Loaded Drone attack: Black communities must take cover

Sherwood Ross pretty much hits the nail on the head in his first paragraph in a recent submission in Counterpunch.  "In case you didn't know it, what's called a "recession" in White America is called a "depression" in Black America. During much of last year white unemployment held steady at around 8.8 percent. Down the block, though, it was about 12 per cent for Latinos and in Afro neighborhoods across town it averaged 16 per cent. And as unemployment spiked at 24 percent for white teens last year it hit 45 percent for black teens, according to the Kirwan Institute at Ohio State University".

No, this is not Pakistan, Afghanistan, Somalia, or Libya where drones are having a holiday, but it is America where the drones of poverty keep unloading missiles of mass destruction even in a so-called post-racial era.  Since the drones carry weapons they can successfully cause much collateral damage as opposed to liberation and empowerment.

What are drones?

One should find this analogy most effective. Militarized  drones are either UAV (Unmanned Aircraft Vehicle) or sometimes referred to as a UAS (Unmanned Aircraft System).  These systems are defined as a powered, aerial vehicle that does not carry a human operator, uses aerodynamic forces to provide vehicle lift, can fly autonomously or be piloted remotely, can be expendable or recoverable, and can carry a lethal or nonlethal payload. ( "The Free Dictionary" accessed 19 November 2010).  The history of drone technology (or its use) goes back as early as 1916.  Without going into any long and technical scientific expose, it should be concisely stated that drones are remotely operated from the the scene of the crime to seek and destroy or to spy on its targets.  .


Without the missile payload they may be considered physically harmless.  However, when missiles are added, they can become very destructive and are prone to exact a lot of collateral damage.


So what does this have to do with the Black community?


A lot.  In proper context the drone-like attacks on the black community can be compared to the drone attack in modern warfare. The primary difference is metaphysical and/or philosophical.  Unlike the drones that modern military war, the drones cannot be physically seen.  There are no aircraft and no one can be singled out who runs the operation.  Yet the comparisons are profound when it comes to destruction, secrecy, planning, targeting and discrimination.  Like missiles launched by he military drones are loaded guided to kill, the same missiles programmed for the black community carries the same DNA (kill, cripple) but with different
modes of destruction.


Racial advancement is increasingly understood not as a process of social change but of individual promotion—the elevation of black faces to high places. Instead of equal opportunities, we have photo opportunities.  Gary Younge, The Nation

So what missiles are we speaking?


The historical disproportionate distribution of wealth (and poverty) missile could be a pivotal missile that is hard to shake.  No one has to resort to victimology conspiracies if they are too lazy to recognize the facts on the ground.  And, by the way, this missile has multi-warheads.  The end result  is centuries of malicious aftereffects that continue to be shroud in distorted exercises of enlightened mythology.  One only should look at the nuclear bombing of Nagasaki. Or, getting back to the virtues of modern day dronology, the neighborhood is never the same.


So out of the web of the onslaught of missiles that have been unleashed by predators for a historical status quo, a status that is artificially promulgated by hucksters who are clothed in the design of pious edification that are mostly found in material fortified churches and those who would rather me the 'first black' whether than the first human redeemer, its clear that the system of oppression missile will be able to pinpoint its target.


Unfortunately the black communities have not overcome historical adversities (contrary to popular belief) enough to respond as their leadership has either fallen by the wayside, been destroyed, or has swore to the enemy camp--which brings us to the mother of all missiles, racism.  Here, I must confess, that I don't have the charismatic aura to assuage the guilt of white people' historical foul ramblings and to abruptly tell them that the scars and wounds of that past cease to exist--have been healed--now let's party!  No, but a persona like  Oprah Winfrey's is a sure-fire, .a would-be conservative president Michael Steele is a wanna be, and the ex-God Father Pizza CEO, Herman Cain seems to be is stuck in a cheesy and delusional charm, I must confess that I will never see a post-racial society before my death.  Post-racial should not be mistaken for remnants of hope.


No, there are just too many drones flying overhead, everyday, and are loaded with oppression, materialistic depression and racism.  Sherwood reflects  further in his article and seems, at the same time, seems to be to satirically and eerily humming the music of Sam Cooke's "A Change is Going to Come":  Back in 1962, the Urban League's Whitney Young pleaded for a "domestic Marshall Plan" that would revitalize the nation's ghettos. But Washington preferred to spend its money on military hardware in Viet Nam. A half century has gone by and not that much has changed. Marc Morial, the UL's president, is hard at work pushing childhood education, trying to stop home foreclosures, and canvassing employers to provide jobs for minorities. The change is that instead of fighting in Viet Nam, Washington is fighting in the Middle East. Same difference.


The missile attacks have yielded  55% of all those incarcerated are people of color.


The missile attacks have yielded 45% of blacks living with prevalence of HIV are black (CDC).

There is an infinite  list of disparities that the drone missile heads have caused and will continue to cause if they fly unabated.  But the point is that people should not be too flabbergasted when doomsday does not happen when man thought it should.  In this reference lies the hope of a progressive march from an unfinished to a complete victory on earth where life and liberty are not just wishful thinking but it continues to be a work in progress.  Until the work is carried out in earnestness and truthfully, blacks are charged (unfairly or not) to run and hide from the drone attack and to maintain some degree of integrity in the fight as they either bow to defeat or rise like the phoenix (like those before them).


Other Sources:


 Sabol, William J., PhD, Minton, Todd D., and Harrison, Paige M., Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prison and Jail Inmates at Midyear 2006 (Washington, DC: US Department of Justice, June 2007), NCJ217675, p. 9, Table 14