretha’s Jazz Cafe, 350 Madison St., Detroit; 35.00.
Sky Covington’s Satin Doll Revue (Sky Covington performs Billie Holiday, Tosha Owens perform Etta James, Nina Simone Neal performs Dinah Washington & Faye Bradford performs Nina Simone ) 7-10 pm; Aretha’s Jazz Cafe, 350 Madison St., Detroit; 40.00.
A Tribute to Detroit Queens of Jazz Benefit Concert ( Coat & Blanket Drive ) 7-10 pm; Aretha’s Jazz Cafe, 350 Madison St., Detroit; 35.00.
The Tribute to Whitney Houston ft. Nina Simone Neal & Terrance Neal ( Inna Zone ) 7-10 pm; Aretha’s Jazz Cafe, 350 Madison St., Detroit; 35.00. DJ/Dance
Adult Skate Night 8:30-11 pm; Lexus Velodrome, 601 Mack Ave., Detroit; $5.
Tuesday Dec 17
Live/Concert
Global Sunsets, Blackman & Arnold Trio 7-10 pm; Northern Lights Lounge, 660 W. Baltimore St., Detroit; no cover.
Suki Waterhouse w/ Bully 7 pm; Royal Oak Music Theatre, 318 W. Fourth St., Royal Oak; DJ/Dance
B.Y.O.R Bring Your Own Records Night 9 pm-midnight; The Old Miami, 3930 Cass Ave., Detroit; no cover.
Sky Covington’s “The Preservation of Jazz” Returns to WJZZ Detroit Radio with a New Day and Time! 2-5 pm; WJZZ Radio Station, 2187 W. Grand Blvd, Detroit, MI; Donation.
Karaoke/Open Mic
Continuing This Week Karaoke/ Open Mic
Open Mic : Art in a Fly Space 7-10 pm; Detroit Shipping Company, 474 Peterboro St., Detroit; no cover.
THEATER
Performance
Max M. Fisher Music Center Detroit Symphony Orchestra w/ Home for the Holidays Wednesday 7:30 pm.; Friday 10:45 am & 8 pm, Saturday 3 & 8 pm and
Stirling’s birthday soirée
Come celebrate in style as Detroit’s legendary music promoter, record shop owner, club and band manager, and collector of some of the wildest, most rock ’n’ roll stories you’ll ever hear, the one and only Stirling, embarks on another fantastic voyage around the sun. Join Stirling and friends at Northern Lights Lounge Saturday night, Dec. 14, for a sterling silver soirée filled with night songs, revelry, and debauchery, with blazing DJ sets by Liz Warner, Mike E. Clark, and Michael Solaka, plus special guest emcee (and Metro Times cover girl) Audra Kubat!
—Dave Mesrey
Starts at 8 p.m., Saturday, Dec. 14, at Northern Lights Lounge; 660 W. Baltimore, Detroit. $10 cover at the door.
Sunday 3 & 7 pm.
Meadow Brook Theatre A Christmas
Carol $50 Wednesday 7 pm, Thursday 7 pm, Friday 8 pm, Saturday 2 & 6:30 pm and Sunday 2 & 6:30 pm.
Planet Ant Theatre The Christmas Collection: A Planet Ant Original Sketch Comedy Show The Planet Ant Home Team is back with a brand new holidaythemed sketch comedy show. Once the beating heart of Suburban City Township, Plaza Place Mall is going out of business but not before hosting its final Christmas Collection celebration. There’s no shortage of shenanigans when it comes to
28 December 11-17, 2024 | metrotimes.com
the staff, performers and shoppers of all generations. Find everything on your last minute list and more in The Christmas Collection, an all-new sketch show coming to Ant Hall December 5th-21st. $30 online / $35 at the door Thursdays, 8-10 pm and Fridays, Saturdays, 8-10 pm.
Tipping Point Theatre Little Women
This familiar, beloved classic novel by Louisa May Alcott is presented in an entirely new way; a whimsical and adventurous play that’s perfect holiday fare for the whole family. Imagination abounds as four actors in an attic play several roles, yet the voices of Jo, Meg, Beth and Amy
remain true and clear. The story unfolds as the sisters experience the Christmas holiday, family hardships, artistry, love and loss. “This stage adaptation is a master class in storytelling” (The News Herald). $25 - $55 Wednesday 2-4 pm, Thursday 7:30-9:30 pm, Friday 7:30-9:30 pm, Saturday 2-4 & 7:30-9:30 pm and Sunday 2-4 pm.
Musical
Fisher Theatre - Detroit Les Miserables (Touring) Wednesday 7:30 pm, Thursday 7:30 pm, Friday 7:30 pm, Saturday 2 & 7:30 pm and Sunday 1 & 6:30 pm.
COMEDY
Improv
Ann Arbor Marriott Ypsilanti at Eagle Crest The Dinner Detective Comedy Mystery Dinner Show - Ann Arbor, MI America’s largest interactive comedy murder dinner theatre show is now playing! Solve a hilarious mystery while you feast on a fantastic dinner. Just beware! The culprit is hiding in plain sight somewhere in the room, and you may find yourself as a Prime Suspect before you know it! Join us for an event that is very different from a traditional mystery dinner show. Our actors are not dressed in costume and are hidden in the audience! This results in a fun, social and interactive evening suitable for all adults. $69.99 Saturdays, 6-9 pm.
Embassy Suites Troy The Dinner Detective Comedy Mystery Dinner Show - Detroit, MI America’s largest interactive comedy murder dinner theatre show is now playing! Solve a hilarious mystery while you feast on a fantastic dinner. Just beware! The culprit is hiding in plain sight somewhere in the room, and you may find yourself as a Prime Suspect before you know it! Join us for an event that is very different from a traditional mystery dinner show. Our actors are not dressed in costume and are hidden in the audience! This results in a fun, social and interactive evening suitable for all adults. Each ticket includes our signature awardwinning mystery dinner theatre show, along $69.99 Saturdays, 6-9 pm.
Go Comedy! Improv Theater Pandemonia The Allstar Showdown is a highly interactive improvised game show. With suggestions from the audience, our two teams will battle for your laughs. The Showdown is like “Whose Line is it Anyway,” featuring a series of short improv games, challenges and more. Fridays and Saturdays 7:30pm & 9:30pm 25.00 Fridays, Saturdays.; $20 Every other Friday, 8 & 10 pm.
Planet Ant Theatre Hip-Prov: Improv with a Dash of Hip-Hop $10 second Wednesday of every month, 7 pm.
Critic’s Pick
COURTESY PHOTO
MUSIC
And how with Bandeau!
Chad Thompson talks conserving and unleashing creative energy
By Jeff Milo
Chad Thompson starts off talking about tanks and burnout. But he’s really talking about songwriting.
The Ferndale-based multi-instrumentalist, singer, songwriter, and producer has spent the last 18 months developing a quirky pop-project known as Bandeau. It’s been a significantly refreshing experience for the lifelong musician and creator, but it’s required a careful distribution of energy.
“There can be a choice,” Thompson says, “when it comes to what you’re allowing to drain your tank.” He’s talking, albeit abstractly, about that internal reservoir of elusive energy that every creative person often finds themselves scrounging for, or cobbling together, at the end of their proverbial day. “You have to be careful how you’re using that [energy], too; you can only go so far on a certain tank until you risk beginning to repeat yourself.”
With Bandeau, the distinctly contemplative Chad Thompson delivers a potent and pleasing patchwork of popadjacent sonic flavors, complete with danceable beats, splashy guitars, spacey synths, and catchy earworm melodies — something like a nü-new-wave, or a jazz-injected disco, conveyed in a sort of post-modernist cosmic crooner style. Yes. All of that, and more! Bandeau’s debut album, Spirit Fingers, is available digitally this weekend (Bandcamp, Apple Music, etc), and there’s a formal album-release show booked for January 25 at Outer Limits Lounge. But let’s get back to the tanks …
Thompson admits he was beginning to “feel some burnout” with his “career,” which would understandably be draining his creative “tanks” because for most of the last decade he’d been working in animation, which involved writing, editing, and composing. It’s just that it had been a while since Thompson made art,
and specifically music, just for himself, rather than, say, a client.
“There was only one tank for all of that stuff, and it was getting used up by the end of each day,” Thompson says. “Then there’s nothing left for your own stuff; I was using my tank toward lots of other things, really.”
Thompson’s a natural-born performer who’s been making music for most of his life. He and his brother, Keith, grew up out in the sticks of mid-Michigan, near Flint, raised by a musician father who got his boys started on instruments at an early age, indirectly, as a way to stave off boredom out there in the remoteness of their rural milieu. As children of the ’80s, Chad and Keith also got their hands on an inspiration-stoking camcorder, which started feeding their fires for DIY production and nurturing their sensibilities for an inherently entertaining strain of moderately hammy, absurdist anti-humor.
All of that energy was later harnessed, in the mid-2000s, for a dynamic artrock/dance-pop band known as Johnny Headband, with Thompson on keys/ lead vocals/guitar, and his brother, Keith, on bass/backing vocals. It was quirky, it was aerobic — it had props, costumes, and choreography, but the songwriting at its core was finely crafted and served as the beating heart for their performances and for their several albums and EPs, the last of which came out in 2016.
Thompson’s day-job’s demands inevitably put Johnny Headband into a sustained period of inertia, and Thompson worried that his songwriting muscles were beginning to atrophy. “Then I
bought a Wurlitzer electric piano just before quarantine, and it reenergized that particular aspect of my life,” he says. “I sat down at that thing and wrote a song called ‘No River,’ which was a Harry Nilsson-esque kinda country-ish song. I thought, Whoa, that was pretty good Then I started to do another. Then, after four or five more songs, I started thinking, OK, well, maybe this is something But I didn’t intend to make an album — not, at least, until the songs started fitting together. And so you just start working harder at it, more so than just dabbling.”
And this is work, after all. Thompson isn’t necessarily joking around here — even if, when you see a Bandeau performance, he could likely be in a costume of sorts, potentially a black do-rag with garish tinted glasses and a frill-laden cowboy shirt, maybe. And, similar to Johnny Headband, there could be rudimentary-yet-rhythmic choreography, and there could also be a lingering composite of deadpan melodrama and gonzo vaudeville. But that stagecraft is all very intentional work for Thompson, just as his focus on songwriting also has an air of disciplined stoicism.
“You either have to work at it or play just for fun — there’s no in between for me,” Thompson says. “You could either be having fun and just jamming, or you’re really gonna go for it and work at it and finish something.”
And after so many years away, Thompson simply missed being onstage.
“I love performing,” he says. “But it’s also really hard and it takes a lot of work — I just don’t ever want to half-ass it.”
Looking back at what would eventually become the first song for Bandeau, “No River,” Thompson realizes that the lyrics became emblematic of a specific motivational urgency. “Like, what the hell was I waiting for?” he asks. “Why did I wait so long? It’s about embracing the things you’ve been avoiding and how you hope that you didn’t squander too much time. And then I really felt grateful and appreciative for everyone around me at that time.”
Thompson’s grateful for his early Bandeau-era collaborators — his wife, Michelle, and his brother, Keith, contributed to early music videos and the first live shows. Guitarist/songwriter and kindred contemplative spirit Gregory McIntosh (from the Ypsilanti-music scene) provided lots of guitar parts for Spirit Fingers and recently, officially, joined the band for live performances — you’ll see McIntosh onstage with Thompson at Outer Limits on January 25.
Thompson might speak about music with a beguiling sense of pragmatism, but deep down he also does want to have a little fun up there; he particularly hopes you, the audience, do, too. And on that note, now that Thompson’s essentially “back” with Bandeau, he wants to play as many shows as possible. “I get myself into trouble being too solitary in this, when the whole point of it all is to connect,” he says.” You don’t do all of this if you don’t really wanna connect.”
Check out Bandeau’s Spirit Fingers online, this weekend: https://bandeau.band. Release party takes place Jan. 25 at Outer Limits Lounge.
Chad Thompson (left) and Gregory McIntosh are Bandeau, which is celebrating its debut album with a record-release party Jan. 25 at Outer Limits Lounge DOUG COOMBE
FOOD
Instant Smash
How Matashia Dykes went from smash hits to smash burgers
Just Smash It
2005 E. Eight Mile Road, Warren justsmashitburgers.com
Just Smash It is in the middle of an unexpected 6:30 p.m. rush. Three young women wearing scrubs are using the restaurant’s kiosk to browse the menu, while four Detroit police officers and others are standing to the side waiting for their carryout orders.
This burger joint has been open for less than three weeks, and they’re still figuring out their peak periods. As soon as the rush dies down, rappers Tay-B and Skilla Baby stroll in amid a new wave of customers. By now it’s 7 p.m. and the restaurant’s owner, Matashia Dykes, promises me that she’ll be ready for our interview soon.
Another half hour goes by and her friend and fellow entrepreneur Darlynn Mumphord tells me she’s ready. I’m escorted through the kitchen, where employees are grilling burgers, dropping fries, and bagging orders. We arrive at a small, furnished office at the rear of the restaurant, where Dykes is seated wearing fatigue like a busy apron.
“That was crazy — you saw that!” she says with a sigh of relief. “I’m thankful, though — it’s all been a blessing.”
Dykes is a self-described hustler, a proud native of Detroit’s east side, a member of King High School’s graduat-
By Kahn Santori Davison
ing class of 2009, and someone who’s been characterized as a serial entrepreneur.
“I’ll try whatever, and if it works, it works,” she says. “You got some people — they try something, and if it don’t work, they’ll give up on life, period.”
Dykes’ first foray into entrepreneurship came as a teenage hair stylist. At the early age of 14, she built up a clientele so strong that her stepfather gifted her a salon on Cadieux and Harper. But as promising as the venture was, the need to experience life as a regular teenager started to matter more.
“I was young, and it was cutting into my me-time,” she says with a laugh. “At the end of the day, I’m doing everyone’s hair and they’re getting dressed to go out, and I’m still not ready. I’m like, ‘I can’t do this. I gotta do something else to make money.’”
For the next several years, Dykes worked at Chili’s, managed a Jimmy Jazz clothing store, and worked as a bartender at a gentlemen’s club. In 2016, she jumped into the world of hip-hop. The venture was more for fun, as she didn’t consider herself a hip-hop head looking for instant fame.
“I was dating someone — it started off as a prank,” she says.
Dykes dropped her own remix to Desiigner’s hit “Panda” that went “Detroit viral.” She followed up in 2018 with her debut project, Bag Secured (highlighted
“I always had this idea,” she says. “Just Smash It and Maison’s came at the exact same time, but Maison’s was what I could afford.”
Her ownership of Maison’s lasted only a year, but the experience served as a tough love tutorial in how to operate an eatery.
“Now I’m getting the feel of it,” she says adamantly. “Maison’s was smaller, only 1,100 square feet. I’m in 3,300 square feet now,” she says confidently. “I’m triple the size.”
Dykes’ demeanor is relatable. She carries herself like a down-to-earth boss bitch who doesn’t need to remind you of such every 10 seconds. With Just Smash It, Dykes feels she’s found the cornerstone business that she can continue to build off of. She’s found a niche in Detroit’s burger industry, as smash burgers are offered at other restaurants, but aren’t often the primary meal that’s marketed. Her menu also offers turkey and Impossible smash burger options, along with a full bar with daiquiris and Wet Willies.
by the single “Wdyl”), and tipped all the scales in her favor when she joined Rio Da Yung OG on “Displayer.”
Dykes was bold and tenacious behind the mic. “I really spin you hoes’ niggas like a displayer/The coldest bitch in my city, MT for mayor,” she raps on “Displayer.” But even with a steadily rising fan base, the shadiness of the music business got to be too much for her to deal with.
“I liked doing music, but I didn’t love it,” she says. “It wasn’t really my passion. It was starting to … but what came with it, I just wasn’t built for. I’m a woman at the end of the day, and certain guys got leverages — they try to blackmail you, and I ain’t doing that for that.”
While Dykes was enduring the life of a female rapper, she opened the iBODY clothing store on East Eight Mile, across from Eastland. Her store sold crop tops, bodysuits, leggings, and swimsuits.
“It was so crazy,” she says, “because I’m like, ‘Dang, I used to work at the [Chili’s] across the street. Now I got my own clothing store facing it.”
After opening a second location, Dykes decided to close down both stores due to recurring disputes with the business entity she was leasing the property from. Her next venture came in 2023, when she purchased Maison’s Fine Foods on Mack Avenue. Maison’s had been a Detroit staple since 1943, and it was Dykes’ first time owning a restaurant.
“I just wanted to give it something nobody else had,” Dykes says. “A lot of these restaurants get so big, they start to give out bullshit. The food be processed. Here, everything is 100 percent what it is. You get a home feel when you eat here. I’m not serving anything processed, and I’m giving it a home feel. I believe that’s what’s going to keep me going and keep me different.”
Despite her success, Dykes has faced her fair share of challenges along the way. She can offer up multiple stories about how being a woman has made it harder to earn what she has. Her construction contractor held up the opening of Just Smash It for a month, as renovations to the building weren’t complete. She’s also been the target of some good old sneak dissing from competing establishments in the area.
“People around me saw us coming — probably saw us as a threat and was hating a little bit,” she adds.
In the future, Dykes plans to incorporate breakfast options and wants to be able to franchise Just Smash It out to other aspiring entrepreneurs in the future. She also hasn’t ruled out a return to the mic.
When asked what she would tell young, aspiring Black women who want to follow in her footsteps, Dykes just wants to see young women stay focused and not get sidetracked by what they see on the internet.
“It’s a good place,” she says, “but it’s a bad place sometimes. They don’t know what a lot of people have to do to get what they have or be the places they are.”
Instant smash: Matashia Dykes at her new Just Smash It burger restaurant on Eight Mile.
KAHN SANTORI DAVISON
CULTURE
Gladiator II is just more bread and circuses
There’s absolutely no grit to the film, whatsoever
By Jared Rasic, Last Word Features
Gladiator II
Rated: R
Runtime: 150 minutes
“Already long ago, from when we sold our vote to no man, the People have abdicated our duties; for the People who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, legions — everything, now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses.” —Juvenal (100-200 A.D.)
There’s a metatextual aspect to watching Gladiator II (written as the gleefully ridiculous GladIIator in the opening credits) that I couldn’t stop thinking about throughout the entire movie. If one of the main points of pitting gladiators against each other in the Roman coliseums was to keep the masses entertained and placated so the emperors could continue ruling with strong public approval, then what exactly is the purpose of a movie that exists simply to entertain without nourishing thought and reason? Is it not ultimately the same thing?
Obviously, I don’t think Ridley Scott sat down to make Gladiator II for the purposes of social pacification or influencing political power, but there’s something so empty about the film that I felt actively dumber as I left the theater; entertained by the 140+ minutes I spent in a dark room with strangers, but also left with absolutely nothing nourishing for my spirit, soul, or mind. Which is fine, I guess.
Not every movie needs to offer something more than a brief respite from the outside world. But I’m pretty sure the original Gladiator movie did and, if we’re not making historical fiction with the purpose of either educating modern humans on our collective past or making allegorical connections to our present and future, then what are we really left with? Just bread and circuses.
Don’t get me wrong — Gladiator II is fun and entertaining, with Scott proving once again why he’s Hollywood’s go-to filmmaker for epic historical movies. With a career littered with massive, spectacle-driven films like Gladiator, Kingdom of Heaven,
cackling and mildly insane emperors Geta and Caracalla (giving off strong Romulus and Remus vibes).
Here’s where Gladiator II makes its fatal mistake as a movie: Almost the entire runtime is dedicated to different set pieces in the arena. I love action movies, and the idea of a $200 million epic that’s mostly dedicated to a series of escalating battles between the great Mescal and whatever next deadly horror is thrown his way sounds like an absolute blast. But Mescal has so much swagger that (aside from an early scene where he cries for a few seconds), we’re never really that concerned about him being in danger.
In fact, Mescal has an amused grin on his face for so much of the movie that he makes being a slave forced to fight to the death for the amusement of Rome look like it’s downright delightful. Plus, since he’s enslaved so quickly at the beginning of the film, we never really get a chance to get into the routine of his life or become invested in his marriage. We need to acutely feel what he’s lost or else we don’t feel his pain.
1492: Conquest of Paradise, Exodus: Gods and Kings, Robin Hood, and Napoleon, Scott can make movies like this in his sleep. But when he doesn’t find either an interesting story to hang all the expensive action set-pieces on or a lead performance grounded and relatable enough to carry the audience through the stupid bits, then he’s left with empty excitement sapped of all human emotion.
The story and structure of Gladiator II is basically identical to the first one, with Paul Mescal’s Lucius (I won’t say how he’s connected to the original because I think it’s a pretty big spoiler that the trailers ruin for audiences anyway), a warrior from Northern Africa who is captured by the Romans in the first 10 minutes of the movie, enslaved, and then forced to fight in the coliseum for his freedom. Denzel Washington plays Macrinus, an ex-slave who is now one of the richest men in Rome and only hungers for power above all else. Macrinus purchases Lucius and pits him against increasingly hazardous gladiatorial battles for the entertainment of
This leads to Gladiator II’s other biggest problem: There’s absolutely no grit to the film, whatsoever. There was a tactile grime to the original that gave audiences a sense of place. Rome looked hot and smelly and dangerous. It looked itchy. With 2 Fast 2 Gladiator, everything is sterile and designed to look impressive in an IMAX theater. So much CG is used to make everything bigger and more exciting that nothing feels immersive as an audience member.
On paper, gladiators fighting computer-generated sharks from atop dueling ships (while inside the coliseum, no less!) sounds ridiculously, insanely, stupidly fun — to the point that it should be jaw-dropping to witness. Instead, it looks like a video game cutscene. As entertaining as some of this is, none of it has any weight or generates any emotion.
But Washington makes a meal of the scenery and will at least get an Oscar nomination. It makes me happy that Mescal is a bona-fide movie star now because he’s nice and deserves it. Scott at his worst still makes compulsively watchable movies, and after Alien and Blade Runner he has a lifetime pass from me. So it’s not all bad. It’s aggressively fun — nothing more and occasionally less. If this is what you want, then Gladiator II has what you need. But there’s no food here — just a reminder that the circus is in town, and while there is plenty of bread to be had, it’s heels all the way down.
Paul Mescal plays Lucius, and Pedro Pascal plays Marcus Acacius in Gladiator II.
PARAMOUNT PICTURES
WEED
The Straight Dope
Wojo leads the live rosin revolution in Michigan’s cannabis market
By Steve Neavling
Welcome to The Straight Dope, our new weekly series that explores the best cannabis products in Michigan.
In the ever-evolving world of cannabis, a group of friends from Michigan is leading the charge in crafting one of the most sought-after products in the industry.
Just a year after their Pinconningbased company joined the recreational cannabis industry, Wojo has earned a reputation as the trailblazer in creating live rosin — a high-quality, solventless cannabis concentrate that is prized for its purity, potency, and robust flavor profile.
For the first time, Wojo became the state’s top seller of rosin in a one-month period in October, surpassing 710 Labs, a California-based cultivator of concentrates.
Wojo’s products, which also include flower and infused prerolls, are sold in 278 dispensaries — a tremendous achievement for a company barely a year into the saturated market.
Live rosin is the crème de la crème of concentrates and has become the top choice for many cannabis connoisseurs. The gooey substance is rich in terpenes and THC (as high as 90%), capturing the aroma and flavor of well-cultivated plants.
And Wojo has nailed the process, creating robust, mouthwatering flavors that are sold in one-gram jars (aka pucks), half-gram disposable vapes, and inside enormous, two-gram prerolls, called Honey Holes, that are as hardhitting as any cannabis I’ve ever tried. Wojo has a whopping 57 strains.
Live rosin is made by first washing freshly frozen cannabis in near-freezing
Wejrowski recalls in an interview with Metro Times. “If I know it comes down to how hard I work to get success, I’ll bet on myself every time.”
When he returned home, Wejrowski bought all of the supplies he needed, began making rosin, and sold it to medical dispensaries.
“Dispensaries were opening, and they were taking caregiver products, so I hit the road, showing everyone the product,” Wejrowski says. “It was going great. People were loving it. It started snowballing. People loved the product, and they loved the brand.”
It became a quick hit, and his rosin began winning awards.
Wejrowski didn’t do it alone. The friends who collaborated with him in the early stages — growing weed in their basements — are still working with him at Wojo, and they’ve developed a strong bond and are committed to producing unique, high-quality concentrates.
“We’re all friends and passionate about what we do,” says director of operations Tyler Smith. “We want to be the best. Doing this is an art and a passion. You have to be all in.”
Finally, after some unexpected setbacks, Wojo broke ground for its new building in mid-2022 and received its recreational license in November 2023.
Wojo hasn’t looked back since. Wejrowski and his buddies have meticulously cultivated dozens of exclusive strains that are designed to deliver premiumquality rosin. To create those strains, the company has grown “thousands and thousands of seeds” to find the ideal phenotypes for pungent, tasty rosin.
“You’re trying to bring the best out of both parents,” Wejrowski says. “That’s your winner.”
The company has won nine awards for its unique strains, including Sundae Driver and Wojo Mints.
water to separate the trichomes, the resinous hairs where THC and terpenes are concentrated. The resulting bubble hash is then pressed using heat and pressure to extract a thick, sticky oil without any solvents. This chemicalfree process preserves the plant’s full flavor and terpene profile, resulting in a concentrate often described as resembling opaque earwax.
Wojo’s success is impossible to understand without knowing the people behind the operation. Tyler Wejrowski, the founder and CEO of Wojo, is the brainchild, and he’s as passionate as he is knowledgeable.
One day in March 2018, while drinking beer and doing dabs, Wejrowski came across an ad for a hashmaking conference in Las Vegas. Five days later, he was on a plane to Sin City.
“I was like, ‘I’m going all in on it,’”
The strains are divided into five flavor profiles — candy, citrus, floral, funky, and gassy.
Wojo uses 1o grow rooms, each of which has between 320 and 360 plants. About two-thirds of Wojo’s business is concentrates. The other third is flower.
Wojo focuses on keeping the plants and concentrates free of chemicals and additives.
“Our process is very clean,” Smith says. “We don’t spray our plants. From the seed to selling it, it’s a very clean process. Every flavor you taste comes from terpenes. None of it is artificial.”
Last month, Wojo celebrated its 40th harvest and now has 50 employees, up from 11 in January.
Wejrowski says he prefers live rosin over flower.
“I dab every day — it keeps me calm and focused,” Wejrowski says. “I just like
Director of operations Tyler Smith helps to cultivate Wojo’s cannabis free of chemicals and additives. STEVE NEAVLING
it more. It’s much cleaner and doesn’t smell as much. If I smoke a joint and go into the grocery store, I get a lot of looks. I do a dab, and it’s not that way.”
The straight dope
I was skeptical when I first sampled Wojo’s live rosin. While I expected a good experience, I wasn’t sure I’d see the appeal of live rosin over flower.
How wrong I was. Vaping or dabbing live rosin offers a more flavorful way to taste terpene-rich cannabis. And Wojo’s signature strains are the result of a painstaking hunt for plants with exceptional taste and fragrance.
The real treat is the unique high, which is more potent and invigorating than a flower buzz, while somehow staying clear-headed, inspired, and balanced. I could stay focused on whatever I was doing, and the more uplifting strains kept me going all day long, without the anxiety often associated with potent flower.
Another benefit of live rosin is that the extraction is chemical-free and relies on near-freezing water, heat, and pressure.
It’s also a clean, discreet, and easy way to consume cannabis. You can either use a dab rig or a vape. Wojo recommended a Puffco vape, and it worked
well for me.
I sampled five live rosin vapes, two pucks, bubble hash-infused prerolls, and a Honey Hole. For an all-day high that will keep you energized, I loved the strains Roasted Lemons (Pink Lemonade x Bakers Dozen) and Strawberry Candy (Orange Zkittlez x Strawberry Guava). Both have unique, nuanced flavor profiles and deliver a long, stimulating high.
For more of a body high, my favorites were Sundae Driver (FPOG x Grape Pie Bx), which has a smooth and creamy profile with a strong flavor of sweet grapes, and Bukbuk Bobuk (Motor Breath 15 x London Pound Cake), a zesty, gassy strain that smacks you in the face.
The one-gram pucks generally cost between $45 and $50.
Wojo’s disposable vapes are a game-changer and are typically priced between $30 and $35. The vapes are discreet, easy to use, and effective.
The Refinery in Detroit has the best prices for Wojo products — $25 for a vape and $38 for a puck. New patients also receive a free top-shelf eighth for the first four times they spend at least $50.
Wojo lists its 57 strains on its website, with descriptions of the flavors, aroma,
and effects, making it easy to select a strain tailored to your taste and desired experience. You can filter the strains by effects, flavor profile, breeder, genetic makeup, and terpenes.
Wojo also makes terpene-rich prerolls infused with hard-hitting bubble hash. The options range from 0.5 grams to 2 grams. I smoked half of a 0.5-gram joint of Malibu Marsha, and I melted into the couch with a serene, bodynumbing high.
Wojo’s Honey Holes are massive and come with a reusable glass tip. They’re stuffed with 1.5 grams of flower and 0.5 grams of rosin.
For many, it’s easy to question the practicality of such an indulgence. With potency levels that might floor even seasoned smokers and a price tag to match ($45), Honey Holes aren’t exactly a casual, everyday smoke. But perhaps that’s the point. They aren’t designed for practicality — they’re designed for a celebration.
My wife and I set out to conquer a Honey Hole, but it quickly became clear we were in over our heads. By the time we were about three-quarters through, we were absolutely wrecked.
While live rosin put Wojo on the map, the company also harvests highquality flower that hasn’t yet gotten the
attention it deserves. I sampled Swagyu, a gassy, funky cross of Gorilla Nut and Meat Breath. The buds were dense and covered in frosty trichomes. The high was relaxing and euphoric.
Wojo’s rise in Michigan’s competitive cannabis market is nothing short of remarkable. With a relentless commitment to quality and innovation, they’ve set a new standard for live rosin and bubble hash. Their products don’t just cater to casual consumers but to cannabis connoisseurs seeking exceptional taste, purity, and effects. From robust live rosin to terpene-rich flower, Wojo offers something for everyone — whether you’re looking for an all-day, uplifting high or a serene, couch-lock experience.
More than just a cannabis company, Wojo is a testament to the power of passion, hard work, and collaboration. The dedication of its founders and team is evident in every jar, vape, and preroll they produce. As Wojo continues to refine and expand its offerings, it’s clear they’ve earned their place as a trailblazer in Michigan’s cannabis industry — and they’re just getting started.
If you want us to sample your cannabis products, send us an email at steve@ metrotimes.com.
CULTURE
Savage Love
Out and About
By Dan Savage
: Q I’m a 45-year-old cis woman. I’ve been married to a cis man for almost 20 years. About a year and a half ago, I made out with a woman at a party, and everything clicked. I realized something was missing in my life, and I started exploring my attraction to women with my husband’s blessing. I had always felt attracted to women but didn’t fully acknowledge it, thinking it was normal for “straight” women to be attracted to other women while only dating men. (I’ve since learned about compulsory heterosexuality.) I met a wonderful woman, and we dated for over a year. While I was with her, I realized I’m gay. We spent a lot of time together, I had the best sex of my life, saw shows, went out to dinners, had sleepovers, met each other’s kids. It was a real relationship. But she ended things because I wasn’t ready to make major changes in my life — she wasn’t included in our large family gatherings, as some family members don’t know about our open marriage. My husband has a girlfriend now, and I’m happy for him, but he feels certain family members wouldn’t understand. This made my girlfriend feel deprioritized, despite my reassurances and all the time I spent with her.
I love my husband dearly, but our relationship is platonic, and we’ve stopped being intimate. We have three amazing young children, and our lives are deeply intertwined emotionally, financially, and where our families are concerned. While I feel I need to live authentically as a lesbian, I’m terrified of the fallout — hurting my husband, my family, blowing up my life, etc. The plan was to keep our family together and slowly integrate my girlfriend into my life, but that wasn’t enough for her. My husband wants to stay married, and I wanted to stay married. Should I get a divorce instead? What should I do?
—Wanting To Live Authentically
A: You wanna live authentically, WTLA, and I wanna respond authentically. And if I’m gonna be authentic — if I’m gonna be honest — my first impulse after reading your question was to find you and your husband and figuratively slap you both upside your metaphorical heads. On the off chance your email
found me in an ungenerous mood, WTLA, I set your question aside for a few days. But I had the same reaction — the same metaphorical impulse to do figurative violence — the second time I read your email.
Zooming out for a second…
It’s totally fine — not a problem at all — that it took you decades to realize you’re a lesbian. Compulsory heterosexuality is a helluva drug, WTLA, and lots of queer people don’t figure themselves out until later in life. And it’s totally fine not a problem at all — that you wanna stay married. You’re not letting down the lesbian side by staying in your marriage. Companionate marriages are valid marriages! So long as there’s mutual respect and real affection, marriages like yours can work and often thrive. If you wanna stay together for the kids and/or stay together because you actually do (platonically!) love each other and/or stay together because divorce is an expensive hassle, you have my blessing!
Where you lose me, WTLA, is when you talk about not being able to “integrate” your girlfriend into your life because “certain” family members wouldn’t understand. I get it. You’re staring down some very real fears: fear of judgment, fear of rejection, fear of losing people you care about. But every out gay or lesbian or bisexual person that came before you — and every openly non-monogamous couple that came before you had to confront those same fears.
And the people you and your husband are so afraid of — your families of origin — don’t have any real power over you. Yes, they might not understand. Yes, some might judge you. Yes, they might say shitty things. But they can’t throw you out of the house (you have your own place!) they can’t cut you off financially (you make your own money!), and they can’t force you into conversion therapy (you are not minors!) All your judgmental family members can do, again, is say shitty things to you. But one of the best parts of being an adult, WTLA, is that you don’t have to show up for Christmas or Kwanza or Hanukkah — you don’t have to do whatever holiday your families celebrate — if your family can’t be kind to you and the people you love. I understand why your girlfriend dumped you. She doesn’t want to be abandoned on holidays for the comfort of people who don’t fully know you people you don’t fully trust — but people whose comfort you’ve decided to prioritize over her safety and comfort. And while she may be comfortable being with a woman who’s married (companionably!) to someone else, she doesn’t
want to feel like your lowest priority either. Perhaps she should’ve been more patient — you’ve only been out for a year and change — but if she’s close to your age, WTLA, she may not feel like waiting until your husband comes around is the best use of her time at this (grownup!) time of her life.
Look, your family might not understand at first — mine sure didn’t — but if all the gays and lesbians who came before you waited for our families to somehow magically “get it” before we started coming out, no one would’ve come out at all, ever. While some queer people these days are lucky enough to come out to supportive families who already got it, WTLA, most of our families don’t get it until after we come out to them.
If you want to be who you are — if you want to live authentically — you have to be willing to make some people uncomfortable, WTLA, and that includes your husband.
: Q How do partnered-but-monogamish people identify each other and get things going?
I’m a 42-year-old bisexual woman, happily married to my husband for 15 years. My husband and I are monogamish and have dabbled here and there, the biggest dabbling being an on-off relationship I had with a woman for nearly a decade. I was able to start that because my former lover was loud (and proud) about her open relationship, and brought it up to anyone who had a set of ears. Aside from her, the other sexual partner my husband and I had was a very close friend who we were able to bring it up to.
I have a crush on my neighbor, who is 10 years my senior. She is married to a man, and I’m pretty sure she’s bisexual. However, I’m not really friends with her, and I don’t know how I would go about approaching this if I wanted to make something happen. We live in a close-knit neighborly community and if I were to ask her out, she would interpret it as being purely friendly. I don’t want to make her feel uncomfortable in any way if she was not into the idea, but it would be a shame if she would go for this, but we just can’t cross the chasm. How would I go about getting this started, if it is possible at all? Would it be wise to test the waters for potential by asking a third party to feel her out in some way? In general, how do monogamish people identify each other and get things going outside of apps?
Need Expert Insight Getting Hot Babe Over Regularly
A: Even if your neighbor is in an open marriage — and even if she’s bisexual and even if she’s into you (and that’s a lot of ifs) — sending someone to ask her if she might wanna mess around doesn’t
say, “Your neighbor is a mature adult woman that you might enjoy fucking,” it screams, “Your neighbor has the emotional maturity of a second grader and people like that are risky fucks.”
You’re a grown-ass woman, NEIGHBOR, and grown-ass women don’t send their best friends to ask out their crushes for them during recess. Grownass women also don’t slip notes under their neighbor’s doors with “I want to be your girlfriend” or “I don’t want to be your girlfriend” written on them next to boxes to check. And sensible monogamish people typically don’t hit on neighbors who’ve never signaled any interest or availability because sensible monogamish people — like sensible single people — don’t shit where they eat. Unless the sexual tension is off the charts and the signals are unmistakable and you’ve controlled for dickful/twatful thinking, NEIGHBOR, sensible people don’t hit on their coworkers and/or the parents of their children’s friends and/ or their next-door neighbors. Because if it turns out that person isn’t interested in you — or if they are interested but things end quickly and badly — your workplace, your children’s playdates, and your backyard will become almost unbearably awkward.
To answer your question, NEIGHBOR, here’s how sensible partnered and monogamish people find each other: They go places — online and off, separately and together — where partnered-andmonogamish people gather. They get on a dating apps and hookup apps like Feeld and #Open, they go to local swingers clubs and sex parties, and if they run into their neighbor in one of those places — Yahtzee! — they get to use one of these all-time great pickup lines: “Do you come here often?” “Fancy meeting you here!” “What’s a nice next-door neighbor like you doing in a place like this?”
Now, if you put yourself out there apps, clubs, parties — and you never cross paths with your neighbor, NEIGHBOR, that doesn’t mean she’s not bisexual, isn’t in an open marriage, and isn’t masturbating about you right now. But instead of sending a friend to pump her for information about her marriage, you could get to know your neighbor a little better — you could do a little platonic socializing —and then, once you’re friends, open up to her about your life and your marriage.
Got problems? Yes, you do! Email your question for the column to mailbox@ savage.love!
Or record your question for the Savage Lovecast at savage.love/askdan!
Podcasts, columns and more at Savage. Love
CULTURE
Free Will Astrology
By Rob Brezsny
ARIES: March 21 – April 19
If you were walking down the street and spied a coin lying on the sidewalk, would you bend down to pick it up? If you’re like most people, you wouldn’t. It’s too much trouble to exert yourself for an object of such little value. But I advise you to adopt a different attitude during the coming weeks. Just for now, that stray coin might be something like an Umayyad gold dinar minted in the year 723 and worth over $7 million. Please also apply this counsel metaphorically, Aries. In other words, be alert for things of unexpected worth that would require you to expand your expectations or stretch your capacities.
TAURUS: April 20 – May 20
The Taurus writer Randall Jarrell compared poets to people who regularly stand in a meadow during a thunderstorm. If they are struck by the lightning of inspiration five or six times in the course of their careers, they are good
poets. If they are hit a dozen times, they are great poets. A similar principle applies in many fields of endeavor. To be excellent at what you do, you must regularly go to where the energy is most electric. You’ve also got to keep working diligently on your skills so that when inspiration comes calling, you have a highly developed ability to capture it in a useful form. I’m bringing this up now, Taurus, because I suspect the coming weeks will bring you a slew of lightning bolts.
GEMINI: May 21 – June 20
My upcoming novels epitomize the literary genre known as magical realism. In many ways, the stories exhibit reverence for the details of our gritty destinies in the material world. But they are also replete with wondrous events like talking animals, helpful spirits, and nightly dreams that provide radical healing. The characters are both practical and dreamy, earthy and wildly imaginative, wellgrounded and alert for miracles. In accordance with your astrological potentials, I invite you to be like those characters in the coming months. You are ready to be robustly pragmatic and primed for fairy-tale-style adventures.
CANCER: June 21 – July 22
In December 1903, the Wright Brothers flew a motorized vehicle through the sky for the first time in human history. It was a very modest achievement, really. On the first try, Orville Wright was in the air for just 12 seconds and traveled 120 feet. On the fourth attempt that day, Wilbur was aloft for 59 seconds and 852 feet. I believe you’re at a comparable stage in the evolution of your own innovation. Don’t minimize your incipient accomplishment. Keep the faith. It may take a while, but your efforts will ultimately lead to a meaningful advancement. (P.S., Nine months later, the Wrights flew their vehicle for over five minutes and traveled 2.75 miles.)
LEO: July 23 – August 22
During the rest of 2024, life’s generosity will stream your way more than usual. You will be on the receiving end of extra magnanimity from people, too. Even the spiritual realms might have extra goodies to bestow on you. How should you respond? My suggestion is to share the inflowing wealth with cheerful creativity. Boost your own generosity and magnanimity. Just assume that the more you give, the more you will get and the more you will have. (P.S. Do you know that Emily Dickinson poem with the line “Why Floods be served to us — in Bowls”? I suggest you obtain some big bowls.)
VIRGO: August 23 – Sept. 22
The term “cognitive dissonance” refers to the agitation we feel while trying to hold conflicting ideas or values in our minds. For example, let’s say you love the music of a particular singersongwriter, but they have opinions that offend you or they engage in behavior that repels you. Or maybe you share many positions with a certain political candidate, but they also have a few policies you dislike. Cognitive dissonance doesn’t have to be a bad or debilitating thing. In fact, the ability to harbor conflicting ideas with poise and equanimity is a sign of high intelligence. I suspect this will be one of your superpowers in the coming weeks.
LIBRA: Sept. 23 – Oct. 22
“Amazing Grace” is a popular hymn recorded by many pop stars, including Aretha Franklin, Elvis Presley, and Willie Nelson. Created in 1773, it tells the story of a person who concludes that he has lived an awful life and now wants to repent for his sins and be a better human. The composer, John Newton, was a slave trader who had a religious epiphany during a storm that threatened to sink his ship in the Atlantic Ocean. God told him to reform his evil ways, and he did. I presume that none of you reading this horoscope has ever been as horrible a person as Newton. And yet you and I, like most people, are in regular need of conversion experiences that awaken us to higher truths and more expansive perspectives. I predict you will have at least three of those transformative illuminations in the coming months. One is available now, if you want it.
SCORPIO: Oct. 23 – Nov. 21:
“Thinking outside the box” is an American idiom. It means escaping habitual parameters and traditional formulas so as to imagine fresh perspectives and novel approaches. While it’s an excellent practice, there is also a good alternative. We can sometimes accomplish marvels by staying inside the box and reshaping it from the inside. Another way to imagine this is to work within the system to transform the system — to accept some of the standard perspectives but play and experiment with others.
For example, in my horoscope column, I partially adhere to the customs of the well-established genre, but also take radical liberties with it. I recommend this approach for you in 2025.
SAGITTARIUS: Nov. 22 – Dec. 21
I don’t recommend burning wood to heat your home. Such fires generate noxious emissions harmful to human health. But hypothetically speaking, if you had no other way to get warm, I prefer burning ash and beech wood rather than, say, pine and cedar. The former two trees yield far more heat than the latter two, so you need less of them. Let’s apply this principle as we meditate on your quest for new metaphorical fuel, Sagittarius. In the coming months, you will be wise to search for resources that provide you with the most efficient and potent energy.
CAPRICORN: Dec. 22 – Jan. 19
The world’s longest tunnel is over 35 miles long. It’s the Gotthard Base Tunnel in the Swiss Alps. I’m guessing the metaphorical tunnel you’ve been crawling your way through lately, Capricorn, may feel that extensive. But it’s really not. And here’s even better news: Your plodding travels will be finished sooner than you imagine. I expect that the light at the end of the tunnel will be visible any day now. Now here’s the best news: Your slow journey through the semi-darkness will ultimately yield rich benefits no later than your birthday.
AQUARIUS: Jan. 20 – Feb. 18
Would you like to avoid wilting and fading away in January, Aquarius? If so, I recommend that during the coming weeks, you give your best and brightest gifts and express your wildest and most beautiful truths. In the new year, you will need some downtime to recharge and revitalize. But it will be a pleasantly relaxing interlude — not a wan, withered detour — if in the immediate future you unleash your unique genius in its full splendor.
PISCES: Feb.19 – March 20
My treasured Piscean adviser, Letisha, believes it’s a shame that so many of us try to motivate ourselves through abusive self-criticism. Are you guilty of that sin? I’ve done it myself on many occasions. Sadly, it rarely works as a motivational ploy. More often, it demoralizes and deflates. The good news, Pisces, is that you now have extra power and savvy to diminish your reliance on this ineffectual tactic. To launch the transformation, I hope you’ll engage in a focused campaign of inspiring yourself through self-praise and self-love.
Homework: What will you revive, rejuvenate, and renovate in 2025?
JAMES NOELLERT
The darkest nights are upon us. Don’t get SAD or give way to misguided thinking. It’s the time of year to be with others to take in the warmth and the light of the crowd. So shake off the cold, order a double and make some friends.
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