Another Crisis

I'm upset with myself.  I'm giving the NFL far too much of my attention.  Oh, it's not the games or the standings or the players.  I can't tell you how many games, say, the Lions have won.  I'm pretty sure I can't name even five or six running backs in the NFL--I probably can QBs, though.  But it's this taking a knee thing.

The other day was a riveting Detroit News article about the "Struggle with crime" in black Detroit neighborhoods.  I'm guessing the statistics provided in the article are vastly understated.  But besides the actual crimes themselves, imagine the psychological and emotional distress the residents in these neighborhoods must endure.  I'm not just talking about the shootings--gang-related, random, for "dissing" someone, desiring another's shoes, etc.  One section explained how an uncle in Detroit shot and killed his nephew because he didn't like the look he was getting--shot and killed over a dirty look!  The city is celebrating that the number of annual murders is down to 300 or so now.  What?  First, that's about one a day.  Second, Detroit now has fewer than one-third of the people/population it had 50 years ago.  That's not one-third less population, but one-third of the people!  So, cynically, one might come to the conclusion there are fewer people to kill?  (Should we cite Chicago, DC, and/or other major cities?)

But consider some of the "tips," the strategies given to residents "to avoid becoming crime victims."  They are told, if they buy televisions, computers, or other such items, not to leave the empty boxes by the house.  Those boxes are invitations for robberies.  They are told "not to get boxed in" at fast-food restaurants or at traffic stops to avoid carjackings.  Don't buy gas at night. Carry "decoy wallets," with dummy credit cards and a few dollars to hand over to robbers.  Heck, they are advised not to keep Christmas trees by windows; Chris trees are "signals" to thieves that there are things worth stealing.  People moving into new homes should move in at night so they don't tell thugs what is being brought into the houses.  And there's more......

OK, I understand there are some rogue police officers out there, but the number must be pretty small.  I understand, too, that there are some racists among the police departments; again, I'd guess the percentage is small.  Even if my guess on the few numbers is wrong, how many more black citizens are being terrorize, not by the police, but by thugs in their own neighborhoods?  People shouldn't have to live that way.

Where are the NFL kneelers on that??????  Here we have players making far more money in a single season than many of us make in our lifetimes.  (One night I was out to dinner with a group of guys, most teachers or former teachers.  One NFL player that day signed a contract that gave him more money in a season that the five or six of us made over our careers, all of us put together!)  Why aren't they "tithing," that is, giving one-tenth of their inflated incomes to help in the black neighborhoods?  Instead, they "take a knee."  Sure they do; it costs them nothing.  No doubt there are a number of NFL players (and other professional athletes) who do give back to their communities.  But also there is no doubt not nearly enough of them do.  "Tithing?"  Hey, here's an idea.  Why don't they devote half of their incomes to their communities?  I know why and so do you.

I have no idea which player it was the other day said if the owners cracked down and prohibited players from taking a knee during the Star-Spangled Banner, he'd quit.  I don't remember his exact words; like I said, I never heard of 99% if these guys.  Maybe somebody talked to him; I don't know.  But later that same day he took it back.  Well, he wouldn't really quit......  Of course he wouldn't.

Protest.  Protest.  Protest.  I don't see anyone protesting life in the cities.  Where are Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton when a 6-year old playing in his neighborhood park is shot in a drive-by shooting?  Where are they when a 9-year old is killed in a drug-related trial to keep his father from testifying?  Where is the protest when a little girl reading on her mother's bed is shot to death when her house is riddled with bullets?  Where are the protests and demonstrations in front of known gang clubhouses and drug dens?  Gangs and drugs are the causes of much of the daily hell these good residents experience.  Ah, but protesting this and these are not trendy.  Such demonstrations might require some people to face some uncomfortable truths......