Violence is even hitting close to home
With the daily reports of the horrors inflicted on Gaza and
airplanes falling out of the sky, there is the question of what can one
do? Social media has been a
godsend. Although Russia still dupes its
citizens, we learned almost immediately that the Ukrainian separatists armed by
Russia shot down Malaysian flight MH 17. At least we did in the international
media; the US media took much longer. If
you stick to reporting that isn’t the standard US newscasts, you can find out
what is happening in Gaza and let others know.
That might help change the impressions of a public that has always been
fed one point of view. Here’s a moving
article by a Jewish writer living in Canada:
The next question is what to do about our local neighborhoods. Lately, Buffalo (where I’m living) has
undergone what the media calls a renaissance.
At the same time there were a series of rapes in what are among
the most gentrified neighborhoods in the city.
I’ve heard nothing more except for the arrest of one of the
perpetrators. The
website CrimeReports.com, which tracks crime statistics, lists even more sexual
assaults in the City since late last month:
•07/07/2014 | 300 Block FOX ST
•07/07/2014 | 1100 Block MAIN
•07/06/2014 | 1 Block KINGSLEY ST
•07/05/2014 | 300 Block BRECKENRIDGE ST....
•07/07/2014 | 300 Block FOX ST
•07/07/2014 | 1100 Block MAIN
•07/06/2014 | 1 Block KINGSLEY ST
•07/05/2014 | 300 Block BRECKENRIDGE ST....
And unfortunately more.
Yesterday I found out about 3 violent assaults in the same
neighborhood as the one where some of the rapes took place. Thanks to the neighborhood association which
has put out this information. Otherwise,
I don’t think many of us would even know what is going on at night. Has it
always been this way? Or is social media
making us more aware and able to take more precautions? Is the violence a backlash in the 4th
poorest city in the US? Is it some sort
of gang initiation? The property crimes
can be connected to poverty but the rapes?
There are more questions than answers here. Fortunately, there are women who organize
free self-defense classes and marches at night but how many women are afraid
now and how is that limiting our lives?
Here's a poem that I usually open my poetry readings with and will probably continue to do so:
Birthright
Past knots and tendons,
I look
to bone
and see,
centuries past.
my face shrivels
as flames rise higher.
The point of a sword
slashes my belly.
Today, head to toe in black,
I barely breathe,
walk the requisite
steps behind.
The open hand
of my husband
reddens my cheek.
In India and China
girls form
the Greek chorus,
and chant,
Never born,
Never born.
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