Tuesday, August 19, 2014

Racists should rue the day

A protester is treated for tear gas effects after being hit
  Sunday night in Ferguson, MO.
| Alex Wroblewski / for Sun-Times Media
What's so distressing about the events in Missouri this month is that they're a repeat of a rerun of a redux.

Is this the 1960s or the 1990s?

No, it's Teens, the 20-teens. "Post-Racial" America.

A white police officer gunning down an unarmed black man with a dubious past is so commonplace that it hardly rates as news in America.

Yet, with no major catastrophe for the TV/cable networks to cover during the "dog days" of summer, we're left with a one-time mainstay of TV coverage: blacks rioting.

For most white Americans, it doesn't matter that a majority black community is "safe-guarded" by almost a completely white police force, that is armed like our Army. Or that this same community is governed by almost a completely white city council. They see blacks looting and they get angry.

They see this as further proof of how President Obama is dividing America.

Actually, it's their perception of President Obama and of most African-Americans that is dividing our country.

Leave it to The Onion to explain how an unarmed black teen should behave in their own community in 2014. Also, watch any episode of Key and Peele on Comedy Central. Those guys nail it.

The rest of the world is covering this story because they assumed that by electing President Obama twice in a row that this country had put its racial problems behind us.

Obviously not.

Check out any of the comments after stories on this crisis on Yahoo and you'll read unbridled hate towards African-Americans or anyone who isn't white. It's rather depressing.

I fear for the safety of President Obama should he visit Ferguson or anywhere in Missouri, the state from which Dred Scott sought, and lost his freedom, his personhood.

Many white, racist Americans are agitated these days. They're enraged that a black man occupies the White House. They're tired of movies like "12 Years a Slave," which accurately depict how this country treated slaves. Actually, they're just tired of hearing about black people. They've got problems of their own.

Well, get used to it. Soon enough, white people will no longer be the majority racial group in this country.

Notice how the NRA is silent in all of this. Had the dead black teen been properly armed, along with "open carry" protections, perhaps the story would be different. You know, "stand your ground."

One of the hidden reasons why African-Americans mostly prevailed in their civil rights struggle, is that they could buy guns and protect themselves when the police would not. Certainly, the NRA does not promote gun ownership by African-Americans.

This country lives by the gun. We are also dying by the gun.

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