Category: Opinion

Categories
At Large Opinion

When It Rains

Just some wacky weather, nothing more. (Photo: Bethany Butler Myers)

Perhaps the nadir of last week for me came Saturday morning, as I was standing in a sudden downpour with my two leashed dogs, imploring them to, well, pee.

“C’mon, Olive! Pee and you get a treat! C’mon, girls, pee! Don’t you want a treat?” 

Their ears always perk when they hear the sacred T-word, but they never seem to make the connection as to how relieving themselves might make the magic happen, and so on we trudged along the flooded Midtown sidewalks until at last the deeds were done and we could return home to shake ourselves dry.

Seriously, can we all agree that last week was insane? Twelve inches of rain in four days? They called it a “generational event.” Maybe, but does anybody remember the great flood of 2011? Seems less than a generation ago.

My rain-crazed friends and I spent the afternoon sending each other flood videos gleaned from social media or local TV websites. Overton Park is under water! Union Avenue is closed! Poplar is shut down! Stay away from East Parkway! Giant tree fell on Cooper! There’s a guy kayaking by Ecco!

There were several images of sad people standing beside their cars in waist-deep water, victims of the kind of foolish optimism that leads someone into thinking their Corolla is a Humvee. We got 5.5 inches in a single day, a record for April. 

By Sunday, we were down to an occasional drizzle, but there’s more moisture to come, folks. That giant anaconda of a storm squatted over the center of the country for several days, and all of that water is headed our way, spilling down the countless rivers, streams, creeks, and ditches that feed into the Ohio, Illinois, Tennessee, and Missouri rivers, and ultimately, the Mississippi. A rise of two feet a day on the lower Mississippi (that’s us), is considered a big deal. The river rose 5.6 feet(!) at Memphis on Monday and is predicted to rise more than 20 feet before it crests at 37 feet on April 14th — three feet above flood stage. The 2011 flood crested at 48 feet, but still, the redesigned Tom Lee Park may be tested. 

But all of this wacky weather was really just background noise as the country was being “looted, pillaged, raped, and plundered by nations near and far” and cruelly denied a “turn to prosper.” Or at least that’s what was happening in the spacious cranium of Donald Trump, as he proclaimed last Wednesday “Liberation Day” and imposed tariffs on, well, every country in the world except Russia. He was like Oprah Winfrey on a bender: “You get a tariff, and you get a tariff, and you get a tariff! And everyone gets a global market collapse.” Good times!

Noted leftist hippie rag, The Economist, described the proceedings thusly: “It’s hard to know which is more unsettling: that the leader of the free world could spout complete drivel about its most successful and admired economy. Or the fact that on April 2nd, spurred on by his delusions, Donald Trump announced the biggest break in America’s trade policy in over a century — and committed the most profound, harmful, and unnecessary economic error in the modern era.”

Out of curiosity, I went around my house checking manufacturing labels. Here’s a partial list of things I own that were made in another country: toaster oven, blender, coffee maker, knife sharpener, microwave, vacuum cleaner, nine lamps, two televisions, stereo and turntable, hair dryer, washer and dryer. If I’d gone out to the garage, I could have kept going, starting with my Subaru and working through all my tools and battery-powered lawn care devices. I do own two American guitars and a Kershaw pocket knife. 

All that stuff is soon going to cost, at minimum, 20 percent more, thanks to Tariff-Boy’s McKinley wet dream. Hope you like the idea of $1,500 iPhones. Not to mention, everyone’s 401(k) is in the toilet and the IRS’ and Social Security’s computer programs are being rewritten by Elon Musk’s unrestrained junior code-hackers. What, me worry?

There was at least some good news. Trump sent out this announcement on Saturday: “The President won his second round matchup of the Senior Club Championship today in Jupiter, FL, and advances to the Championship Round tomorrow.” Priorities! I bet you can’t guess who won. 

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

Honoring Midtown’s Champions

The Mojo of Midtown Awards celebrate those whose actions bettered Midtown — and the city. (Photos: Courtesy Emily Bishop)

Among this year’s Mojo of Midtown Award recipients, two individuals were honored for their outstanding contributions to the stability and revitalization of Midtown neighborhoods. Their efforts have been so transformative that their successes now feel like an inherent part of the community, as if Midtown has always been a collection of thriving neighborhoods. However, when Hershel Lipow and Earlice Taylor received their honors at the Mojo of Midtown Awards Bash, hosted by MidtownMemphis.org on April 7, 2025, we were reminded that the Midtown we know today was shaped by the dedication and vision of individuals who worked tirelessly for its betterment.

Earlice Taylor has long been a pillar of the Glenview neighborhood, where her unwavering commitment to preservation and community-building has earned her widespread recognition. Thanks to her efforts, Glenview has become both a national and local Landmarks District, ensuring its historical integrity while fostering homeownership and neighborhood pride. In a 2010 oral history program, Earlice described herself as a historic preservationist, a landmarks commissioner, and a singer — each role reflecting her deep commitment to safeguarding both the physical and cultural heritage of her community. A gifted communicator, she articulates a vision that inspires others to take action. She also founded the Tennessee Cultural Preservation Society, an organization dedicated to identifying, protecting, and celebrating African-American history and culture. While her ideas and ambitions have been far-reaching, she has always maintained a steadfast focus on the neighborhood just beyond her front door.

As the first administrator of Memphis Housing and Community Development (HCD) in 1975, Hershel Lipow played a pivotal role in shaping Midtown’s trajectory. Under his leadership, HCD developed a comprehensive program of public works, housing initiatives, and community services that laid the foundation for the vibrant neighborhoods we see today. His team of planners worked closely with Midtown residents, educating them on the benefits of organization and helping them form neighborhood associations — one of Midtown’s greatest assets today.

In the 1970s, Midtown neighborhoods faced significant decline. Recognizing the need for change, HCD staff studied existing land use and recommended “downzoning” — a shift from multiunit residences to single-family home zoning. This policy aimed to increase homeownership and instill a sense of pride in the community. Though such changes take time, the results were profound. Midtown neighborhoods became more desirable, experiencing a resurgence in stability and vibrancy. Inspired by the success of neighborhood organizations and improvement efforts led by HCD, many communities, including Annesdale Park, Annesdale-Snowden, Rozelle-Annesdale, and Cooper-Young, saw remarkable revitalization. These efforts spurred other Midtown neighborhoods to follow suit, embracing the model of strong neighborhood associations to drive their own improvements.

Hershel and his team also recognized the importance of preserving Midtown’s architectural and historical significance. Rather than treating Memphis as a blank slate, HCD encouraged historically significant Midtown neighborhoods to seek inclusion in the National Register of Historic Places. They provided residents with education and support to facilitate the application process, ensuring that Midtown’s development history remained an asset rather than an obstacle. To further safeguard Midtown’s historic character, Hershel and HCD established the Memphis Landmarks Commission (MLC), which introduced the review process for “Certificates of Appropriateness” in historic districts. By the 1980s, the MLC had initiated a program of locally adopted historic districts, many of which remain active participants in the Landmarks approval process today. Achieving Landmarks historic district status has not only become a source of pride for Midtown neighborhoods but also serves as a protective measure against the indiscriminate destruction of their character and charm.

A recent Smart City article by Tom Jones highlighted the complexities of urban population loss, noting that “if there is a main lesson to be gleaned from other cities, it is that there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Rather, solutions that work for each city must be organic and appropriate to its distinctive trends and conditions.” This insight aligns closely with the philosophy of Memphis Housing and Community Development under Hershel Lipow’s leadership. Rather than imposing rigid policies, HCD sought to understand and amplify the unique strengths of Memphis neighborhoods, empowering them to shape their own futures.

Earlice Taylor embodied this same spirit of local leadership, fighting tirelessly to preserve and protect Glenview. Her dedication was recognized in November 2000, when the Commercial Appeal reported on Glenview’s groundbreaking achievement: “A measure creating the city’s first predominately Black local historic district won City Council approval without opposition.”

The achievements of Hershel Lipow and Earlice Taylor exemplify the essence of what the Mojo of Midtown Awards seek to celebrate. Their vision, persistence, and commitment to community empowerment have left an indelible mark on Midtown Memphis. As we honor them, we acknowledge not only their past successes but also the lasting impact of their work — an impact that continues to shape and inspire our city today. 

Emily Bishop is a native Memphian and a Midtowner by choice. 

She currently serves as the president of MidtownMemphis.org.

Categories
Letter From The Editor Opinion

I Don’t

Defining success in terms of marriage is misguided. (Photo: Rui G. Santos | Dreamstime.com)

On Monday, the Tennessee state House approved the “success sequence” bill in a 73-20 vote. The bill, which would require the state’s public schools to teach a specific life path to “success,” previously passed the Senate in a 25-5 vote and is now headed to the desk of Governor Bill Lee for signing. That life path: education, marriage, kids. 

In fact, the text of HB0178 focuses heavily on marriage as the crux of a “successful” life: “WHEREAS, children raised by married parents are more likely to flourish compared to children raised in single-parent families; and WHEREAS, children raised in stable, married-parent families are more likely to excel in school, and generally earn higher grade point averages than children who are not; and WHEREAS, children raised by married parents are about twice as likely to graduate from college than children who are not; and WHEREAS, children not raised in a home with married parents are twice as likely to end up in jail or prison before reaching thirty years of age …”

Perhaps data somewhere shows these things are more or less likely for children who had both parents around, but setting curriculum to teach youth that marriage is a required part of a “successful” life is an overstep. Will they, too, teach how to maintain a successful marriage? According to the National Center for Health Statistics, approximately 41 percent of first marriages and 60 percent of second marriages end in divorce. In 2021, the most recent state report showed Tennessee had a divorce rate of 3.3 per 1,000 inhabitants. And in 2024, U.S. News & World Report listed Tennessee among the top 10 states with the highest divorce rate. A crucial piece in teaching marriage as an asset would be teaching people how to navigate the commitments, challenges, and changes of marriage. 

State Senator London Lamar, raised by a single mother, recently commented on the bill, noting it implies single parents are “less than.” “If you are not married, it does not mean that you are less than anybody else. I think this bill is misguided, it’s very offensive, and I’m living proof that this bill has no merit,” Lamar said.

I’m no senator. But I have what some may consider a successful life and career. My parents divorced when I was 5 years old, but I excelled in K-12, graduating with the fourth-highest grade point average in my high school class (a difference of mere tenths from valedictorian). I finished college at University of Memphis summa cum laude, with the highest GPA among all graduating journalism students that year. I held jobs while earning an education, taking an internship here with the Flyer as a working student. Dedicated to this publication, and with immense respect for the talented people with whom I work, I took positions in various departments to stick around — editorial, ad sales, advertorial — and wrote/edited for other magazines published by Contemporary Media. Through the years, I learned the ins and outs of the processes that make this thing work. In 2022, my bosses deemed me fit to run the whole Flyer shebang. I’m grateful and honored. 

I’m also childless (by choice) and have never been married. I knew at a very young age I didn’t want children. And marriage is not for me. Do my life choices make me less than? By not following a rigid “sequence,” did I somehow fail?  

Did my parents parting ways make me a bad kid? A dumb kid? A kid with less potential? No. My mother struggled at times as a single mom. But through her, I learned perseverance, determination, and the value of hard work. I knew that for most people, success (however it’s defined) would be a climb, and not a straight one — and that I was most people. I think the fact that I’m here, writing love notes to my dear city on a regular basis — and that you’re here, reading my words — is, by some measure, success. 

Marriage and kids not required. 

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

Memphis Is My Boyfriend: Testing Season

Online resources can help. (Photo: Patricia Lockhart)

’Tis the season for testing! While the weather is warming and most of us are eager to get outside, it’s a different season for our tweens and teens. I’m the grateful mom of four — an 11-year-old girl, twin 13-year-old boys, and a 16-year-old boy. This spring, they’re all facing end-of-year assessments. My middle schoolers are preparing for TNReady (TCAP), while my high schooler is tackling AP Exams, ACTs, and more. These tests are crucial for their next steps in education. Since hubby and I know the trajectory we want for their educational future, their performance matters. So we aim for balance during the testing season: work hard, play hard.

Get them tutoring or homework help

Parents, if you know that math isn’t your thing, don’t you go undoing all that hard work the teacher put in by trying to teach your child “how you did math 20-plus years ago.” While the procedural steps of mathematics haven’t drastically changed, the conceptual learning of math has. So leave it up to the professionals. My high schooler is involved with math that contains more letters and angles than numbers. Since there is nothing I can do to help him, I rely on outside resources. Check out tutoring or homework help at your school or local library. The Homework Hotline is still going strong! You can either get help with homework or free weekly tutoring at homeworkhotline.info. My favorite online resource is Khan Academy. It’s filled with standards-aligned content for a variety of subjects. What I love most are their “how-to videos” for math. Khan Academy is great if your tween/teen already has a foundation about a subject, but just needs more practice.

Ease up on them at home

During the testing season, my hubby and I absorb all the chores and cooking. Typically, everyone in the house has chores they are responsible for, including the parents. We find it best to consistently model the expectations rather than only voice them. But during testing, hubby and I divide the chores among only us. The kids simply come home and have a little down time before reviewing the next day’s testing subject. We do ask them to be considerate and clean up after themselves as much as possible.

We also absorb all the cooking responsibilities. Just like the chores, everyone is responsible for cooking a healthy meal at least one night a week. But not during testing season! For three to four weeks, hubby and I cook every meal. Yes, it adds more to our plate after a long workday, but our future goals are not hinged upon our performance on one test. So we do whatever we can to ensure that our kids have space for rest and review. 

Extracurricular activities

Last year, we made a huge mistake. We removed extracurricular activities from the schedule during testing season. No ballet practice. No video games. No random outings. After school, the kids were instructed to come home, do nothing, then study a little bit. While they were okay for the first few days, energies began to increase because they did not have a creative outlet. 

It didn’t take long for the lack of creative outlets to shake things up. Activities like ballet, gaming, and random outings weren’t just fun pastimes — they were little mood-boosters and motivators. Creative outlets gave them a way to let off steam, express themselves, and come back to their studies feeling refreshed. Without them, all that extra energy had nowhere to go, which only led to bickering and boredom. 

I’m a huge fan of the Memphis Public Libraries. They have a ton of activities for tweens/teens to get involved in. Dungeons & Dragons, music labs, videography, Drumming 101, chess, crafts, and so much more! If you’re looking for a creative outlet for your tween/teen, check out the activities at the Memphis Public Libraries.

Testing season can be tough, but it doesn’t have to be miserable. A little balance goes a long way! From tutoring help and lightening their chores to letting them enjoy their favorite activities, it’s all about setting them up for success. And, once again, don’t sleep on the Memphis Public Libraries — they’ve got tons of cool programs to keep kids inspired and refreshed. At the end of the day, we’re just here to cheer them on and help them do their best! 

Patricia Lockhart is a native Memphian who loves to read, write, cook, and eat. By day, she’s an assistant principal and writer, but by night … she’s asleep.

Categories
At Large Opinion

Sea Change

Photo © Lawrence Wee | Dreamstime.com

A pelican glides by just offshore, there, out where the blue dolphins dance, emerging and disappearing into the sea. The kite hangs overhead, side-slipping in the ocean breeze, tethered to your umbrella pole by a gracile thread. You push your new sunglasses up on your nose and soak in the sun, the blue sky, the bleached sand; you hear the surf mumbling, “Stay.”

I could do it, you think, shifting in your canvas chair. “I could get a job renting beach umbrellas or maybe working on a fishing boat. In the evenings, I’ll sip margaritas and finish the novel.”

Your young daughter hands you a sand dollar from a plastic bucket filled with saltwater currency. “Let’s go cash this in,” you say. “We’ll buy this place.

The cast is perfect, a dry fly circling at the deep end of an eddy. There is a flash of silver and a tug that feels like you’ve hooked the river and it wants off. The trout streaks into the current, jumps once, twice, takes line, gives it back a reel-turn at a time. You stand in the riffle, gravel crunching, sliding under your feet. “This is a good one,” you think. Minutes later you net the fat rainbow, admire it for a few seconds, and release it back into the pool.

“I wonder what a piece of land on this stream would cost,” you wonder. “I could live here, deep in these dark woods, enjoying a life of fishing, solitude, and contemplation — become a wise old man.”

You’re sitting on the pool steps, waist-deep in cool water, deep in the steamy jungles of Quintana Roo, south of Cancun. The house is modern, open, with glass walls overlooking the pool on one side and the twisted green jungle on the other. Every morning, a troop of monkeys swings by, screeching through the trees as you sit outside with your coffee, marveling at the strangeness of it all.

“I’ve decided this must be a drug lord’s house,” your wife says from her chaise lounge, not opening her eyes. “Who else would build a place like this in the middle of nowhere?”

“They didn’t mention that in the rental brochure,” you say, “but whoever owns this house certainly knows how to get away from it all.”

Two grackles land near the diving board and begin dipping their heads in the water and shivering it off. They chortle and chatter like an old couple in the park. You slip neck-deep into the pool and they fly away, complaining at the intrusion. 

“Hey, I’m thinking maybe we should look into property in this area.”

“Sure,” she says.

Two-hour layover in the Atlanta airport. You’re sitting in a bar that has a stupid name, talking to a man in gray — gray suit, socks, tie. He’s on his way to St. Louis, a software rep for a company you’ve heard of. You both watch as five men walk into the place — scruffy hair, tattoos, colorful funky clothes — obviously a band. You overhear them talking about going to the Bahamas to record. 

“Nice work if you can get it,” says the gray man.

“I used to be in a band myself,” you say.

“Really?” says Mr. Gray. “Me, too!”

You sigh and take another pull on your beer.

How many times have you been tempted to start over, to ditch your life, your career, and make a big change? If you’re like me, those moments occurred, but were seldom followed up on, unless you count moving to a new city to take a job, which last happened to me in 1993.

Change is difficult, even when the goal is worthy and attainable. It’s much more difficult when it’s not worthy and it’s forced upon you, and when you’re not sure how to fight against it. That’s where we all are now, in the midst of an attempt to change how our country will be governed, to overturn our core human values. Democracy itself seems tethered by a gracile thread. I take solace in knowing we’re all in this together, and that that’s the only way we’ll get out of it. I don’t know how it ends. I do think that we’re well past the “have a margarita and watch the dolphins” stage. Courage, my friends. 

Categories
At Large Opinion

Huddled Masses

Photo: Dhvstockphoto | Dreamstime.com

“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

These are the final lines of Emma Lazarus’ poem, “The New Colossus.” They are inscribed on a plaque at the base of the Statue of Liberty. How quaint those words seem now that it’s apparent that those leading this country no longer want anything to do with the poor or homeless or those huddled masses yearning to breathe free. There’s no lamp and no golden door, unless it’s the ones controlled by the for-profit ICE detention centers run by CoreCivic, GEO Group, LaSalle Corrections, and Management & Training Corporation.

That there are big profits being made from immigrant deportation is a feature, not a bug. In 2023, during Joe Biden’s presidency, 90 percent of the 30,000 people then held in ICE detention were housed in private facilities contracted by the agency. In 2022, Biden pledged there would be “no private prisons” used for detention, but he never delivered on that promise, and the number of immigrants in ICE detention centers has almost doubled since then.

Biden did at least keep detained immigrants in the U.S. until their cases could be handled in court. Donald Trump ramped it up to the next level last week by flying 238 Venezuelan immigrants to a notorious prison in El Salvador without giving them judicial due process. Trump justified the illegal move by invoking the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which enables the government to rapidly deport people from countries at war with the United States. Last time I checked, we weren’t at war with Venezuela. 

The deportees are now subject to a “justice system” that relies mostly on the whims of banana republic authoritarian President Nayib Bukele, who calls himself the world’s “coolest dictator.” El Salvador (read Bukele) received $6 million from the U.S. for taking the Venezuelans off our hands. It’s blood money. The prisoners had no opportunity to prove their innocence or challenge their sentences — because they haven’t been sentenced, just imprisoned for however long Bukele decides to keep them. It’s a business deal disguised as justice.

The administration claimed that the men were members of the Venezuelan gang, Tren de Aragua, but no proof was offered in a court of law. Some of these men presumably were gang leaders with criminal records; others may have been low-level members; others, we are now discovering, may not have had any association with the gang or any criminal record at all. They all got the same punishment.

It’s utterly inhumane and flies in the face of any American legal processes. At the very least, the men could have been deported to their country of origin. Using a Salvadoran prison as an American Gulag is a new low, even for Trump. 

And all of this was carried out against the specific orders of federal Judge James Boasberg. It’s perhaps instructive to learn that when Bukele was told about the administration’s lawyers ignoring the judge’s order, he posted, “Oopsie, too late” on X. It was promptly reposted by Secretary of State Marco Rubio and President-Select Elon Musk because … well, of course they did.

That exchange makes it increasingly clear that the last line of defense against Trump’s march to authoritarianism will be the judiciary. And the final bulwark of the judiciary is the Supreme Court, which has six right-leaning Republican appointees among its nine members. Trump has already hand-picked a subservient attorney general, Pam Bondi, to lead the Justice Department. If Trump just starts ignoring judicial orders from lower courts, as he has begun to do, will the GOP-linked members of SCOTUS stand up for the rule of law — or cede our democracy to the oligarchs who have taken over their party and our country? Their track record isn’t great.

And even if they do stand up to Trump, what happens if the president just ignores the Supreme Court? Who’s going to stop him? According to the Constitution, the only means available for judges to enforce their court orders are fines and/or arrests carried out by U.S. marshals. So, who controls U.S. federal marshals? Attorney General Pam Bondi. Oopsie. 

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

This Time It’s Personal

Trump’s federal cuts affect Americans, far and wide. (Photo: Cpenler | Dreamstime.com)

Yesterday, my wife and I took my infant son to his one-month pediatric checkup appointment. He got a glowing report from his wonderful doctor, but a month ago, that outcome was anything but certain.

Some 20 or so hours into my brave wife’s labor, the hospital staff realized that our son was having serious and potentially deadly fluctuations with his heart rate. They tried every intervention possible while I ran through the pain-coping techniques I had learned in our birthing classes.

Suddenly, there were at least half a dozen medical professionals in the room. They stopped explaining what they were doing, but their eyes told me everything I needed to know. My brave wife, whose birth plan had changed three times in a handful of hours, was rushed to an emergency “crash” C-section while a nurse took me to get into scrubs. The time apart from my best friend, my beautiful, caring, courageous wife was the most terrifying few minutes of my life. 

Soon, a nurse took me into the operating room and I was able to hold my wife’s hand during the procedure. I would swear that the surgery took hours, but our family, who were waiting outside, all said it was the fastest C-section they had ever waited on or heard of.

After 26 hours of labor, my son was born via crash C-section. He was (and is!) healthy, and he recovered from the difficult labor quickly. My wife was safe, too, for which I will never stop being thankful. After a few days, we were allowed to go home to begin our journey as a family.

One week after our son’s birth, my wife and I learned that we had lost our jobs thanks to President Donald J. Trump’s federal cuts. Though neither of us works for the government, we did work with federal agencies. My wife, who had been promoted based on merit mere months earlier, was recovering from major surgery, learning to be a mom, and suddenly needed to find a new job. She had worked for a lovely company doing work that I can describe only as “good.” She has helped scientists and researchers fight cancer, fight coastal erosion by saving native sea grass, and helped environmental and data scientists communicate with each other and with the Indigenous community. 

As for me, well, it was contract work. I had recently taken the plunge and begun my own copywriting, editing, and marketing company. Until I lost that one big client that helped make the dream possible. I’m not stressed about myself though. My family is healthy; I’ve found work before, and I will again. But I do worry about all of the workers at our national parks and the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation who have dedicated their entire adult lives to the dream of making the U.S. a healthier, safer, greener place. 

It’s easy to think of Trump’s measures as affecting only a faceless horde of bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., but no human being is faceless. No one is without dreams, a history, a rich inner life. These are our countrymen, and they’re real people who will really suffer. 

The former federal workers who are doubtless scrambling to find employment and feed their families are, of course, only the tip of the iceberg. Immigrants, documented or otherwise, who are detained by ICE agents are people guilty only of being from somewhere else, of dreaming of a better life. They probably had more hope for the U.S. than I do, but that hasn’t helped them when plainclothes agents handcuff them, often without providing the necessary legal documentation. 

And then there is the trans community, specifically, and the LGBTQ community in general. Did I mention that the doula who taught our birth classes is trans? That they are easily the kindest, most generous human I have met in years? That they helped my wife feel safe before confronting the biggest and most frightening unknown a pregnant person can experience? Of course, they’re not the first trans person I’ve known, nor is their kindness the reason why that community has my support, but this column isn’t about sense and reasons. I’m desperately trying to humanize these issues, to put a face to the headlines. Again, these are people. Americans. Often brave people who work harder than I can imagine, who work to help others more vulnerable than themselves. To demonize them for political gain is nothing short of callous cruelty I’m not ashamed to call evil. 

During the Covid pandemic, the previous iteration of the Trump administration soft-launched eugenics, to little outcry from the American people. Collectively, we decided that we didn’t mind if the old and vulnerable paid the price for our weekend brunches, our vacation trips. Trump is back, emboldened by a so-called mandate from voters. The message is clear: As long as the economic wheels keep turning, no one in power cares if they’re greased with the blood of the vulnerable. 

I don’t want my son to grow up in a nation devoid of empathy, where might makes right. So I’m asking you — begging you — to care. 

Jesse Davis is a former Flyer staffer; he writes a monthly Books feature for Memphis Magazine. His opinions, such as they are, hope we can find some way out of this mess. 

Categories
Opinion The Last Word

Let’s Do Something About Youth Overdoses

Overdoses in Shelby County almost tripled between 2017 and 2022. (Photo: Tloventures | Dreamstime.com)

Overdoses have been the third leading cause of death in youth under age 20 since 2020, and a vast majority of youth overdose deaths are unintentional. Over 60 percent of youth aged 10 to 19 who overdose do so at home, more than two-thirds of the time a bystander is present, and less than one-third of the time someone gives the overdosing teen the life-saving overdose reversal medication naloxone. Overdose deaths have increased rapidly, not only among 15- to 24-year-olds but also 10- to 14-year-olds across the United States. Concerning amounts of fentanyl in the drug supply make even experimenting with one pill deadly. 

Here in Memphis, overdoses have taken the lives of many of our friends, colleagues, patients, and loved ones. Overdoses in Shelby County almost tripled from a rate of 22 per 100,000 in 2017 to 65 per 100,000 in 2022, and Shelby County suffered the highest number of fatal overdoses across Tennessee counties between 2020 and 2022. But we have decided to do something about the overdose epidemic in our backyard.

We are the Youth Overdose/Opioid Taskforce (YOOT), a group of Shelby County residents made up of clinicians, social workers, educators, students, behavioral health professionals, and other concerned citizens from Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Pagan, and other religious backgrounds. Some of us work in harm reduction, and some with the justice system. About 8 percent of us are high school students under 18. Around two-thirds of us have tried some kind of illicit drug (including cannabis) at some point in our lives, and more than a fourth of us have lived experience using opioids illicitly. About 80 percent of us have seen a loved one, friend, or ourselves struggle with substance abuse, about a quarter of us have witnessed someone overdose, and about half of us have a family member or friend who has experienced an overdose. About one in six of us have experienced an overdose ourselves. 

All of us want to make a difference in this space. 

We have been coming together every few months since January 2024, sharing space, mutual respect, and understanding with one another and putting our superpowers together. Using our diverse expertise to reflect on national, Tennessee, and Shelby County data, we discussed the root causes behind this overdose epidemic, and 48 of us voted on a list of priorities to address among the root causes. We have broken into subgroups to move forward in developing and implementing evidence-based strategies to reduce the amount of young people who die from unintentional overdose in this community. 

Our current top priorities to address are:

• Insufficient youth-focused, accurate education about drugs

• Self-medicating untreated mental illness 

• A lack of supervised, fun, safe spaces for youth

We encourage you to take up the call to action to address any of these priorities, whether in partnership with us or on your own. We must not, as a community, turn a blind eye to this epidemic. Join us in the fight today to save the lives of young people we love. 

Connect with us for future updates about meetings and events: TikTok @yootmemphis; Facebook @YOOT Memphis; Instagram @yootmemphis; Remind: text @yoot901 to 81010; email yootmemphis@gmail.com; text (901) 860-4589.

Resources:

• If you or your adolescent are experiencing a mental health or substance use crisis, call or text 988

• Tennessee Naloxone Program (provides confidentially mailed naloxone, a medicine that rapidly reverses opioid overdose)

• Regional Overdose Prevention Specialists (provide naloxone as well as education on how to administer)

• David Fuller: david@memphisprevention.org | (901) 484-2852; Tony Hampton: tony@memphisprevention.org | (901) 484-1649

• TN Statewide Crisis Line: (885) CRISIS-1

• TN Redline (provides referrals to addiction treatment for substance use disorder, can help you figure out where to go, including treatment information for people 18+ years old): (800) 889-9789

Substance use treatment options for youth under 18 years old:

• Outpatient Treatment — Young person sleeps in their own bed at home and goes to treatment during 1 or more days of the week. Some *with asterisks* offer evidence-based substance use medication management (e.g. buprenorphine/naloxone for opioid use disorder), some do not. Ages accepted by facilities vary but all accept some patients under 18.

○ IAC Associates*: (901) 746-9438

○ Le Bonheur Adolescent Health Clinic*: (901) 287-7337 [Starting 4/1/25]

○ Recovery Associates*: (901) 590-4106

○ Urban Family Ministries: (901) 323-8400

○ Charlie Health Intensive Outpatient (all online)*: (866) 805-2001

○ Bradford Intensive Outpatient (all online): (866) 805-2001

● Inpatient/Residential Treatment — Young person sleeps at the facility (some offer evidence-based substance use medication management (e.g. buprenorphine/naloxone for opioid use disorder)*, some do not)

○ Memphis Recovery Center: (901) 272-7751

○ Parkwood: (662) 895-4900

○ Compass: (901) 758-2002

○ Lakeside: (901) 370-1324 *(case-by case-basis, depends on the psychiatrist)

Categories
At Large Opinion

March Madness

It’s all madness. (Photo: Evgeniya Leonova | Dreamstime.com)

Every year I play in an online pool to predict the outcome of the NCAA basketball tournament, aka March Madness. It’s made up of longtime friends who are scattered all over the country and who communicate for the most part via social media. It’s become a rite of spring for a lot of us, with good-natured smack talk being the main attraction. 

We use a CBS Sports platform, and for some of us the hardest part is remembering our password every 12 months. Well, that and trying to guess who’s going to take that pivotal first-round game between, say, Siena and Northeast Idaho. And for me, there’s also the dilemma of predicting how far the Memphis Tigers will go — a delicate balancing act that pits my hometown rooting interest against years of painful experience. A Penny (Hardaway) for my thoughts. 

The tournament is a particularly timely distraction this year. That’s because the daily news is just delivering one plop-load of angst after another. I went online Sunday morning and read the following headlines: “Arlington Cemetery Website Scrubs Links About Black and Female Veterans”; “Trump’s FCC Chief Orders Investigation into NPR and PBS Sponsorships”; “Trump Signs Order to Gut Staff at Voice of America and Other U.S.-funded Media Organizations”; “Trump’s NIH Cuts Threaten Scientific and Medical Research at U.S. Universities.”

So yeah, just let me ponder that crucial West Bracket matchup between Maryland and Grand Canyon for a while. Maryland’s pretty good, but Grand Canyon is deep, heh, and it’s tough to beat a national park. Or it used to be until they got defunded. Sorry, I’m just trying not to go crazy thinking about the frightening idiocracy that’s now dismantling our government piece by piece. 

This administration’s credo appears to be “Knowledge Is the Enemy of the People.” Or maybe it’s “They Can’t Handle the Truth.” In many areas of the world, Voice of America is the only news that isn’t controlled by autocratic governments. NPR and PBS news services have long been considered the gold standard for fact-based, in-depth reporting. The U.S. government shouldn’t be in the business of suppressing its own media. The First Amendment still means something. Or at least, it did until a month ago, when this administration decided that it would begin hand-selecting the reporters allowed in the press pool to ask questions of the president. 

If knowledge is power, then power is being taken away from us at an alarming pace. And, let’s be blunt, we’re all being put in danger by the reductions in funding and personnel at agencies that provide air traffic control, weather prognostication and warnings, and medical and scientific research. Not to mention the emotional stress being imposed on millions of Americans who depend on Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and their 401(k) funds. 

It’s important to understand that all of these decisions are being made by executive orders that are mostly being carried out by an unsupervised, unrestrained, and unelected creep with billions of dollars in conflicts of interest between his own businesses and federal subsidies. It’s unconstitutional, and none of it is being opposed by Congress, which is constitutionally designated to restrain the excesses of the executive branch.

It goes without saying that the Republicans in Washington are all in the tank for Trump, but the fact that the Democrats are so numbingly compliant is really troubling. They appear to be as vested in accommodating this autocratic insanity as the Vichy French collaborators were in World War II. It makes you wonder just how much kompromat Putin has. Is everyone in Washington compromised except Bernie Sanders, AOC, and Liz Cheney? Where is the damn anger?

I’m no James Carville, but I play one in this column and I have a message for the Democratic Party: Get your shit together. My suggestion would be to set up a daily evening press conference in which a rotating cast of the party’s stalwarts (not Schumer, Jeffries, or Pelosi) addresses the news of the day, takes on the latest lunacy enacted by the White House, explains the real-life consequences of it for everyday Americans, and yes, expresses the outrage that millions of us are feeling right now. It’s time for the opposing party to get in the game — and take some shots. 

Categories
At Large Opinion

Social Insecurity

Photo: Pojoslaw | Dreamstime.com

On the fourth Wednesday of each month, a four-figure amount from the U.S. government gets deposited into my bank account. I wouldn’t want to try to subsist solely on my Social Security check, but it’s an invaluable source of income for me in my semi-retirement, and it’s a fund I’ve contributed to since I was in high school, working as a pharmacy stock boy. 

President-Select Elon Musk said on Joe Rogan’s podcast recently that Social Security is a “Ponzi scheme” and spouted several statistics that were quickly debunked. “We’ll make mistakes,” Musk said, when asked about it. That didn’t stop President Trump from repeating Musk’s statistical lies in his address to Congress last week. Trump added that Social Security suffered from “shocking levels of incompetence and probable fraud.”

Let’s look at their claims: A Ponzi scheme is a system in which the con artist tricks a lot of people into investing in a scam. If investors want to withdraw their money, the scammer pays back the early investors with money he’s gotten from more recent investors.

In a broad sense, that is the case with Social Security; the people paying into it now are covering the checks of those who are retired or disabled. If, as is happening now, the birth-rate goes down and people are living longer, there can be a funding problem. But, as many economists have pointed out, the solution is simple: Americans contribute to Social Security up to an annual income of $176,000. Raising the top salary level for paying into Social Security to $200,000 would fix the issue for years to come. Another Social Security Administration (SSA) analysis says that an “increase in the combined payroll tax rate from 12.4 percent to 14.4 percent” would make the program sustainable for the next 75 years. That’s not a Ponzi scheme or a crisis. It’s an amendable budget line-item that Congress could address tomorrow.

Regarding Trump’s statements about incompetence and fraud? As hard as it is to believe, he’s lying. Trump told Congress and the American public that 16 million people over the age of 100 received Social Security payments, including 130,000 supposedly over 160 years old. As several media outlets reported after Musk first made these allegations, the SSA’s beneficiaries chart shows that just 89,106 people over age 99 are receiving retirement funds. That number (which includes my own dear mother) is a long way from 16 million. As for fraud, the SSA inspector general reported in 2024 that .84 percent of benefits paid between 2015 and 2022 were improper.

So why are the two most powerful men in the country spewing disinformation about the SSA? Simple. They are attempting to soften up the public for cuts in services. DOGE, Musk’s stealthy pseudo-government agency, is cutting 7,000 SSA workers for starters, and the number of regional SSA offices has been trimmed from 10 to four. Will that mean those of us who receive SS checks should worry? I’m going to go with “yes.”

Here’s what former SSA chief Michael O’Malley told CNN: “Ultimately, you’re going to see the system collapse and an interruption of benefits. … I believe you will see that within the next 30 to 90 days.”

This is speculation, of course, and O’Malley is a Democrat, but here’s what Leland Dudek, the man Trump appointed to head SSA, said in a recent meeting, according to The Washington Post: “DOGE people are learning and they will make mistakes, but we have to let them see what is going on at SSA. I am relying on longtime career people to inform my work, but I am receiving decisions that are made without my input. I have to effectuate those decisions.” Reassuring, eh? 

Here’s the bottom line on all this: The “DOGE people” have access to the personal and financial information of every American citizen — living or dead — who has paid into Social Security. What they will do with that private intel is anybody’s guess because they sure aren’t going to tell us. I do know this much: If DOGE screws up with the SSA as badly as they’ve screwed up with some of the other government agencies they’ve defenestrated, our social security benefits could very well be interrupted. If that happens, it will be torch-and-pitchfork time among the citizenry. And it won’t be pretty.