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No Time for Outrage In Missouri
There will be no protests, no looting, no rioting, and no expressions of outrage over it. The New York Times and the Washington Post will print no news stories or editorials about it. CNN and MSNBC will send no reporters — let alone primetime anchors — to cover it. And neither Eric Holder, nor Al Sharpton, nor Jesse Jackson, nor any of the lesser lights of the racial grievance industry will have a word to say about it.
But I submit that what happened in downtown St. Louis on Monday is far more emblematic of what ails the black community in America than the death of Michael Brown, the “unarmed black teen” who on August 9 was shot and killed by a police officer in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson.
At about 2:30 Monday afternoon, just south of downtown St. Louis, two men in a red Oldsmobile opened fire on the occupants of a red Dodge SUV. With gunshots continuing along the way, both cars sped into downtown, coming to a stop at 4th and Market Streets, just outside the Drury Plaza Hotel and in the shadow of the city’s landmark Gateway Arch. When it was all over, two men in the SUV were dead and a third was wounded. Two others escaped injury. When they searched the SUV, police found a gun, marijuana packaged for sale, and what appeared to be heroin. The men in the Oldsmobile escaped.
The men in the SUV were all black, and I don’t think I’m going too far out on a limb here by speculating that those in the Oldsmobile were as well. I’m confident the investigation will reveal they were rival drug dealers. I’m also confident that most, if not all, of the parties involved grew up in homes without fathers.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported on one of the dead men, James Lane, 22. “Lane had two sons, both 4,” said the paper. “Shay Motley, the mother of one of the sons, said Lane was recently released from prison on gun and drug charges, but she said she thought he had left that lifestyle behind. She said the last time she saw him Monday, he told her he was heading out to look for work.”
So, at age 18, Lane fathered two children with two different women, then went to prison (and enforced chastity) on gun and drug charges. But rather than leave the “lifestyle” behind, it would seem he embraced it to his ultimate peril.
The Post-Dispatch also informs us that there may have been additional costs – paid by others – for Lane’s “lifestyle.” From the story:
Lane was the uncle of Latasha Williams, 14, who was shot in her left eye Sept. 12 as she was buying snacks at a corner store at 4300 North 20th Street. The girl’s mother, Donnitta Turner, said Lane was waiting outside the store for Latasha that evening when bullets from a passing vehicle were fired into the store.
We might speculate that it was Lane himself who was the target of the bullets that claimed his niece’s eye, and that Monday’s shooting was merely evidence of improved marksmanship. Note also that the maimed girl has a different last name from her mother, and that her father is not mentioned in the story.
Monday’s shooting is evidence – a pure distillation – of the poisonous culture in which moral instruction is absent. But not a single one of the people so publicly exercised over the death of Michael Brown will speak out about it. In due course, the shooters will be arrested and sent to prison; it will merit a small story or two in the Post-Dispatch and on local news programs before it is forgotten. In the meantime, we will continue to be sold the myth that the greatest threat to young black men in America is the racist white cops looking to gun them down for little provocation or none at all.
How long will this go on?
Published in General
I erred in stating that the father of the girl who lost her eye was not mentioned in the Post-Dispatch story. The story pointed out that he was killed in 2005 in what police described as a gang-related shooting. He was 21, which would mean he was 16 when he fathered the girl.
Until human nature changes.
The inescapable results when you remove religion from the public square. Government has no morals.
Oh, there’s moral instruction all right: “You’re the victims of the system.” “You’re just getting what is due to you.” “The cops are here to keep us down.”
And what about the “Lawless Gospel” philosophy that now dominates too many black churchmens’ preaching. Why would anyone repent if nothing is ever wrong?
One aspect of “human nature” that I see on display in Ferguson is that it is easier to protest someone else’s supposed faults than to fix your own.
Does it matter that the guys were black who did this? Did their blackness cause it? I get that the Left is a bunch of hypocritical race-baiters, but I don’t know what purpose racially-tinged counterexamples serve but to let the Right feel righteous and self-satisfied.
The Right, especially we Christians, should feel condemned by this, not self-satisfied. I encourage congregations to devote more of our mission/outreach to our American family vs. overseas work. Prison ministry — for both the convicted and their families — is a great place to start.
Rule of Law and democracy require that the people voluntarily subject themselves to the results of the process, even when they disagree with how it comes out. Such willingness only comes if the people have an overwhelming sense that they are accountable to a higher power, so their actions have longer term consequences than the immediate.
What Mr. Dunphy demonstrates is that in the black communities this sense has broken down. The direct result is what he portrays. Chicago has had 1342 shootings to date. If you check out the map of distribution, you will find they do not occur with any significant numbers in the white neighborhoods. This is not a condemnation; it is simply a fact. Until we are willing to actually look at facts we have no chance of remedying the situation.
It does serve to point out that while the press and the grievance industry gets their knickers in a twist when a white cop or a hispanic civilian shoots a black criminal in apparent self defense, these same grievance mongers ignore that the vast majority of black shooting victims were shot by black criminals. If they really cared about these communities they would be out on the streets protesting this sort of ongoing problem instead.
I just think our side should be the first to stop talking about race, because it’s a utterly stupid subject that makes people dumber.
It seems to me the inncoent bystanders in this drama are the women and young girls who are saddled with children whose de facto ‘baby daddy’ is the government. The government can be worse than a gang-banger for a spouse because of the intense indifference to the relationship. It serves only to supply a steady drip of subsistence which breeds despair. I can’t believe the right is credited with a ‘war on women’ when the progressive policies of modern America are doing this to the fairer sex. It is shameful.
I’m not so sure that the “young ladies” who have these babies are innocent. They know how not to have babies. Our daughters went to a “majority minority” high school. Although they were primarily in AP and magnet classes, they had a few classes with the general student body. Many of the minority girls spoke openly about wanting to have a baby and about who their “baby daddy” was going to be. It’s a sign of prestige in certain communities; it is also, as someone suggested, a way to get your hand further into the government’s pocket.
Yes, it does matter. Black culture is self-destructing, and dragging other cultures down with it. Welfare and other social fixes pressed by our federal government minders is at the heart of the problem.
Ferguson protestors — they appear to form in “mobs” or “groups” depending on the occasion — recently showed up to disrupt a performance of the St. Louis Symphony and later a playoff game between the Dodgers and Cardinals. (I sense a Saul Alinsky mind at work here). The media reported puzzlement on the part of attendees at both venues. So despite the endless hours of TV news and the acres of newsprint devoted to the subject, hardly anyone even in St. Louis knows about the incident except in the vaguest way. If I were in the advertising field, I would take note of this. Incidentally, has anyone looked into the role the Socialist Workers Party plays in all this? There is nothing they like better than pouring gasoline on fires and then withdrawing to see the fruit of their efforts.
A clarification, please/thank you, FG re: “Lawless Gospel”, a term I haven’t encountered before?
It is a twist on the phrase “Law and Gospel,” which is the foundation of Lutheran and Reformed preaching. My criticism is of preachers who preach the forgiveness of the Gospel without first “convicting the sinner of his sin.” Full repentance cannot come without this.
“I just think our side should be the first to stop talking about race, because it’s a utterly stupid subject that makes people dumber.”
A call for unilateral disarmament.
Thanks, and you’ll get no disagreement on this from me; further, though, how does this get twisted by certain preachers? Would Jeremiah Wright/Otis Moss be an example of this? The “Victimhood Gospel”, too, perhaps?
Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson never miss an opportunity to inject race into the conversation unless of course it is African-Americans killing African-Americans. Pretending there is not a problem with gang culture, unwed mothers, and absent fathers in poor African-American communities will not lead to any positive changes in those communities.
Throwing money at the problem is not the answer, after all some athletes and celebrities, regardless of skin color, that have more money than they know what to do with find themselves in trouble with the law. The cultural norm in America is now to denigrate any judgment on what is good and what is evil. The bill has come due for the refusal of parents, teachers, and even churches to form conscience in children since the 60’s. Conscience is not weeping and screaming at the sight of a fallen tree in the forest.
It is all well and good to march to the beat of a different drummer, but it sure screws up the parade.
Mike, you might want to pay more attention on what is happening and being silent about it is not helpful.
http://americanthinker.com/blog/2014/10/video_of_police_smashing_window_and_dragging_black_man_out_of_car_sparks_outrage_and_lawsuit.html
I don’t at all feel condemned by this. I’ve perpetrated many sins, all worthy of death, but decimating black families is not one of them. I have always been angry about the absolute errors of the secular-leftist-humanist crowd and their “social” policies, and absolutely are satisfied at an intellectual level to throw these horrific results back in their collective pallid and uninterested faces.
This is not ours, or certainly not my problem to own. And yet, I will own it. I’ve adopted two black kids from a homeless drug addicted existence, and tried to do so for a part Mexican part black kid who was unfortunately too medically fragile and died. As you mention, prison ministry is another great place to start. So is anti abortion alternatives, and our church is reaching out to the local Mexicans and Central Americans in an effort to bring them into our church, regardless of their language, skin color and background.
I think the main issue is that black people are far more likely to be killed by criminals than by police. Given that this is true, which party has better policies for protecting the lives of honest black people? Which party thinks honest people of any race have a right to bear arms and defend themselves from criminals?
It’s worth noting that the Rev. Al Sharpton devoted a word or two to the evil of black-on-black violence in his funeral oration for Michael Brown. That surprised me. The ol’ Rev. is getting a little conservative as he ages.
I worry about people whose entire catalog of Jeremiads focuses exclusively on the sins of “those people”, but if we are balanced in our condemnations, then avoiding this topic does absolutely no one any good.
The mothers are neither innocent nor bystanders by their continued actions to have children with men that they know will not stay around, protect young men from the consequences of their actions, and condone criminal behavior.
It may be utterly stupid subject and make people dumber (I think you are misplaced in these thoughts 1. it is human nature to divide itself into groups i.e. The Sneeches and Other Stories illustrates this concept very well, 2. it cannot make people “dumb” since it means lacking speech) but if we do not discuss it we will cede the floor to the liberals and they will do as they please with no response from us or for us framing the subject. I am a proponent of getting to the forefront of an problem so I can frame it in the light most favorable to my client and set the stage. You are advocating letting the other side control and set the discussion/debate/frame the picture with ultimately no response from the right. I think your position will not persuade those that are reasonable or open to the subject.
Avoiding race in this also avoids the question: “What role does race actually have in discussions of family and neighborhood breakdown?” The liberals have been touting the mantra that “race should not matter” while geneticists increasingly say it does matter – that is to say that differences in academic achievement, aggression, physical abilities, social organization, and social interaction all do have statistically measurable correlations with race. Poor white communities do not have the same sets of social ills as poor black communities, but pointing this out in public will get you ostracized.
There was and is a healthy black culture of church-going families who work hard, teach morals at home, and push their children to succeed. Condoleezza Rice came from such a family. There is no terrible flaw in this culture; there is nothing that should intrinsically cause its “self-destruction.” While under assault, this way of life still exists in some communities. Many others, though, have been taken over by a new “culture” in which lack of virtue is a virtue. Jason Riley talks about this on the podcast, and explains it better than I can.
It is a fact that intact black families are fast going extinct; illegitimacy in black communities is around 75%. Does skin color cause all this? Of course not, but the government thinks it does. It targets people to “help” based upon skin color, and this “help” is endlessly devastating.
Exactly. My comment was directed at inner-city Black culture or committees. Someone please correct my labels. Welfare in all Federal forms is bad. It’s effects are known to all who read Ricochet. The question is: How do reverse this mess? Can it be reversed in the span of 2 Presidential terms?