No Place for Kids
On any given night in the U.S., there are approximately 60,500 youth confined in juvenile correctional facilities or other residential programs. Photographer Richard Ross has spent the past five years criss-crossing the country photographing the architecture, cells, classrooms and inhabitants of these detention sites. The resulting photo-survey, Juvenile-In-Justice, documents 350 facilities in over 30 states. It’s more than a peek into unseen worlds — it is a call to action and care.
- A 12-year-old in his cell at the Harrison County Juvenile Detention Center in Biloxi, Mississippi. The window has been boarded up from the outside. The facility is operated by Mississippi Security Police, a private company. In 1982, a fire killed 27 prisoners and an ensuing lawsuit against the authorities forced them to reduce their population to maintain an 8:1 inmate to staff ratio.
“I grew up in a world where you solve problems, you don’t destroy a population,” says Ross. “To me it is an affront when I see the way some of these kids are dealt with.”
The U.S. locks up children at more than six times the rate of all other developed nations. The over 60,000 average daily juvenile lockups, a figure estimated by the Annie E. Casey Foundation (AECF), are also disproportionately young people of colour. With an average cost of $80,000 per year to lock up a child, the U.S. spends more than $5 billion annually on youth detention.
On top of the cost, in its recent report No Place for Kids, the AECF presents evidence to show that youth incarceration does not reduce recidivism rates, does not benefit public safety and exposes those imprisoned to further abuse and violence.
Ross thinks his images of juvenile lock-ups can, and should, be “ammunition” for the on-going policy and funding debates between reformers, staff, management and law-makers. “My images were used by a senate subcommittee as part of a discussion on Federal legislation to prevent pre-adjudicated, detained [pre-trial] juveniles from being housed with kids who’d committed hard crimes. You shouldn’t house these populations together,” says Ross. “That’s a great thing for me to know that my work is being used for advocacy rather than for the masturbatory art world I grew up in.” Read on and see more of the photos…
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about 1 year ago
Stupid American people.
Why do you have to lock up children for minor crimes? In my Country there is no way you could get into a “children prosin” for crimes like smooking, underage drinking, running away from home etc… these are not REAL crimes…. My Country is not a nice place because of public debt but maybe the law is still “normal”. i mean you won’t get into a prison if you download a movie or some songs…
Sorry for my English I’m Hungarian.
about 1 year ago
Our politicians got a little “lock-em-up crazy” with both adults and kids about ten to fifteen years ago. They called it “zero tolerance” for any crime – and then they extended it to any misbehavior as long as they could find a way to legally criminalize it. Fortunately, attitudes are starting to change, partly because they’ve figured out that the lock-em-up strategy is too expensive, and doesn’t work anyway. Now, to get all the thuggish army wannabes out of our police forces and regain some sense of normalcy and balance.
about 1 year ago
Oh! Look, the kid’s black. Surprise, surprise. The old southern racism is gone, right? But it is still alive and well in the INjustice system.
about 1 year ago
Well, what to do Dan?
In the UK we do try our hardest to keep racism down. It is very dificult. But even with our real minority population with ‘black’ ethnicity it is a hard fact that a hugely increasing and disproportionate section of our prison populations are ‘black’. I find that amazing but it is true. Why ‘black’ over and above any other immigrant group of which the South Asians would be predominant.
I have read about a growing concern that black youth eagerly tap in to their home grown culture of Rap extolling violence plus a male imagery of gaining fast bucks from crime and despising education.
Racism exists in the UK but I don’t think that there is a blanket overtly suppressing ‘blacks’.
So just why are they at the bottom of the pile?
I have no idea… it is outside of any experience of mine.
about 1 year ago
What to do? Look, it’s not so much the people that are racists. Yes, a lot are but it’s not the majority. It is the judicial system that is racist. So, what to do? Change the judicial system. Force them to stop profiling blacks simply because they are black.
An other point. Blacks have lots of problems finding jobs because they are stuck with often not deserved criminal records, some from when they were still kids. It is the judicial system that causes the situation, not the blacks. In case you were wondering if I’m biased, I’m white.
about 1 year ago
I think the deepest root cause of why racism against African-Americans is so virulent in America is our history of slavery, which, of course, was entirely racist. It was illegal to enslave any other race, even when slavery was at its height. Our anti-black racism is a subtle, deep-rooted type of blame the victim. It allows us to avoid coming to real terms with our history.
Another reason racism has persisted so long in America is how deeply institutionalized it has been. Before our Civil War of course, it was a legal institution. After Emancipation, however, it was just converted into the economic equivalent of slavery with the Jim Crow laws. After the Civil Rights movement got rid of legalized Jim Crow, the prison system was still available as an institutionalized racist system. The racist politicians passed a lot of “get tough with crime” laws, knowing that they would lock up a much higher percentage of blacks than whites. Notice that almost no American politician ever advocated “getting tough” on white collar crime.
Another, lesser cause of our racism is that it is simply learned. It is passed on from generation to generation, until finally the smarter children figure out that “something isn’t right about this”.
Finally, American racism has been used by the powerfully wealthy as a way to pit white low paid workers against black low paid workers, so the wealthy could exploit both. Our current national insanity called the Republican Party, is very much the wealthy exploiting a racist subculture that is driven absolutely bonkers because our current President is a smart, incredibly competent black man that embodies all the values they claim to aspire to, much better than they do. He has risen from poverty through hard work. He is a faithful and loving family man. And he is a better Christian than they ever will be. They are driven absolutely insane by these facts.
about 1 year ago
:)
A lot of this sounds correct to me too…….
about 1 year ago
It’s not just racism, the actual crime rate amongst blacks is higher. No surprise, since poor people of all races get little early childhood education or even a decent family life. That affects them for the rest of their lives. Until the poor black community has some economic opportunity, better education, better family lives, and an improved attitude toward the world, the jails will be filled primarily with poor blacks. That’s not to say that racist cops don’t arrest more blacks than whites for the same offenses. There are plenty of those miscreants out there.
about 1 year ago
there’s a lot of racism to it:
http://www.allgov.com/Top_Stories/ViewNews/Black_Americans_Given_Longer_Sentences_than_White_Americans_for_Same_Crimes_120204
about 1 year ago
Jails should be reserved for the pathologically violent, who simply can’t exist within society, and for serious white collar criminals, who truly have no excuse for their crimes. All other crime could be handled much better through other means, such as house detention and monitoring. That is certainly true about underage offenders.
about 1 year ago
I agree Scott. I have long said that America would be better off if it eliminated 90% of its prisons. The fact of the matter is that most people in prison don’t belong there.
about 1 year ago
Funny that I only live less than 15 miles from the detention center shown in the picture above.
about 1 year ago
In the school system where I live, it takes only one offense, only one, to land a kid in one of these facilities. It it doesn’t matter how minor, how negligible. It’s up to the teacher’s discretion whether the kid gets sent away. And around here, a sentence has to be at least 30 days. And while these kids are in, it take only one minor, negligible offense to extend their sentences. And then, as statistics will tell you, they will probably spend their teen and adult lives in and out of prison. It’s heartbreaking, if that is an adequate enough word to use.
Oh, did I mention that most of these would be inmates are of minorities and male? I think someone already mentioned the race factor. I thought it bared mentioning again though.
I hope these photos prompt change, but let’s be realistic. Our politicians care nothing of the people that elected them. And kids? Oh, they care even less about kids since they can’t milk much money out of them.
about 1 year ago
It’s the downside of society, isn’t it? I don’t think the prison system works and I often think one is just hitting the pause button on criminals and they will come out armed with new tricks of the trade. The problem is that I don’t think rehabilitation works either. This creates the problem of what do we do with criminals? There has to appear to be justice for the victim or there is no need for the police of the justice system and, without it, criminals would wish they were in prison because it would give rise to the vigilante apocalypse. People would take the law into their own hands. People always complain about the problems with things but they never come up with a better solution. What’s the alternative to prison? Do you believe rehabilitation works?
about 1 year ago
“Do you believe rehabilitation works?” It would depend on what you mean by rehabilitation. Most of the time we are actually talking about habilitation as there is seldom anything RE about it. Many of these kids come from completely unstructured homes with no set meal times (or regular meals),bed times, homework time, and they often do not have any real expectations or responsibilities placed upon them. And the parents are often a cut of the same cloth. In fact, most of these kids come from fatherless homes with over indulgent. rescuing single mothers. And the kids often come from whole communities and a culture where such a life style has been the norm for generations where welfare and crime is a way of life.
The question remains, what do we do?
about 1 year ago
What you describe is little more than a cliché. Most kids growing up in exactly these kind of homes you describe become fine people. What you are doing is stereotyping. I disagree with you completely.
about 1 year ago
Bruce,
I agree with Straight Shooter. Your “analysis” is just a list of tired, false stereotypes that are mostly a justification of avoiding the problems. Your final question sums up the problem completely, but not in the way you think. By just ending with “what do we do?”, you imply that there is no solution. But there are plenty of solutions that have worked incredibly well, both in the United States and in other countries. Why don’t we, as a nation, even discuss what has worked to solve our problems of crime, poverty, prejudice, and race? The reason, of course, is that we, as a nation, don’t want to solve these problems. We want to blame the victim. As a nation, we hate our poor, in a way not seen in very many other countries.
If you really want an answer to “what do we do?”, just look north to Canada, across the pond to northern Europe, or to Japan. Their criminal systems, and social safety net systems generally work quite well (no social policies can be perfect, of course). By almost every objective measure, they are more effective and more cost efficient than our systems.
If our prison and social safety net systems don’t work well, it is not a fault of the criminals or the poor. It is the fault of the American electorate — the majority of voters with the wealth and power to actually change the system — that doesn’t even talk or think about real solutions.
about 1 year ago
Bruce,
If you really want an example solution try this:
Because our American school funding is mostly based on local property taxes, the system perpetuates underfunded schools in poor neighborhoods, and therefore poverty. Simple solution: change to a different, broader, state-wide tax base, with strict controls that the funds are distributed at least evenly, or better yet, a greater proportion of funds to the schools with students who “do not have any real expectations or responsibilities placed upon them”. If you really want “those people” to work themselves out of poverty, good schools are certainly an important part of the solution.
Right wingers, of course, will just yell that “the schools are failing” and that I’m “just advocating throwing more money at the problem”. But the rich suburban school districts, with their high property values and therefore high funding rates, seem to be capable of creating good schools. They brag about how good their schools are.
My solution, of course, is a redistribution of funds from wealthy neighborhoods to poor neighborhoods, or alternatively, increasing the tax rates to bring up the poor neighborhood schools to the quality of the wealthy neighborhoods. And that, of course, is why my simple, effective solution will be immediately shouted down. And yet, the very people that will shout down this solution yell the loudest that the poor should “work their way out of poverty”. They want to shift all the responsibility to the poor, no matter how many additional hindrances they add to their burden. If “getting families out of they cycle of poverty” is really one of your values, aren’t good schools an important part of that?
The real problem here, of course, is that right wing Americans simply don’t want to pay for real solutions, no matter how simple and effective.
about 1 year ago
Yes, good schools certainly are an important part of the solution and often underutilized and underappreciated. Their funding is always being cut yet the schools are the front line dealing with kids and families at risk more so than any other helping profession. School based outreach services are most often productive but are sadly limited. This is an area that really needs to improve.
I am also in favor of school based social work that would represent an education perspective in the writing of quarterly reports, incident reports, needs and services plans, discharge reports, termination reports etc. all of which is reviewed by the Court. The school based social worker has a unique frame of reference to share within the overall network of human services.
about 1 year ago
Just what we don’t need! Paper pushing social engineers are nothing more than control freaks.
about 1 year ago
Well Little Lord WTF,you do make sense.I’ve readed so may complaints and no solutions. Someone said that the parents are working two or so jobs to pay the bills,but I been in this system for 37 years and a good number of these hard working [parent] are hard at work waiting for their Goverment check. They took DISCIPLINE out of the public school system.Now there is no respect for their teachers and no respect for adults period.I’ve found that city schools are much worst then those outside the city.I’am not sure if it is because the outsiders may come from a better family upbring,or there system is a better system.I went to a private school where if you did somthing wrong you got punished,and if that didn’t work you got kick out,and the your parents would deal with you.They where spending good bucks for this private school and you go and you young ass kick out.My father would have kick my ass,but that’s not sparing the rod,is it.
about 1 year ago
I made a mistake on my next to the last line.It is suppose to read [and you go and get your young ass kick out]Sorry.
about 1 year ago
Unfortunately even following your amendment it would still not be correct English, but I guess with a little more discipline on your part you might even – some day – start to get spelling, punctuation and grammar correct.
about 1 year ago
Thank you. I’ve been trying to tell him that for months now (to the point that I sometimes can’t even understand what he’s trying to say). I guess it may take a German or someone from another non-English country to point this out to him. :-)
But “discipline” (none or too much) works both ways — some teachers and administrators seem to think the “iron hand from the bible” IS their answer to everything.
about 1 year ago
For those of you in New York City this Sunday, there is a film some may wish to see. Here are the details:
ONE LAST SHOT
Directed by Lauren Patrice Nadler
A teenage boy tries to reverse some bullying incidents
that haunt him at school before it’s too late.
STOP THE BULLYING
Sunday April 15th @ 6pm
tickets $6 at the door
Anthology Film Archives
32 Second Avenue (near E. 2nd St.)
about 1 year ago
Damn the us law system is getting crazier by the minute.
And it was mad already 20 years ago …
Idk . i loved people and the us in many ways , but the constant confrontational fear and experience with cops , just does not happen in northern europe.
Oh shucks … hope it gets better at some point.
about 1 year ago
@Bruce Tharp… your comment makes you sound like a bigoted elitist.
about 1 year ago
I think your assessment of Bruce is a bit harsh. I agree that the US judiciary is way out of whack when it comes to children, but I think it is a symptom of a greater problem. In my own personal experience, I have known kids that have been severely disadvantaged by exactly the things Bruce describes, and it’s difficult to believe that poorly structured family lives do not have a negative influence on them. I have seen many situations first hand, where children left uneducated and unprepared for life, grow up to bear children of their own and repeat the same mistakes, or worse. Left unchecked, these problems grow exponentially and reverberate throughout society. Understanding this doesn’t make Bruce an elitist or a bigot, just observant.
More people need to get angry enough about this, to start doing things that make a difference.
about 1 year ago
The statistics for the human wrecks emerging from the middle and high income groups (so-called “proper families”) are as bad or worse than those outlined by Bruce. Those with money are better able to cloak their problems… hide them from public scrutiny.
about 1 year ago
You’ll get no arguement from me there. I make no distinction between the social strata in that regard. I am not sure I agree that it’s any worse among mid to high-income groups. I think people are people and money only seems to amplify the family dynamic, for good AND for ill.
about 1 year ago
Dashiell
I’m specifically interested in your statement “these problems grow exponentially and reverberate throughout society”. I don’t think this is true. Neglectful parents and poorly structured families are a problem in all classes of society, and have been a problem throughout history. Is the problem really worse in our American ghettos than it was in Dickens’ London? How well would the typical American middle class mother raise her kids if her income was reduced to poverty levels, and she was forced to move to a neighborhood full of drugs, crime, violence, and underfunded schools?
Focusing on a specific subset of the overall problem as an example (but it is the example that most American’s seem to pay attention to) — there are hundreds of thousands of single black mothers trying to raise their teenage sons to be strong, responsible men amid negative influences that would overwhelm just about anyone. Why don’t we celebrate those women? Why aren’t we willing to give them as much help as they need? Why don’t we, as Americans, ever talk about them, instead of the mostly fictitious “poverty transmitting”, “welfare queen” mother?
about 1 year ago
You are making the assumption that I am speaking entirely about a specific strata or community, but I think that’s my fault, I should have been more clear. I agree with you on all points. I meant, very broadly, that wherever you encounter neglectful parents and poor education, you can see how it ripples throughout the children’s lives.
That point made, I do believe that poverty breeds poverty. I’m no statistician, so the only evidence I can attest to is purely anecdotal, based on personal experience. In my work with at-risk youth (representing all social strata), I have seen in at least four families now, three generations. where children have repeated the mistakes of their parents. It seems to grow worse with each generation.
In my work, I have also seen many strong, single parents, struggling to raise intelligent, confident and self-sufficient children. For the life of me, I don’t understand why we, as a society of media consumers, don’t celebrate those kind of achievements rather than obsess about Snooky’s pregnancy (gag) or buzzing about the latest celebrity flame-out.
about 1 year ago
The educational system creates more problems than it solves just as overly engaged parents are usually a worse nightmare than neglectful ones. And yes, your evidence is anecdotal. I’m glad you are aware of that.
about 1 year ago
We’re pretty much in agreement, Dashiell.
about 1 year ago
Thank you so very much,TAZJIN for your vote of confidence.Bare with me for you see I come from a young country and I guess I have a lot too learn,as you come from a much older country absence of war or strife.
about 1 year ago
This is HORRIBLE……
……….but it’s better than Cuba, South Africa, Nigeria, Brazil. Venazuela, Turkey, India, Pakistan, Russia and France.
about 1 year ago
Cuba? France?
It’s true that Cuba has a very poor record on political prisoners but what has that got to do with youth offenders?
And, why France? Where is the adverse comparison with the USA there?
about 1 year ago
congrats, you’re slightly better than a bunch of third world countries, you can be so proud of yourself you wannabe leaders of the world!
about 1 year ago
I think even more sinister than the “lock ‘em all up” attitude that pervades many aspects of American society, is the fact that there are corporations and individuals growing obscenely wealthy by pandering to that attitude.
Unlike most nations, incarceration has become a growth industry in the private sector, with corrections companies lobbying governments, federal, state, and local, that they provide the solution to the problem of expensive detention facilities.
These same companies, having secured fat contacts to build and administer lockups, then lobby the government to alter the criminal code, labeling it “getting tough on crime”. They get paid on a per-person basis, and if they can convince lawmakers that keeping their facilities stuffed to the gills with “criminals” will be beneficial to their re-election prospects(while keeping the companies’ bottom lines fat), so much the better.
One need only look as far as Pennsylvania, from just a couple years ago, where companies running private juvenile detention centers were caught kicking back money to Juvenile Court judges; the judges would then sentence kids to stints in those centers for the smallest offense, often extending sentences several times, without due process-all in the name of a healthy profit margin.
The Arizona law S.B.1070, the infamous “papers, please” law, was written with the help of a private corrections company that had just won contracts in that state to build/maintain facilities meant to detain illegal aliens. The law was supported not merely by company-funded lobbyists, but members of Arizona governor Brewer’s cabinet, with ties to the same corrections company, used their considerable influence to get the law passed.
Follow the money…
about 1 year ago
Uptempo, this is exactly what is happening. The same is going on in the pharmaceutical industry getting therapists to push their ghastly expensive drugs. Almost all of modern psychiatry has become little more than a drug pushing operation. This is the “re” in what they call rehabilitation. A doped up, spaced out populace that is easy to control. And if they don’t comply, there are the industrial prisons to take care of you.
about 1 year ago
Absolutely spot-on, Mister Uptempo.
about 1 year ago
Mister Uptempo, you have hit the nail on the head. Your analysis is magnificent.
about 1 year ago
For all the understanding on this board and I suppose it’s a reflection of all the ‘normal’ Americans out there… Where are your protest groups and activists?
It’s astonishing that American politics remains stuck in immaturity embracing the 1950s, cloning McCarthy and so on. The grip that screwball religious groups and unbelievable right wingers have over here is sickening to the nth degree.
For a country proud of it’s diversity there is no diversity in moral outlook.
The world does not stand still…. Americans are most definitely being left behind.
Humanity is everything…..
Technology and wealth is nothing…..
C’mon guys — I’ve met lots of really good Americans — why is your country a horrid mess??
about 1 year ago
I think the answer to “why is your country a horrid mess??”, Upikinonme, is well stated in the many posts above. But remember, we were in a horrid mess in the 1930′s with the Depression, the 1960′s with the Vietnam War, the 1970′s with the gasoline embargoes, the 1980′s and 1990′s with globalization, the Savings and Loan crisis, and the e-bubble, and the 2000′s the current Great Recession (still on-going). Europe shared many of those crises with us, and Japan and the British Commonwealth countries have had their own crises.
American politics now is going through a pendulum swing to the far right. But it really isn’t any worse than ten years ago when Baby Bush the War Criminal was in power with both houses of Congress rubberstamping his insanity. After all, we do have a sane President now and a Democratic Senate that can block the extreme craziness of the right-wingers in Congress. Most of the headline grabbing craziness is going on at the state level in states controlled by a Republican governor and Republican legislatures. But there is a growing reaction to the craziness with recall elections, such as those in Wisconsin, and the Occupy Wall Street movement, which has truly changed the dialog in American politics.
That said, we are still a very right wing country compared to most of the other industrialized countries (Russia being one that is more right wing). We are also dominated by religion in ways that people in other countries probably find hard to understand. We are also probably on a long, slow economic decline as a “superpower”, much in the same way that Britain economically declined from its superpower status in the early 20th Century.
I do want to say one thing, however, that probably will not be very popular on this blog. Just like Britain maintained (an admittedly imperfect) “Pax Britannica” from Napoleon to World War I, I think America has maintained (an equally imperfect) “Pax Americana” from World War II to the present. This “Pax Americana” is probably coming to an end. We have squandered our wealth in the process. Hopefully, America will decline economically to be just another among many responsible states, just as Britain declined from empire to be just another European state. The worse case scenario, of course, would be to revert back to the massive global hot wars of the first half of the 20th Century.
So what am I saying? We are in a mess, but it is little different, and not any worse, than other periods in history. Some of those periods led to recovery, and some led to disaster. I don’t claim to know which we are headed for, but either one is still possible, and I actually think that recovery is the more probable.
about 1 year ago
Ah, the big difference now is that the internet has changed the ball game. There is no excuse for anyone to be ignorant of evil or simple badness around them. Information is the key. Just look at how the USA above all other countries went frantic over Wikileaks. It was clearly a country showing fear.
So, the question remains, how can a country with so many advantages and a democratic process in place keep on maintaining a very flawed society?
No-one is perfect and it’s not fair to play a game of ‘we’re better than you’ — but like I have said… The USA and Human Rights and Morality are all words not compatible for the same sentence.
about 1 year ago
“USA and Human Rights and Morality are all words not compatible for the same sentence.”
Isn’t that too extreme? Although there are minor differences, I am generally as free as any European, and certainly more free than some. I certainly have as much or more freedom of speech as anyone in the world. I just called a former American president “Baby Bush the War Criminal” in the post above, and I have absolutely no concern about saying that. As for morality, America has done some very good things, including defending Western Europe from a Soviet takeover for forty years. You say we are a “flawed society”, which we are, but Europe (I assume you are European) has its own flaws that are somewhat different from America. Europe has seen genocide in the Balkans, riots in the U.K., and repression of Muslims in France. Racism is a problem here, but a somewhat different racism is also a problem all across Europe. Yes, we started a completely illegal and unnecessary war in Iraq, but remember that Tony Blair was our biggest supporter (I still can’t figure him out). And admit it — just admit it — because we all know it’s true: In Europe, nobody likes the French.
I don’t say these things to tear Europe down, or, as you say, to play the game of “we’re better than you”, but simply to put the bad things you hear about America into perspective. I think I can stand up, look you straight in the eye, and say that overall, Americans are as just as moral as Europeans.
about 1 year ago
I’m British — but I live and work in Texas and California for most of the year.
If you want to discuss Europe as a cohesive unit and be able compare Europe to USA then you have to think only of the countries and land area north and west of Rome. Any other area does not reflect Europe as Americans would recognise it. Europe is a geographic continent and not singular as a country is. You would not use North Korea as representative of Japan but both are Asia. I would not use Mexico as represenative of USA but both are American.
Nobody likes the French? They are certainly exasperating but worthy of much respect in that they call a spade a spade and their democracy is very grass roots which is how democracy should be. Perhaps your thoughts on France are coloured by the derogatory American phrase “cheese eating surrender monkeys” much loved by certain of your politicians in the run up to the Iraq war. However, we know the French were right and the Americans and unfortunately the British were totally wrong.
Europe (North West) was totally opposed to the Iraq war – including Britain and the British Parliament. Britain entered the war after infamous speeches by Tony Blair where it is now largely recognised that he blatantly lied to Parliament and the British people. It was on his word of honour that Parliament reluctantly agreed to support the USA. Additionally, after 9/11 there was an amazingly strong current within the whole of the UK that we will do anything to help the USA and a good deal of this feeling remained up to the start of Iraq. This feeling of reaching out to assist the USA in any way possible was totally destroyed by Iraq and now the opposite exists.
Within the UK we have had time for a lot of soul searching and reflection of our shame on producing and being duped by a person such as Tony Blair. It remains a problem that we have no easy mechanism to bring him to trial even after all our hopes of some action being taken against Blair when our current government was elected. Politics is a dirty business and it must be the case that Blair is protected by who knows who….
Since Blair’s departure from the British Government, he has been well remunerated by being appointed to a series of international non-jobs. It raises questions as to how international politics works and it would seem easy to believe that he is now protected and rewarded by entities for whom he accomplished favours when in office.
This may be of interest – Tony Blair was leader of the Labour Party (Democrats) – at their most recent national convention it was forbidden to mention his name or discuss him in any way. That is the measure of disdain his former party holds towards him.
There is a large measure of hatred towards Blair in the UK.
about 1 year ago
I for one really enjoyed your comments.
about 1 year ago
Upikinonme,
Thanks for the explanation about Tony Blair. Even when all that was happening I couldn’t understand why the British supported us, and especially why Tony Blair was such sycophant of King George W. of the Bushes. I’m glad to hear that there has been such a strong reaction against Tony Blair. I wish we would have an equal (or greater) reaction here. I personally think that Bush, Chaney, and Rumsfeld should be arrested and sent to the Hague for trail. Instead, we just want to pretend that George W. doesn’t exist, as our Republicans get even crazier than he was.
Since you obviously know both British and American culture very well, I’ll have to defer to your feelings about American morality, even though I still think the statement was too extreme. You obviously feel strongly about the issue. I’m sure that the families of hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqis agree with you.
I obviously know that Europe is a mixture of vastly different cultures, in a way that the U.S. isn’t. If you read my other posts, you will see that I have a great respect for Scandinavia, Germany, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. I honestly think they have better societies than America, and I will admit that their societies are more moral than we are. But I also see a lot of knee-jerk, poorly thought-out anti-Americanism on Milkboys, and I have tried to respond to that.
Scott
P.S. I was joking about the French. Admit it — just admit it — because we all know it’s true: the French have better food than you do.
P.P.S. I don’t think that living in Texas actually counts as living in America.
about 1 year ago
Just to jump in here on the subject of “Dubya”; I was convinced fairly early on in his presidency, that he was merely a rube, a shill, a puppet with strings pulled by Dick Cheney and Karl Rove. I came away with the distinct feeling that behind those kind eyes and simple face, was JUST enough brain structure to let him think he was “The Decider”, and not much else. But, who is the greater imbecile, the man himself or the person who can honestly say, without embarrassment, they he or she voted for him?
about 1 year ago
Dear Scott,
Re: P.S. and P.P.S.
You are right on both counts….. :)
LOLzzzzzzz
Forgive me, I don’t know what your age is and so this is perhaps a bit before your time:
George Galloway is a British Politician and he’s always been a loose cannon. This is what happened when the USA tried to shut him up over his very vocal and increasingly successful opposition to the Iraq War. The Senate subcommittee suffered an ‘epic fail’; was recognised as incompetent and just a tool of Bush/Blair for media manipulation in the whole mess.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnflzhtDkJM&feature=relmfu
about 1 year ago
Upikinonme,
I’m 64 years old, so that means I remember a whole lot of things. I was 21 when Stonewall happened, although I can’t claim I heard about it as it occurred because I was on a two week canoe trip in the Quetico Provincial Park in Ontario. I also remember in 1981 seeing live the original local TV news report in New York City about “a mysterious disease that is killing gay men in Greenwich Village.” There were only about 5 or 10 fatalities at the time.
I watched some of the George Galloway videos, but I really couldn’t take all 45 minutes of it. I don’t remember that happening, but I was ignoring just about anything related to the Iraq War at that time. I had already come to the conclusion that it was a horrible, criminal mistake. In the summer of 2002 I was visiting Canada when I heard an interview on the CBC with the head of the U.N. Inspection Team in Iraq. He flatly stated that there were absolutely no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. That was when, of course, the American media was acting as George Bush’s private propaganda ministry. Who should I trust, the American media or the CBC? For me, the choice was easy — the CBC.
Even more telling however, was the fact I had a Iraqi student in one of my classes for the 2003 spring semester, when the Iraqi invasion took place. (I’m a retired community college teacher.) He had dual U.S. and Iraqi citizenships, including passports from both countries. He had lived in both countries extensively, and knew both cultures very well. It made for some really interesting conversations in the classroom. He obviously had to be a little careful what he said because he still had family in Iraq, but I remember very well asking him “why do you think we are invading?”. He looked at me directly and simply said, “It’s for the oil.” Just about everything I have heard since then supports his analysis.
Whenever much of anything political came on the news back then, I would just make noise and scream so I didn’t have to hear it until I could turn it off. I despised George W. Bush and everyone associated with him with a deep visceral hate. There wasn’t much I could do, however. There wasn’t much of a protest movement — nothing like the Vietnam era. I did make sure I voted in every election for the Democrats, however.
I know this is getting a little off topic for this blog post, and is starting to become a person-to-person conversation, but I hope it is interesting for some other readers also. I beg your indulgence, Josh. There were a lot of us Americans that saw through George W. and his Gang of Four (Bush, Chaney, Rumsfeld, and Rove) at the time. 49.99% of America, in fact, not counting a significant number of Floridians.
about 1 year ago
This is for Josh:
“Punishment.– A strange thing, our kind of punishment! It does not cleanse the offender, it is no expiation: on the contrary, it defiles more than the offense itself.”
Nietzsche, Daybreak, Aph. 236
about 1 year ago
Yeah, it’s definitely black people’s fault. It’s not like there is historical VIOLENT SYSTEMATIC OPPRESSION OF PEOPLE OF COLOR IN AMERICA. Racism is not over people! Wake the fuck up.
about 1 year ago
We do because we can!