Since the fatal shooting of Denver Crips co-founder Michael Asberry, Denver's corporate media has been thrilled to sell news announcing that a new wave of gang violence is sweeping our city. What the media fails to report is the consistent harassment people on Denver's East and West Side face from the most violent gang in town--the Denver Police Department. The media fails to discuss the city's failing education system, the pressures of racist employment practices, and the predatory recruitment of youth of color into the even larger gang--the U.S. military. While Asberry's death and any escalation of gang violence is tragic, these issues must not dwarf the enormous problems of structural racism, the gang violence inflicted by state and corporate power that protects white privilege and capitalist rule. My condolences to Asberry's family and friends. My encouragement to all who wish to organize against the most brutal gangs in global history--the United States Government, capitalists, and imperialists--perpetrators of genocide, mass imprisonment, torture, and slavery. Peace to the streets of Denver, to the gangs, and the community. The fight against the state and capitalism needs our attention, our organization, and perhaps our lives.
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5 comments:
always enthused by posts like yours... the mind is alive in america, still, and that's great. despite it all--capitalism, and the whole, vast, servile, spirit-crushing popular culture it commands-- some people are thinking, right here in america.
keep it up!
I see your wider point that the US government doesn't adequately address the broader problems responsible for gang violence in our nation, but I think your correlation between this and the law enforcement efforts to quell gang violence and criminal activity in Denver's East and West sides fails to actually acknowledge the fact that there are issues in these neighborhoods that need to be addressed in regard to criminal elements and their degradation effects on our neighborhoods.
I am a Mexican American living in Hyde Park (East Side) and my wife and I are constantly struggling to get police to respond to the drug dealing, tagging, and general gang presences we see daily. Due to budgetary cuts in police spending we generally don’t get a patrol car in time and our alleyway has become a thoroughfare for crack cocaine traffic. Beyond that the local church has had to take efforts to reinforce their outbuildings because of the heavy amounts of used prophylactics discarded by prostitutes on their grounds.
To somehow make an effort to tie this into a "shame on you America" rant is oversimplifying real issues. Is the educational system in our neighborhoods under-funded, yes, but so is everything else in this economy. Has America made several missteps over the years implementing Shock Doctrine capitalistic markets in South American, Asian, African, and Middle Eastern Nations, yes, but casting dispersions without presenting real solutions is pissing into the wind.
For people trying to make lives in these neighborhoods we need a multitude of things, starting with increased police patrols to eliminate the existing criminal elements that hamstring our neighborhoods. We need community organizers to capture the imagination of the community and to prevent kids from resorting to crime. We need (re)investments in these communities to provide increased ownership and a steak in our communities. And furthermore we need employment opportunities for the underprivileged members of our neighborhood.
To gloss over these real strategies toward improving inner city living and to slap a pseudo-anarchist slant on real issues effecting the barrio underlines your ignorance and makes you look like a Suburban Che Guevara T-Shirt wearing coffee shop ersatz-intellectual incapable of comprehending the full scope of the problems affecting inner city neighborhoods.
My guess is you're a college kid who hasn't yet grown up and still hold tight to these "damn the man" ideals without knowing the first damn thing about the inner city beyond riding around on your fixed gear bike with your ironic facial hair and your skinny jeans.
Do me a favor before you try to wax revolutionary and start invoking the name of the hood, come on down to the hood for a minute. Maybe tell daddy that the trust fund money can stop for a few months so you can see how real shit is in the hood. Then write up a blog post about gang banging and it's effect on inner city Denver.
Dear Anon,
Thanks for your reply. Having lived for years in neighborhoods where both police and gang violence haunt the neighborhood,having my house shot at, cars (when I drove them) busted up), having been unable to ride my bike (yes I do ride a bike--not a fixed gear--not that what type of bike someone rides really matters) without being pulled over by cops, having soil contaminated by polluting factories, drug dealing, tagging, and gang presence abounding, I'm still convinced that a state-armed militia (the police) worsens my neighborhoods' violence.
From my perspective, your idea of increased police controls oversimplifies a response to this kind of violence. I challenge you to consider more community based solutions--volunteer community foot patrols, community members raising their presence in the streets.
At this point, the police on the East Side (Northeast Side...Clayton...where I live), have committed to broken windows policing which does a great job punishing neighbors economically and not providing any of the solutions you champion (strengthening local business, schools, etc...)
Do I have a problem with gang bangers? Yes. Do I prioritize critiquing gang bangers over the state? No.
Again I think you're missing the larger problem. Crime is a bi-product of poverty, not police presence. To insist that roving bands of concerned community members would eliminate drug trafficking and prostitution in inner city neighborhoods borders on naiveté.
For starters the vast majority of the people living in impoverished neighborhoods like those in question work entirely too much to parent their children who become future gang members, much less to make time to walk the streets or participate in neighborhood watch programs. In addition to that, without any ties to local law enforcement these volunteer groups would have no more authority than the old men who stand on the corners. Furthermore, the gang members who deal in most of these neighborhoods aren't strangers, they're cousins, brothers, and neighbors. There is a "no snitch" unspoken code you'll find amongst minorities. The sum of all of this renders these theoretical watch groups useless. Plus any group of citizens trying to hamper gangs are likely to become targets of escalated violence.
Police forces were formed for a reason. A populous becomes unwieldy when they reach certain sizes. We're not talking villages or local hamlets. We're talking large metropolitan areas and drug rings with financial interests in keeping their product on the streets.
You act as though these are boys playing on your lawn who are easily shewed away.
If you've been harassed by police, I'm sorry. I'm sure you fell victim to profiling. See a white kid on a bike in the hood is looking to cop. Imagine how bad things are being brown. Being told that you either have to leave the mall or take off your blue shirt because you fit the "gang member" type. Yeah, makes you glad you're a white guy doesn't it. So please, spare me the whole, "the man is keeping us down" bit.
Am I a huge defendant of police? NO. I have had my share of ill-treatment the same as the next Mexican guy. The point I'm trying to make here is we need police to ensure a minimal level of safety. We need economic change to develop our neighborhoods, and we need community investments to keep money in these neighborhoods of color.
There are massive issues with the way our government handles it's affairs and those need to be addressed. I'm just saying lets not try to fix the road when the car we're using to drive on the road is on fire. We can't fix our foreign policies until our domestic policies have been address. You picking up what I'm putting down?
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