Eugene Kane has an absolutely idiotic column in today's Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, "Where's anger when victim is black?"
What he writes is factually misleading. Kane twists reality to fit his warped view of Milwaukee as a crucible of racism.
Not surprisingly, Kane whines that people are expressing outrage over the murder of Scott Huggins because he was white. He argues that when the victims of violence are black, it doesn't elicit the same sort of angry reaction.
Of course, that's crap.
Kane writes:
When you're gone for a week on vacation, you don't figure things will change that fast.
But apparently the city of Milwaukee became a much scarier place since I left.
It seems Milwaukee is suddenly much more frightening to some people because of a shocking daytime crime. No, it wasn't the death of Prentice Barnes, a van driver killed by random gunfire near N. 39th and W. Center streets at eleven o'clock in the morning.
My March 13 column lamented that an innocent man could get killed in his own neighborhood at 11 a.m. and suggested daytime crime had become an unsettling reality for those who live in the city.
But Barnes' shooting didn't set off the same amount of hand-wringing as the death of Scott Huggins, the boxing coach from Waukesha. Barnes was African-American; Huggins was white.
If you think that has nothing to do with the reaction to any of this, it's probably good I'm back from vacation to clear things up.
When I heard Huggins was shot at a gas station at W. Capitol Drive and N. Sherman Blvd., it reminded me of all the times I've visited a morning radio talk show at WMCS-AM (1290), right across the street from where Huggins was killed.
For those of us who regularly travel the central city, the possibility of crime and violence is always a daunting reality. But if you travel the central city regularly, you also know Capitol Drive and Sherman Blvd. is not the typical scene for a daytime murder.
I also realized upon hearing the story that since Huggins was white, it would be a bigger deal than most crime in our city.
That's how I view all this overheated talk about an allegedly deadlier Milwaukee all of a sudden, described by doomsayers as a fearsome place with streets so violent, it's time to call in the National Guard. It makes me wonder if the routine police blotter of death in the central city simply never registered until the victim was a white suburbanite.
A few things--
Kane mocks the notion that Milwaukee is a scarier place in a week's time.
I believe that it gets scarier everyday. There's a cumulative effect, with each violent incident contributing to that awakening.
Kane suggests that Alderman Bob Donovan's idea to use the National Guard to help restore and maintain order in the city was prompted by Huggins' murder.
Obviously, Kane has time line issues. It's a careless error that exposes his agenda, which is to stir up controversy and get under the skin of white Milwaukee residents.
It's a pathetic cry for attention. (Yes, I realize that I'm giving it to him by commenting about his column, but his race-baiting can't go unanswered.)
Kane goes on:
Sadly, there was a brief opportunity to extract some hope out of Huggins' death. Police reported unprecedented support from African-American witnesses to help find the culprits, including two young bystanders who stayed by Huggins' side during his final minutes. Daniel Carter, the black Milwaukee County sheriff's deputy who caught the 16-year-old suspect, also deserves praise. But few have gotten around to it, seeing how they were too busy proclaiming Milwaukee a new murder capital.
That's flat-out wrong. It's another example of Kane altering reality to fit his template.
The people who helped to apprehend the Huggins' murderer, Antonio Jones, were proclaimed as heroes and role models.
I don't play the usual game in town that calls for quick response to a white death while a black death just reaffirms the black community's violent dysfunction. I also don't pay much attention to frightened suburbanites who vow never to visit the central city because of reported violence. Frankly, some of these folks didn't need a shooting to steer them away.
What's clear is the people who want to make Huggins a martyr for all the wrong reasons are the same ones for whom Barnes' death didn't register a blip.
That kind of thinking does make this a scary place.
And exactly what sort of game does Kane play?
Check out his highlight reel here and here.
His irresponsible accusations are, I believe, intentionally divisive. I know uniters. Uniters are friends of mine. Kane is no uniter.
He enjoys being a lightning rod.
But enough about Kane, the egomaniac and hypocrite.
What's most disturbing is Kane's complacency.
Instead of writing a column about the pressing need to take back the streets of Milwaukee from the thugs, he chastises the people wanting to do exactly that.
Kane is not part of the solution. He's part of the problem.
No comments:
Post a Comment