CSotD: What’s going on?
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Let's start the day with this Juxtaposition.
Janis is right: Market forces determine what's available. If nobody watched the violent, fear-inducing, division-creating, hateful crap on TV and in the movies, they'd stop making it.
Arlo is right: Knowing that enough of our fellow-citizens enjoy this toxic garbage to keep it around is not reassuring.
And Anne is right: It's hard for decent people to get much joy out of it all.
And Peggy Charren was right, too, when the founder of Action for Children's Television pointed out that, if she were sitting in a rocking chair reading to her small children and two men began fighting in another part of the room, the kids would stop listening to the story and watch the fight, and that that has nothing at all to do with which is better for them.
Well, for all the whining and bashing of Boomers, our time commanding the American oil tanker is drawing to a close and Peggy, who died this past January, didn't change its course very much after all.
Which doesn't mean she wasn't right.
Problem #1 is that the people who object to violence, sexism and a general lack of civility are just as beaten down and intimidated into silence by First Amendment hard-liners as responsible gun owners are by Second Amendment hard-liners.
Problem #2 is that we've always had people who enjoyed rolling in the mire. As I have noted multiple times, medieval marketplaces hosted puppet shows and street performances that were vulgar, violent, stupid and extremely popular.
But their drooling, gormless fan base had absolutely no input even into how the village was run, much less into the decisions that came from the castle.
It's hard to reconcile this simple fact with a belief in universal suffrage.
Still, silence does imply consent.
Forget it, Jake: It's Chi-Town
Kevin Siers is only one of several cartoonists appalled by the evidence of an extensive cover-up in the Chicago death of Laquan McDonald.
This would be a lovely time to, shall we say, round up the usual "I am shocked, shocked" memes.
But for those of us who remember dealing with (the real) Mayor Daley and his thugs, it does not bring up memories of sweet corruptible Louis Renault, but rather of the movie's true villain.
Renault: We are very honored tonight, Rick. Major Strasser is one of the reasons the Third Reich enjoys the reputation it has today.
Strasser: You repeat "Third Reich" as if you expected there to be others.
Renault: Well, personally, Major, I will take what comes.
And that is the evil at the heart of the film: Until its final moments, both Rick and Louis are willing to stand by and watch, profiting from what they can and closing their eyes to what they must.
Customer: When they come to get me, Rick, I hope you'll be more of a help.
Rick: I stick my neck out for nobody.
The Major Strassers of the world depend on the Louis Renaults and the Rick Blaines who remain willfully ignorant, despite what they can plainly see if they choose to look.
Well, some things you can't unsee.
I still get a tightening of the gut when I see that trademark checkerboard band on the uniform hat of a Chicago cop, as in Chris Britt's cartoon, and I was only a tourist in their town on maybe two or three dozen occasions.
And now that my hair — what's left of it — is short, I know I'm not on their radar anyway. And, yes, I knew a lot of good cops before, and then, and since.
But here's what I carry away, and what informs my thoughts, not just about Laquan McDonald but about #BlackLivesMatter in general, and the whole clueless, "Well, if you cooperate …" suburbanite response.
April 27, 1968, I went to a peaceful march against the war. First, the city revoked the parade permit, forcing us to walk on the sidewalks and wait for crossing lights at each intersection, which broke up any leadership and control by parade marshalls.
Then, when we arrived at the City Center Plaza, we were told it was closed for maintenance — a closing that had started about an hour earlier, as soon as the Boy Scouts finished holding their Loyalty March there.
And when some marchers crossed over to the plaza anyway, they were met with truncheons. I guess you had to be there to appreciate what that looks like and sounds like and feels like.
The people who were there realized that the choices for the upcoming Democratic Convention no longer included walking up the street singing songs of peace. Rather, the options were (A) stay away or (B) come prepared.
But what stuck with me most was the carload of young black men driving by as the march ended and we started walking away.
They raised fists out the open windows, shouting "Now you know! Now you know!"
They weren't talking about moments. They were talking about their lives.
A few weeks later, a buddy and I hitched into the city for a concert and were dropped off on the edge, and had to walk through some mean streets to get to the Loop.
As we trod the crumbling concrete past the crumbling buildings, we saw up ahead a flashing light and a small crowd, and, as we got closer, it turned out to be an animal control officer, putting a large dog into the back of his truck while two or three little black kids stood by, watching and crying.
And their mother comforted them, saying, "Don't cry. He's just going to go to jail for a few days."
Now you know. Now you know.
A few months later, they assassinated Fred Hampton, and then lied and fabricated evidence and covered that up, too.
Because that's how it's always been done.
Download the rest of this report
or check out this article and video documenary.
Knowledge is Power
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