By Matt Rooney | The Save Jersey Blog
You’d be hard pressed to find a place more in need of a genuinely positive populist uprising than Camden, New Jersey.
The notoriously devastated former industrial hub of just under 80,000 souls is also a textbook example of how Big Government ideology — public housing, the welfare state, teacher’s unions, etc. and so on — have failed our society’s most vulnerable members. We write about it on an almost weekly basis here at Save Jersey. Someone needs to.
The most frustrating part of the fight? For those of us who are invested in seeing South Jersey be great again?
Misdirected energies. This month’s tragic circumstances surrounding the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement is illustrative.
Imagine if every soul protesting the police this morning instead teamed up with police to chase drug dealers from neighborhood street corners?
Paint the classrooms of a local public school or volunteer for after-school tutoring programs?
Engage local campaigns for public office?
Join a mentoring program at a nearby house of worship?
Civil Disobedience is appropriate when there aren’t any proactive options (e.g. the government is denying you the right to vote). That isn’t the case here; most of these protesters WANT to be angry. Someone with that attitude can’t be helped until they change their attitude and come to the table ready to work.
A good place to start?
Upending the political superstructure that’s playing a decisive role in holding Camden back. Camden Parking Authority executive director Willie Hunter is a small but well-paid part of that superstructure.
On Monday, Philly.com reported that the politically-connected Democrat bureaucrat recently received a $18,000 raise, bringing his annual gross salary to $115,000, thousands more than the city’s mayor.
It’s all part of a pattern. Back in 2010, Mayor Dana Redd moved to double her aides’ salaries.
Democracy? Nope. Camden is a kleptocracy.
And I’m going to go out on a limb here and suggest to you, the discriminating student of N.J. politics and human nature reading this post, that the institutional corruption afflicting Camden and hundreds of similar locales across the country is a MUCH bigger impediment to the prosperity and general well-being of the black community than the occasional (and yes, statistically, it’s extremely rare) racially-motivated police shooting.
Facts don’t come in colors, Save Jerseyans, and the facts attendant to these situations have little to do with police violence and a lot to do with decades of cumulative failures.
There are some great people on the ground in Camden who care. There’s no doubt about that. They’re laboring in the vineyard. Still, we all know that ‘caring’ isn’t enough. Pushing against a door in the wrong direction, however firmly or honestly, is a waste of time.
So when will Black Lives Matter — or something like it — stop pointing fingers outward, take actual accountability for the community, rise up and hold the Dana Redd’s and Willie Hunter’s of our wold accountable?
Perhaps never. That’s kind of the point; only the people who feel marginalized have it within their power to make a difference here. What I know: until it happens, folks, all of the marches, and rock-throwing, and cute hashtagging is an exercise in futility for everyone involved.
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