Of all the years in recent history, 2020 is, without question, the most dubious of them all. We don’t have to tell you all the reasons why this year sucked (99% of those reasons rhyme with “frump”) but we can highlight all the people that helped make it suck. As much as we’d like to set fire to 2020 and watch it squirm and suffer because we are sick bastards who desperately want this year to be a figment of our equally sick imagination, it’s a tradition at the Metro Times to take one last look back and dole out the Dooby Awards, honoring “the most dubious, foolhardy, baffling, hilarious, or just plain bad stories” of the year. This is one award you absolutely do not want.

 

 

January The ooze blues:The owner of a now-shuttered factory that was so contaminated that it sent a hazardous, bright green ooze onto I-696 in Madison Heights reported to federal prison at the start of the year. Gary Alfred Sayers, 70, was sent to FCI Morgantown, a minimum-security detention center in West Virginia, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons. In 2019, Sayers was sentenced to a year in prison on a charge of illegally storing hazardous materials at Electro-Plating Services in Madison Heights. Some of the hazardous materials were stored in a dirt hole in the basement, where the chemicals seeped into the ground and eventually found a path onto the freeway. The green slime was groundwater contaminated with cancer-causing hexavalent chromium, which was featured in the movie Erin Brockovich. The EPA spent about $2 million and nearly a year to clean up the waste, but officials now acknowledge they underestimated how much toxic waste ended up in the ground. Anyway, Sayers didn’t even serve his full year sentence, as he was released on house arrest in May. Photo via Michigan Department of Transportation
February Mom’s spaghetti?:We should’ve known we were in for some shit when Detroit rap legend Eminem appeared at the 2020 Academy Awards to perform a song he won an Oscar for 17 years prior but did not show up to snag. Anyway, Em sang his record-smashing, award-winning hit 2002 song “Lose Yourself” from his autobiographical film 8 Mile. While we love this song — like, seriously, it’s in our top 10, er, 15 of all time, or something — neither we, nor the unsuspecting Oscar audience, had a fucking clue as to why Eminem was performing the song 17 years later. Sure, if it had been a major milestone anniversary, that would make total sense. While we were left scratching our heads, Em said he showed up because, well, he wasn’t there when he won. OK, well, we don’t see Woody Allen showing up randomly with award FOMO for Annie Hall, which he won three awards for but didn’t show up to accept. OK, that was maybe not the greatest example.
March Only god knows why: We did it, Detroit. We ran #MAGA-loving rebel rap-rocker Kid Rock out of his home state — and it wasn’t easy. In recent years, he’s sold off his Detroit and Macomb County homes, followed by the closure of Kid Rock’s Made in Detroit restaurant at Little Caesars Arena. Now, it appears that Kid Rock and all of his “Rock ‘n’ Roll Jesus” idolatry is someone else’s problem: the kind citizens of Nashville, Tennessee, where he lives in a camouflaged luxury trailer and co-owns Kid Rock’s Big Ass Honky Tonk & Rock & Roll Steakhouse, which was the scene of a November 2019 incident in which he went on a drunken tirade aimed at the ladies of daytime television: Oprah, Joy Behar, and Kathie Lee Gifford. Anyway, Honky Tonk is located in a bustling entertainment district and, in March, refused to shut down amid COVID-19 coronavirus concerns, despite Nashville Mayor John Cooper’s order for bars along Lower Broadway and throughout Davidson County to close. Kid Rock is not just Nashville’s problem, he’s everyone’s. Photo via Twitter user @Ovation_Girl
March Jesus take the wheel: Perhaps one of the strangest stories to come out of metro Detroit this year — and one of the strangest reported on by Metro Times — was the tale of Alyssa Carone — a xenophobic, militant Baptist Christian, a distracted driver, and the type of woman who urinates in a Tim Hortons coffee cup in her car after she’s denied use of their restroom, and, on another occasion, who pees in a cup in her car and laughs maniacally when her husband proceeds to drink from it later. As the pandemic panic ramped up in Michigan, a video began surfacing across Hamtramck resident-moderated Facebook groups. The 34-minute video revealed Carone in her car with her two children embarking on what she called a “weird opportunity” to run errands and throw Arabic Bibles to Hamtramck Muslims after dropping her husband off for work. Carone, who at the top of the video claims that the streets of Hamtramck are normally “mobbed” with homeless people, which is why she typically chooses to steer clear of the city, especially when traveling with her children in tow. One troubling aspect of Carone’s Hamtramck visit was that she, in previous videos, had believed she and her son may have had coronavirus after they both experienced very high fevers (there’s a video of Carone going maskless during a hunt for a thermometer.) In the Hamtramck video, she admits to having lost her sick son’s coat, which is something that can easily happen to a frantic on-the-go stay-at-home mom who is non-stop recording mundane handheld daily videos, but proceeds to bring her children to the Conant Family Dollar and hand a man a Jesus pamphlet. Photo via screengrab/YouTube
April Face the strange: Ughhhhhh! Republican Sen. Dale Zorn totally gaslit us when he wore a Confederate flag face mask on the Senate floor during a session addressing Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s emergency powers and the coronavirus pandemic crisis. When asked about it, Zorn said it wasn’t a Confederate flag, but even if it was, the Confederate flag is still part of our national history. His wife, he says, sewed it for him.”I told my wife it probably will raise some eyebrows, but it was not a Confederate flag,” Zorn said. Upon closer examination of the mask in question, Metro Times determined with, like, zero effort and one Google search, that his mask was not the Tennessee nor Kentucky flag he said his mask more closely resembled. He later removed the mask and said the mask was not worn with the intent to offend, which is weird considering he earlier said he knew it “will raise some eyebrows.” Photo via Screengrab, WLNS News
April Take the high road: Though we’re no strangers to venting our frustrations over things like, oh, you know, incompetent presidents, the discontinuation of Taco Bell’s taco pizza, and general outrage over the existence and popularity of The Big Bang Theory, we’ve never taken our rants to the sky. Well, a Grand Rapids-area man aired his grievances with Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s coronavirus executive orders by spending an hour flying his airplane in a path to spell out the letters “F U.” According to The New York Post, his design also included an arrow pointing to the governor’s mansion, but to us it kind of looks like a dick (which perhaps is very fitting here). Ed Frederick, 45, says he did it after Whitmer announced her executive order extending the state of emergency through May 28. “It’s a power trip,” Frederick told The Post. “The government, no matter Democrats or Republicans, always seem like they’re trying to do something just to prove they’re doing something, without weighing the ramifications.” While we don’t 100% disagree with that last bit, we think the real “F U” should go to COVID-19 and all the politicians that truly failed to weigh the ramifications of their negligence.
May This charming man: The most dubious man in American history, President Donald Trump, told Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to reason with armed protesters who stormed the state Capitol in opposition of the governor’s executive orders to close down much of the state’s businesses to combat the spread of COVID-19. Many of the protesters, emboldened by Trump’s past praise, went off-script. Many stood close together and didn’t wear face masks, flouting the social-distancing guidelines experts recommend to stop the virus from spreading. There were Confederate flags, signs calling Whitmer a bitch, and signs insinuating that the governor should be lynched. Of course, the protesters were largely white — because can anyone imagine Black or brown people walking into a government building with guns without getting shot? Anyway, Trump took to Twitter and urged Whitmer to cut a deal with the protesters. “These are very good people, but they are angry,” Trump said. “They want their lives back again, safely! See them, talk to them, make a deal.” Good people? As it would turn out, a handful of men in attendance during the springtime protests would later make headlines for plotting to kidnap — and possibly kill — Gov. Whitmer, as well as plotting to set fire to the Capitol building with representatives locked inside. Photo by Steve Neavling
May From hero to zero: There’s no question that frontline workers were the true heroes of 2020, despite being slighted by Time magazine for persons of the year (lame!) Anyway, many essential businesses offered some extra cash for their employees as a way to thank them for putting their lives on the line, working crazy hours, and keeping shelves stocked with essential items. One such business was Kroger, the largest grocery store chain in the country, with more than 2,500 stores across 35 states and estimated sales of $70 billion a year. In late March, Kroger announced that it would provide thousands of its hourly frontline grocery, supply chain, manufacturing, pharmacy, and call center associates with weekly $2 per hour pay increase, or hazard pay, something the chain touts as a “Hero Bonus.” Well, Kroger decided to to discontinue the temporary appreciation program in May, prompting outrage from employees and several local unions, whose members penned a letter to Kroger CEO Rodney McMullen expressing concern over the discontinuation of its Hero Bonus “weeks before other major retailers,” as well as addressing the fact that customers are not held to the same safety measures as Kroger employees, which will continue to put workers at risk. Shortly after the Hero Bonus rollout, Kroger announced the death of four metro Detroit Kroger employees due to the coronavirus. Following the union letter, Kroger announced a new set of bonuses that expired in June. Cleanup on aisle BULLSHIT! Photo via Jason Whitman/Shutterstock.com
May I just wanna fly: If we at Metro Times learned anything about our fellow Michiganders, it’s that y’all are thirsty for the Blue Angels because nothing says “thank you for risking your lives during a global pandemic” quite like a flashy — and expensive — military aircraft performance. Detroit was among several spots along the “America Strong” tour led by the Navy Flight Demonstration Squadron, aka the Blue Angels, and the U.S. Air Force Air Demonstration Squadron, aka the Thunderbirds. The gesture was part of a string of multi-city flyover performances intended to honor frontline workers and first responders as a “collaborative salute” in those cities hit hardest by the coronavirus. The cost of a flyover? Well, it’s estimated a Blue Angels flyover could cost $60,000 per hour, but since it’s already accounted for in the Pentagon’s annual budget, who cares, right? Not so fast. Not everyone is thirsty for expensive disruptions, as many people questioned whether the America Strong tour was the best use of resources, considering many of the frontline workers and health care workers for whom the gesture was intended for were without PPE gear and coronavirus testing kits. In New York, some people cited the tone-deaf display for triggering 9/11 PTSD. Like they say, it’s the thought that counts, unless the thought is stupid. Photo via Chuck Wagner/Shutterstock.com
June Renegades of spunk:In 2020, being a fan of an artist or a band doesn’t necessarily mean you’re a fan of their politics, even if, you know, their political stance and general philosophy is encapsulated in the band name itself. For Trump supporter Scott Castaneda of Rochester Hills, his fandom for Rage Against the Machine came to an end when he realized that, well, Rage guitarist Tom Morello was a little too politically outspoken. “I use (sic) to be a fan until your political opinions come out,” Castaneda said in a since-deleted but at the time, totally viral tweet. “Music is my sanctuary and the last thing I want to hear is political bs when i’m listening to music. As far as i’m concerned you and Pink are completely done. Keep running your mouth and ruining your fan base.” What machine did Castaneda think Rage was raging against, exactly? Also, he’s a fan of Rage and Pink? Anyway, Morello responded sarcastically with a tweet that screams what we were all thinking: “Scott!! What music of mine were you a fan of that DIDN’T contain “political BS”? I need to know so I can delete it from the catalog.” Ouch. Photo via Milan Risky/Shutterstock.com
June If the glovebox don’t fit, you must acquit: If you’re going to release one of the most anticipated cars of all time, you might want to, you know, make sure you’re not releasing it on the birthday of the alleged murderer whose affiliation with the vehicle was made famous only after he fled police in said vehicle. Well, apparently Ford needs to peep their true crime calendar next time because in July, Ford announced that the new Ford Bronco, a vehicle that has been out of production since 1996, would be unveiled on July 9, which just so happens to be O.J. Simpson’s birthday, you know, the former NFL star who led a slow 60-mile police chase in a white Ford Bronco after he was charged with the gruesome murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman, both crimes he was remarkably found not guilty of. Anyway, Ford said the date was “pure coincidence,” not a marketing ploy and bumped the reveal date to July 13. Nicole Brown’s family, however, does not see how selecting Simpson’s 73rd birthday was a coincidence, and frankly, neither do we. Photo via Joe Seer/Shutterstock.com
June If Kneel Street could talk: Oh, boy, was this year filled with virtue signaling and performative hypocrisy! And no one pulled off 2020’s hottest trends quite like the Detroit Police Department, who kneeled for the cameras minutes after arresting about 100 peaceful Black Lives Matter protesters. Kneeling, of course, became a statement for the Black Lives Matter movement when San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick took a knee during the national anthem of a 49ers game in protest of police brutality in 2016. The symbolic gesture was bastardized when a Minneapolis police officer kneeled on the neck of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man who was killed as a result of not being able to breathe due to, you know, murderous and racist police. Anyway, during what would become a violent year between DPD and Black Lives Matter protesters — specifically, the advocacy group Detroit Will Breathe — not only did they use excessive force when dealing with protesters, like tear gas, chokeholds, and rubber bullets, but they had the audacity to kneel for the cause … for cameras … literally minutes after aggressively slapping zip-ties on nearly 100 protesters, none of whom had attacked police, destroyed public or private property, nor were they looting or starting fires. Photo via Screengrab/Facebook
July Material girl: Provocative pop star Madonna was once again censored — this time for sharing a debunked viral video on her Instagram account. Though Bay City native Madonna could’ve landed herself a Dooby for any number of malfeasance, (like calling COVID-19 “the great equalizer” during a flower-petal bath or having her son David “dance away racism” by dancing to alleged pedophile Michael Jackson’s “They Don’t Care About Us” to “honor” George Floyd), it was her flagged Instagram post that featured the video of Houston disinformation doctor Stella Immanuel, who claimed that the drug hydroxychloroquine is a proven cure for COVID-19. “They would rather let fear control the people and let the rich get richer and the poor get poorer,” Madonna wrote in the video’s caption, while also calling Immanuel her “hero.” Instagram soon censored Madonna’s post, blurring it out and marking it as “false information” flagged by independent fact-checkers. The app also provided a link to a page that debunks the claims in the video. Madonna eventually deleted the post altogether. Photo via JStone/Shutterstock.com
July When guac is really extra: There was no shortage of white people openly displaying their blatant racism this year, especially here in Michigan, where Karens weren’t just annoying but really fucking dangerous. Take Jillian Wuestenberg and husband Eric of Clarkston, who were arrested — and later charged with felonious assault — after Jill pointed a gun at a Black woman outside of a Chipotle in Orion Township. The altercation went viral via a one-minute video clip that amassed 9.5 million views on Twitter in less than 24 hours of its posting. The couple alleged the gun-pointing was an act of self-defense. Meanwhile, Takelia Hill, the woman who had a gun pointed in her face, says Jillian Wuestenberg bumped into her 15-year-old daughter as they were walking to the restaurant. The couple became upset when Hill’s daughter asked for an apology. “Get the fuck back!” Wuestenberg yelled. “Back the fuck up!” During an interview with local news, Wuestenberg claimed she was “terrified,” so terrified, in fact, that she decided to threaten a woman and her child rather than drive away in the safety of her car. Photo via screengrab/Twitter
August Homework-ish: It wouldn’t be the Doobys without an entry or two courtesy of Cruella, er, Betsy DeVos, the world’s worst Secretary of Education — like, ever. Not only did Michigan join some other states in taking aim at DeVos and the Department of Education for allegedly abusing her rule-making powers and redirecting millions of federal relief dollars to private schools, but she didn’t do shit. In fact, the inexperienced billionaire essentially spent months dodging opportunities to meet with public school advocates, including meeting with those representatives of the School Superintendents Association, which represents superintendents in 49 states — you know, which is pretty important, considering the safety and education of 51 million children hung in the balance during a pandemic. At the time, she praised President Donald Trump’s call to hastily reopen schools for in-person learning and defund those schools that don’t. (Though neither Trump nor DeVos has the sole power to do so.) Some officials, including the executive director for advocacy for the School Superintendents Association, said that as of August, they had not heard from DeVos all year. Honestly, maybe that’s a good thing. Photo via a kats/Shutterstock.com
August Better off Ted: Speaking of infectious diseases, Ted Nugent tested positive for diarrhea mouth. Though the dude might believe in “Cat Scratch Fever,” he does not believe in the coronavirus, which officials say has killed more than 330,000 Americans. In fact, he thinks it’s all “bullshit.” Nugent, 72, who says his Kill It & Grill It diet is the reason he can “outrun puppy dogs for a short distance,” appeared with his wife, Shemane, on a conservative podcast hosted by author David J. Harris Jr. to disprove “Chinese communist virus” statistics and to call B.S. on the CDC, FBI, and USDA. “They claim 160,000 people dead from the Chinese communist virus. Bullshit,” he said in August. “They claim millions and millions have been tested positive [for the virus]. Bullshit. They claim that the ICU units are overcrowded. Bullshit.” The self-proclaimed “goofy guitar player” says he wants a list of all American deaths from January-July from the last five years to compare with those reported deaths this year. He believes the government is inflating numbers by including non-coronavirus deaths in the death count. Well, good luck with your future infections, Ted! And thanks for moving the fuck out of Michigan! Photo via Shutterstock.com
August Lapdog dance: Only in The Sopranos is discussing top-secret business transactions and other shady shit at a strip club a good idea. Embattled Detroit City Councilman Gabe Leland, who since 2018 has maintained his innocence amid bribery allegations, but a secret FBI recording revealed a different story. Leland met Detroit businessman Bob Carmack at a west-side strip club in May 2017, where they hammered out details of a $15,000 payment, according to a recording obtained by the Detroit Free Press. Carmack was wearing an FBI wiretap when the pair met over screwdrivers, vodka soda, and lemon drop shots. During the recording, Leland agreed to accept two $7,500 payments in exchange for his role in preventing the city’s sale of property Carmack said he owned. “I’ll give it to you in a fucking cashier check or a money order. That way you can do whatever the fuck you want with it,” Carmack told Leland in the recording. Next time, stick to the lap dances and lemon drops that you’re used to. Photo via the City of Detroit
August Class dismissed: It wouldn’t be 2020 if a college didn’t attempt to host a whites-only event intended to give white people a platform to discuss their feelings about being white — you know, without people of color around to make them feel uncomfortable. Well, according to an event listing made in August, the University of Michigan-Dearborn’s Center for Social Justice attempted to launch a virtual discussion group for “non-POC” to “gather and to discuss their experience as students on campus and as non-POC in the world.” The group was advertised on the UM-Dearborn website and on Instagram as “the Non-POC Cafe,” which would take place recurring bimonthly via Zoom. Shortly after announcing the group for white people, another group — the BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) Cafe — was launched, which was a virtual meetup for those UM-Dearborn students who identify as being from “marginalized racial/ethnic/cultural communities.” Both groups were slated to take place on Tuesdays between 2-3 p.m. (Imagine getting those Zoom links mixed up. Woof!) It didn’t take long, however, for the college to release a formal statement admitting that they took issue with how their segregated discussion groups were described. Photo via Susan Montgomery/Shutterstock.com
September Sunset your ass down: We get it. Getting excited about anything in 2020 was pretty difficult. Whether it was getting amped for being able to work from home (boy, has that worn off) or getting cocktails and beer delivered to your house, getting excited came with a price this year. But no fucks were given when the Detroit Free Press posted a very thirsty article about a stellar Instagram-worthy sunset Michiganders would be awarded, thanks to some dipshits in California who started a devastating blaze that ravaged more than 3 million acres because they just had to announce to the world what their unborn child’s genitals are. Anyway, the Freep header read: “Smoke from California wildfire could reach Michigan by next week, enhance sunsets.” We’re horny for sunsets, too, dude, but maybe chill on the verbiage. Photo via Shutterstock.com
September Pastor? I hardly know her! This is between Macomb County pastor Rev. David Muns and his god — and, well, everyone else who read this wild story of harassment. Muns sent New York Times journalist Sarah Jeong threatening and racist emails — from his church’s email address. Jeong posted a screenshot of Muns’ email, which referred to Jeong as a “little bitter Asian woman” and made references to some controversial older tweets about white men — along with many inflammatory tweets that have been falsely attributed to her — out of context. Muns later said he ultimately “caved” and admitted that his response was “terrible” before defending his actions. “But what I was responding to was simply reversed of exactly what she posted towards white men, and I just reversed it and said, ‘How would you feel?'” Muns said. Well, we feel pretty annoyed to have to even report on your bullshit, so that’s where we’re at, rev! Photo via screengrab/YouTube
September Slim Shady: Speech! Speech! Speech! Among Mayor Mike Duggan and the city of Detroit’s many accomplishments this year, being awarded the Golden Padlock Award for sketch-ass and secretive behavior — like deleting public records, emails, etc. — is probably among Duggan’s highest honors. The mayor and his fellow cronies were named the most secretive public official and government in the United States in 2020 by Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE), a nonprofit journalism group that issues a Golden Padlock Award every year as a way to spotlight secretive U.S. agencies and government officials. Duggan and the city earned the ignoble accolade after top city officials intentionally destroyed public records last year. In a scathing report in December 2019, the Detroit Office of the Inspector General found that Duggan’s chief of staff, Alexis Wiley, and two other top city officials ordered public employees to delete emails related to the nonprofit organization Make Your Date. The report concluded that Wiley, a former journalist, “abused her authority” by ordering employees at the city’s Office of Development and Grants (ODG) to erase emails that referenced the nonprofit. Two other city officials were “complicit” in carrying out Wiley’s orders to delete the emails, the report states. Duggan and city officials turned down IRE’s request to receive the honor or respond to the award. Photo by Steve Neavling
October What’s in a mask?: During the final throes of the 2020 election, which pitted Democratic Senator Gary Peters against elusive Republican non-politician and Trump puppet John James, the Michigan Democratic Party dropped the hottest video of the year, or at least, the hottest video compilation of the political hopeful not wearing a mask despite claiming he has “always done everything he can to protect folks who are vulnerable.” Posted to John James Revealed — a website run by by the Michigan Dems — the video strings together a series of photos of all the times James has been caught in public this year not wearing a mask, including appearances with Vice President Mike Pence and MAGA lapdog Kid Rock. The slideshow pairs the images with “In the Hall of the Mountain King” for dramatic effect, and, yes, it slaps even harder now that James is a two-time Senate loser. Reuters/Rebecca Cook
October Born Free (speech): Nothing screams “Kid Rock” more than a grammatically incorrect, profanity-laden tweet aimed at the CEO of Twitter — you know, the dude who co-created the very platform. The 49-year-old “straight out the trailer” wannabe cowboy took issue with Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, using Twitter to launch his insult, paired with a photo of a heavily bearded Dorsey. “Look at this bitch ass mother fucker! Have a great weekend. Kid Rock,” he wrote. His tweet followed blowback from the right because Twitter had blocked links to two controversial and questionable New York Post articles regarding Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden. Photo via s_bukley/Shutterstock.com
November Trump pimps out Lil Pump: To make us feel like we’re truly losing our fucking minds with déjà vu, President Donald Trump finished out his reelection campaign in Grand Rapids with a MAGA rally on the eve of the 2020 election — just as he did in 2016 during a late-night rally in which he declared, “If we win Michigan, we will win this historic election.” And, as we all know, the fucker did it. He won by two votes per precinct. But during what we hope is his last-ever Michigan appearance (he said that night that if he lost in Michigan, he would never return), Trump displayed his Greatest Hits. But the strangest moment — and the one to snag the most headlines — was when he failed to get the name of his celebrity guest correct when introducing him to a crowd that clearly had no idea who the fuck this person was — pre- or -post flub. “Speaking of sound, music, and other things, one of the big superstars of the world, Lil Pimp,” Trump said. Of course, he meant to say Lil Pump, as in the attention-starved Soundcloud rapper who made it by repeating the words “Gucci gang” over and over. Trump did correct himself and when Lil Pump took the mic, he praised the president for bringing the troops home and urged the crowd to “not vote for Sleepy Joe at all!” Don’t let the door — or the Xanny bars — hit you on the way out. Photo via Evan Al-Amin
November It ain’t funny: While events like the annual Thanksgiving Day parade were altered per the state orders and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer issued stern warnings against Thanksgiving gatherings of more than two households due to COVID-19, Danny Brown said fuck it for a virtual edition of his annual Bruiser Thanksgiving Eve concert, which was packed with people and performers. “You watching some illegal shit!” Brown acknowledged during his set. That day, 4,273 new COVID-19 cases and 73 new deaths were reported in Michigan. Glad someone was living their “Best Life.” Photo via Jeremy Deputat/Red Bull Content Pool
November Bridge over troubled water: Nothing gets us fully torqued quite like watching the “Trump Unity Bridge” — a roving shrine to President Donald Trump festooned with Blue Lives Matter flags— get towed by Detroit Police. Rob Cortis, the float’s creator, owner, and driver, was arrested for driving with an invalid license plate and an outstanding warrant. The arrest took place during the days-long gathering of Trump supporters outside of Detroit’s TCF Center — which served as a ballot-processing facility — to intimidate election officials, demanding they stop counting, per a Twitter directive from the Chode in Chief himself. Photo by Rusty Young
November Say it ain’t so: Michigan suffered a lot of major losses in 2020, including the loss of the metro Detroit/Windsor area’s “New Rock Alternative,” FM radio station 89X, which, following a cryptic announcement on its website, tragically, turned into a country station, leaving the station’s Linkin Park, Sevendust, Our Lady Peace, and System of a Down fans to change the dial. On May 13, 1991, 89X cemented itself as a leader in alt-rock by airing its first song, “Stop!” by Jane’s Addiction. For its swan song, the station said goodbye — er, stopped — by airing the same 1990 Jane’s Addiction hit, which was followed by Pure Country, kicking off its boot scootin’ bullshit with “Cruise” by Florida Georgia Line. Photo via Lauren/Flickr Commons
November Yacht Lives Matter: Once in a great while, something starts trending on Twitter that’s actually worth reverse-engineering. Perhaps the greatest moment in Michigan Twitter this year came by way of the Wayne County Board of Canvassers meeting. Monica Palmer of Grosse Pointe, one of the board’s two Republicans, voted against certifying the county’s election results due to minor and typical discrepancies in the tally of the votes. After intense public backlash, including calls that they were attempting to disenfranchise the nation’s Blackest big city, Detroit, the two Republicans changed their votes and then they changed their minds again and rescinded their votes, reportedly after Palmer received threats from “Antifa from Grosse Pointe.” (And also after President Donald Trump reportedly called them.) Thus, Grosse Pointe Antifa was born, and Twitter did not disappoint with the memes or the merchandise, providing one of few laughs this year. Courtesy photo
December De-fart-mation of character: One of the four horsemen of the apocalypse and/or notorious lizard person Rudy Giuliani embarrassed himself — well, continued to embarrass himself — when he farted (we’re serious) and lied his way through a conspiracy theory-filled, error-laden Michigan House committee hearing in an attempt to overturn Joe Biden’s win and prove President Trump’s claims of voter fraud. The appearance, which followed the news that Giuliani had allegedly asked Trump for $20,000 per day for his, uh, services. Nothing came of the hearing, except for a wacky “witness” and multiple people confirming Giuliani’s flatulence. Photo via Shutterstock.com
December Eternal damnation and contagion: A Holland pastor is in hot water after a clip surfaced showing him urging his church’s congregants to just “get it over with” and get COVID-19. In a clip that could be a Saturday Night Live skit, pastor Bart Spencer of Lighthouse Baptist Church told his followers — while coughing — “COVID, it’s all good.” To be clear, medical experts have strongly urged against people intentionally getting COVID-19. While most people survive the illness, more than 10,000 Michiganders have not, or 2.5% of the state’s confirmed cases. Many who do survive still report symptoms months after falling ill, plus it’s not just you that health officials are worried about — asymptomatic people can still spread the disease to other, more vulnerable people. Spencer made the comments during a Nov. 14 sermon, which was shared on Facebook by Miguel Medina, a former member of the church. Photo via screengrab/Facebook

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Since 1980, Metro Times has been Detroit’s premier alternative source for news, arts, culture, music, film, food, fashion and more from a liberal point of view.