From: Mark Clement <MClement@bruderhof.com>
Date: Tue, 21 Dec 1999 09:06:53 -0500
FROM MUMIA ABU-JAMAL
HAULING IN THE HOMELESS
Column Written 12/8/99
Mumia Abu-Jamal
All Rights Reserved
The law in its majestic equality forbids the rich as well as the poor to
sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread. - Anatole
France (1844-1924) French writer
As the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the NADSDAQ (National
Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations) reach daily record
levels, and as every major media outlet boasts about the "booming economy,"
the problem of homelessness abounds.
A recent TV network report claimed that in New York City alone, over
400,000 people were millionaires, and that a bare handful of city residents
have annual incomes that exceed that of several nations.
In the midst of this unprecedented wealth, in one of the wealthiest
nations on earth, lies harrowing, soul-devouring poverty, and even
homelessness.
In a response that gives a whole new meaning to the term
"draconian," New York's mayor, Rudolph Giuliani, announced the city's plans
to toss thousands of women, children and men out of city-run shelters, and
into cold, wintry NYC streets. Those found to be homeless in the streets
will find a new place to stay-Riker's Island prison!
And to those who dare seek refuge in the shelters, they are forced
to work in what is essentially slave labor, or their children would be
snatched away from them and placed in foster homes! Giuliani, in classic
autocrat fashion, has criminalized homelessness! With the small-minded
nastiness of more prison warden than political leader, Giuliani has chosen
to banish or browbeat the homeless. Banish them from the streets, or
browbeat them into accepting jobs no one else wants, under threat of prison,
or under fear of the seizure of one's child.
For these homeless poor, this is not an "economic boom," but a time
of gripping terror. If homelessness is a crime, it is one committed by a
system that does not fairly distribute social wealth, does not educate poor
youth, nor provide decent social services. In a nation where capital is the
greatest possible attainment, poverty is the greatest possible offense. To
the ruthless Il Duce Giuliani the homeless poor are to be put in prison, for
daring to mar city streets, and better a jail cell than a homeless shelter,
for there one feeds the prison industrial complex. This is Rudy's job
application to the ruling class, as he gives rein to his unbridled ambition.
But, there is a malevolent method to Rudy's madness, for, as mayor
of the capital of capital, the interests of big business are paramount. It
was these interests that pushed for so-called "welfare reform" (meaning
abolition of welfare), and are pushing the slave labor angle on the
homeless. Why? Scholars Frances Fox Piven and Richard A. Cloward in the
New Class War (Pantheon, 1982/1985) made the point that welfare strengthened
labor's hand:
If the desperation of the unemployed is moderated by the
availability of various benefits, they will be less eager to take any job on
any terms.... In short...there is an emerging recognition among analysts of
all political persuasions that the income-maintenance programs have weakened
capital's ability to depress wages by means of economic insecurity,
especially by means of manipulating the relative numbers of people searching
for work. In effect, these programs have altered the terms of struggle
between business and labor. As a result, unemployment has lost some of its
terrors, both for the unemployed and for those currently working [pp. 26,
31].
With those programs gone (or going) the terrors represented by the homeless
serves to discipline and curb the anxious working class, which is what Rudy
means to do.
İMAJ
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FROM MUMIA ABU-JAMAL
PURVEYERS OF VIOLENCE?
Column Written 12/14/99
Mumia Abu-Jamal
All Rights Reserved
The system will point guns at people and say that it is in
defense of the system. People can point guns at the system and it is seen
as wrong, leading people to believe that when the system points guns at
people it is in the right of defense but when folks point guns at the system
it is in defense of nothing....
-- John Africa The Judge's Letter
According to published reports, the planned meeting of the World
Trade Organization (WTO) was "marred by violence," wreaked by "thugs,"
"anarchists" and "hooligans." The danger of such mainstream media reports,
however, is in the reliance upon police, and government, sources to prepare
such material. In a mass action such as the Seattle anti-WTO marches,
police are hardly neutral sources, for they are, in essence, combatants.
Isn't it simply fair to present both sides?
Jim Desyllas, a college student from Portland, reported via pay
phone to Internet typists who sent his observations around the world. His
eyewitness account is, to say the least, enlightening. The following are
excerpts:
...[T]he government instigated a "riot" to discredit the movement
against the WTO because they couldn't dilute it. I am not guessing about
this. I was there. I saw it happening. And I will tell you I am frankly
shocked to see, close up, just how little our leaders care what happens to
ordinary people. Clinton can pose and speak a lot of flowery stuff but the
truth is we are nothing to them. I saw this with my own eyes....
Desyllas' report, dated late November and early December 1999,
recounts the "aggressive non-violence" of the anti-WTO marchers, and
compares the single breaking of a McDonald's storefront window favorably to
what occurs at a "typical rock concert." Police used that instance to
launch their attacks against the people:
A small group, maybe 100 people total, struck back. Then these cops
herded that group around the city, making sure there were plenty of photo
ops of "violent protesters." A number of times they had these 100 or so
protesters caught between buildings and walls of police. They could easily
have arrested and detained this small number of people and gotten it over
with. Instead they would gas them and let them go.... When you gas a
person, let me tell you, it gets them fighting mad. Tuesday night the
police gassed all of downtown. This was going on from 3 p.m. till 6 p.m.
Gas everywhere. The kids broke a few windows-McD's, Starbucks-small
stuff-burned a few garbage cans. The police were using these people as
extras. It was staged. I believe also the police had their own people in
there, encouraging people to break stuff. If people think I may be
exaggerating, I saw supposed protesters-they were screaming and so on-and
then later, when everything was over, the same people tackled other
protestors and put handcuffs on them.
I bet this report didn't get covered in the corporate media, huh?
Meanwhile, protestors, even those who were "aggressively nonviolent" were
violently gassed, kicked, beat and shot by "peace officers." Is a "rubber"
bullet a nonviolent bullet? People in Northern Ireland certainly don't
think so, for there, 14 people were killed-7 children-by "rubber" bullets.
In Seattle, Desyllas witnessed a cop shoot a man in the mouth, breaking out
his front teeth. Do you remember a headline, a TV story, or a radio report
calling these violent cops "thugs" or "hooligans"? I thought not. How then
can the corporate media be trusted? And who is truly "violent"-one who
attacks property, or those who hurt people?
Similarly, wire reports claimed a "minor explosion" in Zurich was
caused by a so-called Mumia Support Group there. Doesn't this sound
familiar?
What's the point of this? It ain't in our interest, and sounds
suspiciously like state efforts to undermine a popular, nonviolent movement.
Moreover, bombs ain't our way, but it is the way of the state, as shown in
Iraq, in Sudan, in Afghanistan, and in Philadelphia in 1985. This system
viciously bombed babies on May 13, 1985 with utter impunity-not
buildings-but the bodies of babies, and calls us "violent"?
Kids in Seattle break half a dozen windows and the media labels all
protestors as "violent." Cops beat, gas, shoot and kick several hundred
people, and the media reports they "acted with restraint." Cops masquerade
as protestors, and the media is silent. This same media reports a group
most of us have never heard of detonated a "minor explosion" in Zurich.
Sounds like the latest incarnation of Cointelpro, doesn't it?
Our belief is not in bombs, but as you read these words bombs are
still being dropped by U.S. planes over Iraq, not on buildings, but on
people. To quote Dr. Martin Luther King, America is "the greatest purveyor
of violence in the world today."
İMAJ 1999
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