I wonder if we could call Betsy Ross back from the dead, because we sure do need a good seamstress.
Philadelphia is fast becoming the City of Hateful Beatings, with the latest — known — random beating occurring the evening of Saturday, January 28, at 8:30 pm, at 15th and Chestnut. This time the victim really was truly random — he wasn’t losing his temper, cursing and yelling and drawing the unfortunate attention of marauding savages; he was sitting in a cab at a red light when the savages dragged him out of the cab and started to wallop him. When the cab driver jumped out of the cab to help, the savages started to beat him, too, until he started hitting back with his tire iron, which brought an end to the attack.
A victim hitting back, with a weapon no less. Sounds like a very good idea. Effective, too.
The cops caught the perpetrators a few minutes after they fled the scene and took them into custody. The three teens, two aged 17, one aged 15, are facing aggravated assault charges, possibly even hate crime charges, too, because apparently the teens, who are black, were casting racial aspersions upon the victims, who were white, before and during the physical attack.
The City of Philadelphia is a bomb not waiting to explode but in the process of exploding. The explosion has reached such traditionally safe and peaceful neighborhoods as Society Hill and Old City, and is now making its mushroom cloud way into the center of Center City during prime Saturday night time, when all kinds of nice people, of all classes and colors and nationalities and religions, come out for dinner, to hear music, to have drinks, or just to enjoy each other’s company by having a walk. In peace.
These people, all of them, deserve to be safe, they deserve to feel safe.
Most people of all races, religions, and nationalities are good people. They just want to be happy and live in peace with the people they love.
Well, in Philadelphia, they better beware. Because the other people who are not good, who are not happy, and who do not just want to live in peace with the people they love, are increasing in number and becoming much more aggressive. And they are expressing their anger and hate, physically.
Mayor Nutter is well aware of this, and he seems to be trying to take action. But he, and the citizens of Philadelphia, are in a real pickle. Because what can be done? I don’t think any of us want to live in a society that has armed police officers on every street corner — or do we? What price safety? What price peace? It is a larger question, obviously, given the situation of foreign terrorism, and not one easily answered. How really to combat domestic terrorism (which is what this new trend of crime amounts to)? Waging the two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq sure didn’t help much, but could it have, had it been waged differently, with a bit more determination to fight back the way victims of violence and terrorism actually should fight back?
The way the innocent react — whether the Innocent is the United States against the Taliban and the countries that give safe harbor to terrorists or Philadelphia against marauding gangs — matters.
It is relevant that the cabbie who managed to get to his trunk to grab his tire iron and started beating the beaters did indeed stop the beating. In a matter of seconds.
Is it time for the Nice People to weapon up and fight back? Clearly. Once the rotten people realize that they don’t rule the streets, that if they are going to hit or shoot or stab someone, they very well might get hit, shot, or stabbed back, they will stop hitting, shooting, and stabbing.
Three cheers for that cab driver. We all, citizens, Mayor Nutter, and the United States itself, have something to learn from him.
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Philadelphia Coming Apart at Its Seams
In News commentary on January 31, 2012 at 10:24 amI wonder if we could call Betsy Ross back from the dead, because we sure do need a good seamstress.
Philadelphia is fast becoming the City of Hateful Beatings, with the latest — known — random beating occurring the evening of Saturday, January 28, at 8:30 pm, at 15th and Chestnut. This time the victim really was truly random — he wasn’t losing his temper, cursing and yelling and drawing the unfortunate attention of marauding savages; he was sitting in a cab at a red light when the savages dragged him out of the cab and started to wallop him. When the cab driver jumped out of the cab to help, the savages started to beat him, too, until he started hitting back with his tire iron, which brought an end to the attack.
A victim hitting back, with a weapon no less. Sounds like a very good idea. Effective, too.
The cops caught the perpetrators a few minutes after they fled the scene and took them into custody. The three teens, two aged 17, one aged 15, are facing aggravated assault charges, possibly even hate crime charges, too, because apparently the teens, who are black, were casting racial aspersions upon the victims, who were white, before and during the physical attack.
The City of Philadelphia is a bomb not waiting to explode but in the process of exploding. The explosion has reached such traditionally safe and peaceful neighborhoods as Society Hill and Old City, and is now making its mushroom cloud way into the center of Center City during prime Saturday night time, when all kinds of nice people, of all classes and colors and nationalities and religions, come out for dinner, to hear music, to have drinks, or just to enjoy each other’s company by having a walk. In peace.
These people, all of them, deserve to be safe, they deserve to feel safe.
Most people of all races, religions, and nationalities are good people. They just want to be happy and live in peace with the people they love.
Well, in Philadelphia, they better beware. Because the other people who are not good, who are not happy, and who do not just want to live in peace with the people they love, are increasing in number and becoming much more aggressive. And they are expressing their anger and hate, physically.
Mayor Nutter is well aware of this, and he seems to be trying to take action. But he, and the citizens of Philadelphia, are in a real pickle. Because what can be done? I don’t think any of us want to live in a society that has armed police officers on every street corner — or do we? What price safety? What price peace? It is a larger question, obviously, given the situation of foreign terrorism, and not one easily answered. How really to combat domestic terrorism (which is what this new trend of crime amounts to)? Waging the two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq sure didn’t help much, but could it have, had it been waged differently, with a bit more determination to fight back the way victims of violence and terrorism actually should fight back?
The way the innocent react — whether the Innocent is the United States against the Taliban and the countries that give safe harbor to terrorists or Philadelphia against marauding gangs — matters.
It is relevant that the cabbie who managed to get to his trunk to grab his tire iron and started beating the beaters did indeed stop the beating. In a matter of seconds.
Is it time for the Nice People to weapon up and fight back? Clearly. Once the rotten people realize that they don’t rule the streets, that if they are going to hit or shoot or stab someone, they very well might get hit, shot, or stabbed back, they will stop hitting, shooting, and stabbing.
Three cheers for that cab driver. We all, citizens, Mayor Nutter, and the United States itself, have something to learn from him.
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