Contributors

Showing posts with label Chicago violence. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chicago violence. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 29, 2016

Why, Chicago?

Every single day our nation hears stories like this from Chicago. Everyone across the cultural and political spectrum weighs in with their opinions and solutions which they are CERTAIN will work.

My favorite is the Gun Cult who harp continually about how "restrictive" gun laws prohibit ordinary citizens from defending themselves. This results in the "only criminals will have guns" meme which has always cracked me up. So, we make guns easier for them to get? And we allow more, untrained citizens access to guns? I guess the Gun Cult wants a return to this...




I suppose it makes sense since they are largely older, white men who grew up on a Hollywood western view of violence. Yet this on Chicago's ongoing challenges with crime (along with nearly all of them) fails to note the root cause.

Violence in Chicago is the direct result of slavery.

Consider that it was slavery (and the ensuing Jim Crow laws) which drove African Americans north to Chicago over the course of several decades in the 19th and 20th century. The result of such an influx of people resulted in a jolt of increased population density that was economically harmful to the area. With so many people vying for jobs, especially in times of economic contraction, many citizens of Chicago, newly arrive or long time residents, were bound to be disenfranchised economically. Invariably, this leads people to crime and it has continued on to this day with city officials endlessly trying to play catch up in a game they will never win.

So, we are back, once again, with being confronted by the great wound that our society fails to recognize. Violence in Chicago will not be mitigated until our entire country admits that slavery is still having a profound effect on the socioeconomic status of millions of US citizens of color.

We can't even begin to discuss possible solutions until we recognize the problem.