We are all Orioles fans now

Filed in National by on April 27, 2015

As you may know, a 25 year old Baltimore resident, Freddie Gray, was arrested by Baltimore City Police on April 12. At some point after his arrest, likely as he was being transported to jail in a ‘paddywagon,’ Gray suffered a spinal injury that eventually killed him seven days later. Six city police officers have been suspended pending an investigation into Gray’s death. A big protest in downtown Baltimore on Saturday turned a little violent in the evening hours.

A Baltimore sportscaster, Brett Hollander, took to Twitter to say that demonstrations that negatively impact the daily lives of fellow citizens are counter-productive. I have found that this is usually the position of those who oppose protests: “Hey, I am all for what they are doing, but they are inconveniencing me, and therefore they must be stopped.”

Orioles COO John Angelos, the son of owner Peter Angelos, responded on Twitter with a pretty amazing explanation and defense of why protests are happening. I mean, this is movement type stuff.

Brett, speaking only for myself, I agree with your point that the principle of peaceful, non-violent protest and the observance of the rule of law is of utmost importance in any society. MLK, Gandhi, Mandela and all great opposition leaders throughout history have always preached this precept. Further, it is critical that in any democracy, investigation must be completed and due process must be honored before any government or police members are judged responsible.

That said, my greater source of personal concern, outrage and sympathy beyond this particular case is focused neither upon one night’s property damage nor upon the acts, but is focused rather upon the past four-decade period during which an American political elite have shipped middle class and working class jobs away from Baltimore and cities and towns around the U.S. to third-world dictatorships like China and others, plunged tens of millions of good, hard-working Americans into economic devastation, and then followed that action around the nation by diminishing every American’s civil rights protections in order to control an unfairly impoverished population living under an ever-declining standard of living and suffering at the butt end of an ever-more militarized and aggressive surveillance state.

The innocent working families of all backgrounds whose lives and dreams have been cut short by excessive violence, surveillance, and other abuses of the Bill of Rights by government pay the true price, and ultimate price, and one that far exceeds the importances of any kids’ game played tonight, or ever, at Camden Yards. We need to keep in mind people are suffering and dying around the U.S., and while we are thankful no one was injured at Camden Yards, there is a far bigger picture for poor Americans in Baltimore and everywhere who don’t have jobs and are losing economic civil and legal rights, and this makes inconvenience at a ballgame irrelevant in light of the needless suffering government is inflicting upon ordinary Americans.

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  1. Jason330 says:

    Wow. He really nailed it.

  2. Dorian Gray says:

    “Until the philosophy which holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned.
    Everywhere is war. Me say war.
    That until there’s no longer first class and second class citizens of any nation.
    Until the colour of a man’s skin is of no more significance than the colour of his eyes.
    Me gotta say war.
    That until the basic human rights are equally guaranteed to all, without regard to race… Dis a war.
    That until that day, the dream of lasting peace, world citizenship, rule of international morality will remain in but a fleeting illusion to be pursued, but never attained…
    …Now everywhere is war.” —Robert Nesta Marley

  3. mouse says:

    Hear Hear dammit

  4. Steve Newton says:

    I sometimes wonder exactly how people figure the Stamp Act Protests, the Regulator protests, or Shays Rebellion, or the Whiskey Rebellion, or the NY renter protests, or the Dorrite rebellion all looked at the time?

    (Then I recall that no more than a handful of folks have ever been advised that a majority of those events took place.)

    It is also important to recall that the changes wrought by the civil rights movement would never have been brought about by MLK alone; Malcolm X, Eldridge Cleaver, and Huey Newton waiting in the wings, and keeping the urban pots boiling, was a major part of the process.

    The same people who think 100% non-violent (or else they are somehow not legitimate) political protests are the only effective ones are the same folks who argue that workers should have the right to organize but not (teachers, firefighters, police, air traffic controllers) to strike.

  5. mouse says:

    The only legit protests come from angry rubes

  6. AQC says:

    This is the best thing I’ve read all day!

  7. Anonymous says:

    The above statement by Orioles COO John Angelos is right on!!
    1. We need incentives for Companies, to bring jobs back from overseas.
    2. Close the borders, jobs need to go US citizens.
    3. We need to start taking care of the good old, United States of America.
    4. Parents, get involved. I applaud the women who was going after her Son, while he was “protesting”.