Medium, Author at Milwaukee Independent

Same parents who gutted education are now suddenly concerned about getting their kids back to school

Posted by Medium | Aug 4, 2020 |

Suddenly — seemingly out of nowhere — concerned parents in every corner of the country are screaming and asking, “What about our kids’ education?” The debate surrounding reopening schools is contentious and exposes every systemic flaw in public education. Parents are bringing up inequity and inequality. They are discussing special education, mental health, social and emotional development of children. They are asking questions about legalities, taxes, and unions. They are concerned. They are extremely concerned. They have all become experts in pedagogy, educational policy, economics, epidemiology, and virology. They all have sound advice for the teachers, administrators, and school...

Unheard Black Voices: Milwaukee’s Sex Trafficking problem is another area of police neglect

Posted by Medium | Jun 30, 2020

The media world is constantly on fire with scandalous tales of people like the late billionaire financier sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein, and more recently, the widespread protests in the wake of the murder of George Floyd have garnered nonstop attention. However, at the intersection of sexual violence near the heart of power, and police reform/abolition, is a little big story that has only been covered by local news as of now. If you turn on CNN I’m sure you’ll get analysis of the president’s latest tweets, instead of the horror that broke to the surface of Milwaukee on June...

COVID-19 Never Happened: How Gaslighting will convince the public that life has returned to normal

Posted by Medium | Apr 20, 2020 |

*Gaslighting, if you don’t know the word, is defined as manipulation into doubting your own sanity; as in, “Carl made Mary think she was crazy, even though she clearly caught him cheating. He gaslit her.” Pretty soon, as the country begins to figure out how we “open back up” and move forward, very powerful forces will try to convince us all to get back to normal. (That never happened. What are you talking about?) Billions of dollars will be spent on advertising, messaging, and television and media content to make you feel comfortable again. It will come in the...

Hiding Under a Rock: 99 “good” news stories from 2018

Posted by Medium | Jan 4, 2019 |

The world as we know it did not completely fall apart in 2018. It may have seemed like it, because most people were just getting their news from the wrong places. For the last 12 months, the global media has been focused on a lot of bad news. But there were other things happening out there too. Those stories of “Good News” did not make it onto the evening broadcasts, or most social media feeds. The organization Future Crunch spent the year collecting those headlines, as part of its ongoing mission to stop the fear virus in its tracks....

The struggle for fair housing continues in the “Selma of the North”

Posted by Medium | Apr 13, 2018 |

Montgomery. Birmingham. Selma. Each of these American cities is hallowed ground in the modern black freedom movement. But, how about Milwaukee? Yes, Milwaukee. The Cream City deserves its place in our national narrative of the civil rights era, too. In a similar way that Birmingham helped spur passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Selma played a catalytic role in the enactment of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, Milwaukee contributed to the passage of the Fair Housing Act of 1968, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary on April 11, 2018. The anniversary affords an opportunity to reclaim...