“The St. Louis Republic for July 3 (1917) ran
the headline ‘100 Slain, 500 Hurt in Race Riot. 6 E. St. Louis Blocks Burned by
Mob to Wipe Out Blacks.’ The police and National Guard, rather than attempt to
stop the violence, joined in.” (Miles, Barry. Call Me Burroughs; A Life).
“The violence plaguing
Chicago made international headlines after a violent and bloody fourth of July
Weekend – 102 Shot, 14 Fatally, in Chicago over July 4 Holiday Weekend…” (ABC 7
News, July 5, 2017).
One hundred years
later, not much has changed. We have elected a racist, male chauvinistic,
morally reprehensible authoritarian to office who has made a mockery of the presidency
and legitimized an already present culture of racism and intolerance, bringing
it once again out from under the umbrella of political correctness to the
forefront of our consciousness. The oppression and abuse of women and persons
of color is not only acceptable all over the United States, it is often even
encouraged or ignored by officials who are supposed to be protecting the rights
and safety people in America. Every day, I hear stories of hate crimes against
women, persons of color and members of the LGBTQ community; and these are just
the instances we hear of. Many women do not report crimes committed against
them, particularly sexual assault, because rather than being treated like the
victim that they are, they are treated like the criminal. They are interrogated
at length and made to feel as though they are at fault for what happened to
them. The rights of a man always take priority over the rights of women. In
states such as North Carolina, the man has the right to finish even if the
woman has revoked consent. The general climate of the world is that what a man
wants is far more important than what a woman wants. Persons of color and
members of the LGBTQ community face the same fate. They often do not report
crimes against them because they are afraid of deportation (in the case of
immigrants), afraid of being treated as the criminal instead of as the victim,
afraid of additional abuse at the hands of the authorities who are supposed to
be protecting them, etc. The Trump Administration is bit by bit stripping
women, non-white persons, LGBTQ persons and the poor of their rights, their
dignity and their access to healthcare. Local authorities, particularly the
police, are often guilty of joining in on this social injustice. Daily, I hear
of people, usually black, who are abused and even killed by police officers.
Many of these victims of police brutality are unarmed. A recent example that
really sticks out in my head is a young Asian man who was just one day away
from graduating from high school and was killed by police officers who thought
he had a knife. He had a pen.
One hundred years
later, following this excerpt chronicled in this biography of William S. Burroughs,
we are still dealing with this stupidity. We have not progressed. If anything,
we have regressed.
Just nine years before
I was born, it was illegal for my parents to be together. Technically, it would
have been illegal for me to be born. Nine years! Forty years later, I still see
rampant racism and stupidity. I see people cross streets or move farther away
from people because they’re not white. I am frequently seen out in public with
a Mexican and though he and I are the same race (except that I’m half white and
look white), we get stared at a lot. People will even turn around in their
seats just to stare at us. Occasionally people even say stupid shit to us. For
example, someone I used to work with said to me “you should stick with your own
race and age group”. One hundred years after the beginning quote, this is still
a thing. When are we going to, as a nation, grow up?
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