Martial Law declared in Chester PA after 2 year old gets shot
This is totally insane. Crime and mayhem has gotten so out of control in Chester PA that the mayor has implemented martial law and a curfew. A similar call was made in Harrisburg PA by the NAACP about a year ago, but not acted upon. Both of these are small cities with populations of under 50,000 people. I expect that this will start to become more frequent as time goes on. Highly disturbing. The mayor is doing what he needs to do. The thing that’s disturbing is the crime and mayhem. Unfortunately, martial law will likely not work. I really feel for the innocents who live there. Anyone who can needs to leave as soon as possible.
The African-American Clarion Call 
Targeted violence or not, the innocent can get caught in the crossfire, just as this two year old did. In our society we take violence for granted without really examining the root cause of it. These killings in a city of less than 50,000 is appalling.
As a society, we have to become more involved in the rearing of children, not just our own, but others as well. Child rearing should be job one, and not relegated to the backburner of what’s important. We have made child-rearing a nuclear family issue when it should be a village issue. But that would take a restructuring of society, and how we interact with each other.
So-called primitive societies are better at this than we are.
Targeted violence or not, the innocent can get caught in the crossfire, just as this two year old did. In our society we take violence for granted without really examining the root cause of it. These killings in a city of less than 50,000 is appalling
BD, it seems that the gangs are moving into small towns. I suppose that there’s less competition in these towns as compared with bigger cities along with the fact that they can easily overwhelm the local police. Here’s a story about Newburgh New York, a city of about 29,000 people about an hour north of Manhattan with a gang problem. Again, only 29,000 people.
As a society, we have to become more involved in the rearing of children, not just our own, but others as well. Child rearing should be job one, and not relegated to the backburner of what’s important. We have made child-rearing a nuclear family issue when it should be a village issue. But that would take a restructuring of society, and how we interact with each other.
Again, I agree. To a large extent, this problem is highly correlated with the economics of these areas as well, particularly when bad economics is jutaxposed against a value system that defines one’s worth by what he possesses. Poverty by itself is not a problem, IMO, so much as a sort of “poverty of spirit” that leaves one without a substantive purpose. That’s what’s needed to have a village working for the common good.
For some reason as I’m writing this and reading your comments, the opium wars in China are coming into my mind. I know this is not directly related to your point, but the European powers forcing opium into China created a lot of addicts who were a drag on that society. China created re-education camps to address the problem and did so pretty effectively; almost sort of like what the NOI does. I know it may sound drastic, but perhaps what we need is some sort of massive re-education program that addresses a number of things by changing how people are thinking. It’s clear that the current way of thinking is inimical to the well being of many people and their communities.
Small towns? Heck it’s just a ghetto extension of Philly. Which itself is just one massive, sprawling ghetto.
“Heck it’s just a ghetto extension of Philly. Which itself is just one massive, sprawling ghetto.”
Ghetto’s not a “bad name” as you seem to suggest. Most of America is “just one massive, sprawling ghetto” made up mostly of whites–at least for now.