Urban terrorists are bereft of ideology and are bullies whose small egos and big appetite for disorder drive negative statistics through the roof! They are the reason why even Black folks flee inner city areas.
By Nadra
On one side are concerned citizens, activists and professionals who daily combat worsening levels of vulgarity, violence and counter-productivity.
On the other side are the representatives of said " vulgarity, violence and counter-productivity." As a former civil rights activist and urban security consultant I've always been on the concerned citizen side of what I term the Urban War On Terror ( UWOT).
Urban terrorists are bereft of ideology and are bullies whose small egos and big appetite for disorder drive negative statistics through the roof! They are the reason why even Black folks flee inner city areas.
However it is up to urban concerned citizens to police our community if this tide of ignorance and fratricide is ever to be stopped. We must hold our noses at the stench emanating from some peers and tell them in no uncertain terms that their reign of terror is over.
The same way we organized racist terror in the 1960s South ( Deacons for Defense and Alabama's original Black Panthers ) is the same way we must take up rhetorical and ( where legal, literal ) arms against those whose similarity with us is only skin deep.
We have no other choice. After 20-plus years of doing this I know that a silent Black urban majority becomes hostages to the least well-intentioned group among us.
Groups like Jacksonville, Florida's Mad Dads, Concerned Black Men; last year's historic call for Black men to patrol the streets of a major city and even the handful of Black self-described real life superheroes are all important fronts in the urban war on terror.
The alternative is more and more government policing with less and less distinction between law-abiding and law-breaking as race not conduct becomes the sole requirement.
Self-policing is what our community did when children were disciplined by neighbors or other responsible adults long before parents got the bad news.
Self-policing is what our community did when rape suspects and other serious alleged offenders literally ran to the police for fear of what the men in the area would do.
Self-policing is what citizens about public safety problems in their midst. Waiting for the government to solve all your safety issues is what cowards and the government addicted do.
The urban war on terror is Black Love ( an old school phrase but a goodie! ) in action.
When we tell urban terrorists you can live among us in peace or be driven out is the day things change for the better in America's inner cities.
This is our fight! No one else can or will do it for us. I know we never asked for this wave of violence and stupidity to wash over us but this is what we must overcome. If the old civil rights movement declared war on Jim Crow then the new civil rights movement must declare war on urban terror- otherwise we are ignoring the very problem destroying even more lives than racism.
If the global war on terror is America's struggle, then the war against urban terror is ours alone!
NADRA ENZI AKA CAPT. BLACK promotes firsthand conflict resolution and self-development. NADRACAPTBLACK@YMAIL.COM
1 comment:
bravo, but I might add that before a kid grows up to become an 'urban terrorist' there are generational and formative obstacles that help make him that way. It isn't just policing or conflict resolution, it's existential.. "how, then, shall we live?" as Schaefer asked.
that said, excellent post, a real optimism builder in spite of grim subject.
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