Baltimore

I am for violence if non-violence means we continue postponing a solution to the American black man's problem just to avoid violence. — Malcolm X

One hot day back in 1963, I was cooling off in the reflecting pool while MLK delivered his "I have a dream" speech.  Even then, though, I doubted that non-violent protest would accomplish much.  I still suspect that the urban riots of the later sixties accomplished more for black civil rights than the interminable choruses of "We Shall Overcome."  Riots draw more attention than parades.

It seems that the Baltimore rioters are mostly high school boys, and high school boys are temperamentally inclined to be assholes.  Nevertheless, nobody should doubt that some real, well-justified rage is at the root of the disturbances.  The likelihood that a black, Baltimore high school boy has been harassed by cops has to be close to 100%.  Yes, some of those high school boys probably joined in "just for fun," but "just for fun" just might be why the Baltimore cops did whatever they did to kill  Freddie Gray.

The Riots Across the Pond

I've been listening to the BBC for coverage of the rioting/looting in London and other English cities, and I've come to think that nobody over there actually gets it. In case you hadn't noticed, the class system over there is quite pronounced (including "clahhss," "clawws," "clows," and several others.) The rioters, according to David Cameron's "clahhssmates" from Oxbridge, are the "lowest of the low." They are young, uneducated, and unemployed. They are white, black, and various shades of brown. They are just knowledgeable enough to realize that the only way they ever are likely to have a few nice things is to steal them.

I think it was my favorite senator, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who first coined the (now very politically incorrect) term, "underclass." Back in Moynihan's day, the "underclass" in the USofA was predominantly black, since race and class were even more closely correlated then. I know I heard that very term on the BBC today, spouted by some Tory twit or another, whose argument seemed to be that "the lowest of the low" are congenitally defective, with no regard at all for their lower-middle-class neighbors struggling to keep their beauty salons and falafel stands unburnt.

It's true. They couldn't care less. They'll never have a beauty salon or a falafel stand. A more upscale Blackberry or pair of sneakers is their height of aspiration.

Cameron and the Conservatives are committed to austerity. So are our homegrown plutocrats and their political allies, from both parties. Here in the USofA, as the rate of teen unemployment and the widening gap between rich and poor continue to increase, our ability to pretend that we really don't have a class system is falling apart. As state and local governments, strapped for cash, cut back on policing, fire fighting, and education, things can only get worse.

'Ow's 'at 'it ya, guvner?