DYSFUNCTIONAL CITY Seen As Frighteningly Normal! (Could D.C. Be Actually An Experimental Zoo -- But The Public Has Not Been Informed Of That?)
HONEYpot
You agree?
Thought so.
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"A Frightening 'New Normal' in the District"
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By Colbert I. King
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Nearly as many Americans have been wounded in our nation's capital
recently as in Iraq. Nine U.S. troops were wounded in Iraq the week of
Aug. 11, according to the Iraq Coalition Casualty Count.
Just last weekend, the District racked up at least five young people
wounded in a flurry of gunfire in far Northeast. Before that, two men
were found with gunshot wounds in Southeast on Aug. 10 and 11. A man
was found dead last Saturday of multiple gunshot wounds in Northwest.
And don't forget the man discovered Aug. 1 in a basement with a
gunshot wound to his head.
But why cite Iraq?
Stacked against jurisdictions in the region, the District leads the
casualty charts.
Shootouts would have Northern Virginians and Montgomery County
residents in an uproar. Not so in the city.
How else to explain the apathetic response to last Saturday's shooting
spree near Minnesota Avenue and Grant Street NE?
Bullets flying around as if it was downtown Baghdad, teenagers
screaming and running for their lives, ambulances racing to hospitals,
and then . . . nothing. The story just evaporates.
Questions that would have other communities churning don't come up in
the District, not even in media coverage.
Last Saturday, 150 kids, including members of rival gangs, congregated
at a city block party. Sponsored by whom? Where was the adult
supervision? Was enough security on hand?
One hundred and fifty kids equals 300 mothers and fathers. Where were
the parents? How many of them knew about the event or where their
children were? Did they think the event was a good idea? Did they even
care?
And the gunmen?
Goody, you can imagine a TV anchor saying. "Nobody's dead. Now on a
lighter note . . ."
Even in this jaded world, most communities still regard the deliberate
shooting of an innocent human as an outrageous act. The District, I
fear, has arrived at a different place. Our view of what's normal does
not resemble the normalcy embraced by our neighbors. What others
consider deviancy, we seem to accept.
We don't regard youths who pack guns to be markedly different from
those who haven't managed to get their hands on one. A kid who points
and fires a gun, knowing that it could result in a defenseless
person's death, is regarded in our community as a "troubled" child
with possibly strong negative feelings raging within. Nothing more.
Even people in our city who hold a dim view of folks with murderous
tendencies tend to be rather blasé when it comes to doing something
about the homicidally inclined among us.
Which gets us to the heart of today's musings.
Ian Davis, worldwide managing director of management consulting firm
McKinsey & Co., wrote a short essay this spring about how the business
landscape will change after the current economic downturn. He spoke of
a "new normal," a reshaping so fundamental that businesses will not
return to their pre-crisis state. "To succeed in the new normal," he
wrote, executives must focus on what has changed.
That's happening in the District.
Our city executives speak of making the District a "world-class city."
That "new normal" view embraces bike paths and a bicycle center at
Union Station, townhouses and parks along the Potomac, couples eating
al fresco at neighborhood coffee shops, doggy parks, schools befitting
the middle class, and poor people who behave themselves and patiently
wait their turn.
The city's chosen means for coping with a crisis shaped by self-
destructive forces and a shifting civic landscape? The medical
procedure, triage.
Officials won't say it this way, but this is what it means: dividing
our social order into three groups -- those who aren't going to make
it, those who might and those who will.
To be sure, we still give lip service to our belief in children,
family and community life. But our actions speak otherwise.
Those men found dead from gunshot wounds; the kids in far Northeast
feuding and fighting with guns; the moms and dads too worn out, too
wigged out or too self-absorbed to raise their children? The
District's answer: Y'all cut and shoot all you want, just keep it over
there.
To those resilient enough to stay alive and keep on their feet? The
District's answer: Get as far away as you can from those who are about
to self-destruct, and we might have a place for you.
As for the city's talented, educated and emerging middle class? They
are the District's new center of gravity. They, indeed, are the real
beneficiaries of D.C. government deference.
Faced with a steady stream of broken families, unrelenting criminality
and community dysfunction, the District of Columbia has, albeit
unwittingly, restructured and accommodated itself to a new social
order.
And the teenage shootouts? Pay them no mind.
The new normal has arrived in D.C.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/21/AR2009082103032.html
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