As for ThirteenStars...
I have to give him some credit for standing up and trying to do something, however unorthodox it may sound.
I haven't read every single post he's made on here, but from what I've gathered, He seems fearful and disheartened that our neighborhoods are going down the tubes, one at a time.

It's apparent that present enforcement agencies lack the power to prevent the deterioration of good neighborhoods, and in history there's been intervention "by the people" to "get things done".
ThirteenStars is a rebel, and they've always been looked down upon by others, mostly the ones that sit on their thumbs and cry.

I don't really see a problem with "saving the planet" tactics, as long as they're well-thought-out beforehand, and for the benefit of the whole community.
Believe me, living in Mayfair, and owning property here, I want to enjoy the freedom to go about my life without stress, strain, and fear caused by some needless cancer infesting the area.
I refuse to be driven out just because the area's gone to crap.
I chose to live here, I moved here because of the convenience to work, and I'm a decent citizen. So are my present neighbors. The area of the city I grew up in has now become a slum, and for obvious reasons. I don't want that happening here too. It's way past time to start taking a stand, and do whatever it takes to maintain a quality decent quality of life.

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"Accept the fact that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue"

I didn't say I agree entirely with him. I was just commending him for having the courage to exercise his First Amendment right. Too many people are afraid to express their opinions just because the majority doesn't like them. It's a good trait to have the ability to speak your mind no matter what others will think. More would get accomplished if people stopped worrying about "offending" others.

Without condescension or derision can you tell me what Thirteen Stars is doing? How does fliering the neighborhood with bigoted posters change or begin to address the "realities" that you're facing up there? If it perpetuates the notion that the Northeast is racist and dissuades middle income minorities from displacing some of the low life renters (both white and black) isn't he doing you guys a disservice?

Seriously, what concrete steps has he taken to help you guys out? In our neighborhood people who are serious about action attend monthly meetings at the 17th district and they have the police brass' ear. Our Captain and those below him in the command structure have been extremely responsive when we complain about nuisance bars, problem PHA houses, corner dealing, abandoned shells with squatters, and other problematic situations. Our community organization (SOSNA) is becoming more functional and has become a more effective means of transmitting neighborhood concerns to our Councilwoman. We still have significant issues. However, slowly but surely we're chipping away at the problems. A big reason that we've been successful is that people from all walks of life are doing their part. It's pretty compelling when you have a diverse community all focused on the same set of problems, no? If you have some responsible minority voices complaining about the dregs pulling your neighborhood down you begin to make a more compelling case. At least, it looks a lot less like racists trying to scapegoat one group and more like people voicing legitimate concerns.

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Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur

It's a shame that you guys can't learn to distinguish individuals from a group based upon their actions. No one's asking you sugarcoat things or be "PC." If people behave like valueless scumbags call them on it. Just don't attribute it to race because you're unfairly lumping in people who don't deserve to draw your ire. Decent people have a concept of fairness and wish to assign blame only to those who are truly blameworthy. This isn't rocket science. This is basic stuff.

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Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur

I've always found it ironic that anytime people, well white people that is because non-whites continuously speak openly from a racial perspective, speak up about this sort of thing that it's because their ignorant and out of touch when in fact it's the exact opposite that propels them to become straight forward and out spoken. It's because we have been exposed to these issues and circumstances on such a profound level and acquired such a vast wealth of knowledge on this subject that we have found it necessary to stress these issues.

You can continue to blame the actions of others on everything but themselves and call facts "hate" but that is still not going to change reality. You my friend live in a fantasy world where somehow only the non-white community is effected by poverty and only white people seem to be responsible for their own actions, and sometimes even the actions of others. It is people such as yourself that have turned the other cheek out of fear & ignorance, and sometimes with the best of intentions in mind, while our neighborhoods have been shattered & abandoned, over and over again. You can hold your well intended yet fraudulent signs of justice & tolerance high above your head for all to see but you my friend are the one that is dated and out of touch.

I proceed as any normal, rational and healthy individual should, the way that they have preceded since time began. The notion of racial equality and multiculturalism is bogus and destructive to ever group forced to take part in it., forced being the key word here.

Perhaps you should take a look into the minds of this country’s founding fathers on these subjects. It has only been over the past few decades that we have been forced to question the validity of our people’s position and traditions and it is over this very short time span that our society’s morality, sanity, family structures & values etc have gone down the drain. Why, because we’ve been forced to abandon our values and traditions, tolerate a forced set of ideals because “there is nothing we can do about it”, and adapt as individuals to this sick plastic multicultural one sized fits all society of instant gratification and individual consumerism.

Our neighborhoods have been founded on distinct cultures & traditions that have been brought to America, adapted and transformed over hundreds of years by our own people. Our neighborhoods, and country for that matter, were built on them. It is these cultures that are the very essence of our neighborhoods and essentially what gives them their distinct characteristics. It’s no coincidence that the disappearance of the ethnic characteristics and distinctions between our neighborhoods (German, Irish, Italian, etc) has resulted in the destructive changes were seeing, we are seeing a change of people, a change of cultures and not a change of income.

We are bonded to our community through a distinct culture, tradition, history and experiences that have been brought about over generations in this country and not just by our skin pigment. Skin pigment is only the representative of these things and superiority, harted and human worth have nothing to do with it.

These are pretty good reads from a non-racial perspective:

10 Steps to Destroy a Local Community:
http://www.corrupt.org/articles/poli...ocal_community

5 Steps to a Successful Community:
http://www.corrupt.org/articles/poli...sful_community


*I’m just going to shamelessly repost a recently published “letter to the editor” written by a friend of mine up in Scranton/Wilkes Barre, PA over their similar activities in the area, which b.t.w. is facing very similar problems to ours. Just substitute the “vandalism of the Jewish Temple Ohav Zedek” with Officer Liczbinski death because I think this is fitting:

http://www.citizensvoice.com/site/in...d=455154&rfi=8

“This is in response to Robert E. Griffen’s letter published on May 5.

Griffen claims that the Keystone State Skinheads exploited the vandalism of the Jewish Temple Ohav Zedek through our distribution of fliers and banners. That is a very disingenuous statement. The KSS have been distributing literature for months prior to this incident.

Griffen is also wrong on his correlation of poverty and crime. Whites make up at least two-thirds of the people living under the poverty level in the United States, yet they commit only half the crime. If poverty is the main factor of crime, shouldn’t whites be committing the vast majority of crimes? Black poverty rates have dropped while their crime rates have risen. Linking crime with poverty has several underlying inconsistencies.

It’s time for people to remove the blinders on the issue of race and crime. Telling the truth and wanting to have safe communities should not be labeled as “hate.”

Steve Smith

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"The only problem with common sense it that it's not so common."



*Tiocfaidh Ar La*

Your thoughts on this one?
http://www.phillyblog.com/philly/nor...tml#post769 970

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"The only problem with common sense it that it's not so common."



*Tiocfaidh Ar La*

It’s really not a matter of prejudice though. That really is a word that seems to get thrown into the mix way too easily. Prejudice is pretty much defined as a predetermined judgment based on fear that has resulted from a thorough lack of knowledge on the subject. I along with a great deal of other people have reached my conclusions based on facts, opposing views and life experiences that I’ve tested and weighed out over my entire lifetime. Terms like prejudice & ignorance, along with racist, white supremacist, xenophobe, fascist, Nazi, sexist, homophobe etc are only used to stifle discussion and undermine people’s opposition to tolerance, the acceptance of degeneracy & destruction.

Sorry if I’m coming off as a bit radical on this subject but it really is quite in depth and emotionally charged, there’s definitely a lot to it.

I definitely appreciate your compliment about speaking up etc. But watch out though, I’ll ruin your reputation if too many people notice you complimenting me, lol. As for the fliers/stickers, they’re available from our site and we’ve got a decent amount of local people that take the time to put them up. Every once in awhile I’ll get out but I prefer to interact with the people on the street instead of hanging things up. I do help design a lot of the stuff that gets put up though, with the “dangerous minorities” flier being the most straight forward and blatant piece we’ve put out. I try to design things in the most intelligent and least intimidating and offensive way possible but there’s really was no other way to put that one, it speaks for itself whether people think it’s cruel or unfair.

As for whose to blame, a great deal of it is genetic and has unfortunately become ingrained with their culture, with the number of successful/established and hardworking “minorities” being the exceptions to the rule. A lot of people deny the reality of genetic racial differences but it’s very real and an extremely well documented fact. Something that has even been acknowledged by the co-founderd and pioneer of DNA and genetic research James Watson, who has been viciously attacked for his comments and forced to apologize and retract them:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/sc...rs-394898.html

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"The only problem with common sense it that it's not so common."



*Tiocfaidh Ar La*

Anyone who lives in the most remotely integrated setting deals with racial issues. The problem isn't that you're talking about race it's how you are talking about it. Blacks and whites are not monolithic. There are pockets of entrenched white poverty where bad behavior is the norm. Where whites are engaged in self-destructive behavior, no one with half a brain attributes it to their race; they look for other factors.

My friend, you're no better then the people you claim are ruining your community. It would be stupid, prejudiced, and hateful to attribute your inability to stay on the right side of the law to your skin color. You aren't making objective observations. Your observations are value-laden and hateful. You think exclusively in racial terms. From your vantage point, if someone is black they are automatically unworthy of equal treatment under the law. That, my friend, is hateful.

You fancy yourself a man of action but what are you doing other than fomenting hate? What have you done to help your community? Whites and blacks have worked cooperatively to do more for my neighborhood than you will ever do for yours.

Don't feed me that bullshit about turning the other cheek and about fear and ignorance. You're the one who's ignorant. There are hard working minorities that would be better citizens in Mayfair than some of the white residents that you have living there. My community has a diverse population of people who have solid middle class values. You really need to get out more; your travels into middle class communities might just belie your attempt to rigidly assign negative behavioral traits to people based solely on race.

And that's really the conversation ender and the clearest sign that you are depraved. You think that racial equality is misguided? Are you merely confusing equality (equal treatment under the law) for preferences (like affirmative action) ... or do you not really believe that blacks should be subject to some form of apartheid?

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Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur

CONTINUED:


How has multicultualralism led to dysfunction and decline within white communities? How do you explain the levels of dysfunction seen in white communities that remain homogeneous? Those communities have seen higher rates of teen pregnancy, substance abuse, sexual abuse, and violent crime. Mayfair is still pretty insular and you have some white people up there who are real pieces of work. They deal drugs, they break into houses, they commit armed robberies, they beat the piss out of their girlfriends, they get caught with illegal weapons. I've seen it all first hand at the the criminal justice center. Did multiculturalism lead you to assault numerous people. I suppose it was multiculturalism that led you to get arrested with a guy who was carrying an illegal gun?


How? How does embracing multiculturalism force you to accept those things?

This is bizarre. The typical pattern goes something like this: immigrants move here; they stay in a neighborhood for a generation or so, and then their children (who have more upward mobility) move on. This exodus of upwardly moble whites to bigger homes in the burbs along with the displacement of manufacturing jobs has done more harm to white ethnic neighborhoods than any other factor. Those who have the means to buy a place in the burbs don't want to live in your community. That might change as people gravitate back towards the idea of urban living.

You want to blame blacks because its convenient ... but that's not the problem. White people have invaded SWCC which was historically black and continues to have a large black population. Why is your neighborhood going in the polar opposite direction of mine? The people buying here aren't ranting and raving about those black people South of Washington Avenue. I've yet to see any KSS fliers down here. We have our share of crime committed by blacks here. If your response to it all is so rationale, why haven't I seen racist posters deriding the presence of minorities in my neighborhood. Your views are pretty aberrant.

Bullshit. Irish, Italian, Polish and (other white ethnic groups) have little in common. All have been hated and cast as outsiders at one point or another as they tried to assimilate into the mainstream. There is no set "white" culture. There is no set "black" culture. Culture is a construct. I have nothing in common with a black crack dealer. We like different music, we dress differently, we speak differently, we have a completely different set of values.

Not following you here. What are you trying to say?

Sorry -- these are not race neutral sources.

Yeah yeah yeah -- it's the same unintelligent ill informed rhetoric that you guys also spew. I won't address it piece by piece we'd just be rehashing ****, but I will comment on one assertion:

The data is wrong here. In every statistical breakdown that I've seen whites have constituted no more than 50% of people living below the poverty line. Blacks constitute approximately 35%. So the disparity isn't as large as your buddy claims.


Blacks do represent a disproportionate percentage of the people convicted of violent crimes in this country; but that doesn't change the fact that poverty has obviously had a negative impact on whites. Most whites in the prison system grew up in poverty.
White poverty tends to be rural -- people are more spread out and have less opportunity to harm one another. The introduction of methamphetamine into some of the those rural communities is changing that. Do some research. Some predominantly white "cities" that are no where near as densly populated as Philadelphia have experienced pretty dramatic spikes in violent crime (amongst whites) as methamphetamine addiction has become more common.

There are most certainly some cultural things that have led to increased crime rates in poor black communities. The real flaw in your buddy's reasoning, however, is that 50% of blacks are now considered middle class or wealthier. Crime rates, rates of teenage pregnancy, drug use, substance abuse, and other indicators of dysfunction aren't any higher for middle class blacks than they are for whites who are similarly situated.

In short, to attribute dysfunction in black communities to "culture," which is really a proxy for race, doesn't work.

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Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur

Yeah -- It doesn't bolster any of the shoddy generalizations that inform your hateful beliefs.

Sorry Keith, I've backed up my labeling of your views with a point counterpoint argument as to why you are wrong.


EDIT: I'm still waiting for some concrete example of the constructive actions you've taken to improve your community. Running around with neo-nazis and fear mongering doesn't cut it.

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Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur