With this construct - upon hearing the plans of Detroiters who now live in the rubble left by favorable political and community leaders that they helped put into power the fact that few of the people who are active in this renaissance have done any INTROSPECTION upon what about THEIR preferences - politically, ideologically, socially, culturally, economically - lead to the previous collapse of this fabled city is quite disconcerting.
On the parallel track - many of you claim that the United States of America still has "unfinished business" as it relates to slavery and Jim Crow and thus since it has not "owned up to" its past deeds - you can't be fulling accepting of its present promises. I content that more material damage is exerted upon the Black community at present by the forces who operate - UNHINGED from this past but instead who's present assaults are made for instant gratification or future power. In many cases they are allowed to operate out in the open today because so many of us have our eyes focused upon the "rear view mirror" of long term history - upon which most of your grievances are built upon. Your "grievance based movement" would not have it any other way.
If there is any force that needs to be "put on trial" - forced to testify as to why it did what it did; what it has learned from its mistakes and, with great specificity - what it plans to do in the future so that it will never happen again - it is the Machines That Control Our Cities. Beyond Detroit there is Philadelphia, Cleveland, Newark, Camden, Milwaukee, Baltimore, Rochester, New Haven, and many others. While some have the acumen of tying their present fate in with long term capitalistic misallocation, motivated by racism and disrespect for the working class of any stripe - the truth is that these places have never been more controlled by the "will of the people" than they are at present. It is surely the case that "you got what you have long struggled for and now you seek to return it because it did not taste as good as it looked prior to you having it in your grasp".
Beyond the indictments about the past I am game for looking forward. There is one condition that must be implemented prior to moving forward: TRANSPARENCY.
Those of you who are given to support labor and civil rights STRUGGLES would benefit from the imposition of INSTITUTIONS from which TRANSPARENCY of actions and intentions would be communicated. You know as well as I do that many of the recent corruption cases in these places came from the "external" federal government. Sadly many of the citizens have rationalized the corruption. Either the claim of "Why are they NOW worried about corruption now that WE are in charge?" (I'll let you define who "we" is) or "They just resent having US in power and thus when one of US gets too strong they need to topple them. WE need not be fooled by this and support our prince/queen who is SPEAKING TRUTH TO POWER". (Again you define the "us").
In reading the newspaper article from the "Declaration Detroit" I seem a will to simply "move forward" from the carnage without any acknowledgement of the INSTITUTIONAL changes and/or checks and balances that they plan to put into place.
For the Black community in particular we have a problem with "Confidence Men"/ "Confidence Machines". They are expert in keeping us rallying against our (popular) enemies:
- Corporations
- Conservatives / Republicans
- Capitalism
- Police / Judicial System
Ironically once each of these "threats" exit the city limits and a "victory" is had by the forces of permanent revolution - some of the key "establishment operatives" who directed the movement from the inside of the political game charge "benign neglect" and or violations of "social justice" in the departure of their long time adversaries. Again this shows that they are merely "grievance movements". Take away the magnet which is oriented at polar opposite and they fall to the ground like a mere piece of scrap metal. They are a function of their struggle. This Detroit reformation group needs to wrest control from these organizations AND more importantly this consciousness.
I wish these groups success.
My scrutiny is not a sign that I am their enemy.
It is only a sign that they are in need of a force of "check and balance" to make sure the previous state of UNITY which became COMPLICITY "this never happens again"
2 comments:
CF,
The only way I see that a coup can be mounted against the dysfunctional leadership who rules in our community (and I include here the street pirates and the politicians for both thrive in the absence of accountability) is for some of us to execute on something visible that solves a problem. I believe that people believe what they think they see. Since the only folks presenting an economic and political models are the ne're do wells on the street corner or in political office, those are the only things folks know.
They are no match for a group who is mission focused and knows how to manage towards a result. What we really need is a movement of people who know how to execute who take on a problem in the African-American community and resolve it. It doesn't matter how small the problem is.
I am in agreement with you.
My only mandate is for those who "went along" with the past failure ADMIT that there is a need for a system that CHECKS their popular views. If we don't put out our Permanent Interests and manage/govern toward them then people will cower toward their populist preferences.
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