Saturday, March 31, 2007
'A brazen daylight attack'
The latest city shootings -- coverage here, here and here -- is beyond shocking. I can't get this quote from a local reverend out of my mind:
I fear it really has come to this. ... As for the Guardian Angels, I know they're publicity hounds. I know they'll largely be ineffective. But there's also something inside me that admires their almost foolish unarmed patrols. Have they ever been accused of dodging dangerous patrol routes? Just wondering. I know I wouldn't want to do what they're doing. There is an element of bravery to what they're doing. ... Then there's what I'd call the Weird Barometer Effect: Their mere appearance indicates that we've hit desperate times. Jack Levin, director of the Brudnick Center on Violence at Northeastern University, seems to agree:
The latest city shootings -- coverage here, here and here -- is beyond shocking. I can't get this quote from a local reverend out of my mind:
Shooting someone in the middle of the day like this, they are saying, ‘I don’t care who sees me, I am going to smoke this person and I dare someone to rat on me.'
I fear it really has come to this. ... As for the Guardian Angels, I know they're publicity hounds. I know they'll largely be ineffective. But there's also something inside me that admires their almost foolish unarmed patrols. Have they ever been accused of dodging dangerous patrol routes? Just wondering. I know I wouldn't want to do what they're doing. There is an element of bravery to what they're doing. ... Then there's what I'd call the Weird Barometer Effect: Their mere appearance indicates that we've hit desperate times. Jack Levin, director of the Brudnick Center on Violence at Northeastern University, seems to agree:
It is a sad state of affairs that we have to shame the goverment and local residents into doing what they should’ve done anyway.
