Commentary & Opinion

Opinion essays and letters from our readers.
Posted inCommentary & Opinion

RAM “Riverwest Anti-Nigger Movement”

by Editor

by Tanya Cromartie-Twaddle / photo by Tess Reiss

Even the ugliest things in this world serve a purpose. RAM’s pathetic attempt to incite unrest, fear, and racial division served a higher good. The race war didn’t happen. There are too many good souls in Riverwest. We know better. This ugly episode has brought many diverse members of our community closer together. Several of us are having the much-needed sensitive conversations, taking action, and committing ourselves to improving the quality of life in our neighborhood for ALL.

Posted inEditorials

Hate In The Box

by Editor

by Vince Bushell

It seems as if recently Riverwesters have been channeling Germany in the late ’30s with Maxists fighting Nazis. Racism has raised it’s ugly head and the Wobblies are trying to chop it off. The IWW, Industrial Workers of the World (Wobblies) are far left, and the Creativity Movement, which claims to be a “Church” is about as racist as you can get.

Posted inCommentary & Opinion

Everyman a Murderer

by Editor

by Heimito von Doderer

“Just consider the almost heroic modesty that is involved in a man’s applying his mental force to the attainment of a single goal: to be able wholly to assent, without excepting anything, without wanting to change anything. To offer a counterpoise to all things within the self. To be able to feel as a matter of deep and real experience that this world is always in order, always hung

correctly on its hinges. And thus in the end we may attain, without whole personalities, a knowledge and a capacity already possessed by every loafer who stands leaning against a fence and who from the start sees the world just as it is, though it may be that he only sees it from below, sees it squirming on its belly through the mud. . . . “

Posted inCommentary & Opinion

Police Against Peace: An Open Letter to Chief Jones

by Editor

by Dasha Kelly

I am writing you this letter to make you aware of an egregious insult and disservice your officers of the 7th District levied against the City’s young people last week. . . . In support of their efforts, Mecca assisted with media relations for the event and extended our venue for an under-21 “after party” and fundraiser later that evening. When I arrived to unlock the building for Teen Poetry at 7 p.m., however, a police officer (Sgt. Marshall) was waiting for me. He said that Cpt. Ruzinski had instructed him to “make sure this [event] doesn’t happen.”