The Mission

Legal injustice and income inequality lead to violence in our society.

Legal injustice – Michael Brown’s shooting highlights legal injustice because there was a disgusting lack of justice concerning what happened and it is a legal issue because law enforcement was involved.  Captain Johnson wrote of himself as a peacekeeper in his book 13 Days in Ferguson.¹  This means the officer who shot and killed a teenager over some cigarillos needed more guidance or training or something that could have directed him in a direction different from killing or harming anybody.

Violence

At the core of killing, murder, and death is violence.  Violence and violent actions are a consistent theme throughout most of human history.  So what makes the Michael Brown shooting any different?  This young man’s shooting happened thousands of years after humans realized killing other humans is base/basic, counterproductive, and it stops the progress we could all be making if it were not for police killing unarmed citizens over a pack of Swishers.

Death is guaranteed by life.  There is no need to stop somebody else, no need to kill somebody else, unless in self-defense you injure somebody so badly that they die.  Yes, we are owed the right to self-defense.  No, this does not include shooting people that wear different colors or are a different color from us.  People in St. Louis had every right to be angry, unnerved, and upset about this shooting.  The point is not just to highlight police brutality whether it’s in St. Louis, Chicago, or Los Angeles.  The point here is to address the real problem – violence. 

Legal injustice and income inequality are the root of all violence.  Yes, racism is a problem.  Sexism is a problem.  Inadequate education and healthcare are problems.  And all of these problems are rooted in legal injustice and income inequality.

A lot of people incarcerated are not violent.  Cook County Jail in Chicago is one of the largest mental health providers in the country.²  I suffer with mental illness, and I know when a mentally ill person has no medication and his coping mechanisms aren’t strong enough, he goes into a mental health crisis.  The body and the mind lost control of reality.  We see things ‘not there.’  We hear the voices of people not around.  We think something’s around the corner of a vacant lot.

The reality is not irrational to us.

With medication, the things we see are physically there.  Most of what we hear comes from knowable sources.  And we realize vacant lots don’t have corners.  We are not violent people, but it takes a lot of work to be at ease, since our neurotransmitters fire off differently from average people.

It’s not right, it’s not wrong, but it needs careful attention most of the time.

Solving the Solution

This is why prisons are better off investing in psychiatric care facilities instead of jails and penitentiaries.  This would be an evolution in social terms, because people don’t like change.  But we are socially better off investing in people’s mental health.  People’s lives count indiscriminately … No one man’s worth is more or less than another’s.  So if treating his mental illness costs the State, subsidize the difference.  It’s the least the people can expect the government to do, especially when there are lots of people suffering with mental illnesses and just can’t afford to take care of it alone.

This is not to say sometimes real bad things happen, and people need time to heal.  But when legal injustice and income inequality are so bad that the police would shoot an unarmed citizen over some cigars, then there are issues that need to be discussed and resolved. 

We don’t need war tactics for community issues. 

If we are going to exercise our First Amendment rights, let’s use them to highlight issues, concerns, and comment within the community.  Find out what’s wrong and work toward a solution to the problem.  The squeaky wheel gets the oil, but venom is silent and deadly.  It is important to honestly and realistically look at ourselves and try to figure out the world around us.  And how do we fit in?  This is not easy.  Sometimes its more difficult for some than others.  This is even one more reason to come together when reasonably possible, look at the world around us, and everybody has their own perspective.

Mental illness does not lead to violence.  Violence is when people reach a neurotic point that they can’t control themselves and they lash out at the world around them.  A good question is: how do we build a world that can take care of itself and others without question?

References

¹ Johnson, R. (2018). 13 Days in Ferguson. Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House Publishers

² Kobielski, L. (2018). I Refuse for the Devil to Take My Soul. Brooklyn, NY: Powerhouse Books.