What’s really going on with Houston kids?
I’ve been thinking about this Texas Children’s Hospital report since the numbers dropped. In one month, April alone, 647 kids came to the ER for behavioral health issues like depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts. That’s 200 more than usual. That’s not just alarming—it’s heartbreaking.
Mental health professionals say this isn’t new. It started before COVID and has only gotten worse with the state of the world.
Political unrest. Family tension. Social media. Academic pressure.
Our kids are carrying the weight of a world they didn’t ask to inherit. The data from HISD is even more sobering: 14% of students said they attempted suicide in the last year. That’s above the national average.
And while there was a brief surge in funding for school mental health services during the pandemic, much of that support is gone now. What are we telling our children? Their healing has an expiration date?
As parents, educators and community members, we have to stop saying “Kids are so emotional these days” and start asking why they feel so unsafe inside their own minds. Know the signs. Ask the questions. Get the help. Normalize the conversation.
And to the policymakers who are pulling funding from schools, libraries and student support, this is what your negligence costs.
Target FAFO’d—and the Culture is done whispering
Well, well, well. Look who messed around and found out. Target just reported a 2.8% drop in sales and missed Wall Street’s forecast by hundreds of millions—yes, Black customers are part of the reason. After rolling back their DEI commitments earlier this year, longtime loyalists stopped showing up. And let’s be honest: Target spent years courting Black consumers—Juneteenth off, Black History Month collections, shelf space for Black authors and small businesses. We showed up for them. They folded under pressure the moment it got inconvenient.
Now they’re shocked that we noticed? Please. Support is a two-way street—and if Target can’t support us in boardrooms, don’t expect us to support them at checkout.
Nottoway burned down. Where them fans at?
Since May 15, Black folks have been joyfully sharing the news that Nottoway Plantation, the largest antebellum plantation in the South, burned to the ground. And I’ll be the one to say it plainly: We’re not mourning the loss.
This plantation-turned-luxury resort erased its past from its brochures. No mention of the enslaved people who built it. No sign of the blood terror, and exploitation it profited from. Just curated white columns and manicured lawns for weddings and weekend getaways.
Let me say this loud for those in the back: you can’t glamorize genocide and call it hospitality.
The ashes of Nottoway are a reminder that history has weight, and it won’t be prettied up for tourism forever. What’s gone up in flames is more than wood and brick—it’s the fantasy we’d ever forget.
