Tuesday, August 22, 2017

Life in a Post-Eclipse World


“Hello darkness, my old friend, I’ve come to talk with you again.[i]”  Yesterday was a historic day.  The press spent almost as much time talking about the darkening of our sun as it did vilifying the President.  It was as if the world stood still.  Millions of North Americans, (500 million by NASA’s estimate), had at least some opportunity to see a part of this event.

Having made a cereal box viewer, I was not impressed. I think I needed a bigger cereal box or perhaps some fancy look at the sun glasses.  Although it got really dark, and wet for a time, I attribute that to the passing cumulonimbus that seemed to block out the moon, blocking out the sun.  But enough about me.

Today we return to what has become the norm, the people at ABCNNBCBS and Fox will again tell us how a statistically insignificant group is threatening our civil liberties with their hate and violence.  Of course, they will take sides and one hate group will be okay, while the other will be damned.

Politicians and celebrities will continue to climb on board with the idea that statuary that was placed by politicians a previous generation or two ago are now dividing our country unlike anything that has gone before.  In the political frenzy, they will not separate the profound from the mundane and will trample on them all.  They will, of course, be aided by the vandalism of one or two politically acceptable hate groups.

What they won’t cover, what we won’t discuss in reasonable terms, and what we won’t make an effort to fix is why are so many young people killing each other in the inner cities?  Why has gang violence escalated to the point that Chicago is now on track to break last year’s total of 789 murders[ii]?  Unfortunately, most of these are African-Americans, or the politicians would be forced to actually do something.  We see politicians talk in grand terms of government support to the poor, or closing our borders, or expanding/contracting our civil rights, but at the end of the day it is all meaningless if we let the one segment of society engage in murder without consequence.  We can fill our prison’s but they are already filled, and all they seem to be doing is returning the vicious back to the streets with better street cred. 

What would happen if we stopped talking about gun control for just a while (Chicago has among the strictest in the nation), and talked about how society has set itself up for this war in the inner cities?  The problem, as I see it, is we have abandoned the concepts of family, faith, and neighborhoods that form the sense of belonging to the young.  Even in our most liberal of areas we still discriminate with expectations for a successful life.  Those who can afford to send their children to private schools do so, those who can’t are left to the mercy of political agendas of the school board and the unions.

Is it better to allow everyone to become victims in this age of victim-hood?  For the major cities it would seem so.


[i] Simon and Garfunkel, “Sounds of Silence”

1 comment:

Mitch said...

I have tried to keep a sharp eye out for the checks that are being doled out as a consequence of the Charlottesville affair. I saw the Anti-Defamation League charitable receipts (not dollars) has gone up 1,000 fold, and I believe I saw Al Sharpton's group got a hefty boost in donations. Therein, I believe, lies the true genesis of the furor. The outrage puts money in the coffers for Democrats to go fight the 2018 mid-term elections. I don't think they have hit their quota yet, so the headlines will continue....

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