For many years now, there has been the repetitive mantra "that's not the real Baltimore" in regards to any reviews or discussions about the very popular HBO television series "The Wire" and "Homicide" and even "The Corner". The reality is..........it's worse than is portrayed on those shows. The powers that be.....well.....they have a way of offering up obfuscation and misdirection to keep any focus away from the reality.
I felt the need to write about this today after recent events here in Baltimore...........rioting......"protesting"......chaos......looting........and now the National Guard being deployed. I have watched the tv reports......mostly the national news stations.......and payed attention to the tv camera shots.....the background imagery when a reporter goes live on camera.........and you will not see images like the one shown in the above photo. The photo above shows some of the Fulton Avenue neighborhood which is the very same neighborhood considered ground zero this past week. There is no pride shown here. The picture above shows what it looks like on a "normal" day. I recommend that if you truly want to see what neighborhoods such as west Baltimore looks like, get on your Google Maps application and get the street view and virtually drive through these streets. See it for yourself.....with no editing or carefully selected camera angles. This is Baltimore.
Is all of Baltimore so terrible?...........of course not. But a huge chunk of it is. And this chunk has not been decreasing over the past 30 or 40 years.........in fact, it has been spreading from the west side to the east side. That's the reality. Likewise, aside from how things look, there's the crime and safety issues along for the ride. The solutions are not simple, the solutions require tough actions. Ever hear of the phrase "suffer for good"? The kind of suffering now in Baltimore is NOT good in any way shape or form. Misdirected anger, senseless destruction of businesses and home....cars.....etc.....makes me believe that a ridiculous proportion of the population have no good sense or focus.
I realize that most of the problems cannot be fixed by legislation or money. I am sure that both can contribute to the cause........but.......the biggest fix would be if people would stop making excuses and targeting their anger on things and people that have nothing to do with the problems in this city. So where is the blame? Who is responsible?
It makes no sense to me that this recent chaos all started simply because a man named Freddie Gray ends up dead while in the custody of the police. Nonsense. How is it that there is no outrage....no large scale protests.......no nothing about the daily murders in these neighborhoods throughout the city. Oh......its okay as long as it wasn't the police that shot someone.........yeah, right. So this is not about just that Freddie Gray died one day in Baltimore.........nobody has asked how many murders occurred that week.....no outrage.
Its hard to wrap your head around this bullcrap.
While watching the news reports, politician after politician came before the cameras.......some that represent that very district and born and raised in that neighborhood. As if all of a sudden, out of the blue, there is a problem............some even claiming to explain their presence there to get things back to "normal"........imagine that! "NORMAL"!!!!!!........just like the normal as shown in the photo above!
The politicians........hmmmmm........these career politicians.......elected and re-elected year after year........."representing the people from their districts" .......their communities...........seems to me that they need to own up to being part of the problem.......what good have they done? They are all players in the game.....as much as the gangs and drug dealers. The politicians need to be the enemies of the bad not the enemies of the good. Throw these bums out! What have they done for Baltimore? This?
Back to the "pride" thing. People that live is these neighborhoods would obviously have difficulty having any pride in anything. Look at the picture. There is an old saying......."I may have holes in my pants, but they are at least clean holes." That would be a good start...... a place to begin...........get these neighborhoods cleaned up. And for those that intend to dirty it up.......well........fine them heavily........make people accountable.
Shame on these politicians.....shame on the Mayor and the city council........shame on Elijah Cummings......shame on Carl Stokes........shame on the President and the senators of Maryland.
Shame on the pastors of the communities........shame on the media...........shame on the "protestors".
Can this be fixed?.........yes it can.
I could go on and on about this. I love Baltimore and I hate to see this.
