Breaking barriers: When sports change society

Alyssa Graff is a sports fan who found out that, despite the growing interest in women's leagues, she would still need to fight for screen time if she wanted to watch women's sports at her local bar. So, over the last year or so, Graf and others have taken things into their own hands, organizing watch party for women's hockey, basketball and more. Now she hopes to open her own sports bar called Bar IX. It’s a nod to the landmark Title IX amendment that, among many things, expanded women’s access in education and sports.  Alyssa Graff joined the program to talk about starting Bar IX and this moment in women's sports. 

Many of the systems designed to keep us safe sometimes harm the most vulnerable among us. That's often true of people who face financial hardship. Detroit’s 36th District Court is trying to stop that from continuing. Chief Judge William McConico is running a court-wide amnesty program from until April 9, waiving all late fees, penalties, and warrant costs for adjudicated cases when the original fine is paid. Chief Judge William McConico spoke with The Metro's Robyn Vincent about this and more.

Tens of thousands of metro Detroiters took to the streets to take part in another "No Kings" protest, where they opposed President Donald Trump, recent policies on immigration, war with Iran and more.  No Kings marches took place in cities across the country. WDET’s Russ McNamara was on the ground talking with folks in metro Detroit about what motivated them to speak up and get out. He spoke with The Metro's Cary Junior II about what he found.

It's an intense time of political polarization in the United States. With wars taking place across the Middle East and the Arab World, many Jewish and Muslim Americans are feeling those tensions especially strong. Reports of antisemitism and islamophobia are on the rise, including a recent attack on Temple Israel in West Bloomfield by a man who had family members killed in an Israeli airstrike on Lebanon. Just yesterday, Rabbi Aaron Bergman of Adat Shalom told The Metro his temple has pretty much stopped its interfaith dialogue work. Interfaith groups that include Jewish, Muslim and Christian community leaders are present in metro Detroit and the United States, but how effective are they? How do you talk about hard things during tense times?  Ben Ginsburg is part of an organization with a response to those questions. He’s the communications director for NewGround, which is a Muslim-Jewish interfaith group in Los Angeles. He spoke with Sam Corey on The Metro about how to have difficult conversations in divisive times.

This year marks 150 years of Major League Baseball. In that time, baseball like every sport, has become intertwined with culture in the United States. The rules of the sport have not changed much over the years, but we have. In some cases the baseball has changed society and in others, society has changed baseball. In this segment, we discussed the cultural boundaries of not just baseball but all sports. From Jackie Robinson to Billie Jean King, we explored what happens when our society's most uncomfortable realities show up in the arena. Bryan Ellis is an assistant professor of sociology at Michigan State University’s Center for Integrative Studies. He teaches about the social science of sports. He joined the program to help us unpack this.

Abbas Alawieh's grandmother is 91. Her home in Lebanon was just destroyed by the Israeli military. She has been displaced before. When Abbas was 15, he sheltered in a basement in South Lebanon while American-made bombs shook the walls. Now he watches from Dearborn as it happens again. He is far from alone. Families across metro Detroit with roots in Lebanon, Gaza, Iran, and across the Middle East are living with the same weight — war unfolding in the places they come from, grief carried in living rooms and group chats and middle-of-the-night phone calls, most of it invisible to the broader public. Abbas, a candidate for Michigan's Senate, has a microphone. Most of his neighbors do not. The Metro's Robyn Vincent talks with him about what that responsibility feels like, the fractures inside the Arab American community, and what goes unheard when a community grieves in silence.

About one month ago, Israel and America struck Iran. Now, Israel has enmeshed itself in more violence. In Iran, about 1500 people have been killed. Over 1,000 people have been killed in Lebanon. Settler violence against Palestinians has been ratcheted up in the West Bank. And, in Israel, as of one week ago, a dozen Israelis had been killed from Iranian air strikes. Israel says it is attacking the Iranian regime and Hezbollah in Lebanon to remove existential threats from the region. In the midst of all this, a man drove a truck into Temple Israel in West Bloomfield. The attacker then killed himself after engaging security on site. How are metro Detroit Jews processing this moment? And, what do conversations about domestic and foreign politics look like at this time? Aaron Bergman is a rabbi at Adat Shalom, a synagogue in Farmington Hills. He spoke about all this with producer Sam Corey.

In the first six months after the Dobbs decision overturned Roe v. Wade, vasectomy rates nationwide increased nearly 60% in men under 30 years old, according to Planned Parenthood of Michigan. Abortions are legal in Michigan. But renewed interest in vasectomies still prompted the healthcare provider to announce plans in January to resume its vasectomy services. Vasectomies are just one small part of the larger umbrella that makes up reproductive health, so the growing interest among men to undergo the procedure doesn't necessarily mean men understand more about reproductive health overall.   Dominick Shattuck, a community psychologist, a men's health fellow at the American Institute for Boys and Men, and faculty member in the OBGYN department of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, joins the show to discuss how men can take on a larger role in reproductive health.

Due to a polarized legislature, a major vehicle for policy change has been ballot initiatives. Cannabis legalization, the end of gerrymandering, and the expansion of reproductive freedoms all were passed by ballot initiative over the last 8 years. And that leaves a pressing question: Why have so many ballot initiatives from the left failed to make it to the ballot this year?  Already, the initiative for ranked choice voting, an effort to tax rich people to fund Michigan schools, and a campaign to create one minimum wage for Michiganders all failed to make it on the 2026 ballot. Why? And, what does this say about the state of liberals and the Democratic Party in Michigan? Colin Jackson is a Capitol reporter for the Michigan Public Radio Network. He spoke about this with The Metro's Robyn Vincent.

The Detroit mayor's first budget promises new spending on youth, seniors, homelessness, and transit — while the city works with $34 million less in revenue. Detroit Documenters are attending all 47 budget hearings. Noah Kincade, who coordinates the Documenters program, joins Robyn Vincent to break down what department heads are promising, what council members are pushing back on, and what nobody's talking about.